This is probably kinda what it looks like inside my head when I’m standing in line at Wal-Mart on a Friday night…without the F bombs.

       Did you happen to notice the new banner at the top of the page?  Kinda hard to miss I suppose. I added it a couple of weeks ago but I’m just now getting around to commenting on it.

       I liked the previous banner OK.  But it was never meant to be a long-term thing.  I’d originally composed it as a place-holder for the blog while I was learning Photoshop–until I could come up with something better.  Then a combination of laziness and “Hey, that looks pretty good” took over and it held that place for almost two years.

      The new banner image was something that percolated in the back of my mind for a long time.  I’ve always been a fan of the works of Gerry Anderson and movies like Coraline & The Fantastic Mr. Fox that use miniatures and miniature sets.  I really respect the work that goes into detailing those sets and I thought it would be cool to construct an actual miniature nerd cave and populate it with little bits and pieces reflecting my various scattered interests.

     As is my usual MO, I thought about it for a longggg time and then one day said, “Awwww, just do it already” (likely an effect of Operation Get Off Your Butt).  A trip to Hobby Lobby later and I had the materials I needed: A baloon (to use as a “form” for the actual cave), Plaster of Paris, some Woodland Scenics rock molds, Celluclay instant paper-mache, some landscaping materials, and some paint.  The project took me about a week–working on it for 30 minutes to an hour every night out in the Nerd Bunker. It was actually pretty fun.  Don’t get me wrong, I’d have rather been working on a kick-butt Warhammer 40K table but this was a nice diversion.  Here are some in-progress photos:

Some of my materials.

Waiting on the rock molds to set.

The rock molds are glued down and a layer of CelluClay is added.

Some paint and a sprinkling of dirt I collected in the parking lot of the local ballfield.

A typically nerdy backdrop for the cave–Unfortunately doesn’t show up in the final shot.

A test shot in the workshop.

My high-speed photo set-up. I should probably not quit my day job.

     Once I was done (and even before) I proceeded to do some test shots and it turned out to be more of a challenge than I expected.  My original concept was to shoot the pic in panoramic mode and then crop it to fit WordPress’ size requirement for a banner image. I wanted a ton of stuff (because I’m into a ton of stuff) streaming out of the cave towards the left of the frame. But, I’m no photographer (shocking, I know) and after quite a bit of time trying different tricks, I ended up having to shoot a closer up shot than I’d envisioned. Because of that, alot of the props I gathered and printed didn’t get used. There just wasn’t room.

     The good news is I still have the cave prop in my shop and as my photograpy skills increase (as they already have with my new eBay venture), maybe I’ll revisit the concept down the road and shoot a new one.  In the end, I’m pretty happy with the final result.   I’d like to think it’s a pretty original banner and reflects what this blog is all about.

     Thanks for stopping by and please leave a comment to let me know what you think of the new banner.  I’m sincerely curious if anybody but me thinks it’s cool. Until next time…Stay nerdy my friends.

Copyright 2014 It Came From The Nerd Cave