I used Padico's LaDoll series Premier stone clay to sculpt Danny. Mentioned every chance I get, this clay is super lightweight and strong. Able to hold the finest detail!

There's no secret to sculpting the face. It's eyeballing and refining; adding clay where is needed and removing any excess. Repeat until you're ready to move on.

My go to primer is Mr. Hobby's Mr. SURFACER 1200. Again, the fine features of the face were slightly altered because of the primer thickness even with it thinned out. The troubles of working on this scale...

Once the primer has dried, I can begin sanding and polishing to get back some of the fine details such as eyelids, nostrils, the ears and eyebrows. The body is next. Can you guess how I made it?

That's right! Wire. From a coat hanger. I bent it into the general pose and padded the wire armature with small pieces of styrofoam. The goal was to keep this statue piece lightweight.

Positioned Danny's head and tweaked the neckline to fit snuggly. Gave him very basic hands and feet for the purpose of constructing his ride: the big wheel trike (handlebar and pedal position).

Danny's big wheel seat may look sculpted in solid clay, but it's not entirely. Inside is actually paperboard. Once the clay coating dried, I was able to carve out the details. Next were the tires and because they're identical, I sculpted one tire and made two moulds for each side using thermo plastic. The tricky part after was joining the two halves seemlessly.

Setting Danny onto the seat balanced was just a matter of sanding down his butt to conform to the seat. With his stubby hands and feet in place as markers, I could begin to construct the front of the trike. In the previous photo, you can see aluminum wiring used for the trike's frame. Quite easy to form with a pair of pliers.

Please excuse the horrible quality in these upcoming photographs. I didn't realize my camera lens was covered in a fine film of clay particles. Anyhow, the tires are connected by a piece of coat hanger and glued to the seat. The tires can't actually roll, sorry. Now to add the gooseneck of the trike.

This part was quite daunting because there was no reference I could draw from in the movie. Never once do we see Danny's trike from the front so it was my own engineering and design from here on. Once the aluminum handle bars were set in place along with the front tire, I was all smiles.

I just love scotch tape and styrofoam when crafting. This time, the styrofoam was used as a 'holder' to keep in place the front tire and handlebars that were glued together. I won't lie, adding the spokes was a bee lol. It was one month into the Danny statue and I was ready to paint!

I can't tell you how satisfying it was to paint the blue seat, however the next step was a challenge as you can see Danny in the background broken. I had to literally snap his limbs to get him positioned into the seat because both hands and feet were not aligned with the handlebars and pedals... grrr!

Problem solved after a few days of surgery. In the meantime, I decided what would go on the front of the gooseneck. Number 11. Why? Hmm... his Apollo 11 sweater, the Grady twins, and the amount Danny tallied on the dartboard hehe. Yes, I'm a geek. By the way, do you notice the red bell? Weathered and spray sealed with matte lacquer, here is Danny's big wheel.

Now to get him on it without breaking it. One thing I want to mention which has never been pointed out before I revealed it in one of my THE SHINING analysis videos is that the original trike in the movie had a white frame, basket in front of my number 11 decal, and two bells. Try to find the original trike in the movie, it's there and it'll freak you out.

Now to dress Danny. Scouring the local fabric and craft stores in my former city of Kawasaki is always my favorite part of any statue project. I was lucky to find some very fine tweed, I think it was that matched Danny's sweater, color and all perfectly, however, the plaid shirt was impossible to find... hmm... what to do?

The only solution was to paint the plaid by assembling the collar in fine white cotton which was tucked into the sweater. Notice I also added a lip around around the neckline of the sweater. With Danny able to sit firmly in the seat, it was time to give him those LEE overalls with all those wonderful tiny adornments.

The overalls were made with four pattern pieces of the finest denim I could find: front flap, back flap, below butt with back of the legs and pattern for front of the legs. The seams would be masked as wrinkles... yes, that's one of my tricks of the trade hehe.

The buckles were very difficult on my fingers to make. Luckily there was only two. I had found bronze colored pins in the sewing department that were just the right thickness. The buttons were cut out from thin plastic-like foil. Finished the overalls and gave him shoes--unfortunately no photos were taken due to being in the zone.

Notice the handpainted LEE brand label? With Danny fully clothed, there was a minor complication to get him back in the big wheel. I hadn't planned any wiggle room for the added thickness to his butt and length of his legs with the shoe soles... more surgery.

Finished the hands, sleeves and painting the soles, only Danny's head left to do. Pretty cute isn't it? A headless boy riding a big wheel haha. With the first round of facial paints completed and some lacquer, it's beginning to resemble Danny now.

Here I experimented with doll hair for the first time, ever. The results were decent now that I look back on these photos, but at the time, it just wasn't working. I did some revision work on the face to try to balance it with the doll hair, but ultimately, it just didn't work.

Four more days of stubbornness, I ripped out all the hair and went back to my trusted Premier clay to get the job done. In doing so, I ended up revising more on Danny's face. In particular, his nose. Do you see my black cat in the background? Rest in peace, dear Blue.

Moving on to the base. Color felts closely matching the colors of the Overlook Hotel carpet were used to piece together the enigmatic pattern and then chalk pastels to touch up the colors. Many coats of fixative spray was applied to lock in the pastel chalks from smudging.

The base was constructed in styrofoam (body), paperboard (walls) and wood (bottom). First I stacked a few sheets of 1 cm styrofoam then cut out the hexagon according to the dimensions of the hexagons on the carpet. Paperboard was glued to each side with the top and bottom of the base fitted with wood.

The walls were wallpapered with fine Japanese calligraphy paper. I had toyed with the idea to do it in floral paper as seen in the scene with the Grady twins standing in the hallway, but realized it would likely make the piece looking too busy and cluttered taking away from the unique carpet pattern. So I added an electrical socket instead...

Over the years, many people have asked if the socket works and what's it for? There is really no purpose for it other than a detail I noticed in the film when Danny was riding around the halls of the Overlook Hotel.
And that my friends, is a wrap! I began this project on Jan. 29th 2013 and finished May 9th 2013.

Danny and big wheel aren't locked down to the base. I had the plan initially to embed magnets to hold him down but since it's unlikely the big wheel would tip over from loss of balance, it just wasn't necessary.

If I ever attempt a second Danny Torrance statue on his big wheel, I would definitely make it able to roll and Danny's legs articulated to pedal along with it. Thank you for coming along for the ride and following my journey. It was definitely a worthwhile project to have started and completed.

One last thing before I go. It's a bit of interesting news that came out of this statue piece: I was contacted by Pixar director, Lee Unkrich of Toy Story 2, 3 and Finding Nemo fame who wanted to purchase Danny. I kindly declined and that was the end of it. Little did I know he is also the owner and caretaker of the website: www.theoverlookhotel.com. Pretty cool isn't it? No regrets though.