The end of an era!

And so I bid you all farewell!

Well that’s it, the blog competition ends today and to be honest I felt like I have not shut up for a whole month, hang on a minute, … Oh I haven’t shut up for a whole month!! Hehe! I have covered just about everything I have done with regards to modding and I hope that everybody has enjoyed their time here.

All that’s left to do is wish everybody good luck with the competition. I will leave you all with this final image of my mods together as one big happy family! :)

A big thank you goes out to everybody who read my blog and for all the great comments I received via the BTB forum. Cheers!! x

Frosty Fun.

Here is another image i have just created-

(If there is anything more silly than walking through snow bare foot it is standing in snow bare foot whilst trying to remove your tongue from an icy pole!!)

Stoned Marco.

Welcome back again,

Today I just wanted to post a picture of some graphic work I did with Marco. I used to love doing graphics at school but never had my own software until recently when I picked things back up again. I hope you like my stoned Marco! :)

Hornby!

Hey folks,

After yesterdays hectic posting i am going to be quick today. I have had a name suggestion for my railway mod that i think is utterly fab! Thanks to a suggestion by 'Fishy' my bear shall be proudly named 'Hornby'!

This morning i under-took my usual car boot challenge and sadly found no bad taste bears for sale. That's car boots for you, you never know what you are going to find, (if anything!). Perhaps i will have better luck next time.

Speak soon, Craig :)

Creating white ware - Fabio Part Two.

12:50 p.m. - Usually I would let bears soak at least half an hour before attacking them with a brush but this bear really did lose its colour fast and after about 15 minutes I started to brush it whilst still in the liquid. The paint slid of a treat and after just 20 minutes I have my second white ware! So, my advice would be to stick to doing the normal painted bears unless you like playing with rancid smelling liquids for prolonged amounts of time! Hehe. To clean the bears I have just washed them quickly with warm soapy water.

So there we have it, if you like white ware bears or have duplicates sitting around then give it a try! Thank you for your time and have a fab weekend!

P.s. I estimate that with 5 litres I can probably create about 30 white bears, that’s not bad for a tenner! Oh and with regards to naming my train track mod as mentioned yesterday I have already had a few names suggested including, Thomas, Percy and Harold! (I see a theme emerging here, hehe!)

Creating white ware - Fabio Part One.

12:25 p.m. - I have the female bear from Fabio and I am just going to place her in some thinners as I did Gilbert. Check back soon as these bears turn white pretty quickly!! :) (Oh and if anybody is wondering the bear was in the bag of damaged bears won by BTB’s, although she is just dirty and seems to be in perfect structural condition).

Creating white ware - Part Six.

12:15 p.m. - Hey presto!! He is finally finished. I think he looks fab amongst my other white ware and I hope you like him! (He took me 2hours and 35 bleeding minutes, hehe!!) That bear was not a good example at creating a white ware bear but as my updates have been live, (or as live as they can be taking into account time needed to type and upload photos); there is not much I can do about that. I will quickly do another bear to show you how easy a normal painted bear should be. Pop back in 10 minutes or so!

Creating white ware - Part Five.

11:50 p.m.- Ok so now I am getting impatient. The bear is pretty much all white now. I have began to attack my bear with a scrubbing brush and even an electric tooth brush, just anything that will remove the last little bits of stubborn paint. You can use anything and everything within reason because the resin itself is pretty hardy and wont be scratched by bristles.

Creating white ware - Part Four.

11:30 a.m. - The bear is now looking rather white but there are areas that have stubborn black paint remaining, this is never a problem with standard painted bears. The black must have been the base-coat colour for this particular bear. The thinners I am using are now rather mucky as you can see from the photos so I have just emptied the old thinners and have poured a fresh cup. (I have 5 litres of the stuff after all!) The bear is now redunked and hopefully the black will lift as I find thinners work best when clean. Gilbert really was beginning to look like some odd creature from the deep in that dirty cup!

Creating white ware - Part Three.

11:00 a.m. - I have now gave the bear another brush and in some areas I am using a stiffer brush to get into the more ‘hidden’ areas. As I brush the bear the white colour of the resin is now appearing.

Creating white ware - Part Two.

10:30 a.m.- I have let Gilbert sit for almost an hour and from looking into the cup I can see all the top surfaces bubbling and wrinkling. I have now just brushed the loose paint away from the bear with a soft brush. This will allow the thinners to ‘eat’ into the underneath layers. Normal bears are painted rather thinly but Gilbert looks to have a few different layers of paint. (If you click the images you can see a larger photo of the bear).

Creating white ware - Part One.

Righty then, today as promised I am going to create a white ware bear from scratch. I will post live updates of my progress! (I hope this works or else I am going to look bloody ridiculous and this whole post will be very dull. Lmao!)

Now I have already been to my local paint specialists this morning, I use a company called ‘Jawel paints’. From experience I have found that cellulose thinners work best and 1 litre costs about £6 where as 5 litres only cost a tenner!! Needless to say I brought 5 litres and don’t think that I will be running out in a hurry. Lol! :)

The first bear up for dipping is Gilbet. The bear has a few small chips to the paint on his face but other than that is in perfect condition, an ideal bear for this type of mod.

So before we start you will need your thinners, a suitable bear or two, an old cup or container that will hold enough liquid to fully submerge your bear, a soft brush and a stiff brush.

9:40 a.m. - Having already been to the shops I have placed my bear into the cup and have poured the thinners in making sure the whole bear is under the surface of the liquid. The great thing about this process is you don’t have to do much; in fact I shall now simply sit around for a while and let him soak.

Future mods.

Well as the blog competition is nearing an end I thought it would be nice to quickly discuss future mods.

As mentioned I have an ‘Oompa Doompa’ on the cards to sit alongside ‘Willy Wanka’, but if Willy is anything to go by then that wont be completed for a while yet! I also have another mod on the back burner. It is a bear that has been tied to some train tracks and has the top of his head and feet missing! Hehe :) (If anybody can think of a good name for that bear then let me know).

Most mods are on hold for the time being because as you all know there is the event to think about. ‘Mystery and Intrigue’, what does that entail? Well I have a few ideas but as of yet I have not began to mod any bears. (There is no rest for the wicked as they say!). I hope that from reading this blog a few others have been inspired to give the mod a bear competition a go, that would be fab! I can’t wait to see the different entries.

Tomorrow I will be creating the white ware I have been harping on about so don’t miss that!

Bear security.

How is everybody?

Recently I have upgraded the security within my house so that my collection will be safe forever, hehe! Here is how I did it! :)










Meet Sky, she will bark if anybody comes even close to my front door, which is both extremely irritating yet a little comforting at the same time. I live in a busy house anyway and there is always somebody in but I think the chance of anything ever being stolen from my home has dramatically dropped somewhat.

Oh on a different note, yesterday I brought a bear from Ebay. I have brought loads of bears on Ebay in the past but recently have been buying bears elsewhere. Anyway to cut a long story short I was simply checking out the latest selling values when I came across an unopened Shackelton in new condition. I snapped him up for £1 plus £2 postage. Not bad eh? :) The little rush has tempted me to look for the other remaining bears I need but with the event just around the corner I really should be saving my pennies!!

I look forward to meeting some of you soon.

P.s. I received this comment yesterday in regards to my half-finished ‘saw’ mod. It made me smile and hopefully it will make you smile too.

“Hello mate save wasting the bear and turn it into hammy the hamster lol well it got the cheeks already”

Who says BTB collectors are a funny bunch?? Hehe!!

Speak soon,

Mods that never made it.

Hey fellow Bad Taste Bear collectors,

Today I want to talk about ‘the mod that never made it’. I have only ever started one mod that I never got around to completing and I’ll explain why.

Quite a while ago now I stated on a bear that was going to represent the puppet from the film ‘Saw’. I began with Jack and this was one of those mods I picked up every now and then.

When I began the bear I had not heard any talk of a ‘saw’ bear and so thinking the idea was original I began moulding cheeks and clothes onto my bear. A week or two later members began talking about a bear that had been spotted on a tricycle and at this point I stopped any work I had planned for my mod.

It turned out that the suspicions surrounding an official ‘Saw’ bear were true and ‘Billy’ was later released.

My mod will never be finished because not only is the idea now unoriginal but also I could never create anything as good as the attempt made by the BTB Co.

And there we have it, the bear that ‘never made it’. In the week I plan to do something a little different. I will be creating a white-ware bear from scratch and will be posting live updates of my progress throughout the day. Make sure you do not miss that! :)

Willy Wanka - Part Two.

Firstly let me just apologise for taking a day or two away from blogging. I have had a very hectic weekend and my Mom has not been very well recently.

Anyway today’s update has been a long time coming. I have finally finished my Willy Wanka mod! ‘Willy’ has been sitting in my cabinet a while now just waiting for a top hat and bow tie.

I had brought a Mr Magica a week ago and so decided that like the 3 bears before him it was time he was sacrificed in the name of modding. The bear was in perfect condition but I had tried hard to acquire a damaged bear with no success. I used a dremel to cut the hat from Mr Magica and this only took about 10 minutes. The tricky part was getting the hat to sit correctly and believe it or not this took me an hour. (This little bastard has fought me all the way!) Lmao! :)

The existing head on my mod had already previously worn a cap so I simply trimmed the head down to the bottom of the hat line ready for the new hat.

Once glued in place I repainted the hat in ‘Willy Wanka’ colours and gave it a coat of varnish so that it had a shine. I also decided to do the same to his jumper because as a kid I remember the film, ‘Willy Wonka and the Chocolate factory’ to be colourful and artificial like.

The bow is made out of ‘Fimo’. I shaped the piece out of the clay and simply popped it in the oven for about 15 minutes. Once the bow had cooled I glued it in place as the very final finishing touch.

This mod has taken me way too much time and some people may think I have nothing better to do, lol, but when I look at the bear standing in my cabinet I feel proud to have created something which is one of a kind.

I hope that others like him as much as I do.

Thank you for your time! :)

Mods in the making?

How is everybody doing today? Good I hope.

Recently I have had a few people ask where I get my bears from. I often post wanted posts on the bad taste bear forum asking for damaged bears. I also pick up slightly damaged bears from car boot sales for no more than 50p each.

Occasionally I use bears that have nothing wrong with them but it pains me to do this and I prefer not to.

After a few months I had accumulated a lot of bears so brought a toolbox to home them. Now I need another, hehe! It is funny to throw some bears into a crowded box and then very carefully place others into display cabinets!

I now have approximately 50 bears, all-waiting for a new lease of life, hehe.

Expect to see some ‘saved’ bears appearing soon! :)

Craig.

My collection :)

So here is it, my collection!

I have had a lot more bears since I last posted photos of my collection, and now I have my 2 extra bargain cabinets it is nice to have some room again, I do feel like that room will soon disappear on returning from the Sheffield event though! Do 16" bears fit in these cabinets?

I am now 7 cabinets in and I am sure it wont be too long before I need a couple more.

I will let the photo’s do the talking.

Enjoy! :)