Farà uns quatre anys, el New Yorker publicà un article sobre una partida d'ossos de dodo trobada en una fossa a l'illa Maurici. Doncs bé, l'illa Maurici és una illa petita situada a la costa est de Madagascar a l'oceà Índic, i és el lloc on el dodo va ser descobert, i també extingit, tot en uns 150 anys. Tothom es va engrescar amb aquesta descoberta arqueològica, perquè suposava que finalment seria possible reunir l'esquelet complet d'un dodo.
About four years ago, the New Yorker published an article about a cache of dodo bones that was found in a pit on the island of Mauritius. Now, the island of Mauritius is a small island off the east coast of Madagascar in the Indian Ocean, and it is the place where the dodo bird was discovered and extinguished, all within about 150 years. Everyone was very excited about this archaeological find, because it meant that they might finally be able to assemble a single dodo skeleton.
Veureu, mentre museus de tot arreu del món tenen esquelets de dodo en les seues col·leccions, cap ni un -- ni tan sols el Museu d'Història Natural de l'illa de Maurici -- té un esquelet compost pels ossos d'un mateix dodo. Bé, açò no és exactament veritat. De fet, el Museu Britànic sí tenia un espècimen de dodo en la seua col·lecció just fins allà el segle divuit -- de fet el tenien momificat, conservant la pell i tot -- però en un cop de cel i per estalviar espai, li tallaren el cap i les potes, i cremaren la resta del cos en una foguera. Si mireu a la seua pàgina web avui veureu que tenen llistat aquests espècimens, dient que la resta es perdé en un incendi.
See, while museums all over the world have dodo skeletons in their collection, nobody -- not even the actual Natural History Museum on the island of Mauritius -- has a skeleton that's made from the bones of a single dodo. Well, this isn't exactly true. The fact is, is that the British Museum had a complete specimen of a dodo in their collection up until the 18th century -- it was actually mummified, skin and all -- but in a fit of space-saving zeal, they actually cut off the head and they cut off the feet and they burned the rest in a bonfire. If you go look at their website today, they'll actually list these specimens, saying, the rest was lost in a fire.
No és exactament la vertadera història. Deixem-ho estar. A la portada de l'article estava aquesta foto, i jo sóc un d'aquells que creuen que Tina Brown estigué molt encertada duent les fotos al New Yorker, perquè just aquesta foto em va trasbalsar completament. De seguit em vaig obsessionar amb aquell objecte -- no sols per la bellesa de la fotografia en sí, i el color, la poca profunditat de camp, els detalls tan visibles, el filferro que podeu veure al bec que el conservador utilitzà per montar l'esquelet, hi ha tota una història aquí darrere. I em vaig dir, no seria genial poder tenir el meu propi esquelet de dodo?? (Rialles)
Not quite the whole truth. Anyway. The frontispiece of this article was this photo, and I'm one of the people that thinks that Tina Brown was great for bringing photos to the New Yorker, because this photo completely rocked my world. I became obsessed with the object -- not just the beautiful photograph itself, and the color, the shallow depth of field, the detail that's visible, the wire you can see on the beak there that the conservator used to put this skeleton together -- there's an entire story here. And I thought to myself, wouldn't it be great if I had my own dodo skeleton? (Laughter)
Doncs bé -- vull remarcar en aquest moment que de fet he passat la vida obsés pels objectes i les històries que ens poden contar, i aquest era l'últim que havia caigut a les meues mans. Així immediatament em vaig posar a cercar, per veure si algú venia un kit, algun tipus de maqueta que pogués comprar, i vaig trobar molts materials de referència, munts de fotos ben boniques -- inútil: cap esquelet de dodo per a mi. Però el mal estava fet. Tenia desades centenars de fotos d'esquelets de dodo a la meua carpeta de "Projectes Creatius".. és una mena de dipòsit per al meu cervell, on deso tot el que podria interessar-me. Sempre que estic connectat a l'internet, hi ha un moviment continu de coses cap allà, des de bonics anells fins fotos de cabines d'avió. La clau que el marqués de Lafayette envià a George Washington per celebrar la presa de la Bastilla. Una clau de llançament nuclear russa. La que veieu a dalt és l'imatge que vaig trobar al eBay; la de baix la vaig fer jo mateix, perquè no podia pagar la de l'eBay. Uniformes de guàrdia d'assalt. Mapes de la Terra Mitjana -- aquest és un dibuixat per mi mateix. I ahi tenim la carpeta de l'esquelet de dodo. Aquesta carpeta conté 17.000 fotos -- uns 20 gigabytes d'informació -- i està contínuament creixent. I resulta que, unes dues setmanes després, o potser un any després, estava en la tenda de pintures amb els meus fills, comprant algunes ferramentes de modelat -- anàvem a tenir un dia de manualitats. Vaig comprar alguns Super Sculpeys, filferros i altres materials. Mirant aquell Sculpey, vaig pensar que, potser, sí! potser podria fer el meu propi crani de dodo.
I want to point out here at this point that I've spent my life obsessed by objects and the stories that they tell, and this was the very latest one. So I began looking around for -- to see if anyone sold a kit, some kind of model that I could get, and I found lots of reference material, lots of lovely pictures. No dice: no dodo skeleton for me. But the damage had been done. I had saved a few hundred photos of dodo skeletons into my "Creative Projects" folder -- it's a repository for my brain, everything that I could possibly be interested in. Any time I have an internet connection, there's a sluice of stuff moving into there, everything from beautiful rings to cockpit photos. The key that the Marquis du Lafayette sent to George Washington to celebrate the storming of the Bastille. Russian nuclear launch key: The one on the top is the picture of the one I found on eBay; the one on the bottom is the one I made for myself, because I couldn't afford the one on eBay. Storm trooper costumes. Maps of Middle Earth -- that's one I hand-drew myself. There's the dodo skeleton folder. This folder has 17,000 photos -- over 20 gigabytes of information -- and it's growing constantly. And one day, a couple of weeks later, it might have been maybe a year later, I was in the art store with my kids, and I was buying some clay tools -- we were going to have a craft day. I bought some Super Sculpeys, some armature wire, some various materials. And I looked down at this Sculpey, and I thought, maybe, yeah, maybe I could make my own dodo skull.
Haig de confessar-ho -- no sóc cap escultor, jo; Sóc un dissenyador de models durs. Doneu-me un dibuix, doneu-me una cosa per replicar, doneu-me un crani, bastides, parts de "Star Wars" -- especialment parts de "Star Wars" -- Puc fer tot açò sense problemes. M'he guanyat la vida així durant 15 anys. Però si em doneu quelcom com açò -- el meu amic Mike Murnane ho escolpí; és una maqueta d'Star Wars, Episodi II -- no és cosa meua, açò -- és altra gent la qui fa estes coses - dracs, coses toves.
I should point out at this time -- I'm not a sculptor; I'm a hard-edged model maker. You give me a drawing, you give me a prop to replicate, you give me a crane, scaffolding, parts from "Star Wars" -- especially parts from "Star Wars" -- I can do this stuff all day long. It's exactly how I made my living for 15 years. But you give me something like this -- my friend Mike Murnane sculpted this; it's a maquette for "Star Wars, Episode Two" -- this is not my thing -- this is something other people do -- dragons, soft things.
De totes maneres, sentia que havia vist bastants cranis de dodo com per a ser capaç d'entendre'n la topologia i, potser reproduir-lo -- vull dir, no podia ser tan difícil. Així que, vaig començar mirant les millors fotos que vaig trobar. Vaig anotar totes les referències, i vaig trobar aquesta fantàstica peça de referència. Algú volia vendre açò a l'eBay; i es tracta clarament d'una mà de dona, afortunadament una mà de dona. Suposant que era més o menys com la mà de la meva dona, vaig mesurar el polze, i vaig poder trobar l'escala de la mida d'aquell crani. Vaig aconseguir doncs trobar el tamany real, i a partir d'això, i junt a totes les altres referències que tenia, comparant-ho tot conseguí calcular com de gran exactament havia de ser el bec, la seua llargària, etc. etc.
However, I felt like I had looked at enough photos of dodo skulls to actually be able to understand the topology and perhaps replicate it -- I mean, it couldn't be that difficult. So, I started looking at the best photos I could find. I grabbed all the reference, and I found this lovely piece of reference. This is someone selling this on eBay; it was clearly a woman’s hand, hopefully a woman's hand. Assuming it was roughly the size of my wife's hand, I made some measurements of her thumb, and I scaled them out to the size of the skull. I blew it up to the actual size, and I began using that, along with all the other reference that I had, comparing it to it as size reference for figuring out exactly how big the beak should be, exactly how long, etc.
Finalment després d'unes hores, vaig obtenir el que era molt aproximadament un crani de dodo. I no tenia intenció de continuar -- és allò de, ja sabeu, només pots netejar una habitació totalment caòtica fent les coses una per una; no pots pensar en la totalitat. No estava pensant doncs en un esquelet per al dodo; Me'n vaig adonar quan vaig acabar aquest crani, tot el filferro que havia estat usant per subjectar-lo sortia per darrere, tot just on devia estar la columna. I una altra de les coses que m'han interessat i obsessionat durant anys són les columnes vertebrals i els esquelets, dels que en tinc una parell de centenars. Realment entenia prou bé la mecànica de les vèrtebres, com per a començar a imitar-les. Així, peça a peça, vèrtebra a vèrtebra, vaig elaborar-ne el conjunt. I realment, al final del dia, tenia ja un crani prou fidedigne, unes vèrtebres mitjanament bones i mitja pelvis.
And over a few hours, I eventually achieved what was actually a pretty reasonable dodo skull. And I didn't mean to continue, I -- it's kind of like, you know, you can only clean a super messy room by picking up one thing at a time; you can't think about the totality. I wasn't thinking about a dodo skeleton; I just noticed that as I finished this skull, the armature wire that I had been used to holding it up was sticking out of the back just where a spine would be. And one of the other things I'd been interested in and obsessed with over the years is spines and skeletons, having collected a couple of hundred. I actually understood the mechanics of vertebrae enough to kind of start to imitate them. And so button by button, vertebrae by vertebrae, I built my way down. And actually, by the end of the day, I had a reasonable skull, a moderately good vertebrae and half of a pelvis.
De nou, vaig seguir, cercant més referències, qualsevol pista que pogués trobar - dibuixos, fotos.. Aquest tipus - m'encanta aquest xic!, escanejà els ossos de la cama d'un dodo, amb una regla! És el tipus d'exactitud que necessitava, per poder - i fins al ben últim - reproduir cadascun dels ossos i juntar-los. I en unes -- jo diria que sis setmanes, tenia acabat, pintat, i muntat el meu propi esquelet de dodo. Podeu veure que inclòs vaig preparar una etiqueta de museu on s'inclou una breu història del dodo. I Plàstics TAP em muntà -- tot i que no la vaig fotografiar -- una vitrina de museu. Realment no tinc espai a casa per a això, però havia d'acabar allò que havia començat.
And again, I kept on going, looking for more reference, every bit of reference I could find -- drawings, beautiful photos. This guy -- I love this guy! He put a dodo leg bones on a scanner with a ruler. This is the kind of accuracy that I wanted, and I replicated every last bone and put it in. And after about six weeks, I finished, painted, mounted my own dodo skeleton. You can see that I even made a museum label for it that includes a brief history of the dodo. And TAP Plastics made me -- although I didn't photograph it -- a museum vitrine. I don't have the room for this in my house, but I had to finish what I had started.
I això de fet representà un canvi radical per a mi. Com ja he dit abans, he passat la vida fascinat per molts objectes i les històries que ens conten, i també fer-los per a mi, aconseguir-los, estimar-los, i cabpussar-me en ells. També en aquesta carpeta de projectes, tinc força altres coses en les que estic treballant ara mateix, projectes en que ja he treballat, o altres que potser començaré algun dia, i d'altres coses que sols vull trobar i comprar i tenir i -- veure i tocar. Però ara hi havia aquesta nova categoria potencial de coses que podria esculpir i que era diferent, i que jo -- sabeu, tinc el meu propi R2D2, però és -- sincerament, senzill de realitzar, per a mi.
And this actually represented kind of a sea change to me. Again, like I said, my life has been about being fascinated by objects and the stories that they tell, and also making them for myself, obtaining them, appreciating them and diving into them. And in this folder, "Creative Projects," there are tons of projects that I'm currently working on, projects that I've already worked on, things that I might want to work on some day, and things that I may just want to find and buy and have and look at and touch. But now there was potentially this new category of things that I could sculpt that was different, that I -- you know, I have my own R2D2, but that's -- honestly, relative to sculpting, to me, that's easy.
Vaig tornar a mirar a la meua carpeta de Projectes Creatius, i vaig entropessar amb el Falcó Maltès. Bé, és molt curiós per a mi: enamorar-me d'un objecte d'una novel·la de Hammett, perquè si bè és cert que el món es divideix en dos tipus de persones, les persones Chandler i les persones Hammett, jo en sóc una totalment Chandler. Però en aquest cas, no es tracta -- de l'autor, el llibre, la pel·lícula o la història, sinò sobre l'objecte en sí. I en aquest cas, l'objecte és -- juga e una pila de -- molts nivells.
And so I went back and looked through my "Creative Projects" folder, and I happened across the Maltese Falcon. Now, this is funny for me: to fall in love with an object from a Hammett novel, because if it's true that the world is divided into two types of people, Chandler people and Hammett people, I am absolutely a Chandler person. But in this case, it's not about the author, it's not about the book or the movie or the story, it's about the object in and of itself. And in this case, this object is -- plays on a host of levels.
Primer que res, hi ha l'objecte en el món. Aquest és el "Falcó Kniphausen". És un vas cerimonial fet allà pel 1700 per a un comte suec, i és molt probable que fos l'objecte real del qual Hammett tragué l'inspiració pel Falcó Maltès. Després tenim aquest ocell fictici, que Hammet creà pel llibre. Fet a partir de paraules, és l'artífex que conduix l'argument del seu llibre i també de la pel·lícula, en la qual, es crea un altre objecte: la figura que ha de representar allò que Hammett creà de les paraules, inspirada en el Falcó Kniphauser, i que representa el falcó a la pel·lícula. I després tenim el quart nivell, que és un objecte completament nou al món: la peça feta per a la pel·lícula, el que representa la cosa, esdevé, per dret propi, en quelcom completament diferent, un nou objecte de desig.
First of all, there's the object in the world. This is the "Kniphausen Hawk." It is a ceremonial pouring vessel made around 1700 for a Swedish Count, and it is very likely the object from which Hammett drew his inspiration for the Maltese Falcon. Then there is the fictional bird, the one that Hammett created for the book. Built out of words, it is the engine that drives the plot of his book and also the movie, in which another object is created: a prop that has to represent the thing that Hammett created out of words, inspired by the Kniphausen Hawk, and this represents the falcon in the movie. And then there is this fourth level, which is a whole new object in the world: the prop made for the movie, the representative of the thing, becomes, in its own right, a whole other thing, a whole new object of desire.
Havia arribat l'hora d'investigar un poc. De fet, ja ho havia investigat uns anys abans -- per això tenia la carpeta. Havia comprat una rèplica, bastant dolenta per cert, del Falcó Maltès a eBay, i havia descarregat les suficients fotos i dibuixos com per a tenir prous referències. Però vaig descobrir, investigant-hi més, i necessitat de referències més exactes, que l'ocell tenia -- un dels ocells originals de plom havia estat venut a Christie's l'any 1994, i vaig contactar amb un llibreter d'antic que tenia el catàleg original de Christie's, i hi vaig trobar aquesta magnífica fotografia, incloent una escala de referència. Vaig escanejar-la, i passar-la a mida real.
And so now it was time to do some research. I actually had done some research a few years before -- it's why the folder was there. I'd bought a replica, a really crappy replica, of the Maltese Falcon on eBay, and had downloaded enough pictures to actually have some reasonable reference. But I discovered, in researching further, really wanting precise reference, that one of the original lead birds had been sold at Christie's in 1994, and so I contacted an antiquarian bookseller who had the original Christie's catalogue, and in it I found this magnificent picture, which included a size reference. I was able to scan the picture, blow it up to exactly full size.
Vaig trobar encara una altra referència. Avi [Ara] Chekmayan, un editor de Nova Jersey, va topar amb aquest Falcó Maltès fet de resina en uns encants en 1991, tot i que li va prendre 5 anys per autenticar aquest ocell per --- complir les especificacions dels subhastadors, ja que hi havia una gran controvèrsia al seu darrere. Estava fet de resina, material poc habitual per als típics atrezzos dels films per les pel·lícules d'aquells temps. És sorprenent que costés tant de temps autenticar-lo, perquè puc veure que comparant-lo amb aquest, puc afirmar -- que és real, és 'autèntic, està fet a partir del mateix motlle que aquest. En aquest, ja que hi havia hagut tanta controvèrsia a la subhasta, la casa Profiles in History, que el va vendre -- crec que en 1995 per uns 100.000 dollars -- s'inclou -- ho podeu veure aquí a baix, no sols un alçat frontal, sinó també un de lateral, posterior, i des d'altres angles.
I found other reference. Avi [Ara] Chekmayan, a New Jersey editor, actually found this resin Maltese Falcon at a flea market in 1991, although it took him five years to authenticate this bird to the auctioneers' specifications, because there was a lot of controversy about it. It was made out of resin, which wasn't a common material for movie props about the time the movie was made. It's funny to me that it took a while to authenticate it, because I can see it compared to this thing, and I can tell you -- it's real, it's the real thing, it's made from the exact same mold that this one is. In this one, because the auction was actually so controversial, Profiles in History, the auction house that sold this -- I think in 1995 for about 100,000 dollars -- they actually included -- you can see here on the bottom -- not just a front elevation, but also a side, rear and other side elevation.
Així que per fi tenia la topologia que em calia per replicar el Falcó Maltès. Com s'ho fan, com començar una cosa així? Realment, no ho sé. I el que vaig fer va ser, de nou, com ho vaig fer amb el crani del dodo, portar-me totes les referències a mida real, i després començant a fer els negatius i utilitzant les plantilles com a referències per donar-li forma. Vaig prendre de nou el Sculpey, i en vaig fer un gran bloc, i vaig anar fent fins, bé, tenir els perfils correctes. I després lentament, ploma a ploma, i detall a detall, vaig acabar aconseguint -- treballant davant del televisor -- i amb el Super Sculpey -- ací estic jo junt a la meua dona -- és l'única foto que vaig fer durant tot el procés. A mesura que treballava, vaig aconseguir un molt bon facsímil del Falcó Maltés. Però de nou us dic, jo no sóc cap escultor,
So now, I had all the topology I needed to replicate the Maltese Falcon. What do they do, how do you start something like that? I really don't know. So what I did was, again, like I did with the dodo skull, I blew all my reference up to full size, and then I began cutting out the negatives and using those templates as shape references. So I took Sculpey, and I built a big block of it, and I passed it through until, you know, I got the right profiles. And then slowly, feather by feather, detail by detail, I worked out and achieved -- working in front of the television and Super Sculpey -- here's me sitting next to my wife -- it's the only picture I took of the entire process. As I moved through, I achieved a very reasonable facsimile of the Maltese Falcon. But again, I am not a sculptor,
i no conec tots aquells petits trucs, ja sabeu, no sé com meu amic Mike obté unes superfícies tan boniques i brillants amb el seu Sculpey; certament jo no podia fer-ho. Així que vaig baixar al taller, vaig modelar la peça i la vaig farcir amb resina, perquè aleshores podria obtindre sense problema un acabat suau com el vidre. Ara bé, hi ha moltes maneres d'emplenar-lo i obtindre aquest acabat. I la meua preferida és posar com unes 70 capes d'això, emprimació negre mat per a cotxes. Ho ruixo contínuament durant tres o quatre dies, degotant sense parar, però em permet obtindre una superfície veritablement polida amb la suavitat del vidre. Ah, i rematant-ho amb llana d'acer triple zero. Ara, el millor d'arribar fins aquí era que perquè en la pel·lícula, quan per fi mostren l'ocell al final, i el posen sobre la taula, el fan girar. De manera que vaig poder captar imatges i congelar-les per assegurar-me'n. I vaig fixant-me en tots els reflexos, i assegurant que quan tinc la llum en la mateixa posició, estic obtenint el mateix tipus de reflexió sobre l'ocell -- aquest és el nivell de detall que cerco en tot plegat. Havia obtingut això: el meu Falcó Maltès. I és preciós. I puc afirmar sense dubtes a hores d'ara, una vegada l'he acabat, que de totes aquelles rèpliques que hem vist -- i n'hi ha unes quantes -- aquesta és de bon tros la més precisa representació del Falcó Maltès original que mai ningú ha escolpit. Ara, l'original, he de dir-vos,
and so I don't know a lot of the tricks, like, I don't know how my friend Mike gets beautiful, shiny surfaces with his Sculpey; I certainly wasn't able to get it. So, I went down to my shop, and I molded it and I cast it in resin, because in the resin, then, I could absolutely get the glass smooth finished. Now there's a lot of ways to fill and get yourself a nice smooth finish. My preference is about 70 coats of this -- matte black auto primer. I spray it on for about three or four days, it drips to hell, but it allows me a really, really nice gentle sanding surface and I can get it glass-smooth. Oh, finishing up with triple-zero steel wool. Now, the great thing about getting it to this point was that because in the movie, when they finally bring out the bird at the end, and they place it on the table, they actually spin it. So I was able to actually screen-shot and freeze-frame to make sure. And I'm following all the light kicks on this thing and making sure that as I'm holding the light in the same position, I'm getting the same type of reflection on it -- that's the level of detail I'm going into this thing. I ended up with this: my Maltese Falcon. And it's beautiful. And I can state with authority at this point in time, when I'd finished it, of all of the replicas out there -- and there is a few -- this is by far the most accurate representation of the original Maltese Falcon than anyone has sculpted. Now the original one, I should tell you,
fou escolpit per un noi anomenat Fred Sexton. I és ací on la cosa es posa rara.. Fred Sexton era amic d'aquest xic, George Hodel. Un noi sinistre -- molts pensen que va ser l'assassí de la Dàlia Negra. Doncs bé, James Ellroy creu que Fred Sexton, l'escultor del Falcó Maltès, fou qui matà la mare de l'Ellroy. I encara hi ha més.. En 1974, durant el rodatge d'una seqüela còmica del "Falcó Maltès", titulada "L'Ocell Negre", i protagonitzada per George Segal, el Museu d'Art del comptat de Los Angeles tenia un original en escaiola del Falcó Maltès -- una de les sis escaioles originals, tinc entès, fetes per a la pel·lícula -- va ser furtada del Museu. Molts cregueren que es tractava d'una estratagema publicitària per a la pel·lícula. John's Grill, que per cert apareix breument en "el Falcó Maltès", és encara avui una cafeteria de San Francisco, que contava entre els seus clients regulars amb l'Elisha Cook, que interpretava al film el paper de Wilmer Cook, i els va regalar una d'aquestes escaioles originals del Falcó Maltès. El tingueren en una vitrina durant més de 15 anys, fins que fou robat el gener de 2007. És gairebé com si aquest objecte de desig tan sols es realitzés desapareixent repetidament.
is sculpted by a guy named Fred Sexton. This is where it gets weird. Fred Sexton was a friend of this guy, George Hodel. Terrifying guy -- agreed by many to be the killer of the Black Dahlia. Now, James Ellroy believes that Fred Sexton, the sculptor of the Maltese Falcon, killed James Elroy's mother. I'll go you one stranger than that: In 1974, during the production of a weird comedy sequel to "The Maltese Falcon," called "The Black Bird," starring George Segal, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art had a plaster original of the Maltese Falcon -- one of the original six plasters, I think, made for the movie -- stolen out of the museum. A lot of people thought it was a publicity stunt for the movie. John's Grill, which actually is seen briefly in "The Maltese Falcon," is still a viable San Francisco eatery, counted amongst its regular customers Elisha Cook, who played Wilmer Cook in the movie, and he gave them one of his original plasters of the Maltese Falcon. And they had it in their cabinet for about 15 years, until it got stolen in January of 2007. It would seem that the object of desire only comes into its own by disappearing repeatedly.
Així que tenia el meu Falcó, i era captivador. Realment preciós, la.. la llum li feia uns reflexes molt bonics, era millor que qualsevulla cosa que pogués aconseguir o be obtenir en tot el món. Hi havia un problema, però. I era el següent: Volia la completesa del meu objecte, volia que pesara, també. Com que estava fet de resina era massa lleuger. Però tinc aquest grup d'amics a internet. És un grup de fanàtics del modelatge com jo anomenat Replica Props Forum, i es tracta de gent que comercien, fabriquen i envien informació sobre objectes de pel·lícules. I em vaig fixar que un d'aquest nois, un amic al que mai he vist, però bon amic pels nostres mercadejos, era el cap d'una petita foneria local. Prengué l'original del meu Falcó, i amb un motlle a la cera perduda el va fondre en bronze per a mi, i esta es la peça que em va fer. I és aquesta, la definitiva, després d'un tractament final amb àcid.
So here I had this Falcon, and it was lovely. It looked really great, the light worked on it really well, it was better than anything that I could achieve or obtain out in the world. But there was a problem. And the problem was that: I wanted the entirety of the object, I wanted the weight behind the object. This thing was made of resin and it was too light. There's this group online that I frequent. It's a group of prop crazies just like me called the Replica Props Forum, and it's people who trade, make and travel in information about movie props. And it turned out that one of the guys there, a friend of mine that I never actually met, but befriended through some prop deals, was the manager of a local foundry. He took my master Falcon pattern, he actually did lost wax casting in bronze for me, and this is the bronze I got back. And this is, after some acid etching, the one that I ended up with.
I esta coseta -- em satisfà profundament. Ara, vaig a, la deixaré aquí mateix. i més tart avui, vosaltres podreu... vull que l'agafeu i l'examineu. Sigueu conscients de quant interés he posat. Aquest projecte és per mi únicament, i he arribat al punt de comprar a l'eBay un periòdic xinès de San Francisco del 1941, sols per poder ombolicar la figura apropiadament... tal com ho fan a la pel·lícula. (Rialles) Sí, ja ho sé! (Rialles) (Aplaudiments) I podeu veure, que de fet ara pesa unes 27 lliures i mitja (12'5 Kg). La meitat que el meu gos, Huxley.
And this thing, it's deeply, deeply satisfying to me. Here, I'm going to put it out there, later on tonight, and I want you to pick it up and handle it. You want to know how obsessed I am. This project's only for me, and yet I went so far as to buy on eBay a 1941 Chinese San Francisco-based newspaper, in order so that the bird could properly be wrapped ... like it is in the movie. (Laughter) Yeah, I know! (Laughter) (Applause) There you can see, it's weighing in at 27 and a half pounds. That's half the weight of my dog, Huxley.
Però hi ha un problema. Ara, veieu aquí la progressió més recent dels Falcons. A l'esquerra del tot està la peça que vaig comprar a l'eBay. Aquí tenim el meu falcó de Sculpey desfet, perquè el vaig haver d'extraure del motlle. Aquí la meua primera talla, el meu patró, i per fi el de bronze. Passa sempre una cosa amb el modelats i buidats de figures, i és que sempre que ho aboques en silicona i afegixes resina a sobre, perds una mica de volum, es redueix una mica la mida. I quan vaig comparar la peça de bronze amb la de Sculpey, era quasi uns tres quarts de polzada (uns 2cm) més curta. Buff, síi, realment va ser com, aghhh!! perquè no ho he pensat abans!? Perquè no l'he començat una mica més gran? Així doncs què faig? Sols tinc dues opcions.. Una, puc llençar-li un làser bestial, cosa que ja he fet, per escannejar-lo en 3D.. veiem ací l'escanejat 3D del Falcó. Havent calculat doncs quant es reduïa exactament passant del patró de cera al de bronze, i fent-lo prou gran per tal d'obtindre un patró litogràfic en 3D, que hauré de polir i després enviar al modelador per tindre finalment el meu en bronze. O bé..
But there's a problem. Now, here's the most recent progression of Falcons. On the far left is a piece of crap -- a replica I bought on eBay. There's my somewhat ruined Sculpey Falcon, because I had to get it back out of the mold. There's my first casting, there's my master and there's my bronze. There's a thing that happens when you mold and cast things, which is that every time you throw it into silicone and cast it in resin, you lose a little bit of volume, you lose a little bit of size. And when I held my bronze one up against my Sculpey one, it was shorter by three-quarters of an inch. Yeah, no, really, this was like aah -- why didn't I remember this? Why didn't I start and make it bigger? So what do I do? I figure I have two options. One, I can fire a freaking laser at it, which I have already done, to do a 3D scan -- there's a 3D scan of this Falcon. I had figured out the exact amount of shrinkage I achieved going from a wax master to a bronze master and blown this up big enough to make a 3D lithography master of this, which I will polish, then I will send to the mold maker and then I will have it done in bronze. Or:
hi ha diverses persones que posseeixen originals, i he tractat de contactar amb elles, esperant que em permetran estar uns minuts en presència d'un dels ocells reals, potser per treure'n algunes fotos, o millor per ficar-los a l'escaner portàtil de làser que dona la casualitat que tinc i que cap a un paquet de cereals, i potser podria, sense mai tocar el seu ocell, ho prometo, obtindre un escanejat 3D perfecte. Estic disposat a firmar el que sigui assegurant que mai el deixaré a ningú, tan sols per a mi, en la meua oficina. Ho prometo. Els en donaré un, si ho desitgen. Aleshores, potser, podré arribar a la fi d'aquest exercici. Però realment, si volem ser honests amb nosaltres mateixos, haig d'admetre que arribar al final d'aquest exercici mai n'ha sigut l'objectiu, no és veritat? Moltes gràcies.
There are several people who own originals, and I have been attempting to contact them and reach them, hoping that they will let me spend a few minutes in the presence of one of the real birds, maybe to take a picture, or even to pull out the hand-held laser scanner that I happen to own that fits inside a cereal box, and could maybe, without even touching their bird, I swear, get a perfect 3D scan. And I'm even willing to sign pages saying that I'll never let anyone else have it, except for me in my office, I promise. I'll give them one if they want it. And then, maybe, then I'll achieve the end of this exercise. But really, if we're all going to be honest with ourselves, I have to admit that achieving the end of the exercise was never the point of the exercise to begin with, was it. Thank you.