So, let me tell you a little story.

When I was plotting out season four, I knew that, no matter the filming schedule, there was a high likelihood that episode 405 would be due around the time of  a big trip (in this case, my long-standing engagement to go to Edinburgh Fringe for the entire month of August). I knew in terms of structure, I wanted Milton to do the episode, and that it should be somewhat shoddy-feeling; good, but not too good. Originally I was thinking it’d be a song, but then I got this idea.

The idea being that, as I was planning to be at the Fringe for a month, that I’d like to have some tiny, portable show that I could easily perform on the street in my free time. I started thinking about toy theaters, and how neat they were. And this one title kept going through my head – “Goldilocks and the Three Kraken.”

The first problem I ran into was with the script. I had no idea what the structure would be; I’ve been doing Jigsaw so long, I’m sort of used to two-handers, quick scenes of banter. This, on the other hand, is a long story with a single narrator. Actual narration and everything. And I had the problem of what to do with all those Krakenses. So while the first four episodes of the season were written, filmed, and posted a week early, I didn’t have the script for 405 finished until three days ago.

Which leads us to the second problem: illustrations. Toy Theater requires a ton of little drawings. Each time a character picks up a new prop, you either need a new drawing of the character with the prop, or a drawing of the prop. And the drawings need to be in a certain scale, so they all match each other. And you want a degree of consistency, so the characters all look like they’re in the same world. And I decided that, all things considered, all of this would be easier if I did everything in Illustrator.

A program I hadn’t used since, oh, 2003 maybe.

Eventually, after re-teaching myself how to use the program (and getting used to drawing with the Wacom tablet, which is, after all, what I bought it for), I ended up with 12 pages of little drawings of various weird characters. Which I then had to color. And print out. And print reverse copies of. And cut out. And glue together. And then, THEN, figure out how to operate. (I’d show you the sheet, but for some reason WordPress isn’t accepting image uploads, and I just DON’T HAVE TIME to figure it out right now.)

So now we’re up to Thursday afternoon. The episode is already twelve hours later than I wanted. I’ve spent two weeks solid working on it. Also, I’m supposed to be packing for Scotland. So yes, yesterday’s filming didn’t go as expected. The words “good enough” were uttered quite a bit, as were the words “Oh COME ON” and “DAMMIT DAMMIT DAMMIT” and “FUCK I SUCK”. By six I had all the footage in the can, having gone through about ninety minutes of tape (at one point during filming I rewound the tape twenty minutes because not one second of it was even worth looking at later). Having spent 30 of the past 35 hours doing nothing but work on the episode, I decided it would have to be a day late, because nothing I did at that point would be worth showing. I went to bed early.

This morning came the arduous task of trying to cut the episode into a decent length without losing any content (because to lose content would mean reshoots, and again, just no time). I managed to trim about a minute of weird pauses out of the performance, and added the little black bits to try and separate scenes a bit better. Then I put on the headphones and knocked out a Milton voiceover track.

I hate ADR. Trying to sync voice to a specific action is really annoying. Made more annoying by the fact that, during filming, I hadn’t had time to memorize the script, so I was constantly trying to watch the monitor, grab the puppets I needed, and read the lines, way more frantic than my normal shooting (something of an accomplishment). So there were weird rhythms and odd bounces and spots where the narration just don’t sync and can’t possibly do so. Firmly in “Just get it done” mode, I did as well as I could, and moved on.

Originally, the Milton/Kranium scene at the end was to be filmed. Once I had the toy theater show finished, I realized both a) that it was kind of nice to have just that, and b) filming a whole new scene would take way longer than I had time for. So I tried it as an audio track over the credits. For the most part, I think it works. Which is encouraging, considering one of the upcoming Jigsaw projects I’m contemplating. (teaser!)

In the end, I don’t what I think about this one. It’s better than I thought it was going to be yesterday evening, that’s for sure. I’m not sure it’s possible to do on the street in Edinburgh. I’ll take some new sheets and the updated script and see what I can put together. If it turns out to work, I’ll probably assemble all of the materials into a single pdf that people can download and construct. Even if it doesn’t work, I’ll probably do that. Why the hell not?

So to sum up:

-never try anything new
-especially if you’re supposed to leave for a different country soon
-and if you haven’t used the computer program you need in a really long time
-and you don’t even know how to do what you’re doing
-unless you plan on getting lucky and having it be kinda good anyway.

Oh, by the way, you can now buy Lump T-shirts. Right now, they’re selling at zero mark-up. So, you know, get one. Except you, Bill. I have a proposal for you that could put you in free Lump shirts for some time. We’ll talk when I get back.

See you after Scotland.

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So what with the world being the world, and projects being added to my schedule that require immediate action, I’ve been a bit slow in getting planned merchandise into the Jigsaw store. But those winter holidays are coming up, and I figured I really ought to get cracking.

First off, stickers.

Durable, nigh-weatherproof vinyl stickers. White and black ink on clear, so the edges of the sticker vanish around the card itself. Contagious Graphics did these, and they were also responsible for all the stickers back at 305 South years ago; I can tell you, after years on the back of my (black) Scion, the ink of many other stickers has faded, and a few stickers have started peeling and looking ratty. The Contagious Graphics stickers are pristine.

Unsure as of yet as to the distribution channels for these stickers. For now, probably just if you see me, I’ll give you one, or if you order something, you’ll get one included. It doesn’t really fall under the Etsy terms of use, so until I get a stand-alone storefront, they’ll probably just be special gifts.

Here’s a close-up of the sticker image:

Of course, stickers are exciting and everything, but I’ve been burying the lead a bit, because I just finished the prototype for the Milton Inertia Figure.

Not really an action figure, though the arms and legs are bendy. Pretty much it is a nice object that will tend to stay at rest, unless sufficient force is exerted upon it to cause it to go against that tendency. Much like Milton himself.

These will all be hand-made my me, so quantities will depend on time and materials. I hope to get a handful of these done in the next couple weeks, enough time for people to give them as gifts during December holiday things. If I’m feeling incredibly productive (read: unemployed), I may also do another run of the Jigsaw Tree Ornament Things from a few years back. No promises on that, but it wouldn’t shock me.

IF YOU WISH TO PREORDER either of these things, you should drop me a line. Pricing is still TBD (I haven’t done all the math I need to do to set a price), but it’ll likely fall between $15-$20.

Dat’s it. Episode tomorrow should prove to be a super-quick one, as I’ve got Film Festival stuff all weekend. Paying job, unfortunately, does occasionally take precedence.

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