Doctor Sprifford and his four young adventuring accomplices pose for their pre-launch daguerreotype. From left: Archibald McTavish, Miss Felicity Ravensberg, Rupert LeBrock, Doctor R. Sprifford, Leonard Witham-Smythe.

So, I managed to find some intreped adventurers for the journey into the great unknown. My local Lego shop helped me out twice – once with a big grab bin of minifig parts (they’re £1 a minifig) and also with Orient Adventure mini-kits on sale for £1 each! Can’t resist a bargain.

Investigations were made into carrying capacity of a standard cream coloured latex balloon filled as far as I dare with helium. With the lighterweight hairnet applied, and three lengths of thin black thread I couldn’t even lift a minifig! However, cutting off the ‘lip’ on the end of the balloon let it rise to the ceiling promptly! (It made a big difference). However, no fetching headgear could be carried, and only a piece of paper approx 6 postage stamps worth could be carried. I’m right on the edge of my weight allowance! Thinking of making the balloon basket of airmail paper, and writing on that.

As for the image above – it was done in photoshop. Several layers – the base layer was retained, it was copied and then made about 80% opaque, and ‘colourized’ in photoshop Hue/Brightness adjustments to a sepia colour. Another layer with gaussian blur gave the soft look, and a texture/grain/vertical filter was applied. Lastly, a handdrawn border was scribbled round the edge with a fairly hard brush – once at 100% opacity and then a little touch up with 70%.