"Cyban and Cog 1.JPG" by Tom Draco Noir Taylor

I think I like this one better. And I love the retro 1950’s space background, good job on that.

Tom Draco Noir Taylor replies: "Thanks a lot John! I was hoping for that sort of look, goodness knows i read enough Sci-fi from that era. I hope I can get better with more practice. This one was inspired directly by you when you suggested a Cylon type bot. I threw in a bit of Dr. Who cybermen and old sci fi . I wish I had the photographic skills to put them in realistic photo backgrounds, it really adds to the realism of your models."

Thanks Tom. But I hardly think the plant next to my spaceship model is realistic.

What you have to do is find the settings, or while you’re out on the way to work, running errands, just keep an eye out for what might be a good setting. With my tractor model, I took those pictures first on the concrete sleeve of a drain pipe. Now the top of the sleeve looks like and old road.

The second set of pictures were taken at the vast parking lot of my church. I put the camera on the ground, and made sure there were no cars in the background. Then I made sure the whole model was in focus. The upward angle the camera was facing emphases the size of the model. That is why it looks so big, even though it’s only nine inches long.

So try photographing your models in different settings, which you have to look for. And take pictures of them at different angles with these items in mind you can enhance the look you want. Take a picture at what would be eye-level. Take the picture of it with the camera on the ground, this will make it look larger than life. The key with this as well as all photography is experimenting-- wich I’ve been doing for almost 30 years.

Tom Draco Noir Taylor replies: "Thanks for the excellent advice John. I will try those techniques and see what I can come up with. As for your models looking realistic- A more unscrupulous fellow would have already sold them to the Tabloids!! The Enquirer headlines"Strange Alien Craft land in Michigan man’s back yard!""

hehe, thats somwhow quite surreal looking-i think because of the purple clouds/gases; i hate doing backgrounds btw, unless its relatively simple one like a space scape or something. In a few of my pictures for cloud and landscapes i usually start with using a photo, but then keep altering it using paintshop/photoshop with the various art effects until it dosn’t look like a photo, but not too cartooney either.

Tom Draco Noir Taylor replies: "Thanks! I like your backgrounds however- sometimes simplicity shows off the model better. I am hoping to distract the viewer from noticing my bots are made from things like shampoo bottles and drinking straws."

I just tried to leave you a comment on your homepage,but it was too long,so I cropped it,but then it didn’t send it-which is why i never answered the last ime-because i kept getting logged off.Elfwoods been behaving much better & faster today.I’ll write more later-1st let me know if you got the other one or if you ever get this.

Tom Draco Noir Taylor replies: "Hey, we have the same trouble sometimes. This time it made it!"

Ooh!It Took.I’ll be selling my Banned Art at the Bean Dinner thing here in Cataract[Shooting Stars Picture-Tribute to Dead Rock stars that I can’t display/use on Zazzle.com because of Copyrighti nfringement of the dead rock stars.guess I need to write to Yoko and the Other Mrs’s & families to be able to sell it online[at zazzle anyhow-I never pulled it from my other to sites,but they don’t do the actual printing.I was trying to ask if you read about the artist [A-1]who used a photo of another artists’[A-2] art in his own exhibit so they closed his exhibit?He A-1 stole the colored pencils from A-2’s exhibit[that the photo was of,I’m guessing] and was holding the pencils for ransom-saying he wouldn’t give them back until they opened his show again.So A-2 is saying the pencils are worth more than$100,000 and sueing.I laughed my head off-I feel for A-1.You would think A-2 would like the publicity BUT...A-2 is actually in the right and A-1 will probably have to pay a hefty fine if he even has that kind if money.I wish I could remember where I read this Boing-Boing,I think.

Tom Draco Noir Taylor replies: "Here’s wishing you much success with your art Heidi! Man, what a story! This "copyright infringement" business has gone completely nuts . why is it that a person can write an Un-authorized biography of a famous person, and that’s perfectly legal, but to draw their picture is considered infringement? Where does that leave Fan Art?Or ,for that matter, Celebs have their photos taken all the time(to their chagrin) by Paparazzi, and they sell those for big bucks- yet an artist’s rendition of the same person is supposed to be infringement? I will try and look up that story on boing- i like that site too."

COOL PICTURE by the way.

Tom Draco Noir Taylor replies: "Thanks Heidi! That is made of total junk, shampoo bottle, straws ,Etc. It was so much fun to build!!"

wow!

Tom Draco Noir Taylor replies: "Thanks, Chelsae! "

I don’t know if it’s art but I like it. I has the feel of an old pulp magazine. It feels like what sci-fi should be about. Nice work.

Tom Draco Noir Taylor replies: "Thanks Ethan! I know for sure- It is not art! It is a rather creative way to recycle junk, however.And loads of fun! Yeah, I was heavily influenced by old Sci- Fi , have seen all the hokey old movies and read stacks of the old magazines. Amazing how accurate some of the predictions were and how far off others were. I am still waiting for my flying car!"