Year 3 of the 52-Week Illustration Challenge, Week 17

Week 17: Collector.

Matryoshka Batman. Freehand sketches of "Batman" characters (based on photos of my action figure collection) in brown Slick Writer permanent marker, coffee wash, gold Kindy Glitz and watercolour pencils on watercolour paper Matryoshka shapes, collaged onto a separate sheet of watercolour card.‬

Update:

Week 17: Collector II.

"Reverse Santa." Climbs out of the chimney with your treasured collections. Sketch in black Sharpie and watercolours on watercolour card.

Return of the 52-Week Illustration Challenge, Week 21

Week 21: Stripes

"Pinguins". Pinstripe tuxedo penguins, freehand-cut from photocopied pinstriped material, collaged onto a salted watercolour background, with handmade paper ice mounds, white Puffy paint eyes, and black finepoint Sharpie details. Adjusted to grey tones in Photo.

It actually felt like one of my simpler collages. Glad I went with photocopied fabric and not actual fabric, as I think the edges would have frayed. The sky was my second attempt at salting (didn't realise it had to be rock salt, but this time I raided my salt cellar and it worked quit well!) Turning the blue section to monochrome was actually an accident in my new Photo app, but I liked the effect. The original sky is a gentle blue.

Update:

Very excited that my "pinguins" (above) were reposted by the TOFOP gang, the Facebook page for Wil Anderson and Charlie Clausen's hilarious "Thirty-Odd Foot of Podcast"! (Charlie once revealed, in an early episode, that he couldn't say "pinguins", and it became a running gag.)

Week 21: Stripes II

Here's "The leopard who changed his spots". Freehand-cut tiger (from the patterned paper cover of an old sketch pad), decorated in black Sharpie and white UniPaint opaque markers, watercolours, and then collaged onto red handmade paper with some fur fabric remnants.

I finally glued down all the elements. I was so scared I'd wreck something! Sometimes collage has a mind of its own. I must say, S. John Ross, the late Silhouette Man of Luna Park Sydney, is my inspiration when I'm freehand cutting shapes out of paper. It's very empowering to create with only scissors - and no pencil guidelines or erasers!

Week 21: Stripes III

"Barber shop, Ann Arbor, Michigan". Watercolour with black and red Sharpie markers and white opaque Signo. I photographed this traditional, rotating, striped barber pole in winter, during a vacation to my penpal's home town in USA. Loved the row of outdoor chairs for waiting customers - rain, hail, sleet or snow.

On the eleventh day of Christmas

There has been considerable discussion on "the boards" (TrekBBS) lately, to debate Vulcan's controversial twin/sister/planetoid. We first saw the orange Vulcan sky during "Amok Time" in the 60s, but it was in the first episode aired, "The Man Trap", that Mr Spock revealed that "Vulcan has no moon, Miss Uhura." Uhura is "not surprised".

However, the Filmation background artists on "Star Trek: The Animated Series" (TAS in the 70s) did not notice a handwritten comment, "Remove moon", by DC Fontana on her sign-off of preliminary artwork for "Yesteryear" (above left, image from the View-master reels packet of the episode). Thus, Vulcan did get an orbitting planetoid - or perhaps, a sister/twin planet. When "Star Trek: The Motion Picture (TMP, (above right) was hurried into release in 1979, with the film barely dry enough to show on premiere night, the planetoid survived. (Only to be removed for a different interpretation of Vulcan's sky for TMP's "Director's Edition" DVD.)

Filmation's TAS wasn't removed from the official "Star Trek canon" until 1989, when the tie-in licences were renewed under tighter restrictions, and the licensees of the "Star Trek" novels, comics and roleplaying games (RPGs) were asked to refrain from referencing TAS. (That memo, of course, has slowly ceased to have influence since Roddenberry's death in 1991. See the many TAS references in other "Star Trek" tie-ins my webpage Toon Trek.)

"Spock's World", a hardcover ST novel by Diane Duane, came out with much publicity and critical acclaim in 1988. The planetoid was spelt T'Khut in "Spock's World", and also in "Voyager: Pathways" by Jeri Taylor, "The Worlds of the Federation" by Shane Johnson and "New Worlds, New Civilizations" by Michael Jan Friedman. The planetoid's name was given as T'Rukh in the hardcover novel, "Sarek", with an explanation from the author, AC Crispin, that the name changes are seasonal. (Like the names for the phases of Earth's moon, I guess.)

But - before all that - the planetoid had already appeared in another Pocket novel set on Vulcan, entitled "The Vulcan Academy Murders" (1984). Here it was called T'Kuht, and the author Jean Lorrah acknowledges fanfic identity Gordon Carleton for coining the planetoid's name, and his effort to explain its appearance in "Yesteryear" and TMP, and thus reconciling the old (canonical) TOS quote from "The Man Trap". Because, according to that old memo, if it's live action and its onscreen then its canonical.

Hope that clears it all up. Yes, it's four days into the New Year and I'm still mooning you.

Today's Christmas ornaments are:



Above left: For 1986, the wooden Santa Claus is riding in a hot-air balloon. A cool way to deliver presents to hard-to-visit places? This ornament was a gift from my mother, who, over the years, has been determined to undermine my "only two items per year" policy, and often tucks crafty ornaments into my Christmas gifts. The carolling penguins caught my eye while wandering through the now-defunct Waltons department store adjacent to Bankstown Square.

Above right: For 1985, the three white ceramic geese were quite expensive and came from Grace Bros., Roselands. Obviously these geese are half of the famous "Six geese a-laying..." from the song, "The Twelve Days of Christmas"? The wooden Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer was a gift from my friends Karen and Tim; a souvenir from their trip to Katoomba, in the Blue Mountains, the week of the premiere of "Star Trek III: The Search for Spock". Karen and another friend, Eric, took Tim (a Star Trek club member visiting from Perth) to do some touristy things when I was stuck at work.

Save the penguins

Okay, I already have way too many stuffed toys - and, indeed, even too many stuffed penguins - but this weekend I assisted one lone, frightened-looking, stuffed penguin from having a very rough Christmas this year.



The penguin toy is rather well made, but he's meant to be a dog's chew toy - the type my Jack Russell would have had mostly consumed by Christmas Day afternoon. The penguin's legs are made of the same cotton "rope" as other rope-pull toys; although they always look strong, and are meant to act like dental floss, Jack tends to just eat the rope, and pay for it for days and days, straining desperately in the yard to pass wads of multi-coloured cotton.

This sighting (of the penguin, that is, not Jack straining) occurred during a quick trip through the pet section of Big W, while supposedly helping a friend look for Christmas gifts. (He'll be too busy to do more shopping in the coming week). The only one who actually bought anything was me, and most of what I picked up was for Jack, anyway: a new ant-free dish at last (please don't tell Jack it's actually a cat bowl!), and various festive munchies, such as smoked pig's ears, for putting under the Christmas tree (if I ever get around to putting it up in time.)

What was of most concern regarding the poor penguin: the manufacturer had tied another length of the cotton "rope" around the penguin's neck! Other animals in the series had four limbs made of "rope", but to compensate for the penguin having tiny wings, incapable of flight, they put a noose around his neck. I mean, why not look like you're going to kill yourself when your whole purpose in life is literally "going to the dogs"? Such a great Christmas message!?



So I weakened - and, if I can manage to keep his delectably consumable legs out of harm's way, he now joins a flock consisting of Opus the Penguin (of "Bloom County" and "Outland" comic strip fame), a little Christmas penguin that I was given last year from a student, a wooden Christmas ornament of a family of penguin carollers, and a handmade felt penguin (at least 45 years old) which I'm still minding for my friend, Scott, who emigrated to England about 20 years ago.