moss people

I like to range the woods for inspiration, mushrooms or running from time to time. If you take your time and keep your eyes open, you can see and hear a lot you usually wouldn't.

camouflage - find the frog !

 a little pond

 moss covering dead branches. There's legends about moss people. Looking at the various ways moss can grow, you'll grasp what inspired folks to make up these stories. it feels like the forest grows strange and lively green hair.

 fungus always has it's place. Fungi are the secret rulers of this planet. There's fungus in our bodies, walls, food, beds, ... everywhere around us. The largest living creatures of this planet are fungi; there's even fungi that can feed on plastic and other synthetic materials.

 more hair ?

 roots

 and dead roots on a deracinated tree, let's have a closer look

 I was instantly intrigued by these beautiful roots

 and the moss that grows on them. I'll have to find a way to preserve these for deepwood tabletop terrain, for if I don't

 they'll rot anyway. Fungi, bacteria, beetles doing their job.

 yet more water

 and another tree that fell. here's the top

 and here's the bottom, you can still see the treetop in the background of this picture. It is impressively large and managed to stay alive although almost completely deracinated for years. You can see branches and twigs growing out of it's trunk. It's a bit hard to see this tree is a natural bridge across water and swampy ground, the plants you see are growing from mud and water. Not a single spot around you could step on without sinking into the ground up to your knees at least, but  you can walk on the tree, which also provides a weirdly soft ground, since it's completely covered in nature's carpet, thick moss.

Time to sculpt some dryads while not forgetting about the manticore and fairies !

Cheers :)

Fairies, Pixies, Tree Spirits

A truly little something that came out while tinkering around.

They had noses at first but since they already look like tiny muppets I cut them off again. The mini minis are attached to each other and supported by a 'fairytail' of fairy dust, sparkles or whatever you like to think fairies have around them.

total height of the group is 18mm.

While going back to former projects and for the sake of today's subject, I'd like to share the presumably most beautiful of all sloppy scenes in children's and youth literature:

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"Who is that?"

Cheers :)

more work on the headless lion

Recent progress on the Manticore; he grew claws and more muscles. Also, I cut both arms and one leg off and re-attached them.

He still needs some more muscles before knuckles, scars and some fur can be added. But first, I'll be working on his head and tail as I finally have a concept in mind.

Cheers :)

Puttycore

Hi, again

Since yesterday, I was able to create a basis for the main skeletal musculature and the tail. I attached an image of an older attempt at a manticore's tail but I decided to try something different this time. The armature is still missing a head, for a reason.

What about the head ... ? Well I'm not perfectly sure how to make it. The classic Manticore is depicted having a human face and countless teeth, I'd like to stay with that impression but probably less literate.

Let's be honest here: a 4-legged creature and a human head, that's cartoon. There's nothing wrong with cartoons but I'd like to go a bit more horror. Modern, realistic horror, not vintage cinema horror.

It seems the media constantly tries to be more serious and scientific since the internet made such a huge impact on humanity. People can google now, being sceptic and curious is a lot easier today, people hold a lot more "useless knowledge" and thus are less likely to be horrified.

Horror needs to look more realistic now, so let's try and work with a modern and more probable concept (by the way, this is going to be a Manticore, of course ;) ) and let people feel "Hell, this thing could be out there somewhere !".

Back to the concept: Countless teeth ? I've heard that before !

Sharks ! And sharks are horrifying too ! Endless hunger, lifeless eyes, known to be tougher than a tank. How's that not scary ? Perfect, let's consider working with this :)

But a shark's not really human, is it ? What makes us look human anyway ?

If you ask me, it's what makes us different from all other animals: hands and a very peculiar nose. 

With all this, a Manticore still needs to be a majestic lion. So the mission is clear now: Combine a shark's head with a lion's and point out is has some kind of weird nose without making it look too ridiculous.

Cheers, Nico :)

Wirecore

Following the Jabberwock, this is going to be number 2 of my collection of legendary and mythical creatures. You can probably already tell what it's going to be :)

It's 20mm ground to upper back, aluminum and copper wire. You can get pretty useful copper wire out of scrap cables, by the way - and it's cheap too.

Cheers :)

In the mood for ogres

I recently started sculpting again and my first impulse was "I want ogres !", and I thought why not start a whole unit of ogres ?

Starting on the left, going down: let's call them "Bulldog", "Gremlin", "Scarface", "Grandma", "Basic" and "Orc". Made from pre-made 15mm ogre-type dollies, toe to top of the head 25mm, no hair yet.

The plan is sculpting 6 minis with swappable weapon arms (right arms) and heads, different armor and stances. Not the very fat type, not to beastly but not too human either. They'll probably end up looking more like a bunch of brawlers then like a real unit.

Cheers, Nico :)

The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!

"Jabberwocky"

'Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.

"Beware the Jabberwock, my son!
The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun
The frumious Bandersnatch!"

He took his vorpal sword in hand:
Long time the manxome foe he sought—
So rested he by the Tumtum tree,
And stood awhile in thought.

And as in uffish thought he stood,
The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,
Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,
And burbled as it came!

One, two! One, two! and through and through
The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!
He left it dead, and with its head
He went galumphing back.

"And hast thou slain the Jabberwock?
Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!"
He chortled in his joy.

'Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.



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One of my favourite fantastic creatures. Rather than a phantasm of nonsense I tried to create a (somewhat) realistic Jabberwock. Imagine an amphibian, dragon-like beast lurking in a swamp's deep pond and jumping out like a frog when hunting for prey, supporting the leap with it's wings instead of actually flying - or hanging down a giant tree with it's tail like an opossum.


I might stick some warts and wrinkles to his neck and lengthen the antennae.


Cheers,

the Magic Mushroom :)