Re: Work In Progress--Deryni Action Figure Project (was Duncan Action Figure)

[Shiral]

I was thinking maybe Duchess Richenda had seen the gorgeousness of her new 12th Night Court Gown and had fainted clean away. =o)

Or maybe she was SHOCKED to watch how Duncan and Helena were amusing one another with head stands. =o)

Hope the van and all the Little Accoutrements make it home from Tennessee soon,

Melissa

[Evie]

Today's find for the Action Figure Project:


Miniature Bible by evian_delacourt, on Flickr

While I was out shopping earlier today, I spotted this keyring at a sidewalk clearance sale just outside a Christian bookstore.  I flipped through it idly, expecting the pages to be blank, but to my surprise they contain extremely tiny print and line illustrations!  This was originally priced at 50% off, but there was no tag on it, so I brought it inside to see what the original price was.  It was originally $1.99, so the clearance price was $1.  The store manager invited me to browse through the other items to see if there was anything I wanted to add to the purchase, but after doing a quick check around, this was all I saw that I was interested in buying at the moment, so I returned to the cash register to pay for it.  She waved me off, saying it wasn't worth bothering to ring up, and told me just to keep it.  (It wasn't in its original wrapping like some of the others left in stock, so maybe that's why?)  So my little Deryni bishops now have a Bible for the Schola of Saint Camber.  It needs a nicer cover than the cheesy plastic one, I think, and the key ring will definitely need to come off, but maybe I can figure out some way to "medievalize" it.  Maybe it can end up with one of those jewel-encrusted covers valuable enough to get it chained to one of Duncan's study bookshelves once I build his study?  There's already a hole in the cover for a jump ring, so attaching a regular chain to it should be quite easy.


Miniature Bible page by evian_delacourt, on Flickr

Here's the part that makes me squee...there is actual readable text in here, not to mention footnotes and illustrations!  Granted, you need a magnifying glass to read it (plus my reading glasses in addition to that), but it's a legible version of the Good New Translation of the Bible.  (I compared the first verses of Genesis to several different translations found online at Bible Gateway out of curiosity, although I suspected it was that translation because I thought I recognized those itty bitty line drawings which were copyrighted with that translation back in the 1970s.)  OK, so that's not a very period translation for my medieval littles, but they speak Gwyneddan anyway, so they hardly care which English version this is!  Given their time period, they're just surprised to find a bound copy of the Bible that's not written in Latin or Greek instead.   :lol:

The print is so small, I figure most people wouldn't be able to read it without magnification anyway except perhaps under extremely good light, so who's to know it's not in Latin if the Mini-Deryni don't tell anyone?  Shhhhh....   

[Elkhound]

How marvelous!

[Evie]

Of course, that plastic cover would need to go, or at least be concealed under something more suitable for the time period.  Something more like this, perhaps?



This is from the Lindau Gospel.  A 1:6 copy inspired by it would have a lot smaller surface area to work with, of course, which might necessitate a simpler design, not to mention that my art skills aren't up to the task of anything too fancy unless perhaps I can figure out how to temporarily attach a traceable photocopy to the metal beforehand, but I think I could come up with something suitable if I get my hands on some thick gold foil and a burnishing tool (or perhaps if I can mold it from Friendly Plastic and paint it with gold acrylic paint?), and then glue teeny gemstones all over it.  The rear cover could get a similar treatment, though probably with some of the more ornate work left off, such as the crucifix, though the cross-bracing would still suggest the cross and four quarters even if there isn't as much overt symbolism on the back cover.  

And here's a different style of cover from the T'oros Roslin Gospels from Armenia (I think?):



That one even has a similar form of strap closure to this mini-Bible cover, so I wouldn't have to snip it off, just incorporate it into the final design and paint it to look more like leather.

Of course, I'd need to get my hands on a bunch of itty bitty "jewels" first, and if I go with something more like Cover of the Lindau Gospel, I'll want to experiment with gold thread to see if I can get a similar effect to the cross border goldwork and the gemstone settings if I wrap them at the base with tiny snippets of metallic thread glued into place.

In either case, I think we can safely assume it's not a project I'm going to have completed and ready for uploading here by tomorrow afternoon!    

[Evie]

*dies laughing*  OK, I may have to do a copy of the Lindau Gospels cover after all...now that I've found out it is part of the "Morgan Library and Museum Collection."  I kid you not!    

http://www.themorgan.org/collections/collections.asp?id=70

[derynifanatic64]

Very beautiful workmanship!!

[Jerusha]

The "Morgan Library?"  That is just too funny!   

It is beautiful, though, and it's amazing that your new Bible for the littles actually has real text!  Bishop Duncan may just stand on his head again to celebrate.   

[Elkhound]

*dies laughing*  OK, I may have to do a copy of the Lindau Gospels cover after all...now that I've found out it is part of the "Morgan Library and Museum Collection."  I kid you not!    

http://www.themorgan.org/collections/collections.asp?id=70

How fitting.

[Evie]

Here is one item out of a box of surprises awaiting me at my SCA meeting tonight. 


Well dressed pony by evian_delacourt, on Flickr

This is a Breyer horse, so I think it's closer to 1:9 than 1:6, if I remember correctly, but it will work for a "learner horse" for Grub, who is my only child figure.  The saddle and tack were made by an SCA friend.  She was apparently clearing out some of her craft stuff, and some mutual friends of ours spotted this and several Barbie horses and picked them out of the lot, along with a box of fabric scraps, to pass on to me for the Deryni Action Figure Project.  The other horses don't have caparisons and tack yet, but that will change.  I am thrilled by my new goodies!

Not shown in the picture is the new tripod I picked up at the Thrift Store this evening, which I mounted my digital camera on to take this shot.  (I just happened to have the camera in my purse, and had the tripod because I had purchased it on my way to the meeting.)  It's either a GorillaPod tripod or some clone that looks and acts just like it.  (See http://joby.com/gorillapod/original)  They're normally around $20.  Mine was $2.   

[Jerusha]

Nice horse!  Perhaps it could also be a slightly larger than normal Destrier, suitable for a king with that scarlet caparison.  IIRC, Kelson's horse in DR was a black. 

[Evie]

Unfortunately, he's slightly smaller than Kelson or any of the grown figures would need, which is why I decided Grub could keep him, but I have another black horse out of that same lot that is the right size for my knights.  I wish this one were larger, though, as it's my most realistic horse aside from the vintage Marx horse I got a few months back.  Though the three Barbie horses are at least the right size, and will look less like Barbie horses after they've had a repaint and their silly human-looking eyes get changed to horsey-looking ones.

[tenworld]

you can photoshop the horse bigger

[Evie]

YOU might be able to photoshop the horse bigger!  I can barely figure out how to photoshop at all!     (Or to be more precise, how to use Gimp.  I can't afford Photoshop.)  And resizing him wouldn't eliminate the problem of him being too small for my adult riders.  I can't just photoshop them into a photo under a rider unless I can figure out how to pose a rider in front of a green screen or something in exactly the right pose to look natural on an expanded size horse.  Much more trouble than simply using a 1:6 size horse! 

He'd work well as a background figure, though, to give the illusion that there's a little more distance between the standing human figures and the horse and scenery in the background than there actually is, especially if there's a larger horse in the foreground.  For instance, he'd be fine in a picture in which Kelson and Alaric are standing in the foreground, watching from a slight distance as one of the royal grooms leads the royal stallion toward them from the stables in the background.   

[kirienne (RIP)]

Oooohhh, what a nice horsie!!!!!!

[Elkhound]

Seeing all these models done up for characters in the stories makes me think of Edward Eager's "Knights' Castle."  Anyone ever read it?  A group of children take some toy knights and start using them to act out "Ivanhoe"; then, at night, they find themselves transported into the story.  When they change the arrangement of the figurines--for example, use them to act out a baseball game--they find that night that the story has changed.