Going Incobnito!

I realised a few weeks ago that I never actually showed the progress of my final NaMoPaiMo horse - Hamlet the hogged show cob!

I finally settled on a pattern...

...and then totally forgot to update on his progress! XD

I went from primed to complete in only a couple of days - one of the benefits of black pintos is that you can get away without a lot of complicated shading!

I blocked out the markings in black acrylic, then added in some mapping. Shading was added with pastels and coloured pencils - those especially came in handy on the hooves.

I always make a point of dirtying up the feet a bit, as even with the best will in the world and a ton of cleaning products, no horse ever has absolutely perfectly white legs unless they're never allowed outside.

I started making him a tack set almost as soon as he was finished - the same night, if I remember correctly.

 I'm confident enough with the saddles but the bridles are something else entirely at that scale!

As a result I cheated hugely with the bridle as I absolutely loathe strapwork, so the buckles are only painted on and it's split at the crown so it all goes on/off in one piece. It isn't brilliant and in an ideal world I'd like to do it again but I'm not really ready to attempt it again so it'll have to do for now.

I gave him a photoshoot the other day but the lighting was terrible and makes him look much 'colder' than he really is. The WIP pictures above are closest to his actual colour.

 

 In preparation for his ridden career I'd been customising an old Britains rider off and on for a few months. He had a flat cap transformed into a helmet and had most of his inside leg removed and reshaped so he'd sit properly, as well as having his arms resculpted. He needs a skoosh of dullcote to take away the gloss but I think he'll do!

Because of my love of puns and cobs, I decided to name him 'EA Incobnito' as he went under the radar for a bit!

NaMoPaiMo 2017!

As many of my regular readers will have noticed, other than the recent Julip one, there's been a distinct lack of pony posts over the last wee while. I've always had something of a wandering muse; one minute I'll be really into something, but in a matter of days or weeks I'm in the mood for something else, and so I've been doing a lot more with my dolls over the last few months while the horses took a back seat.

 I really needed something to get myself back in an equestrian mood, as my body piles have been mounting up whilst my motivation to paint them ebbed away. So, you can imagine my delight when Jennifer Buxton announced a brilliant challenge for February - NaMoPaiMo!

Inspired by NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) she came up with this one specifically to get hobbyists back into painting and interest in it has been rather dramatic!

I had no shortage of bodies and quite a few awaiting primer, so choosing my victims wasn't too difficult. Only one model would be counted in the challenge, but I've picked four I'd like to get done this month.

From left to right; 'Horatio' by Clare Stokes, 'Truffles' by David Mayer/Horsing Around, 'Night Heather' by Kelly Sealey and 'Hamlet' by Clare Stokes.

All of them have been sat next to my desk for the best part of a year. I occasionally sanded a few seams and carved out some hooves but other than that they've lain more or less untouched.

UNTIL TODAY!

Skara Update!

I'm still working on her first photostory (my muse has disappeared again, typical) but for now, here's a bit of a costume update.

When you last saw her, Skara was kitted out in a very basic shirt 'n' trousers combo which, while fine for escaping a burning town and whatnot it just wasn't suitable for everyday adventuring. Her kit needed some work too, so...

First to be tweaked was the costume. I use a lot of custom mods on my copy of Skyrim for the PC and by far, my favourite is -this armour- set I got from the Skyrim Nexus. I didn't want to copy it completely, just get the feel of it so I tweaked things rather a lot.

Here she is in game... (oh and I have a tumblr for all my screenshots now too, -here-)

First to be made was the leather breastplate. In hindsight, I should have made it a bit differently but hey-ho, I'm pleased with how it turned out nonetheless!

I used some tooling leather I had lying about and using a picture of some celtic knotwork I found online, began to carve it out. As often happens when a sudden bout of creative inspiration occurs, I found myself entirely without leatherworking tools so I was forced to improvise. In place of a punch, I had a mini screwdriver and my 'mallet' consisted of a bottle of water. Oh and did I mention that I was doing this not at my desk or in a specific working area but right in front of the PC with my parents trying to watch a film in the room almost directly below? Yeeeah, they weren't particularly impressed with the noise I was making but once I'd dampened the leather I couldn't just stop so they had to put up with it! :P

I'd never really carved leather before and aside from the tremendous noise I ended up producing alongside it, I really enjoyed it. The runes on the back piece say 'shadow' in Dovah script - an apt phrase to apply to a sneakthief archer I thought - and the symbols alongside relate to Skyrim's Thieves Guild.

I didn't have anything to treat the leather with once it was finished so after I had finished carving it I dampened it down and formed it to Skara's body so it would hold its shape once it dried, then I used a combination of acrylic washes and hand cream to keep the leather supple.

Oh and the hat is just fine leather from a charity shop purse (£1, bargain!) with some fur fabric. I had a little scrap of rabbit fur I was going to use instead as it looked nicer but I couldn't get it to sit properly. I've trimmed the fur since the picture too.

Next up was the maille. I'd attempted to make my own using tiny jump rings but gave up after only a row and a half as it was incredibly fiddly so I had to use my backup plan - metal mesh from an old purse. (another charity shop find) One one side it has flat metal pieces but the other side can double as chainmaille if you squint a bit.



Either way, it was only a couple of pounds for the bag so I thought I'd better give it a go. The 'rings' are a little too big and I have another purse of the same material in a smaller size that would look better, only they're in a much more gold/bronze colour which isn't really what I wanted so I'll just have to put up with it for now until I can find some smaller stuff.

I made her a nice cosy looking overtunic out of some £1 shop socks the other day and oooft, I HATE sewing sleeves! I sewed one inside out at least twice and messed up the other once but now that they're done I can't say I'm too disappointed although now that I look at photos I realise I made it woefully too short. Bugger.
Oh well, she probably took them off someone else anyway so we can just say that it wasn't her size...

At some point in her story (which I will commence writing again once this is posted!) she will make her way to the small village of Falkreath which is one of my favourite places in the game. All the guards carry shields with the individual Hold's sigils so I thought it might be nice to make her one too as I tend to use a shield with her and a sword. I made it from balsa wood, with superglue/bicarb for the metal parts. The sigil I drew from a reference picture and ended up having to repaint it several times as it was so fiddly!



She got a sword too, though it's only temporary as I made it in a couple of hours from a wooden coffee stirrer and I'm not confident it'll last long, haha!

(on a strangely related side note, it sits in the above picture on the blade of a German WW1 bayonet that we found recently in my grandpa's garage. This is odd in many ways but mostly because he wasn't around in the First World War and even in the second he served in India on the trains so we have literally no idea how he came by it and neither does he!)

I'll be taking her and Inky down to Dumfries with me this weekend for a week's holiday so I'll be taking lots of photos, weather permitting!

Skara is finished!

It's taken a while but Skara, (in her current costume at least) is finished!

Aside from the base body, everything you see here I made from scratch myself.

I based the top on the Miner's Clothes from Skyrim, but I used a lot of artistic licence, likewise with the weapons and things. I had an old top made from cheesecloth that I'd cut up for craft fabric ages go which was perfect for this. I'm usually useless when it comes to sewing but I somehow managed to make it look reasonably good. The fraycheck I used on the edges stained them a bit but I like to think it adds to the well worn and weathered look. Once the shirt was all sewn up and had the edges sealed I soaked it in a bowl of strong tea and water to make sure it didn't look too new and bright white.



I stuck some copic markers up the arms so it would dry to shape but alas, one cap must have been open a little bit as it left a mark on one shoulder. :/ I didn't bother trying to get it out as I thought it would just pass as some accumulated dirt or something. XD I painted some of the tea around the bottom of the shirt and the ends of the sleeves as they were the places most likely to pick up wear and tear.





The leather I used for the belt had a really horrible finish to begin with; far too shiny and new looking so I took a bit of sandpaper to it which made it look a lot more worn. The pouch on her belt is made from the fingertip of an old leather glove and opens and closes using a little toggle I made from carved styrene to emulate bone or ivory.

Her dagger is based on the iron and steel ones in game but I simplified the design a lot. When I get back to college in a month or so I'm hoping to use the lasercutter so I can make a few of the really fancy swords with carved out details but for now, simple is best.

The blade and guard are made from 1 or 2mm styrene (I can't remember which, sorry!) and the grip is just wrapped with thread and covered in a layer of superglue to hold it all together. The scabbard for it was cobbled together pretty quickly so I'll probably remake it at some point.

Her bow is a little small but I didn't have a long enough section of wood to make a proper longbow. As it was, I used a wooden coffee stirrer instead! I soaked it in very hot water until it was pliable, cut notches in the ends and strung it with tooth-floss. It sounds like a very bizarre choice but it looks and feels like sinew and does actually work!

(and yes, I did test it out. :P)

She used to be an adventurer you know...until, well... XD






It was sanded and stained with Games Workshop washes and finished off with some matte varnish.



Now no archer worth her salt could go without arrows so I made her a few!



The heads are all individually cut out of styrene (again, another thing I'd like to make with the lasercutter is some more realistic arrowheads.) and the flights were all hand glued and fletched with thread. (which was incredibly fiddly as I kept gluing bits of feather to myself rather than the arrows!)



I thought I had a better range of feathers than I actually had, hence why they're all different sizes and shapes and colours. In my headcanon for Skara, she starts off in Skyrim as a bit of a scavenger so I like to imagine that she's picked up these arrows from all over the place, hence the variety.

The quiver is all leather, stitched together with thread. I struggled to find good photographs of all the associated straps and how they attached to it so I improvised a little.

Her pendant has a real glass gem in the middle, the rest is Fimo clay painted silver and glossed with varnish with a couple of seed beads alongside.

Given that she was wearing Miner's clothes, I thought she might benefit from having a pickaxe on hand...unfortunately I didn't bother looking up a reference picture to work from because I thought I remembered what they looked like...which I clearly didn't as I forgot that one side of the axe was wider at one end...oh well. XD

The handle is a scrap of dowelling I had lying around with some chips whittled off, the blade is styrene and the bit round the top is of all things, leather!

Painted up you can't tell though. It's probably way too small as well but never mind, if nothing else it can be a useful prop to have in the background at some point.

Inky got herself a tack set too! Seeing as I had already strayed from making exact replicas of Skyrim stuff, I saw no harm in making her stuff a little more unique. (Given the kind of world Skyrim is set in, I find it highly unlikely that everyone would have had exactly the same kind of weaponry and whatnot. :P)
 I have never liked the default Skyrim tack, especially the bridle with the little spikes and things so she got a simple snaffle bridle minus the noseband and throatlatch instead. Normally I make working buckles for everything but these ones are just for show as the whole bridle just lifts off. I had left a hole going through her mouth so I could use an actual mouthpiece for the bit - it only goes in a cm or two but with a little sticky wax, it stays in place quite nicely and looks far more realistic than if I just stuck it to her face temporarily. The detail at the browband is just thread.



Her saddle is a lot closer to the original game tack, though I added a few touches of my own.



The bedroll is made of thick felt and I made the saddlebags from scratch out of fine glove leather. The fur covering should have been a little longer but I only realised this by the time I'd glued it together!



I took them out for a couple of photoshoots this week so stay tuned for a big picture filled post!

Here's a sneak preview of what's to come...

A customised Cob Mare...

...who still needs a name!

Some of you may remember seeing this one up on ebay as a body. I recognised her from someone else's collection and really liked her potential so I popped on a bid and managed to win her for the bargain price of £16 +P&P!
She came to me bald and with a couple of rubs as well as an appaloosa pattern added on with acrylic.

I intended to keep her blanket but wanted to tidy the edges up a bit. As these things often happen, I ended up getting a bit carried away... XD She gained pinking and speckling as well as an extended and slightly more accurate spotting pattern on her blanket, oh and I added some more striping to her hooves.



I mixed up some dark chestnutty mohair with some grey which really suits her.










She doesn't have a tack set of her own yet but I think she really suits the red so her colour scheme is already sorted out.



Now all I need is a name! She's being very cryptic and won't give me any ideas at all! 8-)