The Sum of all her Parts is a Whole

Here is our little science experiment from the last post. Notice she comes together quite nicely! Hopefully you can tell what breed she is now. :) She's looking *exactly* like my reference photo so I'm thrilled so far!

 The body comes together within a few hours usually. Mainly because I don't struggle with little intricate details as the body is a big mass with the exception of little wrinkles and rolls here and there. Getting those legs and head attached to the armature probably take the most time as that's where I do a lot of measuring. Once those things are on and secure, it's really hard to move them so it's best to make sure they're in the right spot to begin with. 

And while pushing those legs around they are easy to snap so you have to be gentle. You can see in this photo I managed to break off a little chunk of the weight-bearing leg while I was putting it on to the armature. Doh! It was repaired relatively well though I'll count on this being an area in the master resin to pay attention to and fix more. 

I *lurve* the way her neck came out!!!! Thin and long and delicate. The nice thing about this gal is she'll be getting a roached mane so I won't have to cover it all up! The real horse has neck "rolls" just like this gals, even though she's not cresty. She's still got her neck just about as far back as it can probably go and all that skin has to compact to do so, even on an ASB. The trick was to not go crazy with them, as I usually tend to want to do. 

The other side to this gal has not been touched. So, while this side looks good, the other is a horrible mess. Nothing smudging around clay doesn't fix! And I'll need a base for her. I just want a little something around the front weight-bearing leg. Debating on whether to attach that or make it detachable. Still thinking on it. And this young little filly has a name now too - Clementine. 

Pieces of Ponies

So, while the snow has been coming down I've been guiltily spending time sculpting. I needed a break from the painting just to freshen myself up a bit. After pouring another layer of rubber on Mimi and Baldur (Morgan mare and Icelandic Horse stallion), I decided to make a little more progress on a little filly I'm having lots of fun with!

I find myself wanting to do more "dynamic" poses lately along with the older mares. And I do like a challenge. I really like to take an element that I'm a little unsure of and really come to terms with it by incorporating it into sculpture. Darcy's element was the parked pose, Gawyn's was the drafty bulk and how to make all that hair peformance friendly, Baldur's is capturing the weight distribution and angles of a galloping turn, etc. Each piece had challenges, but those pieces had more readily described ones. This next piece incorporates leg angles in the movement as well as really dynamic shoulder action. Legs don't just move up and down, they move in and out too. It's hard to tell how much movement this pieces has until I put the legs onto a body, but I'm really happy with the results so far!

The leggies are pretty much as far along as they're going to get at this point. You'll see they're not all the way done near where they'd connect to the body. This is because I want to sculpt that part in - one for more stability of the sculpture, and two to create a smoother blend incorporating the "separate digit" from the piece. It'll look more seamless that way.

Thanks to Liesl Dalpe for the inspiration of sculpting the legs separate from the body! This method of sculpting really works so much easier for me. I can pick up the legs and work around all the angles without trying to cram in a long-handled sculpting tool into a tight squeeze. They are also much easier to measure lengths this way. 

While I like her young face, you'll notice I messed up and sculpted the eyes too far down the head. I've photoshopped two of the images to show where the eyes will end up. Now if only they were that easy to move in real life!

My favorite order of sculpting things seems to be start with the head (my absolute favorite part of a piece), then get the dirty work of the miserable legs out of the way next (I *hate* sculpting legs but I'm really making an effort to get better at them!), start the easy work of the body and assembling the entire piece as a whole, and then finish up with my second favorite part - hair. 

That's all the peek you get! For now. :)

Snowy Sunday

This morning we woke up to see a lot of snowflakes! Not too much had stuck from the previous night, but that was about to change. I looked at the barn to see how the ponies had fared through the night and laughed when I saw them.

That's Rocky. Our snow lover. As you can see, the reputation of "hardiness" in Morgans is well earned. 

A little less snow after a shake. Where is Myr you ask? Well, he's demonstrating the reputation of "smartness" the Arabs are known for. ;)

I can happily report that it is still snowing extremely hard and we have gotten at least another foot since the morning photos were taken. I hope it snows 3 more feet! We desperately need anything wet here in Colorado.