Blade-of-the-Moon's Art

[reinier zwanink]

HA
Good for football
ORANJE BOVEN

[mb-cg]

It's great to see all your progress, that's a lot of work. I think a blue coloration for the Pachycephalosaurus would look great, I used it in this illustration for my Stygimoloch 

[Blade-of-the-Moon]

lol maybe I should add some caution stripes? 
I may mix some orange into the final coloration..I also thought a blue or green design on his bald pate might look neat.

You know, a lot of birds see in Ultra violet, so you could probably get away with putting some hi-viz patterns onto the dome. Explain that budgerigars for instance, are a lot more colourful to their own kind than they are even to our eyes, because we can't see in UV. Has some educational value and a chance to do something different.

Exactly, I need the basic coloration to be similar to the Stygi but this possibly being older/different species but yeah some more color in a pattern on the head would be cool I think.

It's great to see all your progress, that's a lot of work. I think a blue coloration for the Pachycephalosaurus would look great, I used it in this illustration for my Stygimoloch 

I did a quick figure took around 6 hours a night for about 8 days so far..lol

Yeah I'm thinking more on the top of his head...if they weren't beating them together what reason would their be to reduce the horn size and increase the big bald spot? It would make a larger display surface for mature patterns is my guess.

[Newt]

Hi Blade,

My gf ran a successful Kickstarter campaign recently, so I'm pretty familiar with its inner workings. It seems like it might not be a good fit for you, since its really best for reproducible objects like books or cds. KS (and Indiegogo too, I think) is all about the rewards.

Patreon, from what I understand, is much different and possibly more useful for you. Patrons are supporting you because they want you to keep doing what you do, not necessarily because they will get a specific reward in return for their money. All you would have to do is keep updating your account with progress reports of what you're doing, just like you are here. You can set up your projects for either monthly payments - so if I pledge $10, I get charged that each month - or per project - I would be charged $10 each time you complete a dino or an exhibit, or whatever milestones you want to use.

Just some thoughts...

lol  okay take a breath!

I have others saying how Patreon isn't for us on FB..still looking for reviews by those that have tried it.  We don't have much to offer in the way of rewards is one thing I'm concerned with.

I haven't looked into indiegogo yet, though I have heard of it. We did try Kickstarter but there were account verification issues.  We do have a very similar GoFundMe page that hasn't helped us out much.

T-shirts are another thing that sounds cool on paper but when you get into sizes, color, ect..it's a huge hassle.  I did try to sell shirts to make money via a site called Booster. They sell and ship the shirts, we get a percentage. I didn't get one order for them from anybody.

[Blade-of-the-Moon]

I'll check it out and see again. I've been looking for more actual user reviews.  I do produce a product but it's the park and that's hard to share with those who aren't right here.

It's a bit of a struggle to keep adding new stuff , our electric and service bills also have to come out of what we get..this time of year it's worse.

I just placed an order with a local quarry for 10 tons of gravel to do paths in the Apatosaurus area and Terrors of the Deep exhibit. That's running about 300.00 with the haul bill added. So we need funds for a lot of things, not just building dinos unfortunately.

[Blade-of-the-Moon]

You can now find and review us on Yelp! : http://www.yelp.com/biz/backyard-terrors-dinosaur-park-bluff-city

[Blade-of-the-Moon]

Okay so I went ahead and made a Patreon account..anyone see anything I need to tweak on it ?

https://www.patreon.com/user?u=602575

[Kayakasaurus]

Okay so I went ahead and made a Patreon account..anyone see anything I need to tweak on it ?

https://www.patreon.com/user?u=602575

That's really neat! I haven't seen so many of your dinosaurs all in one place yet. They look great. The one thing I would mention from a video making perspective is that the video shows lots of shots framing the dino heads, but if you could take some full body shots emphasising the size of the dinosaurs that would be really neat. I think that is a big reason people are interested in dinosaurs because they are so BIG!

[Blade-of-the-Moon]

Okay so I went ahead and made a Patreon account..anyone see anything I need to tweak on it ?

https://www.patreon.com/user?u=602575

That's really neat! I haven't seen so many of your dinosaurs all in one place yet. They look great. The one thing I would mention from a video making perspective is that the video shows lots of shots framing the dino heads, but if you could take some full body shots emphasising the size of the dinosaurs that would be really neat. I think that is a big reason people are interested in dinosaurs because they are so BIG!

The commercial video was a gift from my brother, videographer for the Philly Orchestra. His reasoning was closeups make them seem so big they can't fit into the frames increasing the idea of size. At the time he shot it we didn't have the T-Rex, Trike or Apatosaurus either..our heavy hitters.  I do take a lot of pics some showing scale.  Our making of video might help :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=obDQkACloq4

[Blade-of-the-Moon]

Pachycephalosaurus head ready for paint, arm work

[triceratops83]

Lookin' good, and the spikes are a really good size.

[Blade-of-the-Moon]

Thanks man. I have the arms coated now and they're ready for attaching whenever I actually get around to getting the body ready...lol The eyes sort of follow me around the room..I must have nailed the position of them I guess. heh

Going to have to order some more eyes for the Nothronychus, Ceratosaurus and Edmontosaurus.

[Arul]

Great work 

[Blade-of-the-Moon]

Thanks bud!

[Meso-Cenozoic]

The Pachy head looks terrific! I also like the eyes you chose.

And good job on those two videos. The commercial is just as it should be -- short and sweet and to the point with lots of visuals. And the Patreon page it's on looks really nice too. Good choice of colors used. Has a subliminal JP feel about it, which I think will catch people's eyes.

The other "How We Build..." video I thought was very informative, but at the same time very down-to-earth and easy to follow. Good job!

[Blade-of-the-Moon]

The Pachy head looks terrific! I also like the eyes you chose.

And good job on those two videos. The commercial is just as it should be -- short and sweet and to the point with lots of visuals. And the Patreon page it's on looks really nice too. Good choice of colors used. Has a subliminal JP feel about it, which I think will catch people's eyes.

The other "How We Build..." video I thought was very informative, but at the same time very down-to-earth and easy to follow. Good job!

Thanks bud, I was lucky to have those eyes on the shelf just waiting for something to go in..lol Our "eye" benefactor ( who has purchased eyes for most of the creations here in the Park) gave me the go ahead tonight to order the ones for the Nothronychus, Ceratosaurus, and Edmontosaurus. So I should have those in soon.

My bro shot that commercial for us a couple years ago..I think it could use a little tweaking now to feature our T-Rex and Apatosaurus too. I don't know if that's the standard default for Patreon but the color works and I didn't pick it myself..lol Our whole Park is a bit JP influenced so that works too.

When I shoot a video it's usually pretty straightforward. I don't do much rehearsing..usually it's just winging it. lol

[Blade-of-the-Moon]

Ok guys I need a little help brainstorming here.

I was contacted by the marketing manager of one our local Malls and she is putting together a huge event that will encompass several upcoming months starting with March and ending in July.  The first is a traveling exhibit we've heard of before, T-REX Planet by the makers of Dinosaurs Unearthed, ect.. http://trexplanet.com/events/event-2/

She is also looking to get the movie theaters to show Jurassic Park, The Lost World and JP3 leading up to Jurassic World's release.

There will be a baby t-rex/ WWD similar costume event at the mall as well, the Gray Fossil Site, a local museum is doing a small fossil dig, make your own fossil and a dinosaur cornhole ( southern bean bag toss).  The Mall is doing a Scavenger Hunt with dinosaurs, a Reptile Race, where you follow the footprints between cardboard standups of dinosaurs ( from OrientalTrading.com), they will also have coloring sheets and puzzles.

Here's the deal, she wants us to particpate and get on board as well. I thought, GREAT! it would be wonderful advertising! " but having sat down and thought about it..and read what others are doing..I can't figure what we can do?  All of our 1:1 dinos will be here at the Park they aren't really mobile. We should have our mascot costume by then but what else? I have coloring sheets, but others doing those.  I need something that makes us standout.

I did a scavenger hunt last year where kids can take on the role of a small scavenger dino and try to I.D. what a predator in the Park ate by identifying a foam board cutout of a skull placed nearby. It's a neat concept..but I can't see it being made mobile.  I would like to do something interactive tackling the bird/dino connection but I don't know what.  Any ideas are welcome!

[triceratops83]

Sounds like a tough act, they seem to have covered the bases ie the fossil dig. You could use large cardboard cutouts of dinos for the kids to paint, maybe. Or make paper masks of herding, predatory and parental dinosaurs so that kids can learn the behaviours of different animals. Going back to colours, what about using birdlike dinos whose colours are supposedly known, and kids have match the feathers to the correct dinosaur? Is there any way that a tour of the Park itself could be organised?

[Blade-of-the-Moon]

Sounds like a tough act, they seem to have covered the bases ie the fossil dig. You could use large cardboard cutouts of dinos for the kids to paint, maybe. Or make paper masks of herding, predatory and parental dinosaurs so that kids can learn the behaviours of different animals. Going back to colours, what about using birdlike dinos whose colours are supposedly known, and kids have match the feathers to the correct dinosaur? Is there any way that a tour of the Park itself could be organised?

The organizer, Amy is getting a large mural the kids can paint apparently.  The whole idea is to use the event to advertise and get people to the Park. It's really rough...

I can order a large wood skeleton they can assemble?  I thought about maybe doing something on dinosaur niches. Some burrowed under ground so a small tunnel and box they can stick their heads out of like a burrow? Some like Microraptor could lived in trees so a simulated tree trunk? Spinosaurus was apparently adapted for living in the water..not sure how to pull that one off..maybe plexiglass?  It's all complicated and pricey to do though.   I don't know maybe we'll go simple and make maps for the park and coloring sheets to hand out and bring our mascot costume which we should have by then.

[triceratops83]

The skeleton idea should work out pretty cheap - just grab some sheets of pine or MDF board. The niche idea's good, maybe a kind of puppet show maybe? Or a set of dioramas, like an estuary, burrow, so forth and the kids have to place a dinosaur figure in the right one.

Another idea, how about a giant board game like those big snakes and ladders where you stand on the board/mat. Each kid is a different dinosaur and they have to get to their food/home. Some of the other players are carnivores and have to get the other kids.