Monday 2 March 2015

Amulet of the Frog Cult






A larp prop (/shiny thing) made as a present for a frog cultist (who also happens to play one). The original plan was just fimo and gold leaf, then I thought I'd add some tranbslucent blue fimo to make gems for the eyes. As I was doing that ~I remembered I had translucent green as well. The end result is less gem and more glistening slightly translucent...thing. Which seems appropriate for a mysterious item of eldritch power.








The King in Yellow

 This gilded statuette appeared in an auction in Paris, 1924 with unknown provenance. Since then it has passed between collections. The gold leaf is worn and partially corroded in places, indicating a low purity, but the black, clay-like substance beneath defies analyses. Of the owners of the item, many went on to become noted artists. Several have claimed the figure, and the unusual symbol on its mask served as inspiration in their work. A number of owners have also met untimely ends, often a result of self destructive qualities or apparent mental illness, leading to rumours that the object is cursed, however this does not appear to be statistically significant
  

So I got some gold and silver leaf a while back and figured I'd try some of it out, whilst also attempting a larger fimo project than the small things I'd done before. Getting the leaf into the various crevices was ridiculously difficult but fortunately helps make it look old and worn (especially with a black wash). Due to distractions there ended up being a week or so between the most of the leaf and the final touches, so in a couple of places there's a notable colour change between the older and newer gold - some bits even have a sort of mottled bronze effect.






I started with a tin foil core, and used a bit of florists wire to form the structure for the wings, then built up with fimo for the main body and added details for the cowl, tattered robe, tentacles, and coiled yellow sign on the face. Do wish I'd made the hood a lot thinner though, and possibl added more details to the wings.