Magic Talisman - Fav Photos 2020

the Magic Talisman

Way back in 1987, my sister Marianne wanted to make a Fantasy photo story using three of my children, and two nieces, as the main characters. She would take the kids out on location, dressed in outfits put together from my dress-up closet. Since it was way before the days of digital cameras, all the special effects had to be done manually by cutting the kids out of the photos and gluing them into other scenes, and then taking a new photograph.

I wrote the story, based on Marianne's ideas and photos, and together we made four books, hand colouring all the borders on all the pages. At that time I was still making cloth dolls, and I decided to make a series representing the main characters dressed in costumes, based on what the kids actually wore, but more elaborate in the way I envisioned they could have been.

The dolls have been on display in my doll case for over 30 years, and after debating about making some room for years now, I finally decided to give the entire set away to my daughter-in-law. But before doing so, I first wanted to take some photos of the dolls in settings similar to ones in the book.

First, the three main characters....Eric, Flint, and Galan.....

Eric, who was one of a set of twins separated at birth, was played by my son Nick, who was almost 8 at the time.

His companion was a magical 'ladybug-like' creature called Fizzbizz....

Eric met Galan, a brave Knight...

...played by my son Chris, who was 9 at the time

The third companion was Flint, an Elf....

She was played by my niece Kelly, and my daughter Mary would be her stand in for back views when Kelly wasn't available. Both girls were almost 5 at the time.

The dolls have never been properly photographed, and I thought it might be fun to take some photos of them in various scenes out of the book. So I took them along this week on a little drive up into the country.

One of my favourite photos from the book has always been the one of Eric starting out on his adventure, heading through a cornfield....

So we stopped beside a cornfield to take some photos....

the Evil Queen

The three companions in the Magic Talisman had to overcome all kinds of misadventures, conjured up by the Evil Queen Silvara.....

she was played by my eldest niece, Judy, who was 8 at the time....

Queen Silvara with her trusted, companion.... the Raven....

the Queen and Her Son

In the Magic Talisman, the Evil Queen had raised a son, who was actually the twin brother of Eric. They had been separated in a battle, and Eric ended up raised by a farmer couple, played by Nick and Kelly....

But the second baby was taken by the Evil Queen and raised as her son, Prince Tanis...

Marwendalin

In every Fantasy story there has to be a force of good to help the heroes along. In the Magic Talisman it was the Sorceress Marwendalyn, who was played by my five year old daughter Mary...

In the photo story, Mary wore a blue dress with a red cape and a white stand-up collar, which served as basic colour inspiration for a much fancier dress for the doll version..

The dress had gold fabric 'spots' appliquéd then stitched with satin and straight stitch on the sewing machine to resemble peacock feathers. It's always been one of my all time favourite doll dresses.