Pictures from the final day



In the end we finished in the middle of the field and did not place in the top three as we had hoped.  Our design incorporated a lot of negative space that in the end may have been partly responsible for our undoing.  During the final stages of sculpting, numerous large air pockets were found at the top of the posts holding up the head dress.  This made the block weak at a very critical point; had we more thinly sculpted the front poles as we had intended, the piece would have very likely collapsed on top of us.  With no time left to safely repair the block, the tops of the poles were left off and the poles were left much thicker than intended to prevent collapse.  To make matters worse, we were so preoccupied with the structural integrity issues that we did not finish the drum sticks and other artifacts that were suppose to be placed in the interior of the piece.  So unfortunately, this one did not turn out nearly as good as we had hoped.

 

And so it is with the sport of snow sculpture, you either take risks and hope you don't run into a block defect at a critical point, or you stick to safer (and boring, yawn) designs.  Next year, look out folks...because we have already started planning a design...