TrollHammer's Story Forge

“…Zwoot-brained, incompetent, imbecilic, moron!!!” Jink was rambling as she popped into existence halfway around the world. There was little limitation to her ability to teleport except what she felt like doing. A jump around the world was normally not something she could muster, for fear of missing a target or coming out upside down or even tripping a little and looking foolish. She was too mad to care at this point.

She’d appeared at the top of an ancient pyramid surrounded by forest. It was here that some great city had been built by some great people some great long time ago, but now it was forgotten and overgrown by trees. As the sun rose from the horizon a brightly colored flower waved from its perch in a crack in the stone block. Jink freed it from its captivity by scuffing her boot at it, severing it from the crack and sending it tumbling down the side of the structure, carried along by the morning breeze. Jink smirked as she felt that in some small way that flower was now having about as bad of a day as she was.

She leapt to the corner of the pyramid and slid down the smooth edge, catching it with the arches of her feet. She rode it down, kicking up quite the cloud of dust behind her. As she got to the bottom she broke out into a dead run, no apparent purpose or specific direction.

Indeed, she had no real purpose for this random walk other than to try and run from her feelings of loss. She ran until the forest grew too thick to keep going, and she jinked off to another random part of the world.

Pop

Water, lots and lots of water… no land…

Pop

Really? How can there be an island three feet wide?

Pop

Now the water was falling from the sky. Jink stood in a dark alley in what appeared to be a large city. She began her run again through the rain now. Here, it was night, and probably pretty early in the morning, as the only activity was delivery people and bums. Confirming her suspicions, she noted a bar with its sign darkened.

Of course, this wasn’t going to stop her, and she teleported inside the closed business.

Pop

The rows of inebriation inducing liquids were arrayed in colorful rows around here, and she started grabbing. She set about ten bottles of various kinds on the counter, picked up an ice bucket and started pouring. After the bucket was about half full of potent liquors, she filled the rest with ice, put a lid on it and shook it.

She then grabbed a martini glass from the rack and teleported back outside, leaving the mess of bottles on the counter.

POP

Bucket and glass in hand, she raced down the block in an attempt to burn off some frustration and energy. She wove through the unfamiliar blocks at random, looking for a suitable place to drowned her sorrows. She finally caught site of a city park and ‘skipped’ ahead to it.

POP

She made her way to a secluded park bench that had a good view of one of the moons and sat down. Tamia would have like this spot, the moon so full and bright. Good of place as any to search for oblivion! Jink popped the lid off the bucket and filled her glass, raised it to the moon, and toasted the memory of Tamia.

“To a dear, dear friend, lover, and shopping mate, someone I’ll never forget…. Tam—“

CLICK

“aaaaa…. Huh? What am I doing… where am I?” Jink frowned, trying to figure out why she held a glass full of muddy looking liquid up to the moon in the middle of a park at night. She sniffed the drink, and was almost bowled over by the conflicting aromas that made it up. She looked around, noted the bucket full of more of the stuff, and tried to make sense of it all.

***

“Mistress Winnie, Here are the recruits you requested,” said the Head Lackey. “Each awaiting your approval.”

The line of a dozen or so new Henchmen seemed a little out of sorts. Ten of them were burly folk that filled out their uniforms quite well, exuding the essence of what the word ‘Security’ meant. Two, however, were a full foot shorter than the rest, and seemed a bit rat faced at that. Winnie instantly despised these two, and felt that they made the line look rather rag-tag.

She spent the better part of an hour questioning them, testing them, and having them show various forms of physical activities to prove themselves. She gradually changed the trials in favor of the larger security guards, trying to show some excuse for the smaller pair to be eliminated. Finally, a plan formed in her mind…

She pulled the two out of the line and addressed them. “Everyone here but you two preformed quite well, and unfortunately I only have enough room for one of you. You will have to fight each other.”

“To the death? He’s my brother!” One of the pair asked apprehensively. “Sure we haven’t gotten along with each other the best, but not like I wanna kill him or anything…”

Winnie shook her head. These guys watched too much Holovid, but… “I’d prefer not having a mess to clean up afterwards, so death is optional. One must just defeat the other, however bonus points may be considered for violence…”

The pair eyed each other a moment and got to scrapping. It was more or less a replay of the brawl they usually broke into on a regular basis. Fists and dirt flying, the older held only a slight edge, which caused the younger to back out before anyone really got hurt. The younger brother walked to the door with his head slumped.

“Here’s a few chips for your time, you can play or redeem them upstairs.” Said Winnie, as she chucked two small disks at the loser. As soon as the door closed behind him she beckoned the older brother to kneel at her feet. “Let it be a lesson to all of you, that there is no room for weakness or sloth. You will all do your tasks to the best of your ability. If you cannot perform to the fullest of your ability, leave now!”

The standing guards sensed something was up, smirked, and stood their ground. “As none have left, I assume you understand that there are many ways to leave my service, but none of those ways will leave breath in your body. I will treat you well while you are in my employ… but unfortunately, I feel that you…” she looked down at the kneeling form of the smallest guard in the room. “…may not be able to keep up with the demands of this job, and therefore I will have to let you go…”

A twitch of a smile raised the corner of her thin lips as she raised a hand over eyes that were now wide with fear, and black lightning started to crackle from her fingers. “And this be the lesson of what happens if I become seriously disappointed in you!” The dark sparks flowed over the figure and seared the flesh from his bones. Winnie had learned to fine tune her skills to destroy a body without leaving a mess. This was a fast lesson, as usually when she performed such a deed she was the only one left to clean up afterwards. Sure she had help now, but that didn’t really sink in while she felt the life flee her victim’s body.

The body was incinerated in moments and not much more than a lingering scent of burnt flesh remained as she spoke to the rest of them. “That concludes your lessons, now for your first mission: Get rid of the other brother, without disturbing my customers!”

The horde grinned and quickly set about their first task.

Sorry it's kinda cut off there. I'm out of whatever it is that powers writers for the moment and don't know how long it will take to get to the next part, probably next month. I just spent the last two weeks trying to get somewhere on it and only got another paragraph done, so I decided I should throw up what I have and take a breather, come back when I'm feeling more up to it.

Confused, or have questions? Feel free to ask or complain or whatever!

That's the end of the post. I didn't even remember that I'd posted in until a stumbled on it on the other site. I don't remember if I wrote a part three or where it is, I have about 10 drives it could be on.

I was going to upload a gif of this troll-family's very trollish gift this year, but my phone only has so much editing power and 15mb is all I can muster, which wont upload if I wanted to. So heres a still...


Oh what fun we will have...

Have fun with yer family forge device, LOL! Happy new forger year!

Story:  Dreamland... Welcome to my Abode...

Ch or iss 1, or 5, depending on your point of view.... One more is mostly written, and more probably to come. There's no set goal here, just having fun...

Thursday night, and I found myself peering into the dark, trying to make out and count the flecks of who-knows-what on the ceiling. I was going to have to clean the bare surface one of these days... there weren't many of the dots, and in the darkness I couldn't be sure if they were dead flies in cob-webs, mosquitoes that were waiting to wake me with their whine just as I settled in, or spiders that were plotting to drop on my face and crawl into my sheets to bite me in various places for no real discernible reason. I was sure that that was just my imagination, I really hadn't stared at the ceiling before this to any great extent, but in my insomnia, the dots appeared to move, change in quantity, and otherwise mess with my eyes that refused to stay shut.  The green glow from my alarm clock was possibly the source for the light I thought I saw, but as static-like patterns swam across my vision I couldn't be sure what was real and what was imaginary.

I rolled over, trying to trigger my usual routine to settle into sleeping for the night. The two dots on the alarm clock stared back at me like green eyes, blinking as though to mock my inability to keep my own closed.  As the PM switched to AM to the side, I realized I'd missed my ability to get a reasonable amount of sleep tonight, and tomorrow was going to suck.  It was time to put some of this useless energy to work, after a fashion. Trying to think of something boring, I thought about that alarm clock, how it ticked away the moments of my sleep I was missing, and realized this was quite similar to how the moments of my life were also ticking away off into infinity. Where did those moments go?  I could see my future coming, at least in my imagination, as this thing that could be, had not happened yet, and wasn't real. The now was real. The future held exhaustion and fatigue, moments where I would doubt whether I'd make it through the day without passing out, or it would involve ten bucks of energy drinks and a variety of antics to keep myself awake, or I'd call in sick... even when inevitability lurked in the distance, the future held too many possible outcomes, so may paths that could be taken, it was still hard to say what reality would come to be. The present was real, though, and created the past... but where did the past go? Was it any more real than the future?  Sure, the past resulted in consequences that affected the present, and therefore the future, but those consequences only mattered if the present was affected, and if they didn't they were no more important than remembering a story of something that didn't happen, at least in the grand scheme of things.

But regardless, where did reality go?  Light coming in from distant stars were simply recordings of what happened... there was no more changing those events than changing a grade on a test I took years ago. That test, that star, happened, and was real, but now only the memory of those things remained... where did those things go?  As the clock flipped another minute away, changing to 12:05, I realized it was going to be one of those nights. It was a strange concept.... minutes of your life were precious, disappearing into the unreality of the past, never to exist again outside of memory or recording, but I was waiting for them to go away... no, not go away, I wanted to stop knowing they were passing, and enter into that void that allows one to leap, refreshed, into the future.  Sleep, blessed, precious sleep, second only to a well wakeful minute, eluded me as completely as early retirement, and, much like early retirement, with each passing moment it seemed less and less likely to come.

That thought train... somehow it wasn't boring enough.  It was too entertaining somehow, and made my head buzz with more questions, with random answers of various bits of information I'd picked up through my life, presenting themselves before the questions like some sort of talent show contestants before a panel of judges. Each answer rejected with a sneer, occasionally the judge would open a trap door and release the answer into the void, never to be considered again. I watched in horror as the judges gleefully begin to set fire to the pit below the trap door, and begin to drop the poor answers into flames fueled by those that went in before them, the sizzling of the frying information roaring above the screams of the newcomers... My eyes were wide with horror, and I realized I'd stared without blinking, my corneas burning and uncried tears building... not due to the dieing answers, but because my eyes were so dry, staring at another minute passing, that it had become painful to try and close them.

I now hoped that the dryness would hold my eyes shut. Somehow this would then lead to sleep, and perhaps half a nice dream before my alarm went off and obliterated everything.  As a seven appeared on the clock at the end of the string of numbers, I realized it hadn't worked.

I pushed science away and thought about Elf Quest.  I'd been so mad after the last few series that had been published I'd almost boycotted reading the current one.  The draw of Jink's history called to me, though, and I succumbed to binge-reading the first four issues that had been released to this point.  My thoughts swirled, enjoying the recounting of the tale so far, how young Jink was very much the same character you'd expect to develop into older Jink, but without the demons that chased her in Future Quest... Sure, she's blanked Skywise's memory, but it doesn't seem like it's hit her yet... and Skywise seems to have lost all real motivation for much of anything... His whole plot line felt stalled and aimless, and it kind of angered me for some strange reason.  Really, it was just a story, someone else's story, and a story I had been waiting for for decades. Jink had brought me to Elf Quest and I wanted to know everything about her and her story, and here it was, ticking me off?  I needed to look into this.

What did I know?  Skywise had been a Wolfrider, presumably had been set in the old ways with the 'Now of Wolf Thought' like his soul's brother, and in some analog to Romeo and Juliet, or the Watch and the Comb, and he gave up his wolf blood far too soon in a well intentioned search for Cutter that ended far too soon... I yawned... As part of that, he'd have given up a part of who he was, that ability of a Wolfrider to forget the past... so when Jink zapped his memory, wouldn't it be like getting a part of his old self back? But he'd spent some few decades or so as a non-wolfrider, and the last link to what the Now of Wolf Thought had been erased... huh... hah hah hah.... Jink jinked Skywise's eraser eraser... his link to the past that reminded him that he couldn't forget the past he was born to not remember... but if he can't remember not to remember he can't remember... what does that mean?  but the past isn't real, so if he can't remember what was real, he can't figure out what should be real to go there in his pod... heh... shoot, with light-speed delay, where he is probably hasn't even heard that he isn't a Wolfrider anymore, he could just make a huge psionic telescope out of his pod, focused on the World of Two Moons and remember how to forget! If only he could remember where it was he forgot to remember how to forget remembering...

My mind drifted, impossible geometries of crystal shards forming to create such a telescope while maintaining a living space for a small elf and a small preserver, forming and reforming as I tried to fathom what psychic energy could be in a universe where such a thing was real. What a thing it would be if... well, since the aether of that universe allowed one to be away from one's body and commune with others in the void without substance, then how hard would it be for anyone to connect with those of that place?  A reality of story and memory joining with my present, and I could just be sitting there, in that pod, smiling like Two-Edge while Skywise slept in his cocoon, musing at what I would say when he woke up...

I leaned over against the arm rest and rubbed my chin.  It had been a couple days since I had shaved, and I'd been slacking lately, since my mask hid the stubble, but it was still quite annoying.  Maybe that was why Elves or High-Ones didn't have facial hair... if they shaved the stubble would snag on the wrap-stuff and it would be all manner of unpleasantness.  The webbing glistened like cotton candy, but still iridescent like the star-home stuff the pod was made of. I wondered if maybe Preservers' webbing was actually the same material, if, perhaps, they had been nibbling away at Star Home over the years and gradually the whole planet had been replaced by compressed webbing, eventually dense enough to respond to the High-One's powers of manipulation.... It was quite the funny thought, and as I pinched a corner of the arm rest I tugged it into a fine thread of iridescence, spun silk, even more closely resembling a fiber of wrap-stuff... or perhaps a thread from the Scroll of Colors? Were they all linked?  I looked at the wide, blank eyes of the demunitive Preserver braced defensively on Skywise's cocoon, and imagined a thread of the Scroll extruding from it's mouth.  It eyed me, unblinking, and I couldn't read its body language at all. From the shimmering wings, so unlike a dragonfly's, to the strangely shaped eyes that seemed to contain the deepest, darkest depths of infinity, I found the creature so completely alien. Was that a smile, or was it about to spit webbing at me? Who could know?

I broke my gaze into those eyes and looked down at the sleeping creature beneath it.  Was Skywise breathing through that stuff? Was time suspended within it? That would make sense if the Preservers and the Scroll of Colors were connected through time and space as a recording of all history, but changed by that self-same history... And to think that this Preserver was likely to die in the coming issues... It might not, there was much story to unfold, but if such a creature was bonded with space and time, perhaps through some sort of analog to super-strings, would that creature be unkillable? How could a creature that could survive being crushed by a tank as Petalwing had, actually be killed?  I can't be sure but to wait until I see it with my own eyes.  I didn't want this small creature to die for my entertainment, but it seemed inevitable.  But would not the creature then know it's own future demise, whether in a coming issue of the comic, or in the heat-death of entropy at the end of time?  What it must be like to be such a creature.

Tiny claws began to move and tug at the webbing, much like the thread I was tugging from the armrest. Threads began to shift away from each other and a hole started to open, as it seemed that the preserver was getting Skywise out to wake up.  I mused for a moment, with the preserver hard at work, perhaps distracted, I extruded a glob of the star-stuff the pod and the arm rest was made from, and molded it like putty  between my fingers. Shaping it into a ring, I placed it on my right hand to mirror my wedding ring on my left, finding that I could will it to change color to match likewise.  If this dream was going to be one of those rare vivid dreams I enjoyed so much, I was going to make the most of it and keep a piece of this imaginary space pod.  I'd had dreams I knew were dreams before, and sometimes they reoccurred, and I got to keep the things I'd discovered in those dreams with other dreams... a piece of magical science putty, now that could come in handy.

Skywise moved his arm a little, starting to stir. It hit me, though, that I shouldn't know how to speak elf.  That's right, not even the humans on Abode spoke English... this could get pretty funny or bad either way pretty soon, and I could sense that tingle of danger that sometimes preceded waking up from a nightmare, just as it was getting exciting.  I had to tread lightly. Don't think. Thinking destroys dreams. Just go with it, follow the story....

Skywise pulled the edge of the opened wrap-stuff over his bare arm, like one would a blanket that had slipped off.  He curled into more of a fetal position and his breathing became more regular. He was going back to sleep.  I was having nothing of it, though.  Well, if I can shape star-stuff... then maybe...

*Skywise!* I formed as a coherent thought-word pointed at him.  Nothing happened.  Not a big surprise, really.

I wasn't giving up, though. Who's dream was this anyway? *SKYWISE!!!* I mentally shouted at him.

The elf seemed to bounce off the floor and squint like he'd just came out of a cave on a bright sunny day. *Ow, Strongbow, watch it with the...*

His eyes got wide as he saw me, sitting there in his pod.  The look was half wonder and half terror.  Here it was, the moment when I'd wake up, as he screamed and lept at me and attacked me with decades of fear of the Tall Ones that killed his parents... I could just imagine what it must look like for him, a relatively large, tall, five fingered man leaning forward with the grin of Two-Edge out between the stars....

But to my surprise, he didn't leap at me, didn't scream at me, he just sat there, staring.  The preserver started to fly around buzzing, something about 'busyhead highthing' and 'busyhead bigthing' and some kind of assurance that seemed to work.

*You can send?* Skywise asked.

*Apparently* I replied. *I.. uh..., mean you no harm?* I stammered out.

Skywise's eyebrow raised slightly as he rocked back a little, sitting on his heels.  He just sat there and stared at me for the longest time, the preserver flitting around his head.  *well, then... where do we go from here?* he asked.

My mind raced with all sorts of ways to reply.  I could tell him my reality as I saw it, or play along with his reality in my dream, blurt out this or that about Jink's meddling... but really I just wanted to be the trickster in a way. I felt as though I had grown a beard and pointed ears as I channeled my inner Two-Edge. *Where indeed? You don't seem to be coming or going anywhere fast or slow.  Where is it you want to be?*

Skywise blinked a bit and looked around, as though to remind himself where he was and why he was here. *I don't really know, I guess*

*Then, if I might suggest, think about it... You only know two places of any consequence: your star home and your home star. The home of your birth and the home you longed for ever since.  You only have to will it and you could be at either one, but it is you that must choose: go back to where you came from, or continue to where you were.*

He seemed to think about this a while, staring off directionless. *I left star-home for some reason, so it doesn't make sense to go back without finding what I left for. As you say, I only know one other place. So back to the Holt it is!* And with that, my tenuous grasp on imagined reality was wrung from me. I felt turned inside out yet made perfect somehow, everywhere and nowhere, or somewhere in between, and then we were 'there'.

*I have to say, though, that's one... interesting kind of cloth or hide you made your loincloth out of.* Skywise mused as he nodded toward my belt line.  I looked down to follow his gaze and realized. Oh, it was one of those dreams...  Aside from my rings and underwear, I was stark naked. Figured.

*Well... perhaps if you'd be so kind as to whip up some sort of clothes for me... It's possibly going to be, um, cold, maybe...?*  I wasn't going to let on that I could manipulate the pod myself just yet. I wanted to see where this dream was going first. It was all about the story.....

Skywise smirked with an odd look, as if he understood what I was getting at, and drew a simple but elegant robe from the floor of the pod. I wrapped it around me quickly and noted how strange it was that it seemed I should be able to see through the crystalline fibers, but it was actually quite modest, even hiding my less appealing forms I didn't like.  It fit well, and was surprisingly warm considering it weight practically nothing.

*Do you feel more comfortable?  Honestly, what is it with humans and being covered around others?* Skywise's sending trailed off as he set about to open the pod.  The more analytical side of me was feeling the pod move, or rather, the lack of the pod moving, which would be necessary for any kind of high speed movement not involving space-time folding or warping, or whatever it was that got it going.  We had come to rest, apparently, wherever it was he'd told the pod to go, I presumed at the new holt.

He looked like he was going to start bounding out but froze mid-stride. I leaned forward a bit to look out, but he shooed me back with one hand, very obviously intending I not be seen.  I still caught a glimpse of trees and grass in the dusky gray of morning, and could hear the echos of crows or ravens calling. The cool, damp air carried the definitive smell of the forest.  Passed his arm I could see a tree with large, hollow boles in the distinctive form of the original Father Tree.

I fought back a smile as I realize what had happened.  *Did you forget these pods could pass through the vastness of time as well as the space between stars?* I couldn't hold the thought back but I kept any tone of malice from my thoughts, and smiled to make sure he knew I was just having a little fun.   He backed into the pod and closed the opening.

*Apparently I needed to be a little more focused on what 'home' is.  Why is it like a fog is clouding my head?  ...cloud...head...* He frowned, the words seeming to mean something he couldn't place.  He shrugged it off and sat down, preparing to send the pod somewhere at least a bit safer than the past.  I wasn't concerned myself, since this was just a dream, but Id have though Skywise would have been a little more anxious, since the last time the High-Ones went to the past it worked out oh-so-well... I mused a moment that maybe this would explain some of the other elfin tribes throughout the World of Two Moons, perhaps some un-prepared historians doing some home work and trying to take a peep...

It occurred to me that I didn't know what kind of educational system the High-Ones used on Star-Home... if there were mid-terms, boring professors, and senior pranks.  Cheating students that might take their parent's pod to go see history to make sure they ace a test... Bill and Ted's Elfellent Questventure... it apparently made me chuckle louder than I thought, one  of Skywise's eyes snapped open, half curious and half annoyed.

But it was time I took a little more of the reigns of this dream before it was over.  Down to business. I needed to see my favorite character.  As Skywise began to focus on some specific destination, and start the cycle, I nudged a small sliver of thought at the pod, urging *...and the one who is two...* My stomach lurched, my head turned inside out, and we were off again to the next place.

Skywise opened the pod again, and for a moment I wondered if we had even moved at all. Similar sounds and smells of the forest wafted in, but this time Skywise looked a little more satisfied. He stepped out and I shifted closer to the hole in the side of the pod.  Skywise stood with his hands on his waist, taking in the view and the air, looking around for friendly faces.  I could tell he was sending, I'd already gotten used to the basics of his body language when he sent, but this sending was not for me.

I felt that prickly danger sensation again on my neck and shoulders, and forced myself to stay calm. This dream was just getting good, and I didn't want to wake up now.  Feeling rushed, though, I went ahead and left the pod, fully believing that, if we were indeed in the current story's time frame, that elves were a lot more accepting of humans than where we had been. Besides, I wanted to see what my mind came up with for Two-Edge before I woke up. That tingle was almost burning at this point, it could be any moment now...

But the next feeling I had wasn't the usual 'dragged upward through the floor' feeling I got when i woke up, but rather a massive blow knocking me to the ground. It lasted just a moment before I really didn't sense much at all.

I habe something to confess... If you havent been able to tell after a gander through my writings and ehatnot... Im a bit of a teo edge fan... Trolls in general as well, but mostly Two Edge.  Anyway, Ive had a idea Ive been toying with for a while... A decade or more, but felt silly and wasteful for even considering it. But my kids are old enough to explore various things in art, and figured Id learn with them. Ive done some carvings in wood and plaster, usually of cars or star trek comm badges, but necer tackled a bust, or anything in clay larger than what comes in a playdoh cup.  Im still having some trouble translating frount and side profiles of some details, such as eyes and mouth, but for a first try Im feeling pretty good.

I havent had access to my computer of late, and so processing photos on my phone has been a pain, and the last time I tried uploading an image the service wasnt having it, so we'll see if this works. I dont know if amyone really reads my stories but hopefully if you've been waitng for something perhaps this will be good enough?



Looks like it workeed this time, but it didnt add the script for the width... Hopefully thisnwoth break screens... Sorry in advance. I would love critique, pointers, and ways to fix the mouth (far sides are not working from the drawings, and I dont know how to do lips) and the eyes are not worked on at all.

Thanks Embala for all the help with reference images!

Oh wow, this is so awesome! Leave the head as it is. You can keep the eyes closed and draw them as a line with black paint and a brush.

I may, usually the eyes are little more than slits when two edgr is having fun and in his peak of gameplay. I plan to make a casting of it as oil clay doesnt handle sitting around all that well, and is hard to color/paint/etc. I dont want to spend money on platinum cure silicone to make a mold from but my experiements with DIY silicone molds dont have super good results. I did get a copy of an earlier version of the ear through to plaster but it had bubbles in both the silicone and the plaster, requiring a lot of rework. Also, if I decide to make a mask from the mold, my experiment with the ear-mold didnt work well, even with mold release the new silicone still stuck to the old silicone of the mold, which would ruin everything down the road.

But there might be foam latex as an option, if I use DIY silicone for the mold. Theres ways to thin it and get it to flow better, and if I dont add any accellerant more than coloring, I could use the silicone caulking straight, giving more time to get it into the details. Im worried the thinner might dissolve the clay, I need to do more tests. The stuff I saw online says it should work, but even just caulking + cornstarch is really thick, sets way to fast, and makes the clay really loose, almost runny. I didnt get monster clay or anything, just cheap oil clay from the craft store, and perhaps all my cheaping out is catching up with me.

I should look at plaster casting it. I think the nose is a problem with any mold method that isnt soft, or in several parts, and I might have to get creative no matter how I make a mold of it...

Materials so far: foam head, cheap oil based clay, silicone cauking, corn starch, mineral spirits (to thin the silicone. Have not tried next to clay yet, and Im almost out of my 5 lb brick.

Love how it turned out, Hammer!
In fact the mouth was what made me identify Two-Edge (before I've noticed the ears).

a side note about eyes: https://i.pinimg.com/originals/38/f4/d3/38f4d3806487e6ad05244277dc58861d.jpg

I started using that image as a reference but couldnt find a matching side view I liked to go with it. Still, for the eyes, thats probably the highest quality mug shot of Two Edge's eyes there is. Hopefully I can get my computer out tonight and play with some some better image editing software than bone stock android crop tool. Maybe Ill learn Gimp finally, with its ability to layer several images together at variable transparency. (A bit ambitious considering I should be in bed in half an hour, still need to feed the no-humps, and feed myself as well.)

I was looking at wigs and beards and most of what popped up in white were wizards and santa claus getups. Most of them were wavy. I figured if I could find a halfway decent, long, straight wig and/or beard I could cut some of the length and use it to fill in for poor quality (on cheap ones). Or unweave it and use the 'hair' n a better wig. Id like to know how to jist get the "hair" by itself but I dont know ehat the material is called to look it up. Anyone know what they call wig materials, or better, where to get the stuff?

Or would Animal type feather boas be better and do Muppet hair?

Update:  Im no closer to finding a source of the fiber nor what its called (other than wig fiber, but that doesnt show up as anything.) I did find a video on how to make 'wefts' with a heat sealer, which I just happened to pick up the other day cheap, but couldnt find material. I did run across something that hits me as hilarious and a possible solution...

Anyone ever wonder what Two Edge would look like in a David Bowie mullet?



Of course, it would be fo fun at first, then trim it up to match the character better later. I cant help but chuckle though. $18, I dont think I can make a better one for less.

From another time and place, back when I had time for such things.

I am impressed by your sculpting skills!! I can barely make a cup..or vase. Lol skimmed through the dabbles..interesting the way your brain goes!

Oh lord the mullet...it will never die XD

Yes, that looks wow, as if it came out of a factory. But ...er, what is this?

Its..... A lightsaber! Lol. Or at least my rendition of one. This is actually the second one I made, experimenting with a modular system of making it in sections with connectors. It is machined from aluminum, and I did have a plan for making it a bit more interesting, but this method ends up taking a lot of internal space, so there isnt a lot of room for much. Mostly bits and pieces I had laying around, though I did have over 6" of flame shooting out of it at one point. Lol.

The end with the angle cut in it was interesting to machine cut: I disnt realize the material had some internal stress so after partially cutting through it sprung against the cutter and tried to take the piece out of the vice, which usually ruins the part you are working on. I lucked out this time, but had to flip it over to match the other side... On a round part, if you dont add indexing allowances, it becomes nearly impossible to flip something over and have it line up.

Learned alot, have a lot of ideas if I ever get back into it, but I currently dont have a mill functioning and not sure when I will get going on it again. The one machine needs a lot of parts and the other needs a speed controller... And I domt have a heck of a lot of time lately. Glad you enjoy it, Ill see what other projects I have laying around thst might be interesting.

Currently, on my lunch breaks, Ive been proofreading and editing my old stories to get them ready for binding. My father has a lot of printing and binding equipment, and I want to try my hand at leather binding just for kicks, or at least hard-binding with an interesting cover. My first attempt was paperback with everything printed single sided, mostly for skimming to edit (im an analog at heart, its hard for me to read a computer screen or long periods of time), and it was an inch thick. I screwed up trimming the face of it, instead of using the book shear I didnt know my dad had, and the card stock I used for a cover didnt hold up very well, its extremely dog-eared at this point. Smaller books, better covers, better shearing... All things Ill try next time.

Woah wait you made that??! I just thought you bought it and were showing it off! Dude...my respect for you has grown by magnitudes. You're the kind of crafty i want to be but lack the skills.

Though i tend to lean more toward woodworking...any wood stuff you've made?

Not as much. Ill look around, most of my wood stuff is utility, like structures, tool handles, that sort of thing. I used to carvecar models from balsa but had my stuff stolen and havent gotten back into it. Same with wire sculpture, used to weave butterflies and dragonflies and stuff, but lost interest and cant get inspired with it anymore. Seems to be my MO: see something interesting, do it once or twice, and move on... Fortunately I dont seem to lose interest in writing, though I dont think Ill ever write like I did 10 years go, but I seem to enjoy it enough to keep going.

Have you posted any of your woodwork?

Oh, and as far as crafty skills or whatever, Ive never felt like Ive had much more than curiosity and lack of fear to try something... Which is wierd for me to say as Im actually quite timid when it comes to risk taking. I guess when it comes to things like clay and metal I dont figure its much of a risk, since clay can just be reshaped and some metal can be replaced and done over again, just a little wasted time and materials. When I try to do something like draw or paint, and it gets amywhere nearly like something I like I start getting fearful Im gonna wreck it, mess something up I cant fix, and Ive just pushed it away, too much other stuff to do anyway. Though... Where would a vinyl mural for the side of my truck land in the range of that? Lol. Not gonna get to that for a while yet, still have to get the artwork for it... But then after that its simply a matter of hang the vinyl out and use a projector to throw the image on it, and trace it.

Sorry, brainstorming.

Sounds kind of like me lol. I've only actually done two projects in wood working, one was a Crescent Moon Staff for a Princess Serenity cosplay i did which had major assistance from my dad, i kinda just mainly guided the design. The one project i did on my own was a quite pretty Ouija board with planchette...i tried starting work on a walking stick but uh...when i got to the "thin it down to grippable size" i stalled out after a few tries...^^0

Have you considered digital art? I gave up traditional for the reasons you said, since with digital you can usually fix a mistake from five minutes ago or whatever.

No need to apologize for brainstorming.^^ happy to be of assistance if you can bounce ideas off me!

Digital art... I suppose some of the images Ive done might qualify on a technical level, in that they only exist as pixels in a computer, but they are quite infantile compared to what many here do on this site. I dont have corel, adobe, photoshop... The closest thing I used to have is paint shop pro from the turn of the century, and I dont evrn have that as I dont have a functional windows machine anymore. Technically I have Gimp, but I cant make use of it in the ways Id truely like to, mostly use it for format conversion and color reduction to get clean black and white images to play with, then use a pixel editor like Paint to wrangle pixels into something I find funny. Quite inelegant and inefficient, but its all Im capable of.

Totaly cool with knocking ideas together, what did you have in mind?

Nothing particularly in my mind, just didn't want you to feel you had to apologize for brainstorming.

I've seen great art done by Gimp. Never used it myself so i can offer no advice...but perhaps sketching things and then scanning and finishing them on the computer? Sketching is always so messy...probably why i hate it and can't do it myself lol. I know brushes in program always help me with effects i lack the talent to do by hand...*shrug*

Your vinyl mural sounds interesting. Definitely never considered something like that. Especially the projection thing...i guess that would make murals infinitely easier to do. Here i thought it was all just talent :p

Vaeri wrote:

Nothing particularly in my mind, just didn't want you to feel you had to apologize for brainstorming.

I've seen great art done by Gimp. Never used it myself so i can offer no advice...but perhaps sketching things and then scanning and finishing them on the computer? Sketching is always so messy...probably why i hate it and can't do it myself lol. I know brushes in program always help me with effects i lack the talent to do by hand...*shrug*

Your vinyl mural sounds interesting. Definitely never considered something like that. Especially the projection thing...i guess that would make murals infinitely easier to do. Here i thought it was all just talent :p

Some murals are all talent. We used to have a local town full of murals by one guy, each one was a wall of a building downtown. A few have survived, but there arent many left. He did them all by hand. I did a 16 ft wide sign for a shop I was helping out with, but it was generated in a 3d modeling program to get the shading right, then projected onto the boards and traced, masked, and painted. I was never happy with it, but it was a bit better than the scabby lumber it covered up.

I havent had a pointing device that has allowed the use of brushes with any reliability, mouse hangs up or hesitates a moment and had to redo it, and redo it, and so on. I have not used a modern brush, though: my experience is with bitmap editors that 'spray' or wipe pixels, nothing as elegant as even the simplest modern program. I need to clear a spot for a workstation and get back into things.

Out of time tonight, Ill PM later to see about ideas.

Wow, train of thought derailed, wrecked, caught fire, got hauled away for scrap, which was used to make another train of thought that also derailed and this time they hauled off the rails for scrap...

Some days it feels like Ill never get back into the swing of things.

My kids are productive though. Havent gotten the forge going (1.5 years and counting!) But they have cold forged and created some pretty neat stuff. Im trying to figure out if I shkuld set my older son with an affount here to post his work or if I should post stuff for them here?

One or the other Hammer, - please show if kid agrees!

Troll stuff? Elf stuff?

Hmm... well...
His mom and I are a bit trollish, but we poke fun at the cact he has pointy ears, wherever that came from...

But as to the work, its mostly metalwork. He does some wood carving on occasion, but he rarely goes a week without spending a night at the anvil. He's only been at it a little over a year, yesr and half, and he's doing stuff with steel I didnt know was possible cold.

I gotta get the forge going though. I need to finish the stand and put the second coat of refractory on it and fire it up...

He said I can post the images. Ill first have to take said pictures and will need to find his work first.

wow, sounds interesting. Cold forging must be a lot of work to do.