Geek Crafts

Can one be a “non-practicing Whovian”? I think that’s what I am. I have seen a handful of episodes, and appreciate various Dr. Who references when I see them out and about, but must admit I don’t always get what I see in the shows. Maybe because I haven’t watched a whole season all the way through?

Practicing or not, I can still give mad props to young Oraicia, who painted her locker, and two of her friend’s, as a TARDIS (which, by the way, stands for “Time and Relative Dimension in Space“).

Here is how she described her project, which apparently was an art project for school (get to paint your locker for a grade?? Cool!!)

 The process of painting the locker was a bit lengthy. I first had to prime the locker, which left it in a nasty-looking shade of grey. It stayed this colour for much longer than I would have liked, due to the no-blue-paint issue. After I got the locker primed, I went on to sketch out the design. This involved a lot of measuring, in order to get proportions as close as possible, and to get the design to be symmetrical. When the design was sketched out, painting could commence. I taped the borders, so that the paint would only go where I wanted it. Each part of the locker required multiple layers of paint. Anywhere that was white took two layers. Blue areas took three; a light layer, a medium-toned layer, and a dark layer on top. Because I painted the layers on with a sponge, you could see some of the lighter layers through the darker surface layers. This was done in order to recreate the ‘wooden’ texture of the TARDIS.

I know there were several points in my high school career when I wished someone would just appear and whisk me away – maybe Oraicia created the ultimate “Get Out of High School Free” card with a few strokes of blue paint. If only I had known that’s all it took, I could have saved myself many embarrassing moments.

I also have to wonder if the lockers are bigger on the inside.

Links of Interest:

• Oraicia’s TARDIS locker project
• More Dr. Who crafts on GeekCrafts
• More TARDIS crafts on GeekCrafts

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Monday marks the first episode of the final season of a little show called Eureka. As some may or may not know, I watch an TON of SyFy. Eureka is one of my favorite shows on the channel. The fact that it’s ending has my heart breaking.

In an effort to find something to quell the ache in my heart, I turned to Etsy. I was a little saddened to see such little content on this beautiful show. That was until I came across agirlfrommars‘s shop. In my hour of need, I saw this beautiful and simple homage to my beloved show and couldn’t help but squee.

The Global Dynamic phone charm is perfect for those of us who like simple ways to show their geekiness (which from my posts, is pretty obvious I’m one of those people).  The small charm with the logo of the company where everything can go right (but usually goes wrong), keeps those of us devastated by the cancellation of this show satisfied in pretending that we were there.

• visit agirlfrommars on etsy
• buy Global Dynamic charm

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Developed in 1869 by the Russian chemist Dmitri Mendeleev to help illustrate commonalities in the various properties of elements, the Periodic Table has been both boon and bane to high school chemistry students around the world (my own experiences fell definitely to the “bane” side.)

Fast forward about 140 years, and we have a more modern version, and infinitely more useful, thanks to James the ComputerSherpa. In his first Visual Design class he came up with this little beauty – the Periodic Table of Storytelling.

James really did his research, turning to TVTropes.org for inspiration and information on “tropes” –  which TVTropes defines as “devices and conventions that a writer can reasonably rely on as being present in the audience members’ minds and expectations.” Writers (and Hollywood types) can use these fictional elements to craft endless variations of story lines. Being a wiki, TVTropes has vast quantities of information and discussion threads, so James’ graphical version of the Periodic Table is a real timesaver.

Beyond the concept as a whole, I love the examples at the bottom, illustrating how one might describe certain shows, movies, games, etc, using formulas based on this Periodic Table.  For instance, when you combine:

•  A Five-Man Band (5ma – made up of a Hero, Lancer, Smart Guy, Big Guy, and a Chick)
• Conflict (C)
• The Empire (Emp)
• Dragon-The Chosen One-You Have Failed Me (DraNeoFai)

…and you get Star Wars. Not sure about the “Dragon” element on this one, but then, I have mentioned my chemistry is not my super power.

James very kindly put the image up for purchase as a poster – it would be fun to sit around with a bunch of geeks and work out formulas for various shows and book storylines. Maybe I’ll have to get one for my son to take to college in the fall, for he will surely find himself a gang of geeks to hand out with, and I wouldn’t want them to run out of things to talk about.

[Via: BitRebels]

• The Periodic Table of Storytelling
• TVTropes.org
• More periodic table crafts on GeekCrafts (see also: periodic crafts)
• More science crafts on GeekCrafts

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Hello, all! It’s time for the Friday Roundup!

As part of this week’s post, I have a confession to make: I really enjoy reading what I call “stupid vampire novels.” The good ones are more in the “urban fantasy” genre, but a lot of them, to be honest, are best characterized as “paranormal romance.” (Let’s step back a minute and reflect on the fact that that’s a whole genre unto itself. Right? I know.) I’ve read all but one of the Sookie Stackhouse books (and watched a season or two of True Blood), all of the Anita Blake books, all of the Kitty Norville books (yeah, she’s a werewolf, but it counts), and, yes, that other series that I’ll leave unnamed. That other series could be its own roundup, I’m sure. This isn’t that roundup, though.

As much as I’d love to share some Kitty Norville crafts, there aren’t any (or, if there are, they are well hidden from Google)! I was shocked! We’ll all have to band together, as a Geek Crafts community, and remedy that. ;)

Happily, though, there’s a wealth of Sookie and Anita Blake craftery out there, and I’m here to bring you some of my favorites from Etsy.

First up, these very fun Sookie Stackhouse book cover earrings, by maryfaithpeace. It sounds like she puts a lot of work into these—there’s even “page ridge detail”! You can mix-and-match or buy two alike! I love it!

Next, a charm bracelet, admittedly based more on True Blood than on the books, by Creative Accessories. (Who, by the way, has a coupon code up right now—and offers a plethora of geeky jewelry. Nice!)

Here’s one for any ladies wanting to do some easy cosplay: a Merlotte’s waitress t-shirt, by Scarlett Fabric (also sporting a coupon code!). A couple of red marker dots and this shirt makes an easy Halloween/convention/costume party getup!

If you’re really into the costume, you might want to add another element: scent. Mannaia Frangrances has you covered, with “Bon Temps,” which she describes as “A dark, distinctively southern scent for the vampire, fairy, or fangbanger with taste. Includes notes of magnolia, sweet iced tea, wisteria, bougainvillea, and a good dose of peach.” I’m … kind of intrigued. It sounds nice.

The next one, I admit, I hesitated before deciding to post. I’m a little tired of the “Keep Calm and Carry On” thing—it’s a fun historical reference, but, for the time being, it’s probably been played out. I think. Then again, I laughed when I saw this pendant by Red Hot Kitten, and I would totally wear something like it. So maybe there’s a bit of play left in that meme.

Now, on to Anita Blake. Perhaps because she doesn’t have a TV show or a movie, there are fewer Blake-themed crafts out there. But she has a comic (there goes that paycheck), so crafters do have some imagery to work with. Here’s a card holder (ooh, a library card!) with an image straight from the comic, by Japip:

A different print from the comic appears on these earrings, by WenSi Shop. The guns dangling from the photos of Anita make it much easier to identify her, I think. ;)

Alternately, she could look more like the Anita Blake in this print by Tara Fortin—which I love, by the way:

And, finally, to leave you with something just a bit macabre, here is a necklace by Bottled Up Creations, featuring a “hand sculpted human heart” in a bottle, with a note saying “My heart belongs to Jean Claude ♥ [signed] Anita Blake.” This one kind of creeps me out. It probably wouldn’t be everyday wear for me. But Halloween? Oh yes. I would totally rock this necklace on Halloween!

A few of our past vampire-themed craft posts:

• Wooden Stake Earrings
• Vampire Rag Dolls
• Twilight Resin Necklace

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We’ve been watching a lot of The Big Bang Theory episodes lately, so I thought a roundup of Big Bang crafts might be fun. The Internets did not disappoint me.

Craftyclogs posted this great amigurumi crochet set of Big Bang Theory characters at Craftster – complete with patterns!

Doaflip posted this understated Big Bang Theory cross-stitch project on Craftster – an ode to Sheldon‘s Rock-Paper-Scissors-Lizard-Spock decision-making technique.

Another crazy-detailed needlework project – a flowchart of how Rock-Paper-Scissors-Lizard-Spock works. The crafter, mindboggld, took various pictures from the internet and imported them into Visio to create the chart. Clever girl, and extra geek points for using Visio! I would love to just get a poster print of this for my son! Click on the image above for close-ups!

Also from mindboggld, a set of Big Bang Theory tile coasters, with 3D molecule renderings she found at 3dchem.com. I love that it includes Lactose, since Leonard is lactose-intolerant. These were included in a swap with the above embroidery! I can’t believe she gave them away! Clever AND strong, that one!

A fun & cozy set of Big Bang Theory character plushies by cubosabio on Deviantart. As one of the project commentors said, “these rock more than Care Bears.”

I hadn’t heard the term “hako clones” before seeing this Big Bang Theory paper toys project – I guess I always referred to them in my head as “paper cube heads”. Perhaps hako clones has more (ba)zing(a) to it. Bonus: the artist ditch-scrawls posted the templates in his papercraft gallery. Be sure to link over there, because he has lots of other geeky hako templates, like Luke Skywalker, Superman, Army of Darkness Ash, Highlander, & Dr. Who.

While neither my son nor I are particularly crazy about Sheldon’s catch-phrase, I do like the simplicity of these “Bazinga” earrings by Just Duckie Designs on Etsy.

I’ve seen these photo clocks at Hobby Lobby & Archivers, but never would have thought of putting TV stills in the spaces, like this Sheldon clock by P.S. Francis. You could also intersperse pictures with character quotes. Might be kind of fun to have different clocks in each room, each highlighting a different show or movie. A Firefly clock, anyone?

So, all you BBT fans out there – what are some of your favorite quotes?

Links of Interest:

• Big Bang Theory amigurumi dolls by Craftyclogs
• Big Bang Theory “Stop Putting Up Spock” cross-stitch by Doaflip
• Big Bang Theory embroidered Rock-Paper-Scissors-Lizard-Spock flowchart by mindboggld
• Big Bang Theory tile coasters by mindboggld
• Big Bang Theory plushies by cubosabio
• Big Bang Theory hako clones by ditch-scrawls
• Bazinga earrings by Just Duckie Designs
• Sheldon clock by P.S. Francis

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As an avid Warehouse 13 fan, I’ve searched high and low for awesome Warehouse 13 crafts. The results are saddening.

However, I managed to come across this amazing Farnsworth necklace based off the communicators used by the agents of Warehouse 13. The Farnsworths, invented by Philo Farnsworth (inventor of the television), are a Warehouse exclusive. But now you can have your own, just hanging around your neck or pinned to your jacket.

Just be sure to answer when Artie calls.

• Buy Farnsworth Pendant/Pin
• Visit ugeekdesigns on Etsy.
• More TV crafts on GeekCrafts
• More Jewelry on GeekCrafts

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