bkd, and the NEXT year of paper...

i recently gathered all my paper toys from my first year of collecting and took a big group picture. it was cool to look back on the toys i built during my initial year as a paper toy fan/freak/collector/builder.

there are some sweet toys in there, and i intend to add to the collection, in fact, i've already built a new set of toys, added some more shelves, and am ramping up for another great year immersed in this amazing culture of art, expression, vibrance, and sharing.

plus, there are quite a few plans being made at baykiddead, some seeds being sown if you will, so please stay tuned in the next few days, weeks, and maybe even years. hopefully you'll dig it as much as i do.

today's theme ~ jan. 17

winter blues. and here's what it looks like on my shelf.

the unauthorized SPIKY collection ~ series no. 01

you know those toys that you find and immediately fall in love with? maybe print out a few and place them into your "to-do" pile, but every time you reach for it, there's a little voice in your head telling you that you're not ready for it yet? well, the SPIKY was one such toy. each time i went to build it, i felt that, "not yet" feeling. and then a few weeks ago i finally went for it and built PLAYTIME. 

it immediately became my favorite toy. just holding it in my hand brought an immense smile to my face. so elegant, so awesome! it also set off a mad search for any more i could find, yielding very little in the way of satisfaction (more on this later.) i did however, thanks to the generosity of greenelf, get my hands on the blank. so i started to think, why not make my own?

so i set out to customize this amazing toy, despite the fact that it's over 5 years old. the plain and simple being that i want more SPIKY in my collection. we all know how shin feels about his old toys, but i can't help but think that the world's a better place when there's more shin tanaka out there, condoned or not. i might be wrong here, and i'm certainly not suggesting these five will change anything other than the fact that they make me happy, but why not make more? why not spread the blank around this mad world of ours and raise a few smiles?

so i did, and i'm sharing them with you. i hope you like. 

i won't be making these available on a file sharing service, if only to honor shin's desire to keep things "limited" and "rare" but i will gladly email you the template[s] of your choice should you ask nicely. and all that i ask, in the spirit of shin's wishes, that you yourself don't distribute them. should you encounter someone wanting them (if i allow myself to think they're desirable) send your friends to me, and i'll pass them along.

peace, love, and of course, PAPER!

new leechoso custom from ash+

was very excited to get this in my mail the other day...

wayfarer is some sort of venus fly-trap with feet. a very interesting leechoso to say the least. digging this! thanks ash!

get yours HERE.

Ghost Machine no. 520

This is my custom for the insanely cool ye-boT by Yebomaycu [Marko Zubak].

You can get this and many other custom ye-boTs HERE. You are also free to hypothesize as to what the other 519 ghost machines look like.

The Nick Knite Trifecta is Available

The 3 customs I did for Nick Knite are now available for download.

You can head on over HERE to Nick's site and get yourself some bKd x Funk Food goodness.

Promotional "Poster" for my Nick Knite Custom Series

just messing around...

Sizza Custom for Nick Knite is Done.

This is the third and final toy for the Nick Knite series that I've been customizing. The Sizza follows Kujira and MechaBunny. Nick has designed some great paper and it was an honor to be able to skin them. Once he gets all the templates, they'll be available for download on his site, HERE.

the baykiddead custom for Nick Knite's Kujira

the second in my series of customs for Nick Knite's set of paper toys. this is Daiyamondo, the kujira.

once i finish the final toy, sizza, the entire set will be available for download.

New Custom for Nick Knite's MechaBunny

It's only a teaser, you can't have it yet, but I wanted to whet your appetite for some new paper.

I'm very honored to have the opportunity to cast my name with all the other awesome customs that have been made for this toy. MechaBunny is one of those toys everyone loves, I just hope I've done it justice. I'll also be releasing a custom for Nick's Sizza and Kujira, and when those are both finished, they'll be released as a set. 

So stay tuned. Word to your mother.

stěny: series #2 [set #4] available

here's the final set from the second series, available in the usual place...

[dutch skull]

[synapse]

[ink kid dead]

stěny: series #2 [set #3] available

here is the third set from series two. stěny! download section! now!

[dutch skull cloud]

[fleur]

[purple tiger]

stěny: [scream]

note: full disclaimer: back in the summer of 1994, as I was traveling through minneapolis, mn., i came across a bit of graffiti reproduced here on this stěny. i have no idea who the original artist is/was or anything beyond the memory of the tag and the incomplete photograph i took of the piece. it was an image that was alway important to me as it allowed me to break down my all-too-conventional thinking when it came to my own photography and what i was allowed to do with my pictures after i took them. it was the original image of the "scream" that i used as a guinea pig for my experiments with photoshop and post-production. i've always held a strict set of guidelines for what i'm willing to do with my "fine art" photography, but it was this image that set me on a course of a different art, and for that i'm very thankful for the discovery of the wall that hosted this piece of art. the stěny scream is a tribute to that.

it should also be mentioned that this was the beginning of the alter-ego that eventually became baykiddead.

stěny: series #2 [set #2] available

like the title says... go get them in the {download} section.

[scream]

[star kid]

[bay.koi.dead]

stěny: series #2 [set #1] available

the next stěny series, series #2 is now complete and the first set is available for download.

[blue cities]

[scratched]

[baykidbolt]

so head on over to the download section and add to your collection. and as always, pictures of your stěnys are always appreciated.

stěny: series #1 [set #4] available

the fourth and final set from series one is now available in the {download} section...

[orangesicle]

[tire tread]

[houndstooth]

sneak peeking stěny: series #2

heres a little glimpse of the next round of stěny...

i know, i know, i haven't even released all of series #1 yet, but the final 3 will be available tomorrow or friday, and then i'm gone for a week, riding my bicycle across iowa with 12,000 of my closest friends. so i wanted to give everyone something to look forward to.

as with set #1, there will be 12 total, all bKd designed, all free, all stěny! so whet those appetites, clear off some shelf space, fire up the printer and sharpen those x-acto blades. series #2 is on the way.

marko zubak's custom leechoso

so very sweet to have the leechoso line up feature this awesome custom from marko zubak aka yebomaycu.

marko is one of my favorite paper artists, his ye-Bot is hall of fame, and his style is definitive. you see one of his toys and you know it's his. so needless to say, it's an honor.

i really dig how he dealt with the cycloptic eye, and his interpretation on the mouths can only be described as sea anemone-esque. and how cool are those feet?

get yours by heading over to the {download} section...

special edition stěny [series #3]!!!

i've been a big fan of the tour de france ever since 1989 and lemond's 50 second deficit. there have been some amazing moments in this most incredible competition, and i was lucky enough to bear witness to the most recent.

15th of july, 2011

stage 13

pau to lourdes. a distance of 152.5 km or 94.75 miles. 

and oh yeah, a climb over the col d'aubisque, a "beyond category" climb.

this was the setting for what will most assuredly go down as one of the most thrilling and incomprehensible individual efforts in the history of the tour. perpetrated by a man they call the god of thunder, thor hushovd.

to fully understand his accomplishment, one has to understand his place in cycling. thor is a sprinter, specializing in hanging on in the peloton during the long flat stages with the goal of sprinting to the finish to win the day. thor, at his peak, was one of the fastest men on a bike, for 2 km. never a threat for the overall win, sprinters seek their glory in an all or nothing drag race.

stage 13 wasn't the kind of terrain a sprinter finds glory. not even in his wildest dreams. 


so when thor broke out of the pack, everyone, and i mean everyone had to be wondering, what in the hell is he doing? well, what he was doing was going fast. no one in the peloton went with him, for what i assume was one of two reasons. first off, they couldn't, he was shot out of a cannon. secondly, "what was he doing?!?" they had to be thinking he'd come back to them. 


but he didn't. he just kept going, how? i don't think thor even knows. with 23 k to go, there was still one rider ahead of him. jérémy roy had a 01:20 lead and more of a pedigree on these long grueling stages. but thor kept coming, and coming. at the 2.5 k mark, thor buried roy as if he was standing still. heartbreak for roy contrasted by utter joy etched on the face of the big norwegian. or maybe it was the same look of disbelief tattooed on everyone else's face.


it's not often we get to watch an athlete successfully re-invent themselves. jordan failed miserably at baseball. but watching thor do the impossible was a moment no one will ever forget.


so, to the stěny and what all that stuff means...
-the rainbow stripes on his arm designate that, for the current calendar year of cycling, thor is the uci road race champion, his jersey must carry these stripes.
-thor is from norway, hence the norwegian flag.
-in addition to the nickname, "the god of thunder", represented here by the bolt, another nickname thor carries is "the bull from grimstad" his place of birth.
-the "7" represents the number of days thor wore yellow as the leader of this year's tour. he is the first norwegian to wear the maillot jaune (yellow jersey.) the fact he even wore yellow, and for as long as he did, and what he did to remain in it on two different stages when all the experts pontificated that there'd be no way he maintain it, is in itself reason to honor his efforts in this year's tour.
-the crown with the 13 in it stands for the 13th stage, the jewels of the crown spell out the date of this stage.
-the green 2005 and 2009 stand for the 2 years thor won the green jersey competition for best sprinter in the tour.


so there you go... thor hushovd. this template is available in the downloads section.


one more note, this is part of series 3, which of course means that there's a series 2. i wanted to release this as soon as i could as i'll be out of town all next week and didn't want too much time to pass between thor's amazing feat. i'll try and put together another 11 tour inspired stěnys prior to leaving, but i'm not holding my breath. 


the completed series #2 will be released when i return...

stěny: series #1 [set #3] are available

the third set of stěny are now available in the download section. get it on!

[sugar]

[double death]

[skull burst]