Captain Haddock En Route

Despite evidence to the contrary, I don't generally go for collectables. I've never bought an action figure as an adult and the few bits of Lego dotted around my studio are my favourite sets from when I was a kid rather than pricey AFOL bait.

Saying that, I did pick up this beauty of a Captain Haddock statue from Tojo in Glasgow. I had spotted him when I was Christmas shopping and couldn't justify spending money on myself at the time. Luckily there were still a couple in stock today and my Santa-cash burned a hole right through my pocket.

Oddly enough, I don't know much about Tintin. I remember that I found the TV series kinda boring as a kid and I know that the comics got a little un-PC from time to time. I also saw the Spielberg version which was fine. Creepy, but fine. Beyond that, not much.

Hergé's character design, though, is beautiful. Haddock in particular is timelessly cool-looking (that pullover!) and this little statue of his iconic, pissed-off stride is about as perfect a translation to three-dimensions as you can get. As an object, it's a lovely thing and it looks better in person than my photo makes out.

I guess buying a Tintin figure without having read Tintin is daft so I'm gonna give the comics a shot. Any tips on where to start (or what to avoid) would be great.

You can buy Captain Haddock for £21 from Tojo in Glasgow (in Merchant City if you live nearby) or from the official Tintin shop. The Tintin in a kilt statue is pretty cool too.

Studio Stuff

I've been taking pictures of odds-and-ends around my studio for a while and putting them on Instagram. Now that I've got 16 of them, I can make a 4x4 grid and put that on Instagram. The photos are a bit inconsistent when viewed together. That's fine, I wasn't planning anything like this when I started.

Since this is a blog, and since I feel like it, I'll talk about the objects in more detail:

1. Charlie Brown figure - I found this in Forbidden Planet on Buchanan St. years ago. He's a comforting presence and will likely follow me everywhere. (seems to be the Great Pumpkin version)

2. Goblins - I was big into Games Workshop when I was 10 and I periodically paint miniatures to see if I still can. These goblins are from Black Scorpion. I had planned to paint a full Blood Bowl team but got bored halfway through.

3. Glass duck thing - Came from my mum and dad's attic. I remember this lying about the house when I was little. No idea. I keep badges in it these days.

4. Aberfeldy 'Ramble' Whisky - I designed the label for this limited edition bottle of Aberfeldy in 2013. One of the coolest things I've done. They occasionally pop up at auctions for a nice price. The whisky gets good reviews too.

5. Lump o' Tarmac - I nicked this piece of the old Stirling skatepark when it was being rebuilt a few years back. I wrote a thing about it at the time. Loved that place.

6. Captain Red Beard - My most favourite Lego minifigure ever from my second most favourite Lego set*, the Dark Shark**. The feather isn't an official part of his get-up, but it gives him some flare.

7. Silent Monitor - My mum brought me this back from New Lanark. It's a wooden block that mill superintendents would use to report on the performance of workers. Black for bad, yellow for good etc.

8. Turtles Plaque My gran gave me this when I was mad into the Turtles. She was great at keeping an eye out for things I'd like. She once bought me a massive slab of wax because she knew I used it for skateboarding.

9. Argos Team Badge - I worked in Argos for years. The most common item sold during my time there was 875/7049 (Stirling was a student town, figured the clothes rails were for moving in to new digs). Never once wore this badge.

10. Orcs - Converted these from a set of Warhammer Black Orcs for the aforementioned Blood Bowl Team. Pleased with the wee numbers I added to their shoulder pads.

11. Christmas Lego - My mum bought me the pretty spiffy Lego advent calendar. You'd get a different scene each day. This only comes out in December, obvs.

12. Lego Santa - Despite appearing 4 times on this list, I'm not that into Lego. I've rebuilt a couple of my old sets and dug out some of my favourite minifigs but I don't buy new sets or anything. This Santa (again from the advent calendar) is dope though.

13. Lego iPhone Dock Probably don't need to write any more about this.

14. Moses? - Just guessing, I've no idea who he is. No idea where he came from either. Cool wee thing. Shame about the broken staff.

15. Fingers Crossed (mini) - Awesome handmade hand by my mate Jen's Bolden Ceramics. A birthday gift from Alex. So cool I gave it its own shelf.

16. Petit Cyclist - Another birthday gift from Alex. Spotted in a shop window in the Merchant City (forget the name, will update if I remember). It reminded me of Bretodeau’s box.

I've tons more junk lying around that I'll likely share. Follow me on Instagram if that's your bag. I try to put some effort into it and I'm quite proud of some of my photos.

* My favourite being 6066-1.
** More commonly known as the Black Seas Barracuda (the US name).

Lego iPhone Dock

There's a cable situation on my desk. I'll not go into the full extent of it now*, but I reckon I can fix some the problems with Lego. This Mother's Day, I filled a biscuit tin with grey and white bricks from my childhood stash when I was home visiting.

My first project was to build a dock for my iPhone. Nothing fancy, just something I could easily sit my phone in to let it charge while I'm working.

Building a structure to hold a phone isn't difficult, but keeping the stupid Lightning cable in place is a bit of a fiddle. Like lots of things from Apple, it's tiny, smooth and featureless - not the easiest when your materials are also tiny, smooth and featureless. No cheating with cable-ties or paper clips or any of that nonsense either.

Nailed it.

Voila! My patented cable-holder. It works like a charm. The connector can't push down because of the little clasps, it can't pull out because the grey pegs lock the cable in place, and it can't rotate because it's held tight by part 4590**.

As an added bonus, the wee peg system forced me to leave the front of the dock open to save space. I think the exposed cable looks neat.

The rest of the dock is less inspired, but it'll do for now. I've jazzed it up with grass and flowers (and a parrot), but when I get over the novelty, I'll likely strip things back to a simple white block that matches my desk.

Hey look, I'm writing this post.

To take strain off of the Lightning connector, the phone fits snugly in a trench between the flat grey plates. The whole thing is also tilted slightly by a couple of 'feet' at the front so the backboard takes some of the weight. When I have another go I'll try to make the phone sit at more of an angle.

Some niggles:

1. I'd like to lose 1 brick's worth of height. This might not be possible because of the size of the Lightning connector, but I think a flatter dock would look better.

2. The front is a little busy because I used a ton of flat white bricks to hold my cable-holder together. I bet I could simplify this with another go.

3. I need more flat plates for the top. I know I've got tons of these back home but I forgot to bring them with me. Right now I'm compromising by filling the gaps at the back with four studs and they drive me insane.

4. As most of this Lego is 20+ years old, it's a little grubby. The white bricks in particular don't look great (they've yellowed - some worse than others). I guess I could buy more or rebuild in grey or black or something.

5. After Googling for 'Lego iPhone dock' I found this. It's similar to my dock (but nicer) and it makes me jealous. Mine'll be prettier when I've got a better selection of bricks.

Writing 600 words on this stupid thing is maybe a little much, but I'm trying to break a spell of writer's block so even if nobody reads this, I feel better for having written it. If you did read this, um, thanks.

Next up... USB cables.

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* ...but I might later.

** Brick 4590 took a long time to identify for writing this post. How the hell do you Google for a specific, weirdly shaped Lego brick? You Google for 'LEGO Plate 1 x 4 Offset', that's what you Google for.

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UPDATE ON 18th Nov 2015: I've discovered that someone made a .lxf file (a digital version of a LEGO construction) for my iPhone dock that's more-or-less accurate. Cheers momijis200, whoever you are.

Go: view / download the file on the LEGO Digital Designer page if you want to build your own.

Paolo Rivera's Studio

The bold Elph shared this a few days back and I've watched it a couple of times since. Part 1 and part 2 are on YouTube.

Comic books are not something I'm too clued up on, so I have to confess my ignorance - I had no idea who Paolo Rivera was before watching this video. More fool me. Dang he's an amazing artist. Seems like a good dude too.

As someone who can spend 60+ hours working on a painting, Rivera has shaped his workspace to be super efficient. His pens, pencils and erasers all stick to his drawing board with magnets, he's made a wire doodad for keeping his brushes off the table (totally stealing that one) and his one-handed brush wringer is beautiful. He also shows off a bunch of nifty tools and techniques.

Being mindful of stuff you do over-and-over when you're working, even the stupid stuff, can be useful. It took me months of awkwardly stretching for the just-out-of-reach volume dial on my radio before realising that if it was, like, right beside my computer, I wouldn't give myself a hernia every time I watch a YouTube video (and I watch a lot of YouTube videos). It didn't make me better at drawing, but it made day a little easier.

The 3-part Making of "The Twelve" Cover with Paolo Rivera series by the same folks is worth a nerd out on too. His process is fascinating. There's a surprising amount of tech going into a fairly small gouache painting, but it's all there to help him make the image he wants to make. Rivera's workflow, like his studio, has been refined by doing his job over-and-over again.