Shell Mouse and Hybrid Forms

Making models of a natural form, man-made form, and mix of the two using foam core, clay, and paper.

Shell Form: Clay First Pass

I believed starting with clay was the best choice because of its malleability and with no real understanding of the form of the shell, I think it was good to familiarize myself with the material as well.

This was my first attempt with the clay. Something I forgot to account for was the axis from the tip the end. I was only looking at the view from front/back and sides, but the top view turned out super wonky but! Something really beautiful was the spiral form of the shell in the top view.

Another thing I was thinking of was the spirals located along the shell. They are a very distinct part of the shell, but I am not sure if they are necessary to represent within this abstracted form.

Reference Image for top-down axis

My first attempt at the shape of the shell, but as I mentioned the view from the top was off because I really just forgot to look at it ><

Foam form because I got bored of clay…

My next medium is foam core. I started with a rectangular prism of foam, and I drew the outline of what I saw on all 6 sides. (so naive of me haha i thought i was being smart here TT)

It slipped my mind that when I started carving the shape outline of one side. the outlines on the other side would disappear…

either way, I realized pretty quickly that shaving down one side at a time was not going to work.

I think working with the clay informed my next steps, as I decided to approach the foam shell from the top down as well, keeping the direction of the shell’s spiral in mind.

Iterations of Foam

I made three iterations.

The first came out similar to the first iteration of the clay shell. The spiral of the shell was not emphasized enough, and carving out the outer ear of the shell proved to be difficult, as it folds over the mid line axis of the tip of the shell.

The second went better in the previously mentioned sense, but the ratio of the shells upper curve and bottom cone was off.

Back to Clay

On my second attempt, some things I focused on was the spiraling shape from the top of the point, thus when shaping the clay I would focus on the upward spiral, remembering to rotate and compare the shell more methodically.

Foam Again.

I think this attempt turned out well, with the upper spiral coming out to be much more accurate. I also wanted to hint at the slight ridged texture on the base of the shell. I used the flat end of a plastic knife to ident the shapes in.

shell foam core model and shell side by side comparison

Foam and Paper Mouse

After several iterations of the foam core shell, I was much more comfortable with the medium. I analyzed the mouse and was able to abstract it to a few main elements:

• Three Layers: A shiny top covering, a silver middle layer that wrapped around the back, and a white base.
• Spherical Mouse Roller

Finding the outward angle and position of each layer relative to the overall silhouette of the mouse was important.

The proportion sketches and taping the actual mouse were really helpful with the paper mouse, as it let me choose where I wanted to show the structure in the mouse.

Foam Mouse Iterations

From left to right, I made three iterations. It was challenging to keep the width and length of the mouse proportional, as well as keeping in mind the tapering within the height of the mouse in between the three main layers.

Paper Mouse

For my paper mouse, I measured the horizontal slots that I taped out on the mouse and the vertical ones. With five vertical slots, I made the third in the middle as the main axis, also highlighting the circular knob.

From the top view, I intersected the roller from the center to make the circular roller you can feel when you put your finger on it.

Hybrid Form: But not like a genetic one…

For the last part of this project, we were tasked with a “hybrid form”, a form combining elements of both the mouse and the shell. But this is not limited to physical aspects. The form is not a mash up of physical features.

We started with a list of descriptive words for the shell, and another for the mouse.

Shell:

• subtle ridges
• spiraling
• tapered
• nibbed

Mouse:

• smooth
• ridged
• shiny
• symmetrical
• circular roller

Clay Prototype

I did not have a clear idea of what kind of form I wanted, so I spent some time kneading the clay around and exploring forms that felt aesthetically balanced to me.

I liked the unique aspect of the nib like tip on the shell and the circular roller on the mouse, so something that I wanted to include on my hybrid form was a nodular aspect.

I drew some sketches.

I wanted to balance a natural flowing form with some more geometric shapes. A circular shape was something I wanted to emphasize, but I didn’t really want it to be the main focus.

Overall, it was hard to visualize the 3D form in just my sketchbook, so I decided to just mess around with some clay.

In consideration of the nodular aspect, I thought that the circular aspect could be concave.

I liked the free-flowing feeling from this form

Eventually I realized that clay wouldn’t be a good idea for my hybrid because I personally have trouble with settling on an idea, and since there isn’t really a right or wrong to this, decided to use foam for a more solid form.

Hybrid Form:

I implemented the spiraling aspect in the back of the form, and the nodular/nibbed aspect in the front.

Thoughts.

I really appreciated the different mediums we were required to work with; especially the foam and although I hated it, the paper was also a novel experience. I think in general, I am someone who likes to edit their work as they go, even with really unforgiving medium like the paper, I wasn’t really able to plan out everything, and was more testing things as I went along.