The latest EAE resident...Fidget!

Apologies for the terribly long time since my last post - unfortunately life takes over sometimes and what with the winter darkness and resulting poor quality of light, I just haven't been in the mood to really do anything up until recently.



Anyway, I made Fidget out of pipecleaners (I have a video tutorial here) yesterday as I don't like the fact that cats are so poorly represented on my yard when in reality I prefer them to dogs! XD I've always intended David to have a cat and as he spends most of his time on the yard, it made sense to bring his cat with him so he wouldn't get lonely back at the flat. (plus, a good mouser is always a bonus at a busy yard!)







He's just pipecleaners with leather ears, seed-bead eyes and painted on markings but incredibly flexible and can be posed into literally every feline position you could think of! (as the following photos should prove :P)



He can pose...



...curl around people's legs...



...be affectionate...



...annoying...



...adorable...



...athletic...



...not so athletic... XD



...curious...



...stupid...



...and err...



...errrrrr...



...offputting. XD



Size isn't everything either and Fidge can definitely stick up for himself, even if his opponent isn't really interested in sparring with him.



(^Blue merle dog there is another pipecleaner creation, as yet unnamed and belonging to one of the EAE liveries, though I'm still not entirely sure who! XD)

With great flexibility comes great err...stretchability.





Like most all cats, Fidget can smell approaching food from several miles away and is very quick to react.

'I LOVE YOU I LOVE YOU I LOVE YOU I LOVE YOU'



'NOMS NAO PLZ!'



'Yaaaaaaaaay, food!'



'...'



'Is that it?'



*several facepalms from David later...*



But for all his faults and quirks, David wouldn't part with him for the world. :)



-----------------

So yeah, here's hoping this'll signal a return to more regular blogging! :D I rather fancy making another few moggies for the yard so I'll stick some photos up as and when I get round to it. Also, lol, just realised that my last post was about 'Widget' the Gryphon and this is Fidget the cat. COINCIDENCE?!..err..yes. XD

Pipecleaner Animal Tutorial!

Made, filmed and edited yesterday, but uploaded to youtube today. :D I had a really nice selection of songs as the background music but youtube muted it. ¬¬ It's now some random Jazz number I found on the audioswap thing but it's just not the same! >:(

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Dxpws51a8E

The result from this is this lovely little Australian Shepherd type dog. Name suggestions appreciated as she just won't tell me!









I also made this little dog earlier on in the week. She's definitely a Collie cross of some kind but I can't think of a name for her. She reminds me of the dog my old riding instructor had - black and white with a big bushy tail and always getting covered in hay and bits of muck. XD



Here they both are with Max from earlier on. :D

Fuzzy yard pets!

I've always really admired the hairing work of hobbyists like Juliane Garstka and so on, so when Maren of Ivorytower Stables posted her long anticipated hairing tutorial it absolutely made my day!

http://ivorystablenews.blogspot.com/2011/03/fullbody-hairing-english-version-part.html

No sooner had it gone up than I'd read it, gathered all my materials, read it again and then ended up in bed (I wasn't feeling well) half watching a history documentary on BBC iPlayer while I set about giving it a go. I got an iPhone earlier this week (called Ivor ;)) so whenever I needed to check up on anything I didn't even need to leave my bed and could just check out the blog through that - bliss!

My first victim had been languishing in the props drawer for months as he just didn't look right at all. I made him from scratch out of pipecleaners with scraps of leather for ears and pinheads for eyes. Whereas my other bendy dogs turned out ok as the pile of the fluff looked good enough for fur, these ones were too compact and he just looked like...well...a dog made of pipecleaners! XD





Because the mohair is chopped up anyway I realised it was the perfect way to use up all the mangled straggly bits that are the end (and usually waste) result of any horse hairing job. I decided to make him black and tan as he looked like some kind of Rottweiler cross, plus I had tons of leftovers in those colours. I accidently made him incredibly thickset at the front with short legs so who knows what the other half is!









I painted on pawpads too.



Because he's made of pipecleaners he's still poseable - exactly the sort of thing I like on my yard!





'Stay!'



'Sit!'



Unfortunately all this poseability has its downsides...




I named him Max after my friend Deb's Rottie/Collie cross. He isn't supposed to be a portrait or anything, just a tribute of sorts. XD Here he is! (and as far as I know he hasn't peed on anything important - he just licks the inside of car windows. :P)



..and here's model-max with some of the other yard dogs including the two other bendies who I might hair now that I know it looks so good!




Max finished I found I still had loads of chopped up hair so I had a rummage around in the prop drawer in search of another model. I found this Schleich cat that I'd always intended to paint but decided that she'd probably look much nicer as a fluffy mogg instead.





Ivor came in very handy as I could google tortiseshell/calico coat patterns whilst I haired. I repainted the eyes and nose and painted her mouth and pawpads over the hair. Unfortunatly Nigel's macro lens picks up every little detail so she looks a lot rougher than she really is.









She's quite big for Julip scale but meh, I know some absolutely MASSIVE cats so she'll do. :P







I really love her and after pondering a name for ages, I eventually settled on the rather innocuous 'Mogg'. I want to make her some friends out of pipecleaners so I can have some in more interesting positions.
Somewhat shockingly, for someone who isn't a dog person I've managed to aquire loads of them and next to no cats at all!

All that remains is to thank Maren for the brilliant tutorial and see if I can dig out the rest of my pipecleaners...

TTFN!