Sculptures from Artist Sketches
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Client: Michael Christian Mission: Collaborate with Michael to make some cool sculptures
Services: Design of all the "frames", 3D modeling of his sketches, material recommendations, fabrication services
Our friend, Michael Christian, a well-known local artist, approached us with an idea to produce some small, more affordable pieces for a more down-to-earth art opening he was having.
Typically, Michael makes huge metal pieces that look like this:
But he wanted to make a series of smaller pieces that didn't require a crane to put up! After meeting over what was easily possible via our CNC table and workflow, the idea emerged to do these 'portraits' of characters based upon his rather surreal ideas. Michael then produced some small hand sketches with smooth shading and nice highlights.
These sketches were scanned into Photoshop, where they were touched up, and then were brought into Blender. There they were used to produce nice 3D models driectly from the sketches. This was quick and easy, taking very little time and producing great results.
Those 3D models were then carved out via our CNC table.
And then Michael sanded and sculpted the figures further, and then hand-painted each figure.
We designed the frames for him and cut them out of the same soft, easily sanded material.
The "portraits" were then glued into their frames and the whole pieces were painted.
And here are the final pieces, twelve in all, hung in the space.
Each piece was affordable, for the workflow of pencil sketch to CNC was quick, and now Michael can produce more in different runs of colors, sizes, frames, and finishes too.
This was a very collaborative project. We really love working with other creative folks to produce interesting things. Think of what we could make with you!
