It was officially a day of rest and quiet in the shop but sometimes that is the most enjoyable time to do a little puttering in the creative space. I did manage an hour of sculpting - just for fun. I decided to sculpt the head of the giraffe and made good progress. Tomorrow we'll do up the bulk of the rest and perhaps start the hippopotamus car too in order to make it a real train of substance.
Elephant calls
Every once in a while a project comes along that is so exciting it is hard to put down. The 'Mechanical Circus Train' is just such a project. It was a whole lot of fun to do the drawings with Peter egging me on to be ever more wild with the ideas. We decided there simply had to be a model and I didn't need a whole lot of encouragement. I built the routing files on Thursday and Friday... and finished routing two of the rail vehicles yesterday. I immediately had to assemble them and did a little sculpting yesterday. Today I resisted most of the day as I did other chores but just before supper I had to sneak out to the shop and do a little sculpting. The elephant train engine talked to me the loudest and so I began a little sculpting on that. I went back to the house for supper and then the elephant began calling once more... just a little... It was 9:30 pm the next time I looked at my watch and his head was pretty much done. I might have to go back out there tomorrow for a little more as I can hear him calling again...
All aboard for fun
While concept drawings are a very effective way to present ideas, dimensional models are even better. The customer can look at the idea from all angles and better visualize how it will fit into their park. A dimensional model also helps us work out the best way to build the full size project as well. We are working on a very fun idea for a customer right now. It is a series of small 'buildings' which will serve a variety of functions, from face painting, character meet and greet and small concession stands. Our idea was to build them as a 'mechanical circus' train. The cars are the animals. There are seven (or more) cars in all - each very colourful and unique. The drawings were a lot of fun to do but we decided to have a little more fun and build three of the cars as concept models. We'll show them in our booth at the International Association of Amusements Parks and Attractions EXPO in the fall as well. I first designed the routing files for the running gear and basic shapes. Then I hand sculpt the balance of the figures. We got a great start today.
