Bustin’ Makes Me Feel Good.
There. I said it. In fact, bustin’ makes me feel so good, that Michelle and I celebrated the release of the latest Ghostbusters sequel by engaging in a no-holds-barred, knock-down, drag-out sculpting challenge. And you know what? That makes us feel good too.
If that isn’t peak physical conditioning, I don’t know what is.
The subjects of our sculpt-off are the cute yet diabolical Stay-Puft Mini-Pufts that burst from a bag of marshmallows in Ghostbusters: Afterlife to menace Paul Rudd. They also figure pretty prominently in the trailer for the new Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire. How’s that for timely?
I did a size-accurate sketch we both used to keep our Mini-Pufts accurate.
The rules of this sculpt-off are essentially the same as always: We work on the agreed-upon characters in the medium we prefer — for Michelle this time, that’s wool, and for me, clay — and we try in earnest to wipe up the workshop floor with the each other. However, this time, we’re adding the additional restriction that the Mini-Pufts have to stick to the accepted-as-canon, film-accurate size of three-and-a-half inches.
Cosclay was the polymer clay I chose. Mostly because I drop things.
There’s benefits and drawbacks to working with either wool or clay, so it feels like a fair challenge. And with both mediums, for us at least, working smaller and still hitting the target is the bullseye we’ve both been aiming for. Details are minimal but important with these deceptively simple creatures.
It’s the whitest wool we could find, but it’s not quite marshmallow-white.
Looking over the finished sculpts, we’re still not sure which one of us can claim victory in this battle. But we both learned a little more about working small, and our respective mediums. For instance, with my Clay-Puft, once he’s baked and painted, he’s done. An inert rock. Might as well be a doorstop.
Sometimes, in our moments of victory, defeat is creeping up behind us.
Every flaw, every divot, every lumpy-bumpy bit of clay that I somehow missed smoothing during the sculpting process is there in the final piece, preserved for eternity and the camera. It was not without a little jealousy that I watched Michelle tweak, move, reshape, and repair her Felt-Puft as we moved through a long afternoon photo shoot.
The bases we built are based on the original Ghostbusters logo.
However, the clay shows up better on camera and picks up the colored lights in a dramatic way. The wool, not so much. In fact, up close and personal, you can see the wonderfully detailed sculpting work Michelle did on her deep set eyes and the topography of Felt-Puft’s face. But the wool confuses the camera a bit, and a lot of that detail is lost in images and video. Nevertheless, I think some of the shots she took came out great.
Who would win in a battle between wool and clay? Please, no wagering.
A Night Off?!
After we’d put the Mini-Pufts video to bed and written this post, Michelle surprised me with tickets for opening night and we went to see Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire.
Our review? Classic Ghostbusters action. Spooky stuff. Funny stuff. William Atherton, who played a sniveling, uninformed EPA inspector in the 1984 film was somehow promoted to sniveling, uninformed Mayor of New York. The Big Bad in this movie was an ancient, evil god named Garakka whose ice-based powers perfectly matched the frigid temperature in our theatre. And yes, the little Mini-Pufts made multiple appearances throughout the film (don’t leave before the mid-credits scene).
No, we did not spring for the thirty dollar Slimer popcorn bucket.
As usual, The Ghostbusters battle evil, bureaucracy, and even each other and—spoiler—win in the end. Overall, we thought it was fun. But we think most things are fun, even trying to humiliate each other with pointless sculpt-off competitions. So don’t take our word for it. Go see the movie. And if you don’t have time for that, at least take a look at our Mini-Puft video linked down below.