Work in Progress Roundup

This week was filled with me trying to make a pattern for the unicorns body. I never learned how to do this and I am often having a hard time. It is much easier to think about something and sculpt it than sew it. But I will learn to do this perfectly over time. I learn with every mistake.

Work in Progress Roundup

This weeks roundup is rather sparse. There were some health issues and I did not get as much done as I wanted, but I finished this little lady bat (she already made an appearance on this blog) and started working on something a bit out of my comfort zone. It's going to be a unicorn but since I have a beautiful ornate fabric for its body I sculpted this filigree into its head and... it is different and I am not sure I know what I'm doing... or even like it... my last deer doll was kind of botched and I am a bit scared working on them now, but I have to get over myself. I love deer and I love drawing them. Time to learn doing deer dolls....

The Bats

I am very fond of working on rabbits. I don't know why exactly but they always creep back into my work, as sketches, dolls or drawings. My childhood was filled with stories and fairytales with and about them. Since I worked on the black rabbit and Snowdrop for quite some time I had to force myself to do something else, something new to me.
So I came up with the rough sketch of a bat. The progress on this critter was very smooth, there were no problems with the materials and while I was working on him a whole story evolved in my head. These are my favourite critters, the ones that come to life while I work on them. The first bats name was Hugo and he was the Bringer of Spring. I had the idea for his profession while watching a documentary about pollinators.
The second bat found her way in my mind through the idea of a bat sowing seeds, having a little bag and all. So why not sow stars? She has sparkly stars on her black velvet wings and in her felted bag. I am still not sure about a name for her. Was toying around with Hedwig, since I like the sound and it would sound nice together with Hugo.

Here are some progress and detail pics of Hugo and Hedwig, all together in one post.

This was already pretty far in but one can still see the stages it went through, felting the paws, sewing the wings and so on...

Hugo and his flower crown... I really like that crown...

This picture is nice to see the general size of Hugo... I am not so good with taking selfies...

A nicer pic, not taken with my mobile phone. It is just too easy to take pics with your phone sometimes and not care about the quality...

I only recently had everything I needed to fill Hugos pouch.. Now he carries around a bag of seeds and a vial full of pollen...

The beginnings of the second bat. The choice of fur really came back to bite me in the ass later on. All the fluffy-ness made sewing the body very tedious...

I did not intend to make the second bat bigger than Hugo, but it still kind of happened. A size comparison between Hugo and the unfinished Hedwig.

The sculpted face before and after painting it. I was not sure where I was going with her colors. With Hugo I was pretty sure what to do and how I wanted him to look but Hedwig was a surprise when I had finished her. But I came to like the dark browns and blues I worked into her skin and fur...

Hedwigs felted pouch. It is embellished and filled with beads. I wanted the star theme to be very obvious. 

To go with the over all theme Hedwig has stars on the back of her wings as well. Thinking about her story gave me the idea that she could melt into the night sky to sow her stars, and not be seen by predators. And when she and her mates hang out in a cave at daytime you can see the night sky in the darkest corner of the cave...

She looks like such a classy lady.

Seems like I already got used to the name Hedwig. I like how she looks a bit like a grumpy victorian-era lady. Hedwig and Hugo will get their own post with story and nice pics and all, for now I just wanted to have a place to post all the progress and thoughts, so I don't forget anything...

Work in Progress Roundup + Easterthemed Pics

With birthdays and holidays and the deadline for my taxidermy paper all falling into this week I am surprised I made progress at all. But here it is, the white bunny trophy only needs some varnish, as does the bats face. Then I can start to add the details to the bats body. The bunny got some sculpted fur, since I was not into the smooth look it initially. It was fun to try and sculpt fuzzy fur since I usually only add texture with a needle to the existing form. But it was very time consuming as well.

After sculpting the fur...

... and priming the surface.

The finished rabbit... I decided to add some lace but no ruffles...

The black bats face is rather dark and, like always, it is hard to take nice pictures of it...

And as an extra, since it is Easter Sunday today, here are some themed pics of Snowdrop and Hugo. 

Happy Easter!

Work in Progress Roundup

This week was slow in terms of progress, but I had a day off for sculpting and the needed preparations. I sculpted the black bats face, which looks a little sadder than Hugos. It will probably look completely different once it is painted, which is what I like a lot about adding color. You can completely change the mood.

I am currently trying something a bit different from my full scale dolls, small mostly sculpted trophies with fabric ears. This little one will be an albino rabbit, in time for easter.

The last project has to wait until I have some time, because I really want it to turn out right. You can guess what it will be from the armature...

Work in Progress Roundup

I am currently busy with lots of things, most of them not art related. But I am trying to brush up on my Gouache skills. And I am on the verge of finishing another bat doll. The first one, called Hugo, is a bit smaller. I can't wait to be done with sewing the black fur, it is a really hard material to work with. 

White Unicorn

Like I promised, here is the process of the white unicorn in pictures. It was, like I mentioned many times before, just an experiment, even though I would not call the finished head an experiment. But I did not know how I wanted the finished thing to look like, which is why I changed some things pretty late (like the hair).

I started with an aluminium foil, wire and sticky tape armature. It looked good at first but it was not stiff enough, so when I added the clay I kind of ruined the armature because the Magic Sculpt hardened while I used it (Magic Sculpt is a two part epoxy clay, it hardens through mixing resin with hardener) and I had to use force to get a smooth surface.

First pic shows the rough surface, on the second one I smoothed it down a bit (mostly with my finger nails and water) and decided for a place for the eyes.

Added more clay to the upper side of the head (I had to sculpt the head in two parts, since it had to dry on one side first). This part was pretty much finished, until I decided to try to get some fur texture in it, since I worked with that on two of my three dolls and it would be important to know if the clay was still soft enough for that.

I added the the texture with a pottery needle. Some parts were still pretty soft, others were hardening pretty fast, which made the whole process a pain in the butt. It all worked out in the end, but it stressed me out because working on the texture was a timed event. I should not have been any slower.

The horn and ears were very useful for working on the lower side of the head. I was adding the fur texture starting at the seams to the upper side so they were not visible in the end.

This is the finished head. At first I thought this was it, but for some reason (I really can't remember the reason) I decided it needed some hair.

It took some time to find the right kind of hair, I tried different things, but in the end I used some silvery gray plastic extensions. The picture above shows a bit of the hair. It was not that easy to add the hair because Magic Sculpt is hard as a rock when it has completely hardened (which takes about 6 hours). In the end I just added the extensions which left a bit of a bump, but it is not very obvious. I used white gesso as a base coat for the acrylics I usually use to paint the faces.

Painting at night has its disadvantages, one of them is that colors sometimes turn out all wrong. The first paint job of the fleshy parts turned out very yellow-y, so I added some pink. And I gilded the horn at the tip because I love to use that gilding wax.

And this is how the head looks in the end. I am very happy with it. And the long hair and blue glass eyes gives it a magical look.

There is still the process post of the black unicorn incoming, which won't be that exciting because it was pretty much the same process. Only that I added the hair straight at the beginning. But more on that  in the post itself.

Frida

You might remember that black fox doll I was working on. Yeah, I never posted a picture of her finished, so here is a complete update, pictures from the beginning to the real "birth".

I always start with the face. Usually I use some air drying clay which works find for that kind of face and snout. Currently I am trying some new things, but I am fighting with myself...

When I am cutting all the parts and sewing them together I am often working on the floor, since I don't have a table that is big enough for all of it. And I can vacuum after scattering fake fur everywhere, which is a plus.

A wip pic. Nearly done with sewing everything together.

Done with the body. It has a wire armature inside so it is poseable. This was the first time I worked with an armature, and it was really hard. Sadly, it did not work out completely, one of the ears slipped out but all in all it does not look that bad for my first time. After I finish the body I start to paint the face. I always wait until the whole body is assembled and dyed (I usually dye the body, but black velvet does not show much of anything so I skipped that step) because I try to fit the colors of the face and fur.

Working on the cape. The black lace is lovely, it has the perfect weight for a cloak or cape.

I added a wire to the collar because I wanted the whole thing to look witchy or like an evil queen or something like that.

And here it is, all finished. I really love her look but hate how hard it is to take decent pictures from all the black with my mobile phone. Hope that my camera won't have such a hard time.

Well, I hope you like the whole thing. I will make some decent pictures soon.