The blog is moving

The title says it all. I'm picking up shop and moving to http://eponastudioblog.wordpress.com/

I'll try to get some of the older posts from here moved over there. Emphasis is on the word "try". If there is something you'd like to save from this blog (yes, of course I'm talking about the Scarlett tutorial), I'd advise you to do so now. If not, come on over to the new joint and check out the latest pretty ponies!

Fiore II is done! Pre-orders start NOW!

Well, I finally finished the big guy! I don't think I have ever put this much time and effort into sculpting a medallion, not even the New Orleans French Quarter Mule.


Fiore II is available for pre-order starting now. All the necessary information can be found on his webpage: http://eponastudio.com/fiore2.htm

Here are a few pictures, there are lots more on the website:

Vocabulary lessons

I'm learning all kinds of Spanish words on this project. For instance, that scarf like creature you see tied to the saddle is called a Manta Estribera. I had a great time making it flow all over the place. Right now, I think it looks great. I'm sure I'll hate myself when it comes time to cast this thing. You may notice that the fringe and the ring on the girth are both white. That's Translucent Liquid Sculpey, basically a liquid polymer clay. It bakes clear, and I'm concerned that it may become impossible for camera to register like that so I photographed it wet.

The saddle has been pared down to a more reasonable size (I think I forgot that I was sculpting in bas-relief for a little while there!) and I'm about to add the Pechopetral, which you can call a breastplate if you're not into learning Spanish vocabulary.

Time to saddle up!

I've just learned that it's exceptionally difficult to sculpt something you've never actually seen in person. My entire morning has been spent combing the internet for pictures of these saddles. I think I need to go to Spain. Does anyone want to buy me a ticket as your artistic contribution to the world? I'll give you a free Fiore II medallion. Heck, I'll even paint it for you. That's how generous I am!

Actually, I think I finally have a clear idea of the structure of these bad boys. I've been rolling the clay out in sheets with my mini rolling pin and cutting out the layers that will make up this saddle. The rider sits on a fleece pad that actually fits on top of the saddle (Lovely idea, that. I wish I'd heard of it back when I was trying to get back to riding after breaking my tailbone.). Sculpting fleece or dirt always involves a trip to the front yard for a broken stick, which makes just the perfect texture. We'll call it an all-natural, organic, sculpting tool.

You rug man! Gimme some tass-el!

Fiore II's mosquero, basically an extremely ornate fringed or tasseled fly mask, is now done. The tassels were made from little balls and triangles of clay with a hair pattern carved in. Sorry there are no pics of the process here but they are simply too tiny for my camera to handle. I think we're down to needing just a saddle and a few mane tassels unless I'm forgetting something... Almost done! Woohoo!


(The title of this post is a quote from Aladdin, in case anyone's wondering)

More Fiore updates

I know better. I really do. Every once in awhile, I will need to pry something open and instead of looking for a flat head screwdriver or some other cheap and easily available tool, I'll grab my carbide scraper. Invariably I'll break it. Every single time, I tell myself it'll be ok just this once and every time it breaks. I have never broken one using it for it's intended purpose of cleaning up mold lines and I have never failed to break one using it as a prying tool. Usually I break it at a very inconvenient time, like when I have an entire first shipment of medallions that need to be prepped before shipping out. Oops.

Fiore version one won't be mailed until my replacement scraper arrives. Sorry guys. Mea culpa. Maybe this time I'll learn...

What's happening in the studio

I'm taking a brief break from continued work on Fiore - Version 2 while I work on casting Fiore - Version 1. So far so good, if you don't count the stressful moment yesterday when I dumped actively reacting resin over my hand. It goes from liquid to solid in about 2 minutes and it gets HOT. Note to self: Always wear gloves!

Victrix has moved to eBay. Here is her direct link:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=230450395692

Finally, for those of you who don't know, I have a number of rabbits that live in my studio and can frequently be found hopping around my feet as I work. They are being particularly cute this week, so I just have to share a picture.



Much of today, tomorrow, and Friday will be spent out of the studio planting a veggie garden for them. Look for more Fiore II progress over the weekend if not before.

Leather and lace? No. Just lacey leather.

Ah, the versatility of clay. I can use it to make hair and now, I can use it to make leather. This reminds me of the package filled with spring mix lettuce I bought that was made out of corn. Corn! And here I thought it was clear plastic. Silly me.

Ok, back on topic. I roll out a glob of clay until it is just about as thin as I can make it without tearing it. I have this little tool that is essentially a mini rolling pin and it's perfect for the job. Then I take my very favorite tool, the stylus, and start slicing it into strips.



These strips become my bridle. The bit is another worm of clay, shaped with the clay shaper and the stylus. In my research, I came across about an equal number of these bridles with and without throat latches. Since this guy has such a muscular neck and it's so tightly tucked, I'm choosing the latter for artistic purposes.



The bridles have cutwork on them (I'm not sure if that's the right term) that makes a lovely, lace-like, filigree design... another job for the stylus. They also have a design of white stitches, but I really feel that's going to look best if done by the painting artist later on.



Back in the oven he goes! Stay tuned there's plenty more to be done!

The new 'do

In the process of removing the few remaining bits of Fiore's mane, I managed to break him off of his base. Go me! That should be an easy enough issue to deal with later, so rather than fight with it, I'll be sculpting sans base for a bit.

Onto the braiding of the mane. This is pretty much my usual technique:


I start by creating the roots of the mane. This involves a long bit of rolled clay pressed onto the horse's crest. It should actually look kind of like a pink worm.



Next I flatten out the worm and score the basic hair pattern into it using my stylus tool. As you can see, the mane looks two dimensional and not very lifelike at this point.



What we need now is some high and low points to give the mane depth. I press these in gently with a pointed clay shaper (or an old paint brush when I can't find my clay shaper which happens about 70% of the time. Today, I actually found it!) If needed, I'll go back in with the stylus and restore any hair texture that got smooshed. Sometimes these two steps need to be repeated half a dozen times to hit the right balance between the two tools.



Now comes another worm which will soon become the braid itself.



Using the clay shaper again, held at about a 45 degree angle to the direction of the braid, I alternate pressing into one side and then the other to create the interwoven strands of the braid. The stylus then comes in again and adds the hair texture. Basically I use the tools in the reverse order of what we did above.



Into the oven he goes so I can keep working without fear of squishing the new hairdo.

Happy accidents - The start of Fiore Version 2

My medium of choice for sculpting is polymer clay. I find its workability to be second to none. It does, however, leave something to be desired in the durability department. Which is why Fiore came out of the mold making process looking like this:



In art, as in life, we have what artists call "happy accidents". This could have been a catastrophe. It could have been, but it isn't... because along with the repujada tack that I'm about to sculpt onto this guy as promised, these horses often wear their manes braided. They even wear little tassels in said braids. The more I think about it, the more I love it! Check out this pony for a little inspiration:

http://www.youtube.com/watch#!v=Qhuip8kyBTU&playnext_from=TL&videos=_sDb0EIYtOc&playnext=1

Coming up next, you guessed it: braids.

More medallion work and a Victrix

The mold for Fiore version 1 is finally completed and I'll start sending out the pre-ordered castings next week. Yay! This also means that the original has been freed up so I can work on it some more. I plan to do some of that just as soon as I finish my coffee (A girl's gotta have her priorities!), so look for the tutorial to start back up this afternoon. Yay!

Also, I have another horsey for sale. This time it's the lovely Thoroughbred mare, Victrix sculpted by Carol Williams. I'm accepting offers on her starting at $750 or I'll happily trade for a real mare that looks just like her!

Attack pony

It's five a.m. and I haven't been to bed yet, so I'm keeping this post short. I just finished the pony I've been promising everyone. All the pertinent info is on her MH$P ad:

http://modelhorsesalespages.com/sales/view_details.asp?id=769945

Another mule painted!

I finished him last week, but I just photographed Artist's Choice mule #2. Here he is:





If you want to take him home, all the gory details are on his Model Horse Sales Pages ad:

http://modelhorsesalespages.com/sales/view_details.asp?path=Gallery&id=768420

Painting slot available

Sorry for the late notice on this. I'm making one customizing slot available through ebay and the auction ends tonight. Here's the link:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=230429974603

Hey Mule is up for grabs again!

The handsome Hey Mule resin that some of you may have seen on my website is up for sale again! You can contact his current owner through her MH$P ad:

http://modelhorsesalespages.com/sales/view_details.asp?id=763576

The new medallion version 1 is finished!

The new medallion is finished! I've decided to name him Fiore. (I think the sound of it fits him as long as you don't look up the Italian translation, which really does not fit a big, bad stallion at all, but nevermind that.)

I'm taking pre-orders on version one (no tack) starting right now. The tacked up version should be close behind. Anyone who purchases version one will get a few days advance opportunity to get version two with the tradtional repujada tack before I release it to the rest of the world as well as a discount on the price of #2.

More pictures, pricing, and purchasing information can be found on Fiore's web page:

http://eponastudio.com/Fiore.html

Two medallions it is.

Every single person who has replied to me about the tack or no tack question has wanted to see the big guy offered both ways, so that's how I'll do it. The only down side I see to this is that I won't be able to finish our little follow-along here on the blog until after the first version is cast. Oh well, I guess that will just have to be something to look forward to for later.

I'll start pre-sales on version number one sometime this week. I just want to add a little bit more detail before I call him done. I'll be casting this first version in-house. Further information will be posted here soon.

Thanks for all the great input!

Ready for tack

I've now reworked some problem areas on the new medallion and added in some detail. Of course, he also has his mane now. That took several tries as I was getting carried away at the beginning and he had hair all over the place. Dramatic, but also a little silly. With some advice from another artist friend, I managed to get the 'do under control. I'll be adding some veining still, but he's pretty much ready to start tacking up. I'm toying with the idea of casting him without tack first and offering two different versions, one with repujada tack and one with none. Any opinions on that idea?

Inching forward

Yesterday was a little busy, so I apologize for not posting any progress. Today may prove to be much the same. The medallion now has a stone textured background which doesn't quite contain the entire horse. The fact that his forelegs come out of the frame adds a sense of motion and drama. I'm planning to accentuate that further by taking his mane out the other side. In fact, the mane should be our next step. Look for that to appear later tonight or in the morning.

First baking

There is now some decent facial detail in place. In fact I've completely altered the plane of his face. I'm fairly happy with his lower legs and hooves (maybe just a wee bit more smoothing out is needed), and the muscling is about where I want it. He even has an actual ear instead of just a triangle of clay. It's time to bake the clay for the first time to harden it. This will allow me to start adding some detail without interfering with earlier work.

New Year's resolution? Build more muscle.

The changes at this stage might not look dramatic, but it takes a lot of work and a lot of fussing and fiddling to get the musculature right. In this picture, the horse's body is about a half to a quarter of the way there with many things still needing to be fixed and no real detail in place just yet.

Ups and downs

Now we get to the high point... and the low point. I'm adding clay to the raised areas and carving it away where I want it to be recessed. Every time I do so the new addition (or subtraction) needs to be blended into the whole. This is probably the most difficult part of working on a bas-relief since this is where the foreshortening really comes in. A bas-relief is a strange thing, not entirely one dimensional like a drawing but not quite a three dimensional sculpture either.

Start as you mean to go on

Happy New Year everyone!

I've recently become enamored of the saying "Start as you mean to go on". It seems particularly appropriate on New Year's Day of course. So in the hopes that this will be an especially creative and productive year, I'm starting 2010 with a new bas-relief sculpture. I love sharing the process when I make art, so I'm going to take my loyal blog readers along for this ride. I'll be posting my progress here every few hours for any of you who'd like to follow the birth of this piece. When all the shouting is done, this will be a very large (almost a foot high!) medallion of a rearing Andalusian stallion in Repujada tack. Here is where we start: a flat slab of clay with a rough sketch cut into it: