Cat's got a tongue.

Caleb here, named his monster "Cat." Normally I try to name monsters, but this guy was snapped up before I had a chance.

I'm told Cat and Caleb are getting along great, although Cat keeps getting lost, probably from wandering off when no one is looking.

Fortunately no one is offended that Cat sticks his tongue out at everyone, all the time.

Monsters Class of 2007

I started making monsters sort of on a whim last year. Then they became my Christmas gifts to some close friends. Now, it seems to be a bit of a growth industry.

With the end of 2008 fast approaching, I thought I'd post a shot of the class of 2007:



Somewhere around here, I have a group shot of most of the 2008 monsters. It's a bigger picture!

Art Shop Confidential

Art Shop this past weekend was great! It was my first show, and I sold a bunch of monsters.

Children were drawn like moths, and I'm way happy to send a cushy monster home with an age-appropriate child. But let's face it, I really make these things for... you know, me. Adults who like whimsy and strangeness.

A professor at Temple and his wife spent 15 minutes agonizing over which monster to take home, because they liked them ALL. One college girl kept circling back to the table every few minutes, watching from a distance until she swooped in and gave me her last dollar to buy one.

These are not just my target audience, these are my people. I feel a little bad charging them money.

I'm still gonna! But capitalism doesn't come naturally to me.

Looking for a new sewing machine?

I went looking to buy a new sewing machine a few weeks back, and I had no idea how much it would be like car shopping. Like, down to the dealer not telling you what the price is until you've gone for a test drive. It is not a simple job for the underinformed.

Unlike cars, there's precious little unbiased info online. There's lots of people who will tell you, "It depends on what you want to do." which is not helpful, or, "It depends on what manufacturer I get a commission from," which is a completely different kind of unhelpful. Consumer Reports hasn't even tested sewing machines in years (although there's a new report coming in February 2009, they say).

The best info I found was at craftster.org, in a post comparing sewing machine manufacturers.

Here's the quick version:

Buying a sewing machine is like buying a car, your level of skill, mechanical needs and budget dictate what you get in your machine. Sewing machines vary in price and quality much like cars. Bernina = Mercedez-Benz, Janome = Toyota, Kenmore = Buick, Pfaff = Volvo, Viking/ Husqvarna = Volkswagon. (Ok, most of the countries didn't line up perfectly, meh)

There's a lot more there too if you're interested. Thanks, Penlowe!


P.S. I wound up getting a Pfaff Hobby 1142. (I'm a Volvo kind of guy, basically.) If you're in the Philly area, check out Fabrics on the Hill for help getting a Pfaff.

Hark, an otyugh!

Been working on non-cute, D&D-esque monsters lately too. Here's my first one, an otyugh. Otyughs are Dungeons & Dragons monsters that live in refuse piles and collect treasure. I'm kind of a junk hoarder myself, so I can relate.


I finished this dude a while back, but it took me a long time to get pictures and transfer them to where I could post them. It's a prototype (his eyestalk doesn't stand up on its own... oops), but full of valuable lessons for the next round.



A guy I played Living Forgotten Realms with a few weeks ago told me sight unseen that he would buy a handmade plush otyugh. I hope there's more like him!

Cycloptopus

Saturday I made my favorite monster yet: Cycloptopus. It's not actually that tricky, but it does embody the sudden, unexpected confluence of a lot of things I've learned.

Very little of my output is unusable -- it's hard to screw up something that's meant to look monstrous. But I see more blemish than finish in most of my production.

This guy is different. I'm pretty proud of him!

Anatomy of a kaiju

Are you into Kaiju? Of course you are! All men, women, and children are fans of giant Japanese monster movie monsters, so the answer is automatically yes. In fact, forget I asked.

The reason I even bring it up is that thanks to boingboing, I tripped across this fantastic set of kaiju pics, including the snazzy internal anatomy drawing seen at right. Thank goodness we have quality naturalists working on these things.

Link to kaiju eiga picture set

Monsters for sale: Dec. 5 & 6

I'll be showing and selling monsters and other hand-made artifacts at Art Shop this year! I'm pretty damn excited about my first show.

THE DEETS (in jpg form)


Also, some other people will be there. Maybe you might want to look at their stuff too.

31 flavors

My old friend, Rob McClurkan, is a snazzy illustrator. During October, he's doing 31 days of monsters at his blog, illustration brain. I've stolen one of his drawings to show you a sample at right. He's got a great style, and a sense of whimsy that you will love, or your internet money back.

You can also see his portfolio which includes some non-monster-related pictures at seerobdraw.com. If you were into that sort of thing.

Link

Robots are the best

I found this on the internet today, and I wanted to post it on my monsters blog, so I am posting it on my monsters blog.

According to the page where I found this (goldenfiddle.com), it's probably a screen test for the Where the Wild Things Are movie. (precious little more information available at imdb.)

This bodes well, friends. Dubya E Dubba L. I'd watch a whole movie of this, no plot.

Update: Well it's gone now. But keep an eye out for the movie, if it ever gets released. They'll probably get my $10.

Update 2 (March 2009): YouTube has it back!