Porous Pachyderm

Today's post is another edition of "Erik can't think of what to blog about so he's photographing items on his desk, many of which he's not sure how they got there, but they sort of 'belong' now". I think this might be my favorite of the objects that stare at me all day. It definitely took the most skill to create. I've had her for many years now. Several years ago she fell and chipped a tusk.

The amazing thing about this carved wooden elephant is hard to spot at first glance. Most people never notice its secret, I'm sure. See anything special about it?

I don't know what the tusks are made of. I suppose there's some chance that they could be actual ivory.

Have you spotted it yet? She's got a little baby elephant inside her, facing the other direction. You can see its eye in this last shot. The craftsmanship to carve such an object from one piece of wood rather blows my mind.

My main motive behind photographing this creature was to practice a new photographic lighting technique. Can you figure out how I lit the subject of these photos? I didn't use the camera's built-in flash, and the room was pitch dark with the exception of my light source. I'll give the answer in my next post.

[Update: solution here.]