Researching what to do as a pirate.

Been off working on the ship for the past several months and now I have a chance to get back at writing for the blog.

Summer of 2009 was remarkable slower in terms of people at BRF as well as those boarding the Dreadnought. But that was expected, since December of 2008 in fact, so I was not surprised. The people (patrons) at the Faire did have a great time and the weather was some of the nicest I have had experienced so far. A cool summer suits me fine as I had to work in a costume in it every weekend.

Picking up where I left off-- OK so from the visual surveys done and from my talking with BRF staff it was determined that a pirate attraction at the faire would pull in patrons and it was something at a certain percentage of patrons wanted.

From that I began to draw out and think out what it was I wanted to do, exactly. The Dreadnought ship WAS NOT what was envisioned first. Wow! What I ended up doing was not what I had set out to do. This will come up again later in this blog as the story weaves on.

What first came out of my head was to build, on land, a skull shaped cave. It would have been more like a chicken wire over Styrofoam shaped skull like rock shape that got sprayed with concrete and painted to look like rock. It would have been cheap, easy to make, interestingly enough to draw attention and the insides would have been grottoes that I would have fitted out as displays about famous pirates through out the ages, along with weapons, treasure and the like. This goes back to my museum background. Everything on display behind glass. Very dull actually when I look back at it. But the dry land and skull rock idea I liked and still like today. Would have also served well when I went to sell the "shop" later on.

I seem to recall that Peter Pan and Captain Hook had some sort of skull rock or cave in the Disney cartoon movie of that story. It almost always seems that pirates are hiding out or sticking treasure into a skull like cave. So this is why I wanted a skull cave. It would also been very strong and safe to lock up my displays in.

After more meetings with BRF staff it became clear that a skull looking rock with museum displays was not going to fly. They were right about static displays. Compare that pony rides, elephants, the joust and sword fights in the streets and you can tell it was going to be a real loosing idea. Also the idea of a time line of famous pirates was not working either. The faire is set in 1580s and I was told that what the merchants and others presented was along the lines of Renaissance England. So Blackbeard got left behind- wrong time period!

So now comes the research. Pirates in general I knew about. Elizabethan Sea Dogs and the English Renaissance time period I was very weak on. This meant research on my part. Also the change from a museum display inside a skull cave to something else threw things off track.

Research has the word "search" in it. And that is what you have to do. I dug out all the books at the library I could get about Elizabethan England, Sea Dogs, and the Renaissance in general. I also began to look at business plans and business structures. I was not trained in business at all and I found the business side of the research very interesting. This took a good length of time. If you are considering a project like this better start NOW with every aspect of research you will need. Unless you know it all right now- and good for you! But all the same you never know all that you need to and part of growth in to keep on learning different things.

At about this same time I began to do something that would help get through all the work and research I needed to. I cut out of my life TV viewing and computer gaming. Both of these freed up several hours of my time each week that I could now devote to this side line job. James Gurney of Dinotopia fame is a great spokesperson for no TV viewing. He does not own a TV. Think of what you save on no cable bills!?

Next post will continue on about specifics of researching and planning towards a finished product.

One last thing: I found this image of the Dreadnought from the air. Not clear who to credit it to. If it is yours let me and I will give you create. Here is the link-

http://virtualglobetrotting.com/map/pirate-ship-3/

Fun to have built something so neat and big you can see it from high up in the air.