A Broughty Ferry dad has wowed his neighbour with his impressive snow sculpting skills.
Douglas Roulston, an artist and father of two, has left his neighbours on Blake Avenue speechless after constructing an elaborate sculpture of two hit sci-fi characters.
The wintry masterpiece, which was built in just two days, shows popular iconic Star Wars characters The Mandalorian and ‘Baby Yoda’ (officially known as Grogu).
It’s not Douglas’s first piece in the medium – he constructed a similar snow statue of Darth Vader three years ago.
The artist, who teaches at Forfar Academy, said: “My son’s favourite show right now is the Mandalorian, and since I did Star Wars the last time my first thought was to do the characters this time.
“I also watched a bit of it, but now it feels like I have to commit to actually watching the full thing.”
Douglas has chosen to use the attention his work is getting to raise money for the Archie Foundation, a charity which raises money for Tayside Children’s Hospital.
The art teacher’s Gofundme has raised more than £400 for the group, smashing the initial target of £150.
He said: “I thought that if I was going to put so much time into it, I may as well raise some money from it.
“I designed an Oor Willie for the Archie Foundation before so I thought it would be nice to do this for them.”
The icy recreation took Douglas and his daughter Niamh days to complete, however he’s happy with the end result.
“I was out there for some late nights getting it done,” he said.
“I came back in at about 10pm.
“Over the two days I probably spent about ten hours shovelling snow and another eight shaping it.
“Still, it’s been so popular with people, it’s crazy.
“Everyone walking past has wanted to talk about it and I know that if it wasn’t for Covid-19 all the neighbours would have helped build it.”
And in Invergowrie…
Meanwhile, in Invergowrie, a 62-year-old has put smiles on the faces of her grandchildren with her own snow sculpture.
Ann Hay, a granny of nine kids, all between the ages of one and five, challenged her family to a building contest since they wouldn’t be able to see each other.
While her children and grandchildren were able to produce some lovely snowmen, they were blown out of the water by Ann and her blue-green dinosaur sculpture.
Her daughter, Jenny Wilson, who lives in Edinburgh, said: “She built it yesterday, it must have taken her all day to build it.
“She even used food colouring to dye it green.
“We were all quite amazed, now all my nephews are asking her to do other ones in different colours and of different dinosaurs.”