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Tattoo Time!

Saturday, August 4th, 2018

I bought a few packs of these for 25 cents each:

Considering they’re from 1989, I’d say they didn’t retain value! The gum inside is of course inedible, but the tattoo sheets are fine and look like this:

(Yes I’d removed one…)

This is the old 1980s technology; where the tattoos are just food dye printed onto paper. Get them wet and they (are supposed to) transfer. Let’s try one:

Putting aside for now the fact I resemble a snuffleupagus in the photo, licking my hand to administer just enough moisture to apply the tattoo was a trip down memory lane to say the least! These sorts of things were common in our youth, and I particularly remember them being packaged on lolly/ice-cream wrappers. I’d always be putting them on myself, and I seem to recall having fun applying them to bread (!) and even ice-cream (!!) as well.

However… these didn’t work too well:

Maybe the ‘lick the hand’ technique was at fault? Let’s try water:

Yeah… terrible. I can’t imagine much would have happened to the tattoo in the intervening 30 years, but it’s hard to believe they were sold if they worked this poorly?

I will say though that they last a while! It’s been 12 hours now and they haven’t faded at all, and even survived several handwashings! Maybe these ancient tattoos were engineered for strength as opposed to beauty 🙂

I’ve got a couple of packs left if you want one. Let me know.

Posted in Art, Crafts, Retro | Comments Closed

We Did It Again

Wednesday, May 23rd, 2018

Remember the postcard contest from last year? We did it again! Basically the same rules, only now we were more about overall style than just cramming stickers on.

But then Bernard instantly said “rules-be-damned” and sent three cards as his entry! He didn’t reveal this, so it ended up being his three versus my one. I’ll present them here; you can judge for yourself who won…

Bernard’s three:

The Gudetama card! The simplicity belies the obvious time that went into the design and implementation.

A card that celebrates the diversity of marine life, endlessly circling a sleeping egg. Had Bernard named this, I think he would have called it ‘Albumen Depths‘.

And finally a card dedicated to Yeri from Red Velvet. Gude reclines on a rasher as he ponders the inclusion of the grapes in the central image.

Three cards therefore. A strong collective entry. But was it strong enough? Although I didn’t know the extent of my opposition, I humbly present my knockout entry:

I call this one ‘Planet Gudetama‘ and put my very soul into it. The letter placement! The sticker choices! The hours I spent creating it! This was my magnus opus, at least until the next contest!

Incidentally the Gudetama theme was coincidence. But Bernard and I have been on a ‘lazy egg’ bender for a while so it wasn’t surprising. After all anything is better with a Gudetama sticker!

So what do you think? Did I win?

Posted in Art, Family, Postcards | 2 Comments »

More Masterpieces

Sunday, May 13th, 2018

Most of you have received cards or postcards from me that feature my ‘unique’ art skills. Some of you have even responded in-kind, and it’s always a treat to see your talents on display. But I never expected I’d receive anything like these cards my friend JK has sent me these past six months:

That’s a pencil sketch! Santa Claus with my drink of choice (Mt Dew!) done in a classic style. Talent beyond my dreams.

This is a flabbergasting pen sketch of Yossie, based on this photo I had tweeted:

And then recently came this one:

Believe it or not this is a watercolour! A masterpiece created using $2 paints from Walmart and children’s brushes! I had actually bought the paints myself to try painting myself but my scribblings were as nothing compared to this!

Jessica thought I could do better though and I decided to try! I bought new paints ($4 this time) and a new brush ($2) and with a special piece of thick stock paper she provided set out to reproduce this classic:

It took a while, and pushed my abilities to their very limits, but I think I mostly succeeded:

Don’t you?

Jokes aside isn’t Jessica’s talent astonishing? I could only dream of the postcards you’d all be receiving if I even had a tenth of her skills 🙂

Posted in Art, Postcards | 1 Comment »

The Stamp Collector (Final Part)

Saturday, December 23rd, 2017

This series turned out longer and more work than anticipated but as we all know, all good things must come to an end.

The largest portion of my stamp ‘collection’ is still affixed to the hundreds of postcards I have stored together in a box. From all over the world and spanning over twenty years, these contain a fascinating selection of stamps and cancellations.

The New Zealand stamps on the postcards sent by Bernard were quite special and varied, but I also like the mini airmail stamp attached to the Swiss stamp and the (very unique!) Death Valley cancellation.

There’s those Star Wars stamps attached to a postcard I sent from Hawaii a decade ago. There’s the only postcard I ever received from Italy (and boring at that) followed by an example of my creative stamping from England.

Those were both from Oz last year, and you may have seen these on your cards? Australia seems to have doubled down on large and lavish animal stamps these past years, and I always seek them out to include them on postcards.

In fact I’ve got no problem whatsoever eating up large portions of the back of a postcard with lovely stamps…. like this:

Which is another specimen I sent KLS last year. I’ve done the above several times over the years, but this one may be my masterpiece!

One thing I’ve learned doing research for this series is that while collectors prefer stamps to be as pristine as possible, there are certain stamps that are more collectible if they had been used for postage. This is why I particularly like the ones attached to my postcards, since they were used to mail stuff to me!

In a few days I’m off to Australia again. This time, when you get your postcards, spare a moment to appreciate the stamps. It’s likely I put as much thought into them as I did the card itself or even what I wrote on it.

I hope you found this series interesting. I ended up much farther down the rabbit hole than I ever expected, and at times even I couldn’t see light, but I’m glad I’m out now and can move on with the usual topics 🙂

Posted in Art, Collecting, Miscellaneous, Otaku, Stamps | Comments Closed

Let’s Make A Jigsaw!

Thursday, October 19th, 2017

Kls received this for her birthday:

What’s this? A ‘gyutto size series’ puzzle? Here’s what was inside the box:

The pieces are small and plastic! They’re also transparent:

It’s a stained-glass puzzle! She waited no time before making it, starting (as everyone does) with the border:

Hmmm, a transparent puzzle in poor light against a black background? That made it more difficult! But she soldiered on:

And on…

Until a few hours later (over two days) it was done:

Well… nearly finished! Can you spot the missing piece?

Anyway we found the one that had got away and put it in place. It’s a pretty image, and here it is backlit:

If we were going to display it I suppose we’d want to do so with a light behind it. But for now, back into the box it goes, to be assembled again some day in the future 🙂

Posted in Art, Crafts, Puzzles | Comments Closed

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