Zelda Dungeon Talks Tears of the Kingdom and All Things Creative with Miniature Maker Crossing Crafts

Posted on February 25 2023 by Kora Burton

Crossing Crafts, a maker of video game and anime-themed sculptures, dioramas, and miniatures who also goes by Diana, is at it again with her superb Zelda-themed builds. Most recently, she made a mesmerizing Light-Up Fang & Bone from Breath of the Wild. Like many of us, Crossing Crafts is counting down the seconds to the release of Tears of the Kingdom, but in the meantime, she’s cooked up something special for us to enjoy while we wait.

A self-described sucker for Nintendo’s “scrungly” characters, Crossing Crafts has chosen to focus on Kilton’s shop for her latest Zelda project. Complete with a purple glowing orb and lights dangling from outside the balloon, this rendition of the Fang & Bone would be a delight to have on any Zelda fan’s shelf. Crossing Crafts’ video takes viewers through the whole creative process, from making the bonelike base to weathering the wood of Kilton’s cart to figuring out how to texture all of the various fabrics adorning the shop.

Crossing Crafts is a dedicated fan of The Legend of Zelda. Her past builds include the Lumpy Pumpkin using $1 USD clay, a tiny Tarrey Town, and sculptures of Malanya the Horse God and Cursed Naydra. As we all look ahead to her new crafting content that will surely be surfacing with Tears of the Kingdom‘s release, we sat down with Diana to talk about her channel, her creative process, and her love of all things Zelda.

ZD: The “character” of the projects you feature in your videos always really pops. What makes you gravitate towards the particular projects you’ve featured on your channel?

Crossing Crafts (CC): Well, as someone trying to grow as a YouTuber, I want to make the topics of my videos something people are actively searching for and want to watch. However, as someone who also happens to possess a very chaotic internal monologue with little self-control around creative endeavors, sometimes inspiration to make something less searched-for overwhelms me, especially when I know nobody on the internet has done something like it… the urge to be “first” floods my brain. For example, my video on the Lumpy Pumpkin — nobody has ever made a model of the Lumpy Pumpkin, both inside and out, and when I realized I could be the first to do it, I immediately started working. That being said, nobody is searching for Lumpy Pumpkin videos, lol! Although it doesn’t have many views right now, the most important thing is that it’s a good video which has the potential to be entertaining to people. When I get a little bigger as a channel, YouTube will recommend it and people will say, “Oh, the Lumpy Pumpkin! I remember that from Skyward Sword! What a cool idea!” and it’ll get a bit more recognition.

ZD: Between your humor and the satisfying experience of seeing all these tiny elements come together, Crossing Crafts is just so much fun to watch. What’s your favorite part of the creative experience on your channel?

CC: Surprisingly enough, I really love the editing portion of creating my videos. The first video I made was the first time I have ever edited a video, and looking back, boy, can you tell. When I’m crafting, I will work on it obsessively, usually 10-14 hours a day. It can feel a bit chaotic, my work area gets super messy and unorganized, and sometimes the pressure of finishing quickly to satiate the YouTube Algorithm makes me lose confidence in whether the video will perform well or not. That, and sometimes when I’m crafting, I have parts of the craft that I just can’t do with my current skill set. A few months ago, there were two crafts in a row that I had to stop working on, one where I tried to sculpt a scene from the new (at the time) Hollow Knight: Silksong trailer and another ill thought-out Howl’s Moving Castle craft. After failing at two crafts in a row, my confidence took a bit of a hit!

But editing is something so peaceful. My desk is clean, the craft is right next to me and I can stare at it proudly, I can snack while I work and listen to music or a podcast. It’s super chill. The satisfaction of seeing the dozens of hours I filmed being put together, clip by clip, all the jokes I wrote down being successfully executed in the video, the awesome feeling of watching the ending glamour shots when it’s all put together — it’s just an unbelievable feeling of satisfaction and pride!

ZD: What got you into crafting sculptures, dioramas, miniatures, etc.?

CC: Honestly, I’ve only given sculpting, dioramas, and miniatures a genuine try since April of 2022, roughly 10 months ago. In high school, I was lucky enough to go to a place that had a ceramics class, and it was my only other option besides a drawing and painting class which, frankly, I am lousy at. That introduced me to the joys of clay and sculpting which has stuck with me through the years. In that class, we only used real clay, but I had heard about polymer clay and was interested, albeit intimidated… I had made just one sculpture far before the inception of Crossing Crafts. I used some cheap air dry clay to make a Skull Kid statue out of boredom. That one turned out pretty ok for my first time and, looking back, gave me enough confidence to start filming my projects in the future.

ZD: I’m not going to lie, your channel has majorly piqued my interest in crafting some dioramas to display at my house! Any tips for miniature-crafting newbies?

CC: The best advice would be just find something you want to do, decide how big you want it to be, and get crafting! All of my materials, like paint, paint brushes, clay, clay sculpting tools, are all super cheap so you don’t need much money to get into this hobby, as opposed to a hobby like streaming where you need a nice PC, a microphone, a camera, etc. Find a lot of references for whatever project you want to do. This could be fan art or in-game screenshots, and some places on the internet have full, 3D interactive renders of certain maps and locations from a bunch of different games. That’s how I built the Lumpy Pumpkin. I couldn’t have done it without a plethora of references. If you feel you’re not creative enough to do it or you don’t have enough supplies to get started, I’d recommend slapping that thought out of your head and start watching people like Studson Studio, who makes amazing crafts out of literal trash. You can do it!

ZD: You said in your Cursed Naydra video that you’ve played over 1000 hours of Breath of the Wild… Tell us more about your Breath of the Wild addiction. Don’t worry, you’re in good company here.

CC: I feel like you’re enabling me. But you know what, who am I to disappoint the great team at Zelda Dungeon? Currently, I have 1,165 hours of play-time in Breath of the Wild. I have one account on my switch where I have 100% completed the game: every shrine, every korok, every map location, every armor set upgraded to the max, every piece of horse armor, every monster medallion, a complete compendium, all the divine beasts, every quest and memory… I had a goal to 100% it for a second time playing on Master Mode before Tears of the Kingdom came out, but I don’t think that will happen since I’m so busy making videos. Breath of the Wild really answered almost all my requests for a Zelda game, so my play time just reflects how much I love and appreciate it. If I could change one thing about it, I’d make the enemies act a bit more like they do in games like Elden Ring: more attack patterns, harder to beat, a bit more proactive in their attempts to kill me. Or just let me dive underwater and explore those beautiful coral reefs off the shore of Lurelin Village!

ZD: We’re still pretty fresh off that February 2023 Nintendo Direct — what did you think of the newest Tears of the Kingdom trailer? Any inspiration you’re willing to share with us?

CC: I still have dreams about it, that’s how fresh it is. Nintendo fed me good with that one. Honestly, hearing that Tears of the Kingdom was going to be taking place in essentially the same map as Breath of the Wild was a bit concerning to me because finding new locations, exploring new towns, and making my way to unique landmarks was one of the greatest parts of my adventure playing Breath of the Wild. However, seeing the trailer… the map looks very modified and two new aspects of the map seem to be unlocked: the sky and the underground. Like I said earlier, I also hope that there are new features added so we can explore lakes and oceans (please, let me dive in a coral reef!) and I hope part of this game is helping rebuild Hyrule after Calamity Ganon. It was so disappointing beating Ganon in Breath of the Wild, getting a few cool cutscenes and then — nothing. You’re back to before you beat Ganon. I want to help rebuild Hyrule! I’ve heard through the grapevine this could be the darkest Zelda yet… I loved the trailer so much that I chose to sculpt one of the new enemies introduced in it! I will definitely be sculpting more things from the trailer, so this is just the beginning!

ZD: We hear you’ve been a reader of Zelda Dungeon’s walkthroughs and news articles for a while now. Thanks for being a fan! Is there anything else you’d like to share with our audience that we haven’t talked about yet?

CC: Firstly I’d like to gush about your website because I really have been using Zelda Dungeon my whole life. As a kid, I grew up watching my brothers play Ocarina of Time and when I was old enough to play a few years later, Zelda Dungeon was where I went for answers to all my questions, especially when Twilight Princess came out and I was stuck in the Sacred Grove trying to move those darn statues. Today I still use Zelda Dungeon to catch up on Zelda news, theories, and wishes for Tears of the Kingdom. The Zelda development team does a great job of keeping information under lock and key, so sharing conspiracies with fellow Zelda fans is always fun.

The last thing I’d like to share is probably just a thank you: thank you for writing this article, thanks to anyone who has watched or commented on my videos, and thanks to my growing community of Patreon supporters. It feels nice to have a passion validated and appreciated by other people. I’m not sure I could spend so much time on this channel armed only with internal motivation.

It was a pleasure chatting with Diana over at Crossing Crafts, and we here at Zelda Dungeon can’t wait for her upcoming Tears of the Kingdom-inspired builds. You can find Crossing Crafts on YouTube. Want to show her your support? You can also find her on Patreon and Ko-Fi. In addition to Zelda content, Crossing Crafts has made some amazing builds inspired by Animal Crossing, Minecraft, Kirby, Pokémon, Elden Ring, and more. Check those out by heading over to Crossing Crafts’ YouTube channel, subscribe, and catch up on her content before she releases her next build!

What did you think of Crossing Crafts’ Fang & Bone build? What Zelda-related character or place should she tackle next? Let us know down below, and don’t forget to show Crossing Crafts some Zelda Dungeon love!

Source: Crossing Crafts