Week 14 (13 Oct - 19 Oct 2002)
Giant starfish
The chill salt breeze blew through the grizzled bard's thin hair. He'd never much cared for the sea, but the equally grizzled ship's captain was proving a source of great stories of adventure in exotic locales. Still, there was at least one story he hadn't heard.
The bard turned to the captain and pointed at the hook and pegleg finishing out the sea dog's right hand and leg. "How did you lose your limbs?"
The old sea dog shuddered, and his eyes stared glassily into the distance. A few moments of silence passed.
"A shark?" the bard prompted quietly. "A whale?"
The captain shuddered again and spoke in a low and rusty voice.
"A creature more fearsome than either of those, more dangerous than many a sea monster. A beast so vile, sailors hardly dare name it. It was. . . it was a giant starfish."
This is another original sculpt. . . and for good reason, I suppose. I'm not sure a giant starfish is first on the list of people planning undersea mini adventures. (I'm not sure anyone plans undersea mini adventures, but let's assume for the moment that it's because there are so few minis available.) Plenty of possibilities exist, though. Like surprise -- nobody expects a starfish to be deadly. Unless you've got a mini for it. . . darn.
I used green stuff over a 1" washer. I didn't use an armature for him, as he's from what I like to call my Flat Period. I started out with a leftover lump of putty and a bare washer. Struck by inspiration, I formed a sort of organic pentagon thing, and very gradually added everything else, starting with the arms one at a time. I was worried about keeping proportions more or less right, but that turned out OK. I layered one of the arms over another to try and keep things a little less static, but the angle it's scanned at above makes it look as though it's wiping its brow.
I decided he needed some undersea items to give him the proper feel, so I added in a broken harpoon head and some sunken treasure. The coins are particularly clumsy -- I used a couple methods (poking out the coin shapes, sculpting each individual coin) recommended on 1listsculpting, but I need more practice. The sand is a thin layer of green stuff poked repeatedly with straight pins.
Any advice on texturing this little guy would be quite welcome. Maybe a line of little spines on his back, or some random lumps?
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