I added the fence around the boarder of the graveyard with toothpicks and black paint and put the digital illustrations into a small book with the obituaries.

Guy suggested that I build something to display the 3D characters, so I drew a sketch of a graveyard display and started building it.

I finished coloring the death scenes for my characters.

I made the sketches of the death scenes for my characters. I’m going to color them in Photoshop so they look the same as their portraits.

Guy suggested that I make the illustrations flatter, so I scanned them into Photoshop and colored them digitally.

After presenting my project at the review panel I decided to focus on 2D representations of what the characters looked like while they were alive.  I’m going to color the sketches I did of the characters when they were alive and illustrate their death scenes.

Ben asked that we answer some of these questions at the end of the semester, so here we are:

Restate your project goal in simple but concrete terms.

• I have made a series of skeleton characters to make a complete set of collectable designer toys.  The characters did not know each other in life and have all died at different time periods in different places, but they found each other in death because they had want of a family.

What is one inspiration for your project?

• I have always been interested in anatomy and had originally been accepted to the Univeristy of Connecticut for biology.  I remembered a skeleton model one of my science teachers in high school had that was stored in a locker.  I thought it would be fun to make toys inspired by that skeleton.

What is your project’s greatest success?

• The cohesiveness of the characters makes them so obviously part of a group, but they do still have distinctive features.  The coffins they come in also elevate them to a more complete package.

What is one shortcoming of your project?

• Originally I thought I had a whole year to do this project, so I signed up to do my Lang senior thesis (I’m a BAFA student) this semester.  I figured if the illustration project was a year long I would need more time in the spring to focus on completing it.  I did not find out we only had a semester to work on it until the semester already started.  Since I had to complete two senior theses in one semester I did not have as much time as I would have liked to focus on either of them.  I did end up with a complete project for this thesis, but some elements that I had wanted to put into it I did not have time for (putting the obituaries and portraits on the coffins).

What would you have done differently in light of the semester’s work?

• Though I do like my Sculpy-made characters, I think it might have been a more marketable idea to have made stuffed animals instead.  The Sculpy characters can only be interacted with by adults since they are a bit delicate and have small moving parts.  If I had made stuffed animals everything would be soft and safe for anyone to play with, even small children.

If you were going to continue with this project, what would be your next step?

• My next step would be putting the portraits and obituaries on the coffins.  If I had a lot more time I might even make a poster illustration to go along with it.  Maybe also make a stuffed animal version of one to see how those would have turned out.

Describe the potential audience for this work?

• The primary potential audience would be young adults ranging from eighteen to late twenties.

How would you share, or distribute, this project with an audience?

• My characters would fit right in at a comic book store or at a toy shop geared towards a more mature customer.

I have fully painted all of the coffins.  I have been having trouble getting the doors to stay on and open with the bigger coffins, but the little coffins seem to be fine.  I used super glue for the hinges.  I also superglued some flat plastic hooks to the tops of the insides of the coffins to hang the characters from.  Some of the skeletons had the metal loops at the top of their heads oriented the wrong way, but that was an easy fix (I was worried the wires would come out of their heads if I messed with them too much).  I hung all the skeletons in their coffins and they all fit perfectly except the dog.  He is a little too snug, but it still works well enough.

I have started painting and assembling my coffins.  I am using hot glue since the plywood is too thin for nails.  It’s coming together pretty well for the most part.  The extra glue spills off the sides a bit and dries, but I am cutting off the excess with an ulfa knife so you won’t be able to notice it when it’s fully painted.

I managed to book an appointment at the laser cutter (which isn’t easy this time of year)!  I’ve drawn up all the blueprints in Illustrator with 0.001 line strokes colored with 100% blue from the RBG color scale.  This way the laser will read it and know it has to cut through those places (if you use the wrong color it won’t set the laser’s power strong enough).  I went to my appointment and had a very easy time with everything.  I wish I had tried using this technology sooner.  It saves SO much time.  All of my pieces are cut and I will assemble them into coffins later.

coffin-1 coffin-2 coffin-3