How many monsters can one woman create?

If you are into tabletop gaming, and hang out with other people who share your hobby online, you may have run into my work. Aside from making wigs, costumes, jewelry, buildings, etc, I also make my own dice.

Take one guess whose hand that is.

While my husband is the “face” of our Etsy, I’m the one to blame for it’s occupation of so much of our time. Just like with anything else I do, I can’t settle for “okay” or “good enough”. I have to keep raising the bar until I push it right through the roof. I didn’t want to make dice that were basically a standard 1 though 5 with “F— YEAH” on the 6. (Although I could.) I wanted to make dice that didn’t exist before.

For necromancers, or really weird dentists.

Now, this would have been all well and fine, except that other people like them too. So, instead of breaking my back making wigs, now I’m breaking my wrists making dice. I know, it’s supposed to be one of those “good problems” to have more work than you can handle, but combined with my workaholic nature, it just means I never get any rest.

Sadly, not edible.

One of the biggest reasons I wanted to get back to writing was to move away from production. I have the kind of mind that can create anything with ease and excellence, but my body can’t keep up. I want to make beautiful things that others can enjoy with their minds as well, so when the inevitability of declining health takes our hands and eyes, we can still enjoy a good story in bed. ~K

DIY Rode Blimp Alternative for Less Than $10

After finishing up my first “no-budget” film with my group, they immediately wanted to do a sequel. (Because they are masochists.) As the writer/director/editor, I was subjected to my own special hell caused by the inconsistent sound and film quality, so I only agreed with the caveat that I’d have an actual budget to work with this time.

Probably the biggest issue we had was with wind noise killing our dialog, and although we had windscreens, they just weren’t heavy duty enough. In my research for a solution, I found that we should have been using a blimp style windscreen, like the Rode Blimp, or Marantz ZP-1. However, these giant gridded tubes are all over $100, and some are as much as $300.

After already spending $400 for a good used sound recorder, and another $100 for a better microphone, the crafter in me knew I could make something for much cheaper that would do the same job.

I chose bright orange for my furry cover (dead cat) because it would be easy to find in my sound bag, and easy to see if the boom dipped into the frame while filming. (Coz it’s gonna happen.) My shock mount isn’t as fancy, but it also weighs less than half as much as the 24″ inch equivalent. Even with the fur.


Other Ramblings…