Cthulhu Idol Build

The bases are coming out great. I was really worried about this aspect as I had little experience at "pretty" woodwork before this.


I think a few posts back I showed a big pile of parts that had been cut with my tablesaw.


Those parts were then glued together.


I then picked up a benchtop belt sander give all the faces a nicer finish that the tablesaw left it. I was super happy with how well it worked. Sanding apparently is the secret weapon of woodworking.

I then stained and sealed them with a gloss polyurethane sealer.



Then felt samples are cut and set in.



I think I like the dark red best. Classy and austere without looking like a pool table.

It's coming together! nicely.

every part of this thing is just beautiful

Wait till you see the secret item for the set that I'm finally revealing tonight! Mwa ha ha ha!

it better be how much this thing costs, and when we can buy it, or im gonna have a stroke and die from old age! YOUR KILLIN ME HERE!

It's cool seeing things which have been plans looking so real and crisply put together. I hope I can afford one (*gulp*) but I am really excited for you that you are approaching the finish line with this project.

I imagine your run will be snatched up quickfast. It's looking exceptional, man.

And I keep saying "Cthulhu doesn't have sweet biceps." That's never stopped being hilarious to me.

Awesome!

Those biceps are sweet in all their hideous glory, lol! :cool

heiro5 said:

It's cool seeing things which have been plans looking so real and crisply put together. I hope I can afford one (*gulp*) but I am really excited for you that you are approaching the finish line with this project.

I imagine your run will be snatched up quickfast. It's looking exceptional, man.

And I keep saying "Cthulhu doesn't have sweet biceps." That's never stopped being hilarious to me.

Click to expand...

Will you be including little brass plaques on the bases? I will be excited to get one of these into my grubby little mitts, but also sad to see the process at it's completion at the same time!

Glorious.

Yea, I'm really worried I'm not gonna be able to afford this thing

I think I'm gonna pass on the brass plaque. I was never satisfied with any of the text blocks I came with, and could never find a premade plaque in the size and style I wanted for the price I wanted to hit.

In the end a clean base just looked more austere and bold too.

So? What's the secret!?!

Screw the secret what's the price? :lol

Chris

Okay, here's the last bit.

Lovecraft wasn't a well read author when he was alive. It was only decades later that the importance of his work was realized and as such most of his writings were only published in pulp magazines that are now crumbling to pieces today.

I'm a lover of old books and it has always irritated me that I could never own a nice old collection of Lovecraft stories publish in the time period they were written in. I love the way books from 1900-1950 look and feel and have a big collection of my favorite stories. I'm especially fond of the Edgar Rice Burroughs and Jack London's books from this period in publishing. Classic, pulpy adventure tales published in the popular hardcover style of the day.

Behold my geeky collection!




Once this statue project got going I decided it was the perfect chance to finally design and illustrate my own copy of The Call of Cthulhu in the style and format of a 20-30's hardback novel.

Here is the final product of that work!











I closely studied my favorite examples from my collection and have tried to replicate the page formatting, title treatments and typefaces that would best fit this story size and style. It was actually really tricky trying to identify an available font that fit the style I really wanted. With the wide old school outer margins and the 11 new illustrations the short story comes to a sizable 66 pages of material!

Here is the final book along side it's ancestors.




I sadly didn't take many pics of the artwork being made but here are a photos of the original pencil drawings and development artwork for the cover.





















And this is the only "in progress" shot I took during the illustration process.





For the more pedestrian images I tried to evoke an Edward Hopper and Sidney Paget feel and tried to draw from NC Wyeth on the more adventurous scenes. At the end of the day you are always a slave to your own style however so it's still mostly me. The illustrations were done fairly quickly and at a small size to keep a little energy to the images and to keep my wife sane. She's ready to see this project finished too.

Again I know it's not specifically prop related but it's cool to bring this story to life in another way that doesn't require large amounts of resin and paint. I hope you guys enjoy this as much as I do.

Ohhhh lordy. Spectacular.

OMG! Prop or not, thus is the very essence of the rpf! A true labor of love. Breath taking! I just watched the recent film (another labor of love!) and so this really hits home. These projects are so similar in spirit; are the folks at the HPLHS aware of this?

Can we buy a copy?

The book will be included with the statue but I hadn't thought about selling them seperately. I didn't think there'd be interest honestly. The book has a stapled binding and is only about a quarter of an inch thick so it wouldn't make great shelf porn just yet. As of right now, it'll be a cool companion piece to the statue.

I mainly like the idea of having the statue in one hand and the actual story it's from in the other and wanted that experience to be part of the whole Cthulhu Idol package. A unified vision of something that was never illustrated in it's time.

That and the fact that none of the current Lovecraft reprints feel "perfect" to me. The common Del Rey three volume collection have cheesy (although classic) 80's style covers with so-so illustrations inside. The Barnes and Nobles hardcover Lovecraft book is gorgeously designed it is also giant and heavy. The pages are super thin and wispy feeling in your hand and the text is a bit small. That is a result of trying to collect the complete works of Lovecraft into one huge volume. It's a cool object but not fun to read.

My book has a nice supple creamy off-white paper stock and is lightweight!

However, in an ideal world I'd love to eventually illustrate ALL the stories and collect them all in a multi volume collection and perhaps make more objects to go along with each of the major stories but first things first ya know.

Fun to think about though.

What an incredible project! I am in awe!

Thanks, man! Honestly, I'm pretty proud of how it's all shaping up. I've learned so many new skills that going through this process alone has been priceless.

Even learned new stuff with the book! I've avoided learning Adobe InDesign for years. As an illustrator, I'm usually just sending off files to an editor who has his own staff who puts a book together. Having learned the basics of Quark Express years and years ago in college, it's fun to finally relearn some newer publishing software.

I'd say to expect a junkyard thread in the next day or two. I'll be sure to post here when that happens. Everything is just about lined up and figured out!

Excellent! PayPal account is ready!

That's incredible work, well worth the wait!

Have you thought about offering the book as a kit, so that people could print it out and then bind up their own book? I'd love to make my own one with an aged looking leather cover.