Sorta...

Sometimes you have to take success where it comes. I've been feeling better this week (possibly due to change in diet). "Repaired" my comforter cover once again by hemming it short over the tear. Done this so many times I've already had to add a strip of fabric to extend it again. Well, this time it got so short I was "short-sheeted" all night -- and it was a cold night, too. So enough of that. Checked out a few websites and there was a Japanese bedding store convenient from my work with a good deal.

Which as it turned out I'd read wrong, and I spent more than I expected -- combination of having already had the thing brought back to the counter, not wanting to waste the drive (or go through another cold night) and not a little impostor syndrome. And sure I was thinking about sewing my own but to get one this good I'd spend close to a hundred on fabric and at least six hours on sewing. Which if you counted as opportunity cost would be more than what I spent (but you can't really do that -- it isn't as if there's six hours of hourly work at the same base rate just waiting around for me to fit it in).

So when all is said and done...mission accomplished. Just not in the way I set out to do it.



Which is often the way it goes. Take my latest prop project. The vacuum former machine is broke, and won't be fixed this year. Why am I paying membership to this place, again? So a re-think. I'm still flirting with either laser engraving or CNC wood routing, but right now the idea that offers the best in capture of surface detail, lightweight yet sufficiently robust/rigid, and ease of duplication (I might be making as many as twelve bridge segments) is casting in Smooth-Cast 300 plastic. Might cast around some styrene or aluminium stiffeners, or even metal if I chose to go with magnets to hold all the parts together.

I haven't figured out yet how best to interlock the pieces, and how to mold the resultant. I'm okay with slush-cast molds but still inexperienced at block molds (which might make it good reason to do it this way). And one other detail I'm fairly sure of; I'm going to do the actual casting at work instead of smelling up my kitchen with it.

So I've got a pile of basswood and similar now, and once I've solved the dimensional adjustments the foam-core mock-up showed me I needed, it is off with the traditional tools (aka x-acto and sandpaper) and try to put some nice detail into the masters. Need to seal the surface of the wood pretty good -- might just skin everything with Bondo so I can put a basic texture on the surface. And oh, yes -- I'm pretty much out of Apoxie Sculpt as well.

At least as of the moment, the only part TechShop will play in this prop now is potentially 3d-printing some fluted columns.