~Mini Tips and Hints~

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June 98

Junk Shop. These are great repositories for those items that you receive from well meaning friends and relatives, bought thinking it would be the right size but it wasn't quite, or perhaps a project you made that didn't make the grade.

• Old Appliances: junk shops are great places for old toasters/tv's/sound systems to breed. If you have a dead VCR or something with lots of little shiny bits in it, these can be bashed a bit to represent almost anything (remember that perception is more important than actual realism. If something "looks" like an old cannister or milk jug, the mind's eye will take over and assume it is real). You will have to use your imagination to see things, pick components that "remind" you of something. Scour electronics catalogs for good VCR or stereo faces. To make these sorts of things look old, cover in a fabric or paper that looks like "wood grain".

• "Old" furniture is easy to make from some pieces of foam core and a some fabric. Dirty it up a bit with thinned acrylic paint. For a spring popping out of a tear, add a small spring from a ballpoint pen, and fluff it out with a bit of batting.

• Repainted novelty beads and charms make great trinkets for shelves. Also small gaming pieces can be repainted to look like ceramic statuary that was popular in the 1970's.

• Keep an eye out for inexpensive furniture at dollar stores. "Distress" them carefully with a bit of sandpaper and paint over with a strange color of acrylic. Leave spots where your paint has "chipped" over the years.

• Make your own small strange things from fimo, such as ashtrays, old toys, old pottery, etc.

• Old clothing crammed in a bin can be as simple as some scraps of small print fabrics arranged in a basket. To further the illusion, make a fake sleeve by cutting a strip of fabric, add a cuff and a small seed bead for a button.

...And that is it. If you have an idea for a tips and hints section, please write to me. So far I have done a few reader's ideas, perhaps you can be next! Please also check the archives , as there could be an old theme that might jive with one of your own current projects!:) Also, if you have a good tip hint that you would like to share, don't hesitate to give me a note about it, You could become famous...

For older tips, check out the Mini Tip archive.

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