About this project
STRETCH GOAL: UPDATE: Thank you to everyone who got us to our goal! We ordered the tools (I got them for 950 bucks) and we bought the wood and hardware for the jigs. The total cost was $1150 - if we count the 10% Kickstarter gets our stretch goal would be $1250. That would totally cover the cost of preparation. (We will still pay for plenty of stuff out of pocket!) Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!
We won the Vermont State Snow Sculpture Contest and we are going to the US National Snow Sculpting Competition. We have done this before, but our tools are a joke, and this piece presents certain challenges requiring the construction of custom jigs to be able to nail it. A proper set of chisels and a japanese ice saw would definitely help us execute the piece.
We have been making sculptures together as a "team" (group of friends) for about 12 years. We kind of fell into it by accident, and do it mostly for the fun of it, but we really want to win this one.
We think Vermont deserves the trophy, and we feel we are at the height of our abilities, and we think the design has the potential to do just that.
This is our dream set of chisels and saws. I think we can get it for a little less on Ebay, or from the backchannel ice sculpting network. There are also jigs we have built that we need to transport out there.
We don't really have the money to buy these tools ourselves right now. I got laid off in September and started my own business. Dostie just started his own Picture Frame Shop and Brooke just had a baby and cut his hours as a baker down to be able to take care of her. This money will be deeply appreciated and the tools we buy will be used to make many sculptures.
This is the piece we made in Burlington last February. We had just come back from the Internationals. I went over to Brooke's to talk to him about what to make and we talked about somethings - as he opened up his sketchbook he had drawn this shape. I said "Hey - let's make that!". So here it is!
Brooke is genius in many ways and shapes is one of them. When I started talking about a "vortex" he sketched out the design for this years National entry.
Thanks for your time!
FAQ
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Yes. It's real. There are 13 or so states that have sanctioned competitions - Vermont is one of those states. The competition is made up from all the winners from all those competitions.
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Agreed - I don't know why ice sculpting tools (they don't really make snow sculpting tools - so we use ice sculpting tools mostly) are so expensive. We have scraped by for the past years using floors scrapers and antique saws that I found at tag sales here in Vermont. I have maybe 2 good chisels, but we need a gouge shaped one and one longer one to better make this piece.
You can see here the price of the ice saws.
http://www.jbprince.com/ice-carving-chisels/saws.asp
And here is the price of the chisels
http://www.jbprince.com/ice-carving-chisels/prince-chisels.asp
We would probably get them from Ebay instead of the new ones, to try and save.
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Well, we do like to cut a rug, but the jigs we mentioned are for getting that bell shape out of the cylinder. We need it to be perfectly round, and arced, so we are building these tools to help achieve that. It's lumber and hardware. We use these wood mending plates as scrapers, so we fasten the mending plates to the shaped wood. These jigs in particular our round, and then some are built to allow for the angles of the bell shape.
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Kombi Sports sends us gloves and cold weather gear each year. And Switchback gave us 300 dollars that we are using for travel expenses.
The Vermont Parks and Rec pays for the plane tickets, but not the luggage fees, and that is 320 dollars right there.
The Competition pays for the hotel and most of the meals while we are there. They get about 25,000 visitors, so I guess it works out for them.
So some of our expenses are paid for, which is how we are able to afford to go at all. But a lot of the expenses are not. We will use the Switchback money and our own money for travel, and use this money for TOOLS.
Like I said - We are all particularly broke this year - Both Alex and I started our own businesses and Brooke cut his hours down at the bakery so he could watch his new baby.
Also - there have been a couple years we went to these events with the idea of mostly having fun. This year we are going to the event with the idea executing this piece to the fullest of our potential. We want to win. With your help we can have the tools we need to do the job.
Have a question? If the info above doesn't help, you can ask the project creator directly.
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Funding Successful
This project successfully raised its funding goal on January 20.
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We will send you a postcard from Lake Geneva as we are in the middle of making the sculpture! We will write them at sculpting breakfast. I will write something (hopefully) funny, Brooke will draw a quick something and Alex will mail it.
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A snow sculpting pin! We have three different sayings on pins and we will pick you one at random and send it to you. The sayings are "When Hell freezes Over we will Be There Sculpting" - "Yeah it's cold... but you're hot" and "It's only blocks of snow, but I like it"
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A copy of How to have fun, travel the world and make money with snow sculpture (but make money is crossed out, because snow sculpture and money don't really go together). And a pin!
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Framed photo of finished piece. One of the team members is a picture framer and he is good. It will be a unique thing to hang up on a wall and look at. And three pins!
Project By
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Michael J. Nedell has been the captain of many Vermont State Snow Sculpting Championship teams, and has captained 2 teams to second place awards in National Snow Sculpting Competitions. An artist of many mediums, Michael has received 2nd and 3rd place awards in the SEABA’s South End Art Hop Outdoor Art Competition, and has competed for Team Vermont in the national poetry slam competition in 2000, 2001 2002 and 2003. He lives and makes things in Burlington, VT.
