Wednesday, November 26, 2008

Diorama

So I've been taking this class at the Y. I'm learning how to make museum dioramas! Here's my project.

I think the background painting is pretty good. I don't know, maybe it's too clean? Should I add a touch of...what? Poo? Trash? Air pollution? Something to mess it up, make it more real-looking?

The animals aren't quite right, I grant you that. I got the contours okay but their expressions are sorta stiff, not quite alive-looking. So yeah, I have to work on my taxidermy skills.

Suggestions?

20 comments:

USelaine said...

Yup. Reminds me of the Museum of Natural History alright. I wonder if you could get extra credit for working in a bubbling tar pit. Maybe some saber-teeth put on the critter in the foreground...

I hear mummy-dusting is another interesting workshop.

Dina said...

Really? *I* would sign up for mummy-dusting class.
Your diorama looks great to me, but then, I know little about art. I just now remember a traumatic incident in grade school. Each kid had to make a shoebox diorama about i forget what, but I didn't even know where to start.
So cool that there is a class for such things, and that you are taking it. Have fun!

VonRiesling said...

Tangent alert! Cropping on the dog's nose makes my spine tingle, but not in a good way.

Vanda said...

Do men on horses go with dioramas, or am I thinking of something else?

Jilly said...

gosh, I'm impressed Petrea! I love this. Almost a surrealist painting. I don't know how it works. Do you take a background and then add the dogs? If so, maybe turn the black dog around so he is facing the beautiful boxer? OR you need more distance - more space I should say - to the right of the black dog so they are both looking into the distance pondering the meaning of life - like where is the next bone coming from. I love it regardless.

Anonymous said...

A nice hobby but no dough. The display artist for the Autry Museum sits behind me in my Illustrator class.

John Sandel said...

I think one of them just blinked.

Susan C said...

I think you've been under the influence of PA.

Is your tongue in your cheek about the class at the Y?

Love this photo (or whatever it is).

John Sandel said...

Back for another look … I can't believe how realistic this is. The backdrop looks positively Pleistocene! I've had my browser open to your blog for almost 2 hours and neither specimen has so much as heaved a sigh … your preservative skills are impressive.

Anonymous said...

Cavemen! All shoebox dioramas need cavemen. Preferably with spears made of toothpicks and clay.

Some pine needles glued to the ground wouldn't go amiss, either.

A-. See me.

T Thompson said...

O_o

..wait a tic...

Anonymous said...

Stuffed or not, I bet they'll still eat.

Jane Hards Photography said...

I know of this medium, but I'm to much the purist photographer- spent to long in the profession. It's certainly intriguing and compels you to view in detail. Always interested in artforms of any description, will have to see more.

pasadenapio said...

I was invited to a doggie birthday party years ago in Eaton Canyon, where there were games (stupidist dog trick, downright dumbest dog, highest jump for a frisbee, etc.) I brought my two dogs and they had a wonderful time. The party favors were inspired!

Petrea Burchard said...

I didn't really put it up to fool you. I didn't think anyone would bite. It's an unaltered photo. Boz and Sprocket were staring at something. The light was amazing that day. To me it looked like a museum diorama.

Not everyone bit. VonRiesling caught the fault in the photo that made me hesitate to post it: I missed the tip of Sprocket's nose! Hey, VR: have you made the whole Route 66 trip? I've always wanted to.

I like Pasadena PIO's method of avoiding the subject altogether. A doggie birthday party is an excellent idea.

John Sandel said...

Still no motion from the primordial pooches.
Can it be they're fixated on an approaching glacier?
Have they spotted a faroff line of mastodons, trekking across the muskeg?
Or maybe their Cro-Magnon master summons them to scraps with a bone whistle …?
It's as if, deep in their kapok innards, they sense the creak of eons passing, as they pose, perfectly lit, in their airless vitrine … 'til late at night, some museum staffer in a smock grumbles through the diorama and touches a feather duster to one silicone schnoz …

Laurie Allee said...

What a marvelous capture. It really does look like a diorama! I remember actually trying to make one for my 6th grade science class. You know -- shoebox, little cotton balls, popcycle sticks. NOw I know what was missing... DOGS!

Tash said...

Ha-ha-ha-ha!
Once I stop laughing I might have some suggest... he-he...

USelaine said...

BK - It's the tar pits. They're watching the wooly mammoth sinking down, down, down...

Petrea Burchard said...

Elaine, today I was reminded of your comment about putting saber-teeth on Boz. I think the reason dogs have developed these nice, compact muzzles instead of big teeth is so they can Hoover the floor around the table at Thanksgiving dinner.