I think the stickiest part of a production is pre-production. At its best, it is the time when we throw all the creative spaghetti at the wall to see what sticks.
We can ask, “What if goblins carried swords that look like stalagmites?” or “Could our dwarves wear mushroom armor?” or “Have you seen this coral reef made out of yarn? Are there enough fiber artists in town to make a cave made out yarn?”
As fun as this stage is, ultimately we need to stop asking “What if?” and make decisions so we can move into actual production. Once decisions are made, we must figure out how to make these astounding things we’ve been dreaming up. For me, it’s always hard to leave the dreaming stage and move to the making stage.
While we deal with the end of our “What if-ing” process, we have also been thinking about a few other bells and whistles we normally don’t have around for shows.
Case in point: these awesome mugs that we printed locally, thanks to the Makerspace at the Oskaloosa Public Library, and their sublimation printer.
It’s incredible that our community has a resource like the Kim “Gigi” Blackwell Makerspace Lab. It is a great creative place to make fantastic things!
I designed the mug in Adobe Illustrator, and the library printed out the graphic and transferred it to the mugs. The staff at the library were awesome and went through every step of the process with me.
Before you start putting coins in the piggy banks, these mugs are test projects, and we don’t have a plan for Hobbit merchandise for our production. However, you may see more new graphic design elements rising to the top in promotional material.
BUT… we are nearing the end of our creative spaghetti-throwing journey. It’s time to make some decisions and get our heads out of the clouds, so we will start sharing more concrete… pointier things shortly ;). Until then, head over to the Oskaloosa Public Library and make some cool stuff at the Makerspace!