The wonderful thing about the creative process is that one thing leads to another. After photographing the pants (see my previous post), my enthusiasm for making small sets was revived. I love miniatures. I collect miniature things. I've made miniatures for fun and with the intent of using them in photographs but for one reason or another, it just didn't work out. Getting the pants set up, lit, and photographed got my mind buzzing with ideas and the first thing I decided to try was.......
A tree. I pulled out a roll of steel wire, cut some lengths and started twisting. I twisted a trunk together, leaving loose ends for some massive roots that would stick out of the ground. The upper tree had loose wires that I shaped into branches and then added wires as I needed to shape everything. I headed to the craft store for some air drying clay to make the bark. It took a bit of work to actually form all the branches and shape the roots, then I I had to figure out how to make bark texture. After doing a bit of a search around the house, there was a plain old bic pen cap sitting right in front of me on the table that made a pretty darn nice pattern. Then it was a matter of letting the clay dry, painting, shading, highlighting and adding leaves.
Voila! My first tree! This is the beginning of a process - like I said, one thing leads to another. The swing needs a person so I am currently learning to sculpt clay so I can make a doll. I've already had "fails", and maybe it won't work for me; this is a stretch of my artistic abilities. But along the way I'm having fun exploring a new medium and a new skill. As Nicholas Meyer says, "Art doesn't just happen by accident. It is about pulling out new tricks and trying new things".