Thank you for encouraging me. I truly appreciate it.


Here is the boy version of the lawnmower:




I'm currently working on Jack and the Beanstalk. This is a draft version with quite a bit more to do, but it gives some idea of what I am trying to achieve:

Hello, pcasfer,

That is extraordinarily flattering.

I am nowhere near as skilled as many of the other "kolobokers" who created their koloboks/emoticons and posted them here. If your forum needs are not too onerous, I would be happy to make the occasional kolobok emoticon for you to use, and would do so without requiring any remuneration.

If your forum needs are more than that, and it ends up involving more time than I can easily spare*, we can talk about a payment situation. I do want to make it very clear that Aiwan is the absolute master of all things kolobok - the original maker and the inspiration for all other koloboks - so it would always be a good idea to acknowledge him as that progenitor.


*Some of the kolobok emoticons that I've made are very complicated and take quite a long time to create. An example is the carousel/merry-go-round - insanely tricky to make. Some are far less detailed and haven't been so taxing to make.



Thank you, Reny. It is a very difficult time for us, and I still find myself bursting into tears for no apparent reason sometimes... But I've got to be the strong one, especially for my mother.


Yesterday was Australia Day. In honour of it, here is a kolobok showing off one of the most iconic land features in the world - Uluru.

After a hiatus in making koloboks, here is a girl with lawnmower:




(I did not feel like creating any more for a while; I have been so full of grief because of my father's death.)

Dear Kolobok fans,

I've been absent from here and from making any Koloboks for the last month or so.

My father died unexpectedly on 25th August. He was the hero of my heart and I will miss him all the days of my life.

Oh yes... that carousel involved quite a lot of work!


Here is a new kolobok - relaxing in front of a cheerfully blazing fire in the fireplace.

(It's so cold here at the moment. The winter chills inspired this kolobok.)

A carousel or merry-go-round:

This is a light version of Aiwan's "dwarf" character. (I see it as a berserker with an axe!)

I think something must have gone wrong (in the fourth frame) when Aiwan uploaded his original...



I've also made a girl version. It tickles my funny bone to see a berserker girl kolobok complete with lipstick raising her axe threateningly.

The gondolier is one of my favourites...!





Here are two boy koloboks on a seesaw:

Social distancing:


A gondolier (I've experimented with the hat to get a good straw colour):


Doing push-ups:

I was asked by a fellow forum member (a different forum) to create a Japanese-style kolobok emoticon:


(Perhaps I'll also re-use this Japanese kolobok in a more active way, wielding a samurai sword!)


Another idea also came to mind - the Dr Frankenstein experiment / the Modern Prometheus. (I always feel overwhelming sadness for the creature reanimated by Mary Shelley's Dr Frankeinstein. If he's a monster, he is so by man's design.) Anyway, here he is - the creature made by Frankenstein:

Thank you - I think that water is always interesting to draw with koloboks... So is glass (and mirrors).

I'm always fascinating by how the exceptionally good artists that were here drawing kolobok-style emoticons have conveyed glass and water and so on. Those are the koloboks that inspired me.




I think that I forgot to upload my music box ballerina...



... and the Chinese kolobok with a classical Chinese topknot:

Another of Australia's weird yet wonderful animals is the echidna - specifically the Tachyglossus aculeatus, known as the short-beaked echidna.

One of Australia's most extraordinary creatures is the platypus, with a bill like a duck, a furry body (it's a mammal), webbed feet like a frog's (but the webbing retracts on land), and the males have a venomous spur on their hind legs (like reptiles). The female lays eggs like a bird.

Here is my platypus kolobok:





... and here he is on land (or not in the water):

I'm thinking of making an Australian series of koloboks.

As part of that, here is a koala kolobok, hugging a eucalyptus tree with some tempting eucalyptus leaves within easy chewing distance.

He's under very strict "Stay at home" conditions!





Here is another kitchen kolobok. He's mixing up something delicious in a stand mixer.

I'm glad you like my girl kolobok putting on her makeup and the hand sanitiser kolobok!



Here is a lockdown / self-isolation kolobok:

Girl kolobok applying mascara and lipstick:

Thank you, Reny!

I'm very happy with the dwarves. I've tried to give them all their own little touch, apart from the different colour of each cap. I was toying with the idea of having one dwarf wielding a chisel, but I think it's just too small a tool to render successfully unless I go wildly out of scale - and then the chisel ends up looking like a big knife instead. I was so pleased, though, with the way that the pickaxes turned out.

Another idea with which I toyed was a miner's cart, but I think that's going to be better if I create it in a mine setting, with one or two dwarves sitting on it (on top of the gold), and the others running after it. (We'll see.)



Anyway, I headed back to the COVID-19/medical world for my next Kolobok idea. It's another "take" on using alcohol-based hand sanitiser to inactivate this coronavirus (by disrupting the fatty membrane), visualised as a battle against each virion and the squirted 70-90% alcohol hand sanitiser acting like a cannon.

The Seven Dwarves mourning Snow White, who lies in her glass casket motionless and unchanging.



... and here is the version with the improved lantern around poor Snow White lying in her casket:

The Seven Dwarves from Snow White:



... Improved lantern, I think?

A little mouse kolobok:





A carriage and four-horse-team being driven by a coachman:




The same carriage and four horses with a passenger / Cinderella:




The mice being transformed into horses:

A girl kolobok carrying her suitcase.


This kolobok is ready to travel once COVID-19 travel restrictions have been lifted throughout the world. (In the meantime, the girl kolobok is watching YouTube, doing home renovations, practising new recipes, and using FaceTime or Zoom to keep in touch with extended family members.)

Oh, I missed it!

Aiwan, I hope that your birthday was wonderful, and that you and your family are safe.

Two new koloboks, both trundling along with a shopping trolley.

Another version: