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Purple Cow Original Post: 4 October 2016 When I was very young, my mother's parents had a farm about 3 miles from our home. I can't remember how we got there, but since my mom didn't drive, I presume that we sometimes walked over to the farm. She grew up there and had some friends that still lived in the area. So on occasion, while we were visiting my grandpa and grandma, we would ride one of Grandpa's horses over to visit these friends. The horse was called "Old Blue," which I never understood since he was a brown horse. But Old Blue was so broad that you could almost have had a picnic on his back. We never used a saddle. My mom would ride him over to her friends' homes and my brother, Dan, and I would ride along on that expansive back while my mom sang songs, told stories, or recited funny poetry. One of the poems that I recall hearing as we road along was called "Purple Cow." It went something like this: I never saw a purple cow, According to Wikipedia, "Purple Cow" was written by Gelett Burgess in 1895. My grandfathers' herd had only white-faced Herefords, so I can't say that I've ever seen a purple cow. I've been wondering why Burgess wrote the poem (I do the same about some that I've written.) Why should anyone ever expect that cattle should be purple? I created a Poser image to give a hint to the answer.
I loaded TerraDome 2 into the Poser Pro 2014 scene and injected the Circle Of Hills morph into the AZone. Moorland-11 was used to texture this with grass, but since the grass seems a bit dead, I changed its Diffuse Color to a more pleasing green. The Circle of Hills dial was adjusted to 0.5 to provide a hill in the distance. A Noggin's Cow and a Calf were loaded and placed in a nursing pose in the foreground. Another Cow, a couple Calves, and a Bull were loaded and placed grazing back on the hillside. I gave the bull long horns. HiveWire's Long Haired version of their Quarter Hose was placed at the left of the foreground and equipped with their Western Tack Bridle and Saddle. Michael 4 was loaded, dressed in M4 Cowboy Clothes, and placed in a crouching pose just to the right of his horse. Poser's Pet Dog in a playful pose was placed in front of Michael. I used a tree bark texture (no pun intended) to rough up the dog's coat. One of Crooked Trees' Large Leaf trees was placed in the foreground, behind the horse. Two more were placed on the hill behind the grazing cattle. Three instances of Barbed Wire Fence were linked together and placed to separate Michael and his horse from the tree and the cattle. Now the plot thickens. I changed the Diffuse Color for the horse's coat, Michael's skin, and the dog's pelt to purple. Would a purple cowboy with a purple horse and a purple dog be surprised to see a purple cow? Considering the fate of a beef cow, I suppose that this cowboy would still rather see than be one. Keep reading/keep writing - Jack |
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