Snow for Tiny Village scenes

I took a few minutes this afternoon to test out "snow" for a scene with the micro sized buildings. Obviously not a finished scene as it would need snow on the roofs and every thing properly leveled and lighted too. The snowy ground look is created with a product that used to be found at local pharmacies but now has to be ordered online. It is the very thin, bleached cotton that was used as padding around the edges of cast for broken bones. It comes in rolls and glitter will stick to it since the cotton has lots of tiny fibers making up the surface. The cotton can be layered, just pull off the straight edges so they are feathered and you can blend sections together. If also forms well for making mountain folds. Keywords to finding this product..."cotton roll cast padding". Sold for veterinary use as well as for people :) I think it gives a nice billowy look that is good for miniature scale scenes versus the much thicker quilt battings or Christmas tree skirting material. Plus it is an authentic vintage material that was used for creating such Christmas ornamental scenes. It will also hide the thin metal wires from the little LED light strings. I don't know if I will ever do a finished scene for myself as I have no safe place to store such things from year to year. But I do need to create a few for photography for marketing purposes.

Merry Christmas 2016

 "Micro Tiny Village Castle"© Karin Corbin 2016

Merry Christmas to all of you. There is a golden castle in my hand...this gift from me given to myself was getting this prototype done before Christmas arrived :) It really feels great to get it out of the virtual computer reality and into real life 3 dimensions. All sides of the castle including the inner courtyard sides have lots of details and a lot of great depth changes to the surfaces.

"Tiny Village and Castle" © Karin Corbin 2016

This is the larger sized version in the standard white color (my favorite look) shown with some buildings from the Tiny Village series.  The castle was designed to be used on it own or with the village buildings.

© Karin Corbin 2016

How big is it and what scale are they? Everyone always ask that!  Well castles are much bigger than a village house so it is not going to fit on a shelf in a dollhouse, you will have to put it on a table or on the floor of a child's room or next to a Christmas tree or use it on the shelf in your real house. In a 1:12 scale dollhouse the micro size is going to be the best look unless you are putting it into a 1:12 scale Castle. What scale is it? These items such as toy castles, glitter houses, Putz decorations, cardboard castles and such were not created in scale sizes, they were made in all kinds of sizes ranging from a few inches tall to a few feet high.

The size I settled on for micro was determined by experimenting with making them as small as I could make them and still have them be reliable for cutting and assembling. If I were to make the castle smaller or the village buildings smaller then I would have to start removing the smallest of the details. I like the details, that is what makes them rather magical and fun to look at and interesting to put together and the details I put into my micro tiny and standard tiny buildings elevates them above what others are providing to the marketplace.

I still have a few very minor adjustments to make before I start the process of creating the step by step, photographic illustrated directions for the assembly. Plus I need to order in the materials for packaging and then figure out what it will weigh for shipping.

Penciling it in

The micro size version of the 2016 Tiny Coastal Village. Now available in my Etsy store along with the larger size too.

Pupply onboard!

A new crew member signed onto the good ship Antelope yesterday evening. It's a baby boy standard poodle, color red. Smart as a whip. Brio (his name) learned the commands sit and (lie) down before bedtime and I mean he really has it nailed down for response time to get his bottom stuck down to the deck. This morning he added come and spin (in a circle) to his bag of tricks. You might wonder why teach him to spin right away. It is a great way to teach them to greet people. Puppies and even grown dogs need some way to release excitement when they meet people instead of indulging in the natural inclination to jump up on them. He will be a very large dog when full grown but at the moment he is still small enough to fit into my 15lb cat's harness and fleece sweater so those will serve as his baby clothes. He has not met the two cats yet.