"Their faces were hideous staring masks, fish-like in contour, with parrot-like beaks and great staring eyes covered with a filmy glaze. Their bodies were amorphous things, half solid and half gelatinous ooze, like the iridescent slime of jellyfish; writhing tentacles sprouted irregularly from the ghastly bodies of the things. They were the offspring of no sane universe...."
- --Spawn of Dagon, Henry Kuttner
Although bottled Deep Ones appear in no stories of the Mythos I have ever read, they look really great on a shelf and aren't hard to make. For this project you will need:
-
Sculpey
A ball of tinfoil
2 pins with round heads
Paint: green, black, silver, white etc.
Glass jar with tight fitting lid
Aged paper
Green food coloring
White glue
2-3 stones (optional)
Start by making a ball of tinfoil into a teardrop shape. Cover this with Sculpey. This saves you from wasting a lot of Sculpey on the inside of the sculpture. You might want to put some heavy stones in the tinfoil ball so that the sculpture doesn't float to the top of your jar. If you do, put them at the bottom of the sculpture to weigh that end down. The size of the Deep One is entirely dependant on the size of the jar you plan to put it in. I prefer small jars that can fit on a shelf wthout taking up too much space.
Sculpt the the Deep One's features carefully, this creature has to look like it's real, not just a statue. Remember that at this size it won't be completely developed and should have an embryonic sort of appearance. I used the heads of pins for eyes. First I built up the eye sockets and then pushed the pins into the clay until it looked right. This creates a bulging appearance consistent with Lovecraft's description of adult Deep Ones. Make gills on the sides of its neck and lots of tentacles (I theorize that like a frog, Deep Ones don't develop limbs until after they have grown as large as a human child when it is born).
When you are done sculpting it, add details with the end of a pencil or other objects. Then follow the directions on the box to harden the Sculpey in your oven making sure not to over cook it. Make sure the back is somewhat flat, because when you harden the Sculpey it might flatten out more in the process, deforming details.
Now that it has hardened you need to paint it. I started with a base coat of black and then detailed it with white around the mouth and eyes, green on the tentacles and then a drybrush of silver. When this was dry, I sprayed it liberally with DecoArt Acrylic Gloss Finish. Now the Deep One is done; time to make the bottle.
I sprayed the cap of the bottle I used with black paint to cover over the logo on it. Then I took a piece of aged paper. You can either use one aged with coffee or tea, or use the margin from one of those 'aged documents' you can buy at historic sites. I used the later since I had one handy. Then I wrote the information that would appear on the tag on my computer. I used Times New Roman size 18:
Miskatonic University Archive
Item No: ..............................................
Genus: .................................................
Species: ...............................................
Origin: .................................................
Date: ....................................................
- I then took a brown ink pen and filled in the blanks on the tag, making up an item number and a date, and writing unknown for all the rest. Glue this to the side of the bottle with four dots of white glue, one in each corner.
Finally, put the Deep One in the bottle, fill it carefully with water and then add a few drops of green food coloring. Put the top on and your done! I have had mine for six months and it looks better than ever. The green food coloring makes the silver and white glow, and the water and glass distorts its shape! Good luck!
I haven't been able to photograph mine very well yet, but pleae go here to see Brian Brethauer's excellent Bottled Deep One.
Have you made anything you would like to show off? Email me at: xn@geocities.com
