During this year's Halloween Countdown, I was introduced to the inspired and slightly demented mind of BubbaShelby of Art by BubbaShelby. He created unique and weird monsters for his Halloween countdown, but not just any monsters. They were a menagerie of mythical beasts complete with fabricated backstory that were “taken” from newspaper and eye witness accounts. Not only were his drawings great to look at, but the stories behind them were a fabulous read showcasing both his talent and humor.
I was immediately enthralled by the monster he put up on Day 2 of the Halloween Countdown......Ducktopus! I fell head over heels in love with a cross between an octopus and a duck, and given my recent hobby of making stuffed animals I could completely see this as an awesome plush. I commented on his creation, and low and behold that same day I received an e-mail from him giving his permission to make one if I wanted. I couldn't believe it and was unbelievably excited by the prospect! What a great project to tackle, and he was as enthusiastic about seeing it happen as I was. So, I told him I would love to make Ducktopus into a plush animal (or perhaps a plushimal) once I finished with my own Halloween Countdown projects. Now, here we are at that moment in time.
I haven't made a ton of progress on him, mainly out of sheer laziness. I first drew my own sketch from BubbaShelby's, so I could start breaking him down into parts for a pattern. Plus, it creates him in my own style (such as there is) so I could work off of that simplified version. Then I drew the separate parts: octopus body, duck body, eyes, feet, and duck tail. However, I decided to ditch the tail and go with a design where the octopus and duck body have kind of melded together into one rather than the octopus being attached somehow to a fully-formed duck body. It seemed like it would be easier to sew together, especially with my still limited talent.
As it is, I'm still having to sew everything on the outside rather than turning it inside out so the stitches don't show as much. If you have the separate pieces, it’s much harder to try to sew them together after they've been turned outside in. You're dealing with a smallish hole to sew through and it can lead to much frustration, as I've already learned by making mistakes of that kind. Not to mention the headache of trying to turn all those tentacles inside out. Sheesh!! Plus, once I hit upon this idea and started doing it, I liked the idea of having most of the tentacles sewn to the duck body. It kind of gives that impression of the two creatures being formed together through some freak of nature, mad scientist or blast of radiation. Of course, if it was the latter he would immediately become Ductopus, the octopus/duck superhero that fights crimes against nature and all of Earth’s creatures! : )So, here is what I have so far. I spoke with BubbaShelby about the colors he envisioned, and he chose green for the octopus, and normal colors for the duck....i.e. white for the body and yellow or orange for the feet. He also said red for the eyes, but I'm taking a bit of creative license by changing it to black. I tried the red, and it looked too garish against the green. The black, however, seems to bring out more of the menace or danger that I see in his Ducktopus sketch. I'll post another blog entry once I have it finished. Hope you like what you see so far!
Though it’s no longer the Halloween season, I had an idea for a pillow that I still wanted to do. I started it before the 31st, but our Internet connection was kaput that final day so I didn’t push to finish it. I figured why be hampered by the stringent rule of November marking the end of the Halloween celebration, so I’m posting my ninth pillow regardless. Convention be damned!!One of my all-time favorite shows when I was younger was Scooby Doo. I realize others think it’s goofy and silly and kind of lame, but I’m an animal person who has been around dogs my entire life. How could I not absolutely fall in love with that huge Great Dane who not only communicates with his family but also solves mysteries in spite of being a coward!? (Besides, he always comes through for them because he’s Scooby Dooby Doo!!) It was a fun show for me with great music, a spooky atmosphere and some pretty creepy villains. Watching the episodes now as an adult, I still adore it and cannot help smiling and feeling wonderful as I sit back and watch Scooby and the Gang solve yet another mystery.One of the things that automatically comes to mind when I think of the show, besides the characters and the music, are those eyes in the theme songs on a couple of the incarnations. You know, the disembodied ones that are all larger than life and slanted with menace? For me they are an indelible symbol of that show, so I wanted to sew a homage to something that I dearly cherished.
I took the different shows we have off our shelf and watched the theme song on each one, looking for those eyes. I found one in particular that I liked the most and sat in front of the television to sketch it, wanting to make it the best representation I could. I created something I was happy with, so then moved to the bigger sketchbook to redo it on a larger scale. (Side note here – I don’t know if other artists [not that I consider myself an artist, mind you!] have this problem but I end up having such a hard time with making my sketches bigger. I’ll draw it in my small sketch book and think it looks great. Then when I create it again only magnified, I have such a difficult time drawing it to match. It never seems to be as good!)
Anyway, once I was happy with my results I started deciding what colors I wanted to do. I knew I had to have two colors for the eyes with the pupils and the background black. Why? Because I thought it would look neat!! Shawn and I went back and forth a bit on what we thought might make a nice combination when he suggested that I do eyes on both sides of the pillow. That way, like with the pumpkin pillow, I could make the most use out of the project by doing two different color combos! So, that’s what I did. I thought yellow and red would make a nice duo, and Shawn recommended purple and green. I didn’t have enough felt for the purple/green one so I made a quick trip to JoAnn’s one day, and ended up buying a bunch of new colors besides the ones I needed. Ah, the siren call of colors!!Once again, the end product doesn’t look as spectacular as the cut fabric does when it’s lying flat on the table. I think I need to train my eye and my mind to accept the inherent differences between 2-D and 3-D. Regardless, my spooky eyes pillow is a pretty decent rendition of an aspect of one of my favorite memories from childhood. It was also a lot of fun to make considering while I was sewing I got to see those eyes staring back at me! I think the whole thing may need to be a bigger size, however, and I definitely need more black around the eyes so they look like they’re coming out of darkness. I messed up on that part of it, unfortunately! But, hopefully they evoke enough of that Scooby Doo feel to do him proud.
As it is, I'm still having to sew everything on the outside rather than turning it inside out so the stitches don't show as much. If you have the separate pieces, it’s much harder to try to sew them together after they've been turned outside in. You're dealing with a smallish hole to sew through and it can lead to much frustration, as I've already learned by making mistakes of that kind. Not to mention the headache of trying to turn all those tentacles inside out. Sheesh!! Plus, once I hit upon this idea and started doing it, I liked the idea of having most of the tentacles sewn to the duck body. It kind of gives that impression of the two creatures being formed together through some freak of nature, mad scientist or blast of radiation. Of course, if it was the latter he would immediately become Ductopus, the octopus/duck superhero that fights crimes against nature and all of Earth’s creatures! : )
