Trashbugs 2

I've been enjoying making these things so much that I've simply carried on! I've also experimented with more dynamic portrayals - rather than just emulating specimens on display in a collection - with this rusty looking bug and a dragonfly.

Like the previous trashbugs, these were made entirely from recycled materials (except for the wooden cogwheels which I bought in bulk for another project from a craft shop in 2019).

The bug began as three nitrous oxide cylinders found in a wood while I was walking my dogs. Some silly kids were obviously 'doing balloons' (I say silly because they clearly don't realise the health risks involved). The main leg assembly is a broken hair grip that I reshaped by holding it over a tealight candle and bending the 'limbs'. One of the tins on the hairgrip was broken so I replaced it with an arm and law and mirrored that on the other side. The 'teeth' was also from a hairgrip and the eyes were the earbuds on a broken pair of earphones. Detailing came from my greebly box and then I used a combination of painting techniques to create a rust effect.

To finish, I added some dusty yellow highlights. I then made a base for it to stand on. I used my hot wire to shape a lump of polystyrene packaging and then covered it with a mix of plaster, PVA glue and brown paint. To finish, I drybrushed a lighter brown to bring up the surface detail and sprinkled a little green flock over some PVA. And we were done.

The dragonfly, meanwhile, was suggested by a found toy plastic golf ball that reminded me of compound eyes. I attached it to a body made from a Yakult pot, a broken metal Maglite torch, a pen lid and various other things. The forearms were made from various plastic greeblies and the claws by cemeting tgther the little wooden triangles that I needed to push out of the spokes of my lasercut wooden cogwheels - waste nothing! 

The whole thing was then given a coat of matt black primer and then painted with several different colour metallic pigments.

It was at this point that I realised the body was too stumpy so I increased the length by adding the lid from a dead Posca marker pen. I also built the wing assembly from clear plastic packaging (an antipasto meat selection if you're interested), a plastic clothes peg, wire and beads. 

Here's the finished piece.

I'm now working on a few more.

And I'm running out of space!

Expect an announcement soon regarding sales.