Teddy Talk: Creating, Collecting, Connecting

  Oh, Right Jodi!
The squirrel gets a Guinness and I don't! Just as well, at this point I'd probably be just as squirrelly as the squirrel with a Guinness, my body is so wrecked 
Karen

  :doh:  *warning-colorful language.....
HAPPY WHAT?!?
2 feet of new snow with a crust on top! My back is broken from shoveling the 100 feet back to my studio! We're not supposed to get this much snow this close to SPring 
My youngest (cat) tried working with me. His back legs kept breaking through the crust and the underneath snow is very soft so he'd fall hard. I finally noticed he stopped rolled over and was checking his nether regions. Apparently, all the breaking through the snow froze his unmentionables   
Karen
Any one have some Guinness they can send over?

OK
I have to add here that I was a kid when I worked with that show  :P
Oh, I could tell such stories  ! It was a fun group. The set used for the stop motion photography was in NYC, the village. We used to go out to eat after working and tell stories......
Jodi,
That cake is wonderful :bday:  :clap:  What a cool mom    Candyland? Now that's my early childhood?! Where did you find that?

Jodi, thanks!
That brings back some of the few good memories I have of working with companies. Paul Rubens was so great to artists. He really let us use our creative skills and wasn't afraid of the unusual    The hardest thing about Pterri was creating the mechanism to make the wings flap?! Dummy me, I kept all the design sketches and patterns but I never kept a prototype.
Karen

Wow, Cool!
I'd love to be thought of as a pirate. Johnny Depp here I come  :crackup:
Karen

I've been watching some of my favorite artists on ebay and before they stopped listing bidders, I watched who bid just to see the patterns. I was really surprised! There wasn't actually a pattern. Each artist at the end of their auction had, maybe, 3-4 bidders vying for their piece. And the biggest surprise was that each of these artists had a different 3-4 bidders! I had always assumed that collectors would spread their bids for the best chance of winning. I now know that's pretty naive. Collectors follow certain artists. The problem with this is that if several of these collectors stop buying and you are not able to catch the eye of new collectors I imagine you would see a quick drop in sales, at least that is what would happen in my case    I'm going on that assumption. As what has been said here,  it's a good idea to try different ways of reaching new collectors.
Good Luck! to us all....
Karen
KJ Lyons Design

Daphne,
The reason you didn't get credit in the movie and probably why your name is not even mentioned along with the movie is because they are being very careful so as not to be sued for royalties. They are going to make a fortune off the spin-off toys and products. I worked for many years as a freelance designer for toy companies and they are always asking designers to sign away any rights to their designs. I don't necessarily think this is bad, I just would like artists to realize what they're signing away and have them receive fair compensation for their work. That doesn't always happen with artists who are new to the freelance design field. I would always quote, in writing, the cost of a prototype with an hourly fee for any changes. Most of the time I made more from the changes then I did from the original prototype. In large companies many people want to say they had a hand in the design and get some credit, hence, many changes. Most of the changes were dropped by the end of the design process but I got my fair payment for my time. And I guess I did alright, I still get calls all the time from large toy companies with design jobs. The work can pay well but you have to have nerves of steel and the patience of a Saint 
DAPHNE, you must have both 
Karen

Thanks Maria,
I was at the TED's about 5 years ago. It was a wonderful show! Weisbaden is such a beautiful town    I hope the show does not make a down-turn like a lot of the larger shows, lately?!
Karen

  Jodi and Eliza,
Come-on over! I'm making 8 kitten "play pirate" costumes and 4 real cat pirate costumes. It's fun! Like Tom Sawyer with painting the picket fence 
Karen

Hello!
I like to keep my cat and kitten bellies as soft & smooth as possible. I put the beads in a doll or infant athletic/fluffy cotton sock and tie or sew it closed. then I place it in the belly and as I close the belly opening I "catch" the sock in the stitches to keep it in place and prevent it from sliding down between the back legs.
Karen

Heather,
I didn't drape a live cat but I did measure every inch of my cat's face with a ruler when I was creating the sculpture; eyeballs, nose, between the eyes.....To this day if I even look in the direction of one of my cats with a ruler they RUN!
Karen
P.S. It's amazing how different each cat is when you do all the measurement. This might help you create a portrait of your cat if you don't mind being snubbed for quite a while 

Ellen,
I use Roma Plastalina, medium to hard, depending on the piece. It's really just an ugly dark green or grey version of kid's non-hardening clay. Although it's non-hardening it's tough enough for your sculpture to last just about forever as long as it's not banged around. It costs about $10.00 for 2 lbs. and you can find it online in any site selling sculpture supplies. In a pinch you can use children's clay but it's a little too soft for a sturdy model.  The sculpture in the photo is a fired clay. I just happened to be taking a sculpture class and used it to create a model (Notice the hollow eyes, kind of spooky!) Plastalina is better suited to modeling for soft sculpture.
Side note* Do you remember the Breyer realistic plastic horses and animals? Those and many other realistic toys are designed by artists using Plastalina (the hard version so they can carve the musculature).
Karen

Just a tip about the sculpture.....If you want it to be life size (the size of your teddy bear head), you can use crumpled aluminum foil as the center to help save on the amount of clay you need.

Tracy,
I've always loved your bears. This one is just WONDEFUL!
Karen

Hello! again.....
It's hard to put into words, but I'm going to try to explain a few things about draping. First, there is no right way to do draping. Every artist I have met who uses this technique has a slightly different way of accomplishing it. It, also, depends on how complex your subject is. Of course I chose a very difficult animal, the cat, and my cat head has 12 pieces  What makes a piece difficult is how many twists and turns a piece contains. An animal like the cat has a lot of negative spaces (parts of the head/face that curve in and need sharp darts or a whole separate piece)

1) Your clay sculpture does not have to be detailed like the one I show above. A simple basic head shape is all you need with maybe a slight mark where the eyes and ears will be placed. Make it a size you are comfortable with, you can shrink or enlarge the pattern pieces when you're ready to do a test. It's very interesting to see how a 2d drawing translates into a 3d model  :pray:

2)This is the point where you have to decide which basic pattern type you want to use? It's usually best to start with a pattern you're familiar with. You're just using this as a guide to how many pieces you're going to trace off of the sculpture. Some artists actually draw lines on the clay sculpture showing the pattern pieces.

3) I then take tracing paper. You can use any light flexible paper. I prefer paper because you can flatten it out and trace a pattern from it more easily than from a fabric. Now here's the tricky part and the reason it takes about 3 prototypes to get your shape; you are going to lay the flat paper pieces over the sculpture and create small folds where there are sharp curves. These folds will be your darts/gussets. Certain pieces like a center nose or back of head will curve slightly but as with most teddy bear patterns, no dart is necessary. If the curve is radical; example the side of my cat's nose, a simple dart won't work. I had to cut a separate piece making my original pattern plan more complex.

4) Now you can lay the tracing paper pieces on some card stock and try your first pattern. REmember the symmetry thing with the paired pieces (unless you're creating an asymmetric pattern) I like to sew the darts/gussets in the pieces first and match them to my clay head (if it's to size) and make sure they are the right shape. Then I'll do the same thing as I add more pieces, matching it to my sculpture. Be patient! It does take several tries no matter how careful you are

OK, I know I don't do designs like most teddy bear artists but I have found over the years the only way to quickly create a 3d head is to do a 3d sketch. Meaning creating a head out of clay. Even if it's small, you can use it for the pattern and just use math to create a larger head. In my former life I used to create toys to go with cartoon/animated movies. I quickly found that 2d sketches are difficult to translate into 3d. Sometimes what the artist has created in 2d was physically impossible to translate into 3d  :doh: As long as you know basic pattern construction with a simple clay shape it usually only takes three prototypes for even a difficult design.
Karen
P.S. I always use fur for prototypes.

OK,
How about a Sugar Glider? Australians? They're called arboreal marsupials and are nocturnal.
Karen

Dilu,
I was just kidding. It really looks like your Golly is protecting her teddy from the big cat 
Karen

:crackup:  Dilu, This is how our Face Book photos appear. It's strictly in alphabetical order so it's not Mindy's idea.....

Didn't you tell your Golly that she should look straight ahead while she was in the face book instead of looking into other squares? 
Karen and the nervous Maine Coon Cat 

:hug: SueAnn
I just love that cat! You can tell she is listening to the notes not just playing with the keys. I love the way she tilts her head to feel the sound vibration. I remember seeing some famous pianist that would do that while they were playing 
Karen

  Oh Yes, Shane
Actually I'm pretty good at setting myself up with impossible tasks but by the time I get to the show I am talking incoherently, forgetting how to dress (once went to an awards show with my dress unzipped), and generally removing all doubt about me being the CraZy cat lady  
Karen

Shane and Steve!
You're making me look like a loafer  Cindy's been asking me all year about doing TBAI and I keep telling her I can't do a show the size of Washington EXPO and also do TBAI. I wish I could handle both! TBAI is so much fun!
Karen
P.S. I also love the cardboard box idea. At the end of a show I just leave the boxes and can usually pack everything up into one rolling luggage bag. I'm out in 10 minutes :dance:

Wow, Bobbie!
I don't understand? I always think of what a collector has paid for a piece and what I would expect if I were that collector? I am very careful about shipping; first I wrap the face in special tissue, than I wrap the whole piece in layers of bubble-wrap. I use a box that is at least twice the size of the piece and throughly cushion that piece with paper and tissue so there is no way it can be damaged even if the box is, basically, crushed It is such a small price to pay for the goodwill of a collector?!
Karen

Penny,
Actually, the Hemingway cats have fared better than Hemingway, himself    Their descendants are cared for and live on in the Hemingway Estate in Key West, Florida. They are famous for having 6 or more toes. I have always found Siamese cats interesting, not just for their personalities but because I was able to swing a trip to Thailand(Siam) and Siamese cats are alley cats there! Most have no owners but are fed by Buddhist monks at their temples. At these temples you can see so many variations of the Siamese who are, really, feral cats?!
Karen

Shelli, you're great. Keeping us out of trouble 
Karen