Eaten: Vinyl toy design

I was reading a computer arts magazine at the store on Saturday. The entire magazine was devoted to vinyl toys and their creators. Apparently it's a great way to create buzz for your art and it's cheap and quite possibly profitable.

Now - this isn't something I can jump into right now. But it got me thinking that this was a direction that I would love to go. I have my little character Adelia - who would lend herself quite well to this concept...of course they toy needs to be simplified, to an extent. The more complex the figure, the more the fabricating would cost.

I went back home and started looking up vinyl toys and how to manufacture them when I came upon the Vinyl Toy Network. Apparently it's a convention that's held every year (maybe even twice a year) in Pasadena. And, luckily for me, it was happening the very next day!

I went to the show and had a blast. There are so many talented artists showing off all sorts of crazy toys. From tiny zombies you can paint yourself to cute animals smoking cigarettes - there was even a cute girl toy with a hat made of poo with wings. I was looking for presents for christmas, so I was on a limited budget for myself. But I was able to pick up a Captain Coco special edition from Tokidoki and a Kathie Olivas Scavenger toy. I also bought an art book by Ragnar who had a table selling posters and original art. He's incredible, and if you don't know his art style - you should check it out - http://www.littlecartoons.com/index.html

Anyhow - After the show I was quite stoked. I'm going to go out and purchase some molding clay to sculpt an adelia toy. And, dreaming about the future, I drew and painted (in watercolor) a toy design that I created. It's probably a bit complex considering one has to watch one's budget when starting out in this field, but this is where I'd love to take it, if ever the chance presents itself.


it's still a very simple design, mostly - a big blobby monster type. But what complicates it is that I want the monster to be openable (bisected) and another, smaller, toy is lodged inside. Put together, it'd make quite a cool looking little toy - a see through blob monster who just ate a cute little animal.