Dumpster Diving for Gold: Monster Fun Book Art Project Follow-Up!

Following up with my previous DD4G post, I finally finished up my Monster Fun Book art project in which I took a very cool Goodwill find and showed it a little bit of love.

The frame was fairly beat up, so I gave it a nice sand job (how naughty!) and went about staining it with my homemade tobacco wood stain. Now, while my wood stain concoction gave the frame a nice color and made it look infinitely better, it was not nearly dark enough for my taste. So after multiple coats I gave in and picked up a small can of ebony wood stain to finish the job to my satisfaction. Now, while my initial stain didn't do exactly what I originally intended, I am pretty thrilled with how it all turned out, as the brown from the tobacco stain seems to have mixed very well with the ebony wood stain.

*Left side is the original frame with the right being the final product*

And here is how the whole thing looks all completely cleaned up and put back together. The glass was a filthy mess, so a little Windex proved to be an easy yet big help in making this awesome little Monster Fun Book look light years better than when I picked it up.

So for now, this nifty relic has found a nice comfortable place right on top of one of my DVD shelves, fittingly right next to a Sideshow Frankenstein's Monster collectable. As I mentioned in my previous post, who knows how long this thing sat in that frame for, and whoever put it there is an utter mystery. However, while that mystery will forever remain unsolved, the truth of the matter is this thing has found a home and is now amongst friends. How sweet.   

Alien Lives...and not in AVP Form!

With the recent news of Ridley Scott officially coming back to the series he started with his original 1979 Science Fiction masterpiece, Alien, I thought I would do something different than simply writing about the excitement and potential that can come from such fantastic news. Instead, I have decided to post some of the artwork that would come to inspire the visual look of Alien (and the following sequels); artwork that would result in astonishing landscapes, intricate set design and one of the most amazing and original creatures ever to be put to celluloid.

H. R. Giger’s brilliantly surrealistic Biomechanical artwork lead to him receiving the Oscar in 1980 for his titular creature design as well as the remarkable environments found within Alien. His artwork is something that lives on very strongly, and forever will it continue to influence all aspects of art, from comics, to video games and even right down to furniture and interior design. I have personally owned at least five of the H. R. Giger calendars and have proudly displayed the gorgeous and sexually explicit Biomechanical artwork in my very own kitchen. And quite frankly, nothing says dinner like an alien sucking on its phallic tail! Who wants hot dogs for lunch?! No matter how perfect of a film Alien is, it's very difficult to say just how well it would have worked had it not been for Geiger’s inspirational artwork. Would this incredibly tense and brilliantly paced movie have had the same effect had it featured the Krites from Critters? I’m not saying that Krites aren’t so dope or anything, but it clearly wouldn’t be the same.

Anyway, without any further ado, here are the pieces that I chose. Most of these photos are taken from Giger’s Necronomicon books and are very much a part of what Alien would eventually came to be.
Hope you enjoy!




















All of that incredible work eventually resulted in this...


...easily one my all time favorite movie creatures, the Queen from Aliens!