January 12 - 18 Weekly Recap

What has been happening in the world of Tolkien fandom

More award nominations have been announced for The Desolation of Smaug, fans have shown their love of Tolkien be creating epic works of art, and even a new edition of one of J.R.R. Tolkien's books has been scheduled for release later this year. Find out about all this and more beyond the break!

Over the past several weeks, Kingfisher from Heirs of Durin has been posted about the many weapons used by the dwarves of Erebor. So far, he has covered the armaments of Dwalin, Kili, Fili, and Thorin Oakenshield.

Tuesday:

The nominations for the 12th annual Visual Effects Society Awards have been announced. The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug received 5: Joe Letteri, Eric Saindon, Kevin Sherwood, and David Clayton were nominated for Outstanding Visual Effects in a Visual Effects-Driven Feature Motion Picture; Eric Reynolds, David Clayton, Myriam Catrin, and Guillaume Francois were nominated for Outstanding Animated Character (Smaug, of course) in a Live Action Feature Motion Picture; Christian Rivers, Phil Barrenger, Mark Gee, and Thelvin Tico Cabezas were nominated for Outstanding Virtual Cinematography in a Live Action Feature Motion Picture; Areito Echevarria, Andreas Soderstrom, Ronnie Menahem, and Christoph Sprenger were nominated for Outstanding FX and Simulation Animation in a Live Action Feature Motion Picture; Charles Tait, Robin Hollander, Giuseppe Tagliavini, and Sean Heuston were nominated for Outstanding Compositing in a Feature Motion Picture. See the full list of nominations here.

Wednesday:

The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug received 2 nominations from the Motion Picture Sound Editors: Best Sound Editing: Sound Effects and Foley in an English Language Feature and Best Sound Editing - Music in a Feature (English or Foreign Language). See the full list of nominations here.

Thursday:

Gentle Giant has released the details about the next bust in The Hobbit trilogy line: Legolas Greenleaf Mini-bust. This fearsome orc-head brandishing elf is available for pre-order from the Gentle Giant website.

An amazing artist and Tolkien fan (Victoria of VMCreations) created a breath-taking sculpture of Smaug from the pages of The Hobbit. The dragon appears to have burst from the very pages of this danish translation of J.R.R. Tolkien's The Hobbit. See more images here.




A new edition of The Adventures of Tom Bombadil and Other Verses from the Red Book, put together by Wayne G. Hammond and Christina Scull, will be released this Fall. This collection of 16 poems, originally published in 1962, will feature original artwork by Pauline Baynes and earlier versions of the poems that are now difficult to find. Learn more at Wayne and Christina’s webblog.