This is the first of two carousels I've built for my flea circus. There were two things wrong with it: first, the animals are backwards relative to the direction the flags are flying, and second, the needle bearing I made for it is pretty poor and has a little more friction than I wanted. I rebuilt it with the animals corrected and a metal lamp finial as the pivot point for the needle bearing, and it spins quite nicely.
An ongoing diary of miniatures I've built, as well as links to inspiring scale models.
Saturday, March 3, 2018
Flea Circus Update #01 -- Strongman Pulls Down a Statue
I'm building a flea circus, updating some of the techniques documented in Walt Noon's excellent DVD tutorial, and I think I've come up with a unique strongman act, inspired by fairly recent events in the news. I'm going to have one of the fleas pull down a statue.
Here's how I see it playing out when I perform: I take out the statue, and explain that he's the former ringmaster of the circus, who was terrible and all the fleas hated him. I'll wave it around a bit, so the audience will get the idea that the statue and the plinth are all one piece. Then I'll place him on the floor of the circus, and loop a bit of rope around his neck, and give the opposite end of the rope to the strongman flea. He'll then begin tugging, and he'll pull the statue off the plinth.
Here's the first prototype...
The base for this is a larger spool, painted with a faux marble finish. The figure is from a "Series of Unfortunate Events" board game, and I thought he looked passably like a circus ringmaster. He's painted with a bronze/copper mix, and given a thin wash of turquoise for the patina. TThe whole setup stands about 4" tall.
I thought about using a Confederate general, but it was more expensive to find just one of those toys than I anticipated. Anyway, the right audience members will understand the implication that this guy represents a Confederate statue.
I've built quite a few components of the circus now, and all that's left is assembly, training the fleas, and building some of the hidden mechanisms to help them do their stunts.
More to follow...
Here's how I see it playing out when I perform: I take out the statue, and explain that he's the former ringmaster of the circus, who was terrible and all the fleas hated him. I'll wave it around a bit, so the audience will get the idea that the statue and the plinth are all one piece. Then I'll place him on the floor of the circus, and loop a bit of rope around his neck, and give the opposite end of the rope to the strongman flea. He'll then begin tugging, and he'll pull the statue off the plinth.
Here's the first prototype...
He's Mr. Green from a Clue set. I've inserted a thumbtack in the base, and hidden a small magnet at the top of the spool. That way, I can hold him upside down, and he'll still stay attached to the plinth. Then I attached a stronger magnet to the bottom of the plinth, so I can set him down on the floor of the circus, and he'll stay put because I've either hidden a metal washer or another magnet under the floor. I'll help the flea tug on the rope with some trickery hidden under the floor.
Once I'd tested to make sure my proof-of-concept miniature worked the way I wanted it to, I built the final statue.
The base for this is a larger spool, painted with a faux marble finish. The figure is from a "Series of Unfortunate Events" board game, and I thought he looked passably like a circus ringmaster. He's painted with a bronze/copper mix, and given a thin wash of turquoise for the patina. TThe whole setup stands about 4" tall.
I thought about using a Confederate general, but it was more expensive to find just one of those toys than I anticipated. Anyway, the right audience members will understand the implication that this guy represents a Confederate statue.
I've built quite a few components of the circus now, and all that's left is assembly, training the fleas, and building some of the hidden mechanisms to help them do their stunts.
More to follow...