Movies

Lifted from Silmaril. The top 100 highest-grossing movies of all times; the ones I've seen bold; the ones we own but I haven't seen yet (*) added; the ones I guess I should see/have an interest in seeing in italic.

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Art Project Update

Another update in my little art project. For assorted reasons, my using a 'make your own model horse kit' for making a carousel horse was put on the back burner. I did get some ideas on what I wanted and do some sketches (which are now somewhere really safe ... *sigh*) but hadn't really moved on.

So, I've been feeling the creative urge and finally just took some time to work with it. The kit I am using is one of the older ones (I got several for the proverbial song) where the body is a single rod wrapped in wire (the modern ones have a cylinder for the body). The legs are attached to the body and are also rods wrapped in wire.

The directions tell you to take the clay (sculpy I think) and mash it around then put balls of it onto the armature to get the rough look.

Riiight


The first thing I did was try to guesstimate where the legs would exit the real body of the horse and position them. This yielded my first set of learnings: 1) pliers are good, needlenose pliers are good, one of each is better. 2) Get a real good idea of where you want things before moving them ... the wire raps will come off (and feel like staples when you sit on them) ... the rod will also fracture if you mess with it too much.

So, I started working the sculpy and learned that the stuff is amazingly stiff and leaves an interesting texture on your hands. I also was not pleased with how it stuck together as I added more balls of sculpy to the armature. Lessons learned: 1) Go ahead and prime all the sculpy at once ... repriming is MUCH faster than priming and lets you get the rough together in a cohesive fashion. 2) you really want to get the rough together on certain parts fairly early and solid. The stuff does not stick to the armiture unless it is encasing said armature. 3) If you really need to move a leg/tail/whatever, it is possible to get all the clay off if it is still soft.

So, I got the rough of the horse done in one evening (last Wednesday I think). I quickly decided that 1) the head was too big, 2) the body was too lightweight, 3) the legs and neck were too big, 4) I was REALLY low on sculpy.

Long about Thursday, I was going to work on it some more and start getting more of the details done. I had gotten a very nice set of elbows on him, an OK set of hocks, some cute hooves. I took more sculpy and added to the body, shoved some of it around (it was still pretty pliable) and got out the tool that the kit came with to try to get some more detailing in. The directions said for the eyes to use the rounded end and push up (or something like that). Ummm, riiight. Not a good look. I tried a small ball of sculpy put on the face ... not right either. The head was too large, when I tried to slim it down, the armature kept peaking through the clay (new lesson learned, be VERY sure of the head size/shape with armature before starting ... I was NOT going to undo everything). Eventually, I got him looking pretty good (for a rank beginner, NOT good for someone who has the first clue of what they are doing). And having shaved sculpy off the legs and neck, voila! I have enough to do some other stuff, so I made him a saddle (way too patchwork for my tastes) and some basic trappings.

Next step (maybe tonight), is to tool some designs into the trappings. I think I lost (or never had) one of the tools for detailing because looking at the slots in the kit, there is a slot that nothing quite fits.

Later steps will be doing some more refining/detailing (maybe use a toothpick for some of it?), then bake it, and paint it. Maybe get some pix in its current form and other stages. I sort of wish I had taken pictures of some of the earlier steps.

Weekend Update - 1

I am deliberately splitting this into 2 entries.

Friday night, I got home and played some Roller Coaster Tycoon. I like that game. Then, Java came home and he put WoW on the downstairs machine and signed me up for the 10 day free trial (carefully timed to give me 2 weekends to play with it). He made arraingements with terlan to play with us on Saturday as a group. So, we created a couple of characters (using the upstairs computer to let me look at options while the downstairs one was downloading patches ... DSL is cool). So, with a couple of dwarves, off we went.

Playing together is rather interesting. At first, I could not tell what in the world he was doing at times (and I am sure vice versa) but after awhile we got into a groove that allowed us to work together fairly well. We have different classes of people which probably helps.

Sat. morning, I called the barn to make arrangements, then I did some stuff towards vacation before waking him up (I went to bed late, but he was up even later). Eventually, we got ourselves sorted out (finished most of the vacation arrangements), and contacted Terlan. Then we were all three in the game. Terlan has 3rd class of critter but we were all about the same level and off we went.

Working together was really cool at times and frustrating at times. Unfortunately, Java got dumped off the server so we were left guarding him until he vaporized. Terlan got called away from the computer a couple of times with little warning and Deathfest2005 commenced (it is NOT good to be 3 level 8s in a cave full of level 8-10 critters, some of which are spell casters. 3 deaths later, we finally all got out of the cave. Phew!).

Unfortunately, we didn't really start until mid-afternoon which made going to the birthday party that night not a real option.

Sunday was go barn (more in another entry), then I played a little WoW (human this time got to level 4). Then we went to have dinner with Java's parents. We got home latish but were only there for about 5 minutes when the phone rang and it was his mother, laughing hysterically. You see, we had procured 3 little gifts for her and snuck them into the spare bathroom figuring she wouldn't find them for a few days ... as it turned out, she had to go in there that night ... turned around ... saw the brightly colored, sparkly, stuffed cuddly fish grinning at her and started howling with laughter.

She says that she would know who had done it even if we hadn't been there that night. Only we are that crazy (she also has pictures in there that Java dropped off for her). Giggle

Weekend Update Part II - I worked Echo

Peter has been working with Echo for a month or so and arrangements were made for me to GoBarn on Sunday at noon.

I got Echo from the field (A took Pooh in) and got her mostly cleaned up and tacked up. I didn't get all the (wet) mud off her hooves and pasterns ... I also didn't get the shavings out of her tail. I was roundly scolded for this so next time, the ShowSheen will be applied as soon as I get the beastie.

She is being quite good about getting her feet done ... now we need to work on 'down' so that I can put the boots on ... it is MUCH easier to get them on correctly when the leg is down and still.

Once I thought she was ready, Peter checked my work and adjusted 2 things (noseband was still a little too lose and he didn't want the reins through the throatlatch but through the stirrups). The reason the reins go through one or the other is so that they can stay on the bridle but not fall where the horse can step on or through them.

Off we went to the ring and he started having her work at the trot. After she was warmed up, on went the sidereins and I could see how much better she moved with them on. I was paying a lot of attention to the commands he was using and he pointed out what he was looking for from her. When she is moving too fast, she pulls herself along with her forelegs instead of pushing from her hind legs, she also will move her rump out or sometimes have her inside hind land outside the inside fore. When she is moving correctly and using her body properly, the hinds will be on the same track as the fores and will be landing close to the print (or overlap or full overstep), the weight carrying phase will be when the leg is under the body (not behind it) and the withers will come slightly higher than her rump. This is WORK.

After working her some both ways, he swapped her around to her 'good' side, looked at me and said "Here the keys". So, I went and got the line and the whip and sent her out to do her work. He stressed to me that I must NEVER let her run on the line (even running at the trot) because that is how she could really hurt herself and doesn't do a thing for her training. Slowing her down will help her balance herself and give her time to stay out of her own way.

Things that I need to do/remember:
1) I don't need to preceed the command with her name, it will only confuse her ... this will be the hardest thing for me to remember. I'm used to thinking that you use the animal's name to get their attention and tell them that you are talking to them and not someone else. Peter says that she will need to listen to whomever is on the line and only that person. She does listen to me on the line but if he says a command, she follows it.
2) "Slower" is the slow down command. Slow sounds too much like Whoa
3) She knows walk and trot. However, telling her to walk tells her what she will be doing next but does not tell her to execute the command. Walk, ho will get her to do it.
4) If she runs, tell her slower, if she ignores me, a slight wiggle on the line will probably be enough. If I get too harsh with the line, she isn't going to react well.
5) Raising the hand closest to the head means speed up ... this is going to be the 2nd hardest thing for me because with Dancer, I taught her that the hand near the head up meant slow down and the hand near the rump up meant speed up.
6) Tails must be clean
7) Riding boots are NOT good for walking Echo out after a work.

The problem with riding boots (even the short ones) is that they are designed for having your foot level or better yet with the heel lower than the ball of the foot. When you are walking at full extension, your calves get an impressive amount of stretch if you can't pick your heel up before picking up the ball of your foot.

Peter said I did good. Dede said I did good. They both said (and I agree) that Echo went splendidly for me.

WOOT