SPACE PATROL MACHINE

 

I love this little space buggy I saw on a Japanese site.

I thinks its by Tamada.

Has anyone got one?

Caligaris Tibidabo Space Toy; Your Help Needed

Italian Reader Francesco has contacted me and asked if anyone has any further info about this unusual space toy.

Hi, please see pictures attached.

Please give me your feedback thanks.

A Caligaris Tibidabo [Turin] toy.

Francesco

Italy

KEVIN'S BUILT MPC SPACE 1999 COMMLOCK

Hi,

Made this MPC kit of the Space 1999 commlock. As with the stun gun that I made recently, I filled it with milliput first. It is solid and has a good weight to it.

Attention all sections Alpha.....

Kevin

UK

LOST TOY SHOPS

 These are in my foto archive. I must have saved them ages ago from somewhere online.

This old toy shop is Jeans in Lowestoft.

and this is an old Woolworths window display.

See anything you recognise?

Christmas Sweets: An Early Nibble

Back in the Sixties and early Seventies, Christmas meant sweets in the UK.

Lots and lots of sweets.

Some of my favourites, mostly chocolate, were often clubbed together in that most fabulous of all human inventions, the Selection Box.

As much a part of the festive season as  dodgy socks and dried stuffing, the Selection box was good to go at any time, whether it be part of the general manoeuvres through the whole of December or as a treat on the Big Day.

The best medleys included a Crunchie, a Curly Whirly, a bag of Fruit pastels, a Fudge and a Ripple. To be honest , it didn't matter what was in them. Even Caramac!

Far more important than any titchy chocs to be had in those flimsy Advent Calendars, Selection Boxes were essential gritty supplies to power you through the more boring rituals of the season.

Other sweets of note were sugared jellies or jellied fruits. Not my favourite at the time, a more sedate tid-bit to be found hiding on small coffee tables, the staple of visiting Aunties and my Mum's big-hatted friends.

Much more to my taste were Chocolate Brazils.

 Always the same make, I forget the name, these rock-hard delights came in a flat box, with each nut nestled in a pleated paper cup. The chocolate around them was so thick you just had to eat it off like a fevered beaver.

A far more adult confection were chocolate liqueurs. I'm not sure I liked them that much back then, the injection of cognac or Tia Maria into my mouth a completely alien experience as a kid. I would eat them now though, no worries!

My final guilty pleasure has to coffee creams. Or is it cremes? 

You know the ones, whether left behind in the chocolate box because nobody liked them or found in an entire box of cremes, this strange treat had a bad rep.

 Less popular than the more suave peppermint variety or those pompous After Eights, the lowly coffee creme was an outcast in it's own munchbox. 

I on the other hand adored them as a kid and to my good fortune, often found stragglers languishing in shame round the house at Christmas. Like a festive magpie I'd gobble them up before downing half a bottle of Tizer, that russet fuel of champions. 

Ah yes, sweets at Christmas. Which were and are your faves readers? 

Mystery Cool Radar Car

Seen on Ebay this year this neat lunar radar rover caught my eye. It looks familiar sort of. Described as 6 inches long with a Home made dish.

Any ideas as to what it is readers? 

TERRANOVA47: WORKING WITH ARTISTS

Having been in art school with future illustrators and having commissioned work over the years as a Graphic Designer for various projects I had to think about your question: what is it like to work with an artist?

In the case of the Godzilla art and story I storyboarded from a rough draft of the plot, where I wanted spot illustrations of a talking head and where I wanted a full page illustration. 

With artist Carmen Cerra it was nice that he worked in traditional materials. He liked to do both loose line art with a pen and tight drawings with pen and wash. He would also do brush and ink illustrations. Each style was a different rate as the calculation is on the time it takes. A brush and ink drawing might take just minutes, a detailed drawing an hour or more.

For reference Carmen was familiar with the Wind in the Willows characters, I sent him recent photos of Miles as he was nearly three years older than in the first book and photos of a Thames Skiff which he would not be familiar with.

Things are so much faster than when I was working, email has eliminated weeks of production time wasted waiting for snail mail. Carmen sent scans of pencil layouts for approval, then created the finished art. He scanned them, emailed them and mailed the original art to me. Having worked freelance myself the delay in receiving a cheque after 30 days or more was always a hassle. Now I can send instant PAYPAL payment, something I was never the beneficiary of.

Carmen as unusual in that he is an American familiar with British story books and artists. He recently illustrated a sequel to Winnie the Poo in the original style once the original copyright to the character had expired.

For the first Mileosaurus story I wanted a Beano style illustrator so went to PeoplePerHour.com which is mostly British artists available to hire Freelance. The rates are very competitive and the artists very talented. They are also young and have grown up drawing with computer programs rather than pen and ink. For me it was a new learning experience as colours and size could quickly be altered which in the past would be expensive changes to make as new art had to be drawn.

You blogged the first story I did for Spaceship Away [2023] with Dan Dare and Dennis the Menace. 

A second story was just published in the latest issue, 64.

Artist Dave Windett was found through PeoplePerHour in the UK. I again story boarded the page, sent dialog and reference pictures to Dave and he did the rest. The editor made many changes in colours which would have been prohibitive in traditional art but simple in software based drawings.

This story is for fans of the original Dan Dare stories from 1950-59. The punchline is in knowing the reference of who the Deputy Prime Minister is.

I quote from the HAYNES Space Fleet Operations Manual for the Deputy's father:

Dr Blasco. A brilliant scientist who discovered a way to stabilise and use monatomic hydrogen as a rocket fuel. He designed the Valiant battlecraft for the run to Saturn, but had his own power agenda. Secretly in league with Rootha forces on Saturn, on his return he planned to take over the Earth. Foiled at the last moment, he lost his life when his space helmet came off in a struggle aboard the Kroopak command craft.

So the Deputy Prime Minister is the son of a megalomaniac that wanted to enslave Earth but whose plans were thwarted by Dan Dare..

Terranova47

NYC

NOT MY DING-A-LING!

I saw this beautiful artwork online for the Ding-a-Ling mobile.

I never had a Ding-a-Ling [unlike Chuck Berry!]but thought immediately that rover has the same wheels as my old beloved Firebolt Laser Cannon.

Here's Wotan Bill's as an example.

Did you have a Ding-a-Ling readers?