While I was making the castings for the machine that eats things, I cast this bronze sand drawing of what the end result might look like.

machine that eats things

I made some heavy bronze castings for the machine that eats things, and have been slowly machining them.  I carved the patterns out of styrofoam and sand cast them, using the lost foam process.  They came out pretty rough, I wish I had made wood patterns, then I could recast them easily and fix the shrink spots.  Would have been more accurate too, less machining.  

inspiration from the past

I found some images of old popular mechanix DIY plans online.  Fun fodder for the imagination.  It might suit my toy constructions to make some do it yourself instructional prints, combining engineering drawings and building instructions.  

Big Red Shiny Show 1 Documentation posted

I have finally finished posting images of the first Big Red Shiny Show on the Big Red Shiny Show Blog.

I did not have close up images of all the work, but I put up what I had.

Big Red Shiny Show 2 documentation is on the way.

Cowboys and Indians series

This is work from an old series where I was working with plastic cowboys and indians, welding them together and making large color woodcuts at the same time. I am interested in the idea of the small world of the toy standing in for a more global issue. If I remember correctly, these were done in 2001. They have some relevance to the strategy I am trying with the oil clay relief I am working on now.

a relief

While the parts for the monster that eats things with its rollers sit waiting for me to get back to them, I started another project.

I saw some drawings for paintings Pernilla's studio, landscapes quickly rendered in pen, just quick sketches; and wanted to make some more representational work. I started this relief in oil clay. It is stuck on an old melamine drafting tabletop, so it is fairly large by my standards. The hope at the moment is to have an Iowa landscape with cornfields and grain elevators in the distance. In the foreground with a shift in perspective will be the fire monster burning a thistle, in a cornfield. I am trying to get two pictures in one, to give the idea of microcosm (small world) and larger context for that small world.

It is shaping up to look like some wood cut prints I did about 7 years ago.

After the monster

After the fire monster, I thought a similar creature with case hardened steel rollers for jaws would be just the thing. I milled grooves in a 2 inch piece of steel, then transfered it to the lathe to drill out the middle and cut some relief into the two ends. Casehardening was an interesting experiment, I had never done it before. Used Kasenit, this black powder stuff that comes in a can. You heat the steel red hot, roll it in the powder, then heat it again before quenching in cold water. It puts an almost glass hard case on mild steel, neat stuff.