Saturday, November 12, 2011

The Vault: Treebeard Shadowbox

Treebeard

This project took me ages!  I think it was about a year in total from sketch to completion.  I had a long post about this on my previous blog, and have finally built up the initiative to post the process again.  You can click on any of the thumbnails for a more detailed version.

First Step:  The Sketches and Digital Color Test

treebeard  treebeard background  Colors

Second Step: Mapping the Pieces and Painting Watercolor Swatches

To make sure that I constructed Treebeard correctly I had to map out all of the pieces, and then paint swatches for each of the mapped pieces.

IMG_2514  Swatches

Third Step: Cutting out the Pieces and Construction

To cut out the pieces I have to trace them from my “map” onto tracing paper, and then tape the tracing paper to my colored swatches.  It’s time consuming!

IMG_3766  IMG_3774  IMG_4242

Fourth Step: Building the Box and Placing Treebeard

I built the shadowbox with some lumber I bought at the hardware store, and painted it black.  The Treebeard figure had to be attached to a wire skeleton that I glued to the frame.  After gluing in the ground and Treebeard I attached the background.  Later I had the pieces on the outside of the frame laminated (so they wouldn’t be ruined if the box was splashed with water), and I super-glued them to the front of the frame.

IMG_4264  IMG_4273  IMG_4270

IMG_4279  IMG_4280

Ta da!

3 comments:

  1. Buddy this will continue to be one of my favorites!

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  2. No wonder this took ages its maddening! Love that you've shown the entire process. Inspired me to try my hand at cut outs too - maybe a simpler one for starters!

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    1. You should definitely give it a try. Judging by all of the origami folding in your blog, you already seem to have the pull toward paper.

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