Limited Run Buddha Cthulhu

I finally have a few of these ready for sale as a Limited Run, they're for sale on Etsy for the moment. $35 each, limited run of only 30 for online sale. I have 3 ready to go, as well as a reject - you can view all this on Etsy.
https://www.etsy.com/listing/234557008/buddha-cthulhu

Buddha Cthulhu

Not really sure if I should call it a Cthulhu Buddha or a Buddha Cthulhu. Either way it's a little awesome.

I just have three for right now, I need to  redo the mould and then they'll be up for a limited online retail run of 50 at $35 each. 3 inches tall, cast in resin with a faux brass look and given a hard gloss coating to protect the finish. I might adjust the faux brass look with a base coat of brown rather than black. I tried a patina on it and wasn't really happy with it, it lightened it up too much.

 The three I have are currently for sale, I'll be posting them on Etsy, but you don't have to go through that site if you don't want to. Shipping is as low as $15 in Canada, 9 days or $18 for 3 days on average. $13 to the US, 6-10 days, other options are available though. And overseas $21, 6-10 days - on average.

https://www.etsy.com/listing/234557008/buddha-cthulhu?ref=shop_home_active_1

Albino Cyclops Faerie

Mounted Albino Cyclops Faerie head.

Made of latex and filled with polyfoam and a resin eyeball, the head measures 2 1/2 inches long and comes mounted on a stained plaque with mounting hardware attached. $27.50 +shipping.

A rare mutation of the Seer Faerie, a species with prophetic abilities. It's unclear whether the mutation is caused by a genetic disorder in the parents or something environmental that results in these unusually violent creatures.

While the Seer Faeries abilities are usually limited to minor visions of random future events, the Albino Cyclops Faerie's abilities are limited to only seeing the death of any number of random individuals - it's thought that the constant visions of death is what drives these creatures to madness.

It's also believed that if an Albino Cyclops Faeries prophesies your death, the fate can be avoided altogether by destroying the creature, possibly resulting in immortality.

The Witch's Jawbone prop finally for sale.

I started working on these awhile back and things just got really busy with the Halloween season so I had to put it aside, but it's finally done and ready for sale. It's a limited run of 5 for sale, although there's 1 prototype with resin nails that was given to a friend, and two more - one of which I'll be keeping for myself and the second will be held until I decide what I want to use it for, a prize for a contest or something. I don't know yet.

It's a full sized jawbone, moulded and cast in clay from a medical skeleton jawbone, I resculpted the clay jawbone to incorporate the nails and give a more distressed look. The clay jawbone was moulded for the final pieces, which were cast in resin, all hand painted and finally real antique steel nails were driven into it (there were hole already, but the nails are pretty firmly held in place)

The box is wood and glass (I didn't make it, it was purchased), I stained it myself though. The jaw rests inside on a bed of packing moss, with a Certificate of Authenticity underneath it, stating the number of the limited run each particular piece is.

 I haven't sorted out shipping costs yet, I'm planing on making them available for shipping by November 25th, I estimate $30 for US and Canadian orders, overseas will be pretty expensive I would imagine. Each one will have the jawbone wrapped in bubblewrap inside the display case, to prevent the nails from possibly cracking the glass in shipping. And the case itself will be padded and the package marked fragile. I also recommend a shipping method with insurance - it doesn't cost extra, but those methods are slightly more expensive in general.

And as for the cost on this piece, supposing you made it this far and you're still interested, is $75. To order, send me an email at themoneyrodeo@gmail.com, include your address so I can get you a shipping quote as quickly as possible, I will then send you an invoice through Paypal, or through email if you're in Canada and would rather use Email Interact.

And that's it. I'll be posting these on the website later this week as well as on Etsy.

Witch's Jawbone

This is one of those props I wanted to make as soon as I heard about it. I recall hearing about it a long time ago, before I made props and it just never resurfaced as an prop idea before until recently.

What makes this piece a little more creepy or weird than say a random Cthulhu statue, is that this is a real thing. It's something you could actually find - perhaps it wouldn't look exactly like this though.

The story behind it is that back when people used to hunt witches and do all manner of ridiculous, superstitious things, when a witch was killed - presumably when there was still a corpse, so probably through drowning - in order to prevent her (or I suppose him) from returning from the dead, spikes were driven through the body. There have been actual skeletons found with iron spikes driven into the bones. I thought this was just too bizarre to ignore, so I set upon creating a Witch's Jawbone.

I elaborated on the real version by supposing that if the iron spikes were to prevent the witch from returning from the dead, that they somehow locked her (or, still could be his) powers away inside their bones unable to escape or be used after death. So these Witch's Jawbones became a black market kind of item, used by either apprentice witches, wizards, warlocks and anyone dabbling in dark magic in their practices as a source of magic to enhance their own or as a magic catalyst in alchemy or supernatural devices.

I just happened to have a jawbone from a medical skeleton, so I cleaned up the seams as best I could, moulded that and cast it in clay so I could, rather than sculpt it from nothing, sculpt the damage and whatnot from the spikes and speed up the process a little bit. I was attempting to have this done last minute for a local Horror Festival, but I wasn't able to.

The sculpt turned out great. I was originally supposed to get a small supply of old blacksmithed nails, the squared off kind, but that never happened although I did get my hands on one. So I moulded and cast those in clay, altering each of the seven nails I'd use accordingly. I moulded and cast them in resin - which wasn't the best idea as they came out somewhat fragile, making this not a great idea for a limited run. I'd like the piece to be sturdy, not something you can't even handle without fear of breaking it.

But I kept going, and with very little time and even less supplies, I attempted to mould the jawbone. I did a miserable job of it and ran out of silicone halfway through so the mould itself was pitiful and probably wouldn't hold up to more than one casting. It didn't.

I managed to cast it and get it cleaned up, got the nails into the more or less right spots on the jawbone and I'm pretty happy with how it turned out, but I'll definitely be using real nails I think if I try this for a limited run. How limited will depend on how many nails I can get my hands on, I don't want to order online as it'll just jack the price up on the final piece big time, so I'm on the hunt locally for a batch of nails all produced together, I don't want random sizes, it just makes fitting them too much effort in the end and again would drive the cost up.

But I have a copy for myself for now and it sits on the shelf with all the other random stuff I've made over the years. This is definitely a display piece though that I'd really like to attempt a small, limited run of, boxed up just like this as well so it's something that has a little more of a completely finished display piece for wherever or even as set decoration for a movie or tv show.

UPDATE: if you made it this far and actually read everything - first off, congratulations - and secondly, I've sourced some real antique nails, possibly even iron, so I will within the next month be doing a very limited run of only 5 of these, case included as well. No idea of the pricing at this point though.

Norse Cthulhu Effigy

I realized I really liked simple, old, worn, kind of cruddy looking artifacts. Slightly broken, chipped and just generally used looking. Not only because it lends itself to my sometimes lazy and impatient sculpting skills, but because it tends to have an air of reality about the final pieces. That's not to say I don't care for or appreciate the hard work that goes into creating something finely detailed and pristine looking, it just all depends on the look you're going for I guess - but old and cruddy tends to be more authentic feeling.

I had already done a somewhat realistic piece of Cthulhu and even a crude Mayan Totem, and I liked the idea that perhaps other cultures had encountered Cthulhu and created their own concepts of him. It's been done before, so I don't make any claims to be it being an original idea, but it's a cool concept regardless.

I knew I wanted to make a small, more affordable item - although I'll admit it's been awhile since I've had to listen to people bitching about cost when they had no interest in buying anything in the first place - and a smaller piece as well. So what I ended up with was a Norse inspired Cthulhu effigy, I spent several days searching for examples of Norse art and found most of it was pretty simple and crude - and the rest was all modern versions and way too elaborate.

The back story of the effigy is that Vikings going on long sea journeys fearing an encounter with Cthulhu would carve these effigy that were kept on the ship as a sign of respect and would supposedly allow them to sail without fear of being destroyed by Cthulhu. I wanted it to look like it was carved in bone as well.

It's about 2" wide and 3" tall, made of resin, and while this isn't a solid plan yet, once it goes online I'm looking at $20 with a limited run of 30. Not sure exactly when it'll be on the website since I'm in the midst of updating it, but anyone interested can email me at foxhenderson @ themonkeyrodeo . com.

Brain Keychain and Zombie Head Magnet Combo

I made these a while ago and really never did much with them, I decided to give them a proper paint job, gloss them up and now I'm going to offer up some Zombie Head Magnets for sale as part of the Moonshine of the Damned Fund Raiser.

The Brain Keychain and Zombie Head Magnet combo is being sold for $15, only 10 sets are available. The Zombie Head Magnet is made of the same resin as the Brain and given a gloss coating as well, and the magnet is a pretty strong as well.

Or, you can just get yourself a Zombie Head Magnet by itself for $10 as well, there's only 20 being made. They're all hand painted and the dye for the resin is mixed by hand as well, so there's a bit of variety to the colours, but I'm trying to keep them as close as possible - you can see they're all various shades of greenish though.

As usual, payments can be made through Email Interact and add $0.50 per item if you're using Paypal. Shipping in Canada is $15 and in the US is $10 - at least it should be, I haven't shipped on yet but they're close in size to the Brains and will ship in the same sized padded envelope - so I'm hoping for the best.

You can email me brains@themonkeyrodeo.com if you'd like one.

Leprechaun Toe Earrings

I originally made the Leprechaun Toes as keychains, but I was worried about the durability of the silicone part of it holding up against the wear and tear of being in a purse or pocket and rubbing against the sharp edges of some keys, so I eventually went with this idea - Leprechaun Toe Earrings. Although I am still selling them as keychains, just with a warning.

Sure, they're odd, but that's the point. I felt some folks might like to show them off a little more than just having one on a keychain, what better way than dangling from your ears?

They're really lightweight, the silicone weighs next to nothing as does the resin center to which the hardware is attached. Since they're made of mostly silicone they're also quite soft and disturbingly squishy - much like you might imagine a real severed Leprechaun toe to be.

They're made to order, a single pair can take about 2 days - although I do usually make more than one pair at a time so you might luck out.

Shipping is decently cheap, I can ship them as a letter, for right now I'm assuming that I can ship worldwide for a flat rate of $5. You can order by emailing me at foxhenderson@themonkeyrodeo.com or you can head over to the website and see what else might interest you.

Lucky Leprechaun Toe

Need a little extra luck? How about a wee little Leprechaun Toe for only $10?

A little known fact about Leprechauns, there are many magical creatures whose magic comes from certain body parts, in the case of Leprechauns their power is contained with in one, sometimes both, of their big toes. And when a Leprechaun passes away, their bodies decompose into a bed of clover, their magically imbued toe becomes a 4 leaf clover - hence why they're so rare and considered lucky.

So you can imagine, it's not too easy to collect these, you have to wait to find a dead Leprechaun and hope you get to it before it begins to decompose and the digit loses its power.

Actually, it's a silicone sleeve over a resin nub into which the hardware is embedded and the silicone is bonded to. I was originally selling them as keychains, however I have doubts about the longevity of the silicone to stand up to the wear and tear of being rubbed against keys - however they can be used for whatever you want really, even a pendant. Earring versions will be coming soon!

They're pretty small and should be able to sent as a letter just fine, so shipping on these bad boys should be pretty cheap. If you're interested, you can contact me at foxhenderson@themonkeyrodeo.com.

"Thing in a Jar", the Complete Collection

With the completion of the 5th and final "thing", an Albino Bilifore Parasite, I'm offering up the "Thing in a Jar" props as a whole collection.

Here's the ugly little sucker before being sealed up in his jar. It's made from 2 layers of silicone, with small beads of Premo embedded between them for eyes. A layer of laxet that's been torn and distressed  finishes it off. The silicone is untinted for a semi-translucent look, the image below was taking during sunrise and gives it a sort of delicate deep fried look, it doesn't normally look like that.

Here he is all snug in his jar of simulated Giant Mountain Troll bile to keep him fresh.

Using silicone to make this and adding on 6 thin tendrils really gives it a creepy realistic look. A lot of other "things" like this I've seen online are usually hard, made of sculpy or latex, tend to be stiff, this method gives a very realistic movement when the jar is moved - wasn't sure if it'd work, but I'm pretty happy with the results. Here's a very quick video showing that off.

And finally, here they all are together. The smaller jars are $20 each, the two larger jars are $25. Normally in total they'd be $110, but I'm offering the whole collection up for only $95. One of the reasons, is because sometimes accidents happen in shipping no matter how well they're packed and the most used method with Canadapost offers $100 coverage - so there's some security in shipping at least. And I would, of course, recommend the faster methods - less handling means less likelihood of damage.

I might at some point create a "Collector's Edition" of this, probably only one or two will be available, but each will come in an antiqued wooden case in which they can be displayed. No idea when this will happen though.

"Things in Jars" again.

I thought I'd do up some images of the actual "Things" as they're not totally clear from the jar pictures, which is kind of the point, but from a selling point of view I think some folks might like to see what the "Things" look like.

Freeze Dried Two-Head Faerie

Haitian Bloodworm

Yeti Fetus

I've only made 8 of each for now, we'll see how well they sell and than they'll only be made in a limited quantity. They sell for $15 each, the jars a re pretty high quality 8oz. jars, all sealed shut and coated with wax. The liquid is just water with the smallest drop of acrylic paint to make it cloudy.

Dust Troll Redux

I started my first redesign of one of my older pieces, one of many. As I believe I started before, the reason behind this is just because some of my older pieces were never master moulded and the original moulds are long since gone, so I thought it seemed like a good time to update them - having not only seen what potential problems there were with them, but just because they were older pieces and I've improved a lot in the sculpting department since then.

First up was the Dust Troll, this is one I really wanted to redo. I really liked the design when I first made it but over time saw how many issues there were with it. It kinda lacked any character - plus the tusks were a pain in the ass. All future pieces with horns, tusks or spikes, will all be using the resin pieces instead of having them as one solid foam piece. Making sculpting, moulding and casting so much easier to do it this way.

Just letting the mould dry out after cleaning it for now and I'll be master moulding it tomorrow and hopefully doing a shoot with it this weekend. Really looking forward to seeing how it looks applied and painted up.