October 9 - Bull

"It is not how much we give, but how much love we put into giving."

~ Mother Teresa

Life as a plushie toy at the Windslow house was anything but routine.

Most mornings I fall out of bed, or get stepped on or dropped before breakfast.

By sunset, I've been squished, squashed and used for a hat more than once.

But every night, I get scooped up.

She needs me.

And that's what matters.

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This uses Marina Filatova's double-stuffing design ideas, the way the feet are attached to the body base create a nice tripod area to sit on. I made this with horns but had referred to this as a cow for a while, I have to remember two cows - when I make a cow I have to make an udder.  (Ba-dum-tish!)

 
(view other cows)

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Other balloons by and inspired by Marina Filatova:

May 17 - Babe the Blue Ox

"Myths are public dreams."

~ Joseph Campbell

After a winter so cold it froze words in midair, Paul Bunyan found a calf wandering through the snow, its coat turned blue by the frost.

Babe never left his side after that.

Together, they flattened forests, carved out lakes, and dragged mountains into place.

Some say if you hear a rumble on a winter morning, it’s just Babe, still wandering through the cold.

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This design uses Isopresso's bull form, modified ever so slightly to try and match a different image that was shared.  My intention was simply to build something "not-brown" because my browns are still a mess trying to figure themselves out.

(view other bull)

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Other balloons by and inspired by Isopresso:

May 3 - Bull

"Symbols are power. They shape reality."

~ Saul Alinsky

My first reaction to "Fearless Girl" being moved was anger - so I looked into it.

In 1989, Arturo Di Modica spent $360,000 of his own money to cast a 7000 pound bronze bull and drop it outside the NYSE as guerilla art.  It was a gift to the American people after the crash - meant to show strength, not submission.

Then "Fearless Girl" showed up - framing the bull as something to resist, not rally behind.

She was relocated, but to stand directly in front of the NYSE, confronting a literal seat of financial power, without rewriting someone else's message.

That said .. it is/was an amazing image.

(view other bulls or cows)

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Other balloons by and inspired by Isopresso:

June 20 - Loopy Bull

“For us, warriors are not what you think of as warriors. The warrior is not someone who fights, because no one has the right to take another life. The warrior, for us, is one who sacrifices himself for the good of others. His task is to take care of the elderly, the defenseless, those who can not provide for themselves, and above all, the children, the future of humanity.”

-- Sitting Bull

Here is the next installment from Tony Twist's Loop the Loop - a bull.

I went for a different limb style on this - I think it makes a rather cute bull calf in the sitting pose. I didn't think about it at the time I took the picture, but it now prompts these quotes from Sitting Bull, and though I've done my best to avoid political commentary on this blog - it bears some mention here.

Sitting Bull was a Sioux holy man, who led a resistance movement against the American incursion, later made the "Supreme Chief of the Whole Sioux Nation". He was killed at Standing Rock Indian Reservation in an attempt to arrest him, site of the Dakota Access Pipeline movement. Taken from the Wiki:

On January 24, 2017, President Donald Trump signed an executive order to advance the construction of the pipeline under "terms and conditions to be negotiated," expediting the environmental review that Trump described as an "incredibly cumbersome, long, horrible permitting process." On February 7, 2017, Trump authorized the Army Corps of Engineers to proceed, ending its environmental impact assessment and the associated public comment period.

“What treaty that the whites have kept has the red man broken? Not one.”
-- Sitting Bull

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Other Loop the loop designs:

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March 8 - Rolly Pollie Extras

However much you know giraffes, to see one in the wild for the first time feels prehistoric.

~ Jane Goodall

Just a couple more to explore with Dan Staples Rolly Pollie balloon concept.

It's very easy to use the regular balloons from my pile of extras - but difficult to remember/use the random shapes/prints, so it was great to pull aside all these remaining Big Bear Heads to try and make "something" with. The process was simply - grab color and decide what to make.

Blue was probably the toughest color. Having already built an elephant, I thought I might try for a whale by turning it on it's side and making fins - but imagined it would look very similar to the quad bod fishes I had already done. A hippo would have worked, but been mostly artwork ... In the end I'm glad I went with the bulky man body, I think it might be fun to spend some time coming up with good variations on that.

After bringing in some Pollies to the office earlier this week, someone suggested a giraffe in honor of April the Giraffe (link). Challenge accepted. Once again I think it might be neat to spend some time on building "neck" variations.

The Chicago Bull and the little devil are more in line with the classic form.

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Other posts with the Dan's Rolly Pollies:


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September 8 - Sweet Bull

It is through this mysterious power that we too have our being, and we therefore yield to our neighbors, even to our animal neighbors, the same right as ourselves to inhabit this vast land.

~ Sitting Bull

This bull is the next in the Eric Weinstein Sweet Cheeks line of creations.  I've probably overdone the amount of sweet cheeks I've shown on here, but it really just speaks to the versatility of the concept and darn it if it's not a great one!

I was there when he created this in the jam room at Bling Bling and knew it was destined to be a hit.  The body, though similar to the hippo, does a number of things differently.  That's one of the things I really like about balloon concepts that are explored so well - it really gives you a lot of possibilities of how you might play with changing the form around.

Although this was initially designed to be a bull, it was Billy Damon's suggestion that it could easily be a Chicago Bull mascot -- brilliant!  After building the according to the video, I tried playing around using different muzzle colors and building a normal bull to see how it would compare.  I think the normal bull looks great with a lighter muzzle, but I'm not sure it's necessary for Benny the Bull - the basketball is more of a focal point.

Talent wins games, but teamwork and intelligence wins championships.	Here's the beef!
Actually it's called  "Running with the Humans"

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Other posts with Eric's designs:


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July 8 - Bull

Gil: They call me Cowboy Gil, as in guil-ty. I saw Cowboy Dan. I didn't like the look on his face. It was like this...
[smiles goofily]
Gil: ... so I killed him. I blew a hole in him this big. Actually it was about this big. You know, when I think about it, that hole was about THIS BIG! And his guts were spilled out all over the floor. As I was walkin' away, I slip around on his guts. A couple of other people came by and started slippin' on his guts too. After I blow a hole in somebody and slip around on their guts... afterwards, I always like to make balloon animals. That's mighty courteous of you. Here we go!
[holds up jumbled of twisted balloons]
Gil: Your lower intestines.
~ Parenthood

The Patreon video for the Balloon Blast show is here - no bull!  It's incrediBULL!  It's memoraBULL!  It's unbelieveaBULL!  It's adoraBULL!

Sam Cremeens is an extremely efficient twister and makes everything look so easy despite the complexities - this face distortion took a few attempts and re-watches to get close - but in re-watching without my balloon noise, Sam was telling me exactly what I was doing wrong (make sure to tie this here, keep this soft, trim out knot bulk, etc)

This bull is actually taught as a rideaBULL structure - but I put it on a body to display here (it's a convertaBULL).  I really like the front of face/nose area - the distortion between the nose and lips give a great curve, but I do wonder how well a pressure-held section like that will keep in shape, especially during bronco riding!  Thankfully something I don't have to deal with or worry over.

I decided not to make any Rocky Mountain Oysters...

It's a bull (not Constantinople)	We bulls wobble, but we don't fall down
mah node itches!

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Other posts with Sam's designs:


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