Lots of Photos

Lajjina's dapples are still evolving.

I recently finished this Finn commission. I hope to have more pictures of him posted on my website and Facebook soon.

This Fenwick is close to being finished, I have some minor details to do. He's got some shiny spots that haven't been sprayed yet.

I think I'm going to start in with oils on Alvaro next. This is all airbrushed. I like this color right now, he looks like a red dun to me (not what color he's going to be).

And I've put another coat of paint on the Patty Reiner. He's going to be a darker bay than he looks like here.

Whew! I've been spending a lot of time painting in the studio. Ravenhill is still being detailed so I won't show him until he's done, probably.

Have a great week!

Weekly Update

I hope everyone is enjoying NAN! I was watching the results but unfortunately the photos haven't been posted yet. I love to see what won, and I also like looking at how the judges placed their pieces and how different the placings can be.

Okay, on to some progress pictures.

Alvaro got another airbrush coat on him. I actually had to go backwards with him because I found a couple spots that needed to be filled. I will probably do one more airbrush coat on him and then start on the oils.

The Patty reiner is looking rather hideous. It's painful for me to look at pieces when they are at this point, knowing that I have to wait for the paint to dry before I can do more to it.
I'm going to spray Finn tomorrow, and I'm hoping that he will be done and that I can show a final picture of him next week.

And here's a Jezebel that I've been working on. I can't remember if I've shown a picture of her before. My goal was to re-do the tail so that it was shorter, but still had the same "style" as the original. I really struggled with this and frankly I'm not happy with it, especially the tips of her tail. This is the second version. I'm embarrassed to say that I've spent 20 hours sculpting this. At this point I just want to chuck the whole thing! I didn't want to re-sculpt the mane, but I will probably end up doing that and re-doing the tail some other way. I don't think I have the skill at this point to get the refinement and gracefulness to match the mane. If anyone has any suggestions or advice for me I'd be happy to hear it! I know my advice to myself: Carol, stick to painting lol!

Details, Details

 

I've been working on a lot of little details over the last week, lots of blanket work on Ravenhill but also some detailing on his head and hooves, so here's a little peek at that:

I've also been working on Lajjina's dapples, moving them about a little and changing their size, etc. I still have quite a bit of work to do on them at this point

And here is a shot of my new favorite detail brush, the Escoda 1210 Kolinsky sable, size 5/0. This is a pretty pricey brush (about $5 at dickblick), but the one I bought lasted a long time and held its point really well. I only used it for oils, not acrylics. I wore it down to a little nub! I also bought their higher-end brush, the 1212 Kolinsky Tajmyr, but have not tried that yet.

Production has slowed to a crawl while I work on a lot of these little details. Normally I can touch 4-6 horses a day, but when I'm doing work like this it slows to 1-2 horses.


I know Breyerfest and NAN are just around the corner, I wish all that are going good luck and will be watching the results online :-)

Weekly Update

Not much to show this week as I'm doing a lot of detailing, touching up and letting things dry, etc. Lajjina above is getting some adjustments made to her dappling.

Here's an old Page Patty custom that I just started. He has a very simple basecoat in acrylics and I've just started to put a little oils on him. He looks really orange right now but his coat color is going to be bay. He will be an appaloosa.

I think I did figure out my airbrush problem. I have an Iwata HP-CH (I think) that has something called a MAC valve at the bottom of it. The documentation for this valve offers precious little insight into how to use it, and for some reason I had it set in a way that wasn't allowing a lot of paint to come out. Fiddling around with that valve fixed my paint flow problem so the airbrush is back in business. Whew!

I hope everyone reading this has a great week and stays safe in the heat! I personally am loving this hot weather in Seattle, I wish every day were sunny and in the 80s. I'm living in the wrong state.