Kooky Spookys

[Therin of Andor]

HA!! How cool!! Now, do they GLOW??

But of course! For each one I sat for about 30 mins blending a block of yellow Fimo with a block of off-white "glow-in-the-dark" Fimo (which I've had sitting in a drawer for several years, awaiting inspiration). They came out yellower than I'd expected, but I was concerned I was diluting the glow effect two much. But, yes, they do glow!

Kooky Spookys are tricky to photograph. They look subtley different at each angle (the thumbs look great in person and tend to vanish in pictures) and under various lighting conditions; the sun came out rather strongly while I was taking the pics and the commercial Daddy Booregard looks almost white in some shots.

[Therin of Andor]

GodzillaGirl asked me for a for more details:

I bought the glow-in-the-dark Fimo about five years ago, I think, but it was in my head to make the three Kooky Spookys (we weren't given 41 years ago) for about... 41 years.

Last year, I had to create a yellow chicken monster for a book trailer my school students were making, and I bought more Fimo. With the leftover blocks of lemon yellow, I realised I should finally do something about the Kooky Spookys and the forgotten nightglow luminescent Fimo - and then I remembered Toy Ranch's post with the two extra Kooky designs that were never made. Then, just before Christmas, I secured an actual Daddy Booregard (my Holy Grail!), so the muses finally hit!

Each one of my Fimo ghosts probably only took about 20-30 mins of modelling, once the two colours had been blended. And 30 mins of baking, and a few minutes painting facial details the next morning.

UPDATE:

I made customized Teena and Mama figures today. I was walking through a stationery store yesterday, and found little pink, heart-shaped, split-pin fasteners, and thought they'd look good as the pink hearts on their cheeks. I'm not quite happy with the heavy eyeliner, but I'm going to try scraping away excess paint. Their signs were cut out with cookie cutters I happened to have on hand.


Customised Teena Terror and Mama Kaskit by Therin of Andor, on Flickr


Kooky Spookys plus Avon's Gilroy by Therin of Andor, on Flickr

[GodzillaGirl]

I did notice in the photos that included your Daddy Booregard (also my very first and most beloved of all my KS) that he looked stunningly new compared to your other KS figures.  Good find! 

I hope your inspiration continues and you feel the need to make more prototype KS!
 

Kooky Spookys are tricky to photograph. They look subtley different at each angle (the thumbs look great in person and tend to vanish in pictures) and under various lighting conditions; the sun came out rather strongly while I was taking the pics and the commercial Daddy Booregard looks almost white in some shots.

[Therin of Andor]

Yeah, Daddy Booregard is photographing almost white! In person, he is fairly similar in colour to my three from Christmas 1968. I secured Daddy B. just before Christmas on eBay's "Buy it now" for $250 - and I'm now realising he was a great catch. I did some urgent "panic research" after buying, and found references to "most" examples of this figure having serious "melt marks" on his nose (on examples kept in their box too long), or the stud that holds his watch to his belly button having broken off or melting the rubbery stuff it came into contact with, or no watch at all. Also another reference to someone's whole set perishing inside their unopened boxes.

In 2000 (again after research), I held my breath and placed my three Kookys into a glass of water each with an effervescent Sterident denture cleanser tablet - and they came out of their bath beautifully. Over the decades, they'd developed a little bit of "spotting", but for figures that got so much rough play in the late 60s/early 70s, then Mortimer and Spook'em stored in various boxes while Grandma stayed on display, they've weathered the storm rather well, and look great.

I've just found a tiny Patti P. sketch on the 'Net for Geisha Ghost, in her kimono and with a fan accessory, so today I might end up doing "just one more..." custom.

UPDATE:

Done it!


Customised Geisha Ghost by Therin of Andor, on Flickr

More pics: http://therinofandor.blogspot.com/2011/01/greeting-geisha-ghost.html

[jimm]

Your best one yet!

[Therin of Andor]

Today i printed out the official Kooky Spooky haunted house from http://www.undermountain.org/HauntedHouse.html on glossy photo paper (A4), cut out the windows, and added the 3D porch awning with extra posts cut from a second photo. Now the whole thing looks 3D!


Haunted house with Kooky Spookys by Therin of Andor, on Flickr

http://therinofandor.blogspot.com/2011/01/greeting-geisha-ghost.html

And I made a Photo Peach slideshow on "The Kooky Spooky story".
UPDATE: 2021:
PhotoPeach has ended, due to the discontinuation of "Flash". So I have had to move my slideshow to my Facebook page at
https://www.facebook.com/GlowingGhosts/

It will hopefully be visible at:
https://www.facebook.com/GlowingGhosts/posts/3660947530595944

[Toy Ranch]

Those are great!  Nice work!

[Therin of Andor]

Those are great!  Nice work!

Many thanks. I've been tweaking the captions of the Photo Peach slideshow (linked above), and I'm fairly happy with it now. It pays to play it twice; the automatic panning of the various photos actually works in reverse when you replay it. Photos that panned up, pan down the next time, and so on.

The Kooky Spooky haunted house I downloaded from http://www.undermountain.org/HauntedHouse.html freaks me out. It doesn't look that impressive as a print-out, but it photographs amazingly well. Obviously one of those clever "forced perspective" paintings that works best through a camera lens.

[GodzillaGirl]

The Geisha is lovely, and the house looks like the real thing!  Your slideshow was really entertaining too.  I do hope the Geisha wasn't your "last one".     There are so few KS artists around!

I've seen a few seriously battered KS figures on ebay, but most are in really good shape.  Of course, the ones that are minty with their prized accessories or with their boxes end up being outrageously expensive.  I have a complete set of KS (one or two with accessories) and my original Daddy Booregard from childhood, but my dream is to one day snag a boxed KS...if I ever have that kind of cash!  I've never heard anything about KS figures becoming completely trashed from being stored inside their packaging.  I'll have to remember that should I ever actually obtain one. 
 

Yeah, Daddy Booregard is photographing almost white! In person, he is fairly similar in colour to my three from Christmas 1968. I secured Daddy B. just before Christmas on eBay's "Buy it now" for $250 - and I'm now realising he was a great catch. I did some urgent "panic research" after buying, and found references to "most" examples of this figure having serious "melt marks" on his nose (on examples kept in their box too long), or the stud that holds his watch to his belly button having broken off or melting the rubbery stuff it came into contact with, or no watch at all. Also another reference to someone's whole set perishing inside their unopened boxes.

In 2000 (again after research), I held my breath and placed my three Kookys into a glass of water each with an effervescent Sterident denture cleanser tablet - and they came out of their bath beautifully. Over the decades, they'd developed a little bit of "spotting", but for figures that got so much rough play in the late 60s/early 70s, then Mortimer and Spook'em stored in various boxes while Grandma stayed on display, they've weathered the storm rather well, and look great.

I've just found a tiny Patti P. sketch on the 'Net for Geisha Ghost, in her kimono and with a fan accessory, so today I might end up doing "just one more..." custom.

UPDATE:

Done it!


Customised Geisha Ghost by Therin of Andor, on Flickr

More pics: http://therinofandor.blogspot.com/2011/01/greeting-geisha-ghost.html

[Therin of Andor]

I've never heard anything about KS figures becoming completely trashed from being stored inside their packaging.

I've seen online comments that Daddy Booregard's nose and Grandma Macreak's hand normally came into contact with the clear plastic front of their packages. That can cause "melt marks" and, in some examples, where the rubbery material has "melted" it actually turns black. Someone reported the tummy hole of a Daddy reacting to the positioning spike of his clock accessory. On a different BBS, someone boasted that he had the whole set, in mint boxes, on a high shelf but, when he inspected them after many years, they had been "rotting in their boxes" and asked "Is that why they are so rare?" Somehow I think he'd exposed them to moisture or harsh lighting at some point. My Grandma, Mortimer and Spook'em have survived four decades and the first ten or so years in fairly rough-play conditions.

[foolish mortal]

They look great all displayed together with the mansion

[Therin of Andor]

General Gilghouly and Shirley Shriek by Therin of Andor, on Flickr

GodzillaGirl challenged me to try making Shirley Shriek, an early Patti Peticolas design who was morphed into the more commercial Mama Kaskit. My housemate reckons Shirley looks a little too Ku Klux Klan.


General Gilghouly - note the newly-added bluebird, as featured on Patti's sketches - and Shirley Shriek, with skull necklace, using a length of silver neckchain I accidentally broke a few years ago - by Therin of Andor, on Flickr


Custom Kookys by Therin of Andor, on Flickr

[Therin of Andor]

Ah, I accidentally just found the bbs (mentioned higher up in the thread) where someone claimed their Kooky Spookys had rotted in their boxes:

http://monsterkidclassichorrorforum.yuku.com/topic/7451/Kooky-Spookys

Not sure I believe them. Kookys are indestructible!

[Therin of Andor]

Okay, what do you think: you reckon that Ann Garrison Greenleaf, author/illustrator of "Emily's New Ghost" and other books in her Hawthorne Street picture book series, was a Kooky Spooky fan? I found this book from 1993 on our school library shelves this week and it is so reminiscent of the Kooky Spooky 60s style...


Emily's New Ghost by Therin of Andor, on Flickr


Emily's New Ghost internal art by Therin of Andor, on Flickr


Emily's New Ghost internal art by Therin of Andor, on Flickr

[robodog]

I like these. They're so much more interesting than the dime a dozen figures that flood toy shelves these days.