Something Big is Coming!

And it's gonna make your 3d cnc world a whole lot easier!

8)
JWO

Bullets to Butterflies!

An artist friend of Jody's has a new art exhibit that we were able to lend a hand with.
The excerpt from the website says:

The Bullets to Butterflies exhibit is a show which can be featured at your school, museum or library.
The message of this exhibit is one of hope and to show the power of a single voice in the face of inequity and violence.  Malala Yousufzai is a 15 year old school girl, who with her writing and energy has brought much needed attention to the education emergency that exists in Pakistan.  Despite an attempt at her life, Malala’s message has not gone silent, in fact, the awareness of the education situation in Pakistan has become a global issue.  World leaders are making commitments to make changes in Pakistan, and the world, so children everywhere have access to education.
The exhibit consists of 15 art pieces, a video presentation and the installation of a 12 foot concrete wall with bullet holes.  The exhibit invites visitors to engage with the bullet wall by asking a question and placing their answers in the bullet holes.
If you are interested in having this exhibit come to your venue, or have any questions, please contact Huma Durrani at humadurrani@gmail.com or Saba Syed at siba_ali@yahoo.com.

The first part of the build was the 12 foot concrete wall. Of course, this would be a "movie wall", as a real one would suck eggs to move around!

The bones of the build are pretty basic. 3, four foot by 6 foot pieces of 3/4" plywood made the face of the wall. I built a frame of 2X3's around each panel that will allow them to bolt together. The jack stands in the back were built from 1x3's with cinder blocks as counter weights. Youd be pretty hard-pressed to topple this wall by yourself!

 The concrete texture was added by mixing Durabond 90 and white glue together, and parging it onto the plywood.

Then out came the texture roller. I do this step when the compound sets up a little. This gives a more believable texture, and doesn't get the 'whipped spikes' that happen when it's not ready.

Once the mixture is almost set, it gets buffed smooth-ish with the float.

I used an x-acto knife to drag different sized cracks in the wall. Not overly believable now, but when the wall gets painted, these will really sell it.

The 2 end sections got 6" returns on them. This will make the wall look thick and substantial when it's standing at the various shows.
8)
JWO

Returning to Earth!

Due to technical difficulties, I was unable to get a time lapse of the pre-light. It's too bad, but that's how it rolls sometimes!

With the set pieces all located in they're final spot, the lighting crew set to work, running miles of cable and lights.

 The art director gave a hand at carving up some additional rocks that could be placed around the set where needed. In the end, it was only 3 extra rocks that we needed. If you can't tell, the studio was freezing first thing in the morning. And with the giant loading door open for bringing in the gear, the -40c air made things very uncomfortable! Even though the studio lighting eventually warmed up the studio, I wore my snowmobile suit until around 2 pm!

We painted up the 3 rocks in the wardrobe room just outside the studio. This was quite a bit warmer for paint drying than the studio was.

The first thing lit was the stars on the backdrop. For the first part of the morning, the art dept. rode around on the lift, punching holes through the canvas, to let the light blast through.

It wasn't long before things really started to come together!

Jody went around and filled any remaining seems with the sand ground cover. This was a mix of crushed brick and orange and red sand. However, once the moisture in the crushed brick dried off, it was far to light in color. It looked way better wet. Instead of wetting the set down every 2 minutes, to keep the color great, I sprayed it down with Pledge acrylic floor polish. This kept the brick wet looking. In order to remove the gloss from the floor polish treatment, the large rocks got dusted with spray glue to mat everything down.

 The lighting was quite dramatic in the end. Perfect! I couldn't shoot any more pictures after this, as the toy was on set, and I don't know if I can show pictures of it or not.
Another fun miniature base, these are my favourite by far!
8)
JWO