BALLOONS & DRAGONS

I wanted to make a Chinese dragon. To begin with I wanted to maintain what was to become my trade mark in keeping as much of my creations as hollow & as light as possible. The obvious step of course was balloons. With an abundance of balloon types (shapes) the first hurdle was over come. The next step was determining the best easiest fastest method of shaping the balloons whilst adding the paper strips. So using the thinnest balloons I had (clown balloons) I tied a couple up into writhing dragon body like shapes. (see 30 THINGS TO KNOW ABOUT BALLOONS BELOW). Once I had some good shapes I paper striped over them with around 6 layers each.

Having experimented thoroughly with balloons earlier I choose some thicker diameter balloons for the actual final project. This time i prepared some exactly as I did before with the thinner balloons. This time how ever I kept each balloon single rather than join them into elongated exaggerated shapes as with the thinner balloons. My intention here to play around with different body shapes once the balloon forms had dried.

The next step came the simple task of adding definition to the body the back spines of tissue covered card board triangles. Then stomach ridges made of cardboard.

Then colouring the body by painting it.

I never got this dragon finished due to the body was damaged beyond repair, or my willing to pursue the project. I will make more Chinese dragons in the future how ever. At the moment I am currently working on some Western dragon designs. Due to a massive work load work on these how ever is slow going.