Coraline has lips now, thank heavens. I filmed myself making a draft of her head today. It’s not the final draft, but it will show you how the assembly happens. The first thirty seconds are a montage of the dull pattern tracing, cutting and such. The last six minutes of the video are in real-time […]
Drafting Coraline’s face Read More »
It will only last today, but the weather cooled off. Oh, heavenly day. I actually put a sweater on. I baked! I cooked dinner! I even took a long hot shower. Clearly, the year spent in Iceland has skewed my idea of what the weather is supposed to be like. I can’t shake the feeling
Cool weather, nice. Read More »
Douglas Cohen has posted about having a subscription drive for short fiction genre magazines. Now, working on a small press magazine, Shimmer, I certainly support the idea of wanting more people to buy our magazine, but I think that the subscription drive is a matter of looking at the symptoms rather than the cause. The
Marketing short fiction Read More »
I’ve returned from a preview screening of Neil Gaiman’s Stardust–tickets provided by the fabulous Livia Llewellyn. Since I got out of the theater, I’ve been wanting to go back. When was the last time that happened to me? Princess Bride? Goya in Bordeaux? But since then… I can’t remember one. I don’t want to gush
Here I am, in the middle of laying out the Art Issue of Shimmer and stumble across this lovely, lovely review of our Winter issue. Do you like fables? Fairy tales? Mythic Realism? Writers like Patricia McKillip, Charles DeLint, and Neil Gaiman at his most fantastical? Then you’ll like Shimmer, I believe. It is a
Shimmer, Vol. 2, Iss. 2: A Review Read More »
I had to head down to meet Keith De Candido so I could finally sign the bookplates for the new Doctor Who anthology, and the restaurant was in the neighborhood of several paper stores that I needed to visit. It’s a good thing too, because with the flooding from the storms here last night, I’m
Paper and testing Coraline’s hair Read More »
I mentioned that I am using a German paper-folding technique, created by Albrecht Roser, to create the Coraline face. As it happens, I have a pattern and instructions for a face up at my puppet company’s website. If you want to play along at home. It’s for Gerta from the Snow Queen. I start off
What’s this? A fever! A sore throat! Aw… he shouldn’t have. Naturally, of course, we had a dinner guest last night, so I’ve probably infected the poor fellow by cooking at the height of my contagiousness.
Look what Rob brought me from Oregon! Read More »
For the past couple of days I’ve been reading My New Leg, which is a blog about the process of ordering a new prosthesis. This is wonderfully written, up-close-and-personal, and utterly fascinating. I’ve linked to the first post on the blog.
Reading “My New Leg” Read More »
When I do a bid on a puppet, mechanisms are the most expensive part. They are fiddly things and no matter how many times you’ve built something similar, each puppet is radically different. This dog puppet, which I’m creating ears for, technically has four mechs in it since each ear is capable of two movements.
Our friend, Fabulous Girl, came up to our neck of the woods so we could go out for brunch. After we finished a tour of the apartment, we decided to stay in. I’m generally happier cooking than going out, so that worked well for me. I made a beet green and black olive tapénade frittata,
What we say. I think we’re going to have to rip their spines out. Want to try on my beaver? Man. That’s a seriously long rod The chicken lady isn’t safe around other puppets What am I supposed to do with this extra head? The beaver was too tight for him Look! Spanking the monkey
Yet more sayings from work Read More »
Subterranean Press has asked me to create three dolls of the title character in Neil Gaiman’s Coraline, using the art of Dave McKean as my reference point. Mr. Gaiman and Mr. McKean will each receive one of these, and the third goes to a lucky customer who preorders Coraline direct from SubPress. To begin, I
Beginning to build Coraline Read More »
After ten days away, Rob is back from his trip to Oregon. He brought with him a container of fruit, tomatoes and a cucumber (thanks, -r-!) from -e-‘s garden. I have already eaten a plum.
Today I took my bike out for the first time in the city. First of all, I have to say, that my timing was amazingly stupid, because today was genuinely hot. A high of 92. For the most part I was in shade by the river, but still. It was hot. Hot. Hot, I tell