I can see clearly now...

...the rain is gone
I can see all the obstacles in my way...

And boy are there a lot of them.

I finally received Susan Bensema Young's Guide to Making Model Horse Tack, nearly 4 weeks after she shipped it out. Not only did I have to wait a long time, I also had pay a customs fee on top of the $20.00 it took to ship it here. Not her fault, of course. Sometimes I just wish I lived in the States.

Anyway, her book is wonderful! All of those little things that it would have taken me years to figure out are right there to help me. It has lots of great diagrams and advice--I'm just itching to try my hand at carving a western saddle! Some of the techniques are a little less refined than we're used to seeing now (it was written twelve years ago, after all), but it's still a great starting point. If you're thinking of making your own tack, I would definitely recommend this book. It will save you a lot of frustration!

My problem is, I want to be really good really fast! Hence the obstacles song ;). I guess I'll just have to master tackmaking one aspect at a time.

My swap horse is unfortunately not finished yet. I feel really bad about that. Next year I won't do any resculpting, just painting. Hopefully then I'll get it to my partner by Halloween. Shauna sent me an adorable sm named 'Donwanna'. She's a black appy mare with her ears pinned back and a very stubborn expression on her face ;) She also sent me chocolate and awesome chocolatey-smelling soap :D

Here's Ellie so far:

Still working on her off side blue eye (it's harder than it looks!):

And a close up of the medallion:

I do have a photo tent, but I am just a lazy bum so I didn't bother to get it out. Here's my handy-dandy wainscoting backdrop:

It's just the right width for a stablemate!

I also managed to finally make a rope halter with a fiador knot. Unfortunately, you can't see it in this picture. But it is there! That braid on the right will be the lead rope--it's a four strand spiral made out of embroidery floss.

I'm still trying to figure out where to get the rope that Rebecca Dunne uses here: http://www.freewebs.com/griffyndoonropesaustralia/. Aren't the halters she makes bee-yoo-ti-ful? I can still remember when she made her first rope halter...ah, I feel old. But seriously, if anyone has any suggestions I'll be glad to hear them!

I'll leave you with a picture of the double rainbow we had a few days ago:

Cheers!

SM Swap Goodies :D

I am currently working on my models for the Halloween Stablemate Swap over on Blab. My original idea was to turn the G2 (?) Andalusian into a baroque horse with a braided mane and tail--something like this:

Pretty, huh? Unfortunately, my local tack shop didn't have any of that mold in stock (I still plan to do that one day, though!).

I ended up buying the Saddle Club set with four sms. I'm keeping the stock horse OF, because his shading is to die for and he has nice clean masking. The black standing QH mare turned into a failed etchie. It was a good learning experiences, but she'll definitely be getting a coat of paint! The chestnut running tb was primed, but I am having difficulty with my primer. I believe it's called Krylon H2O. It comes out in globs and likes to pool in the grooves of the horse (how will I ever fix that?). I have much more luck with my grey sandable primer. I have heard that some artists prime first with grey sandable primer and then gradually build up a white base coat using regular white Krylon spray. Has anyone else tried this? My latest paint job turned out really grainy and I know it's partly because of my poor priming skills.

Anyway, I took some in-progress pics of my swap sm. She started out as the standing Thoroughbred. She had the most pathetic paint job, and ridiculously uneven ears. I took the liberty of writing on her in pencil:

Next, I performed some surgery:

Gave her some bones:

And sculpted a new neck, mane, tail, and ears, as well as lengthening her head.

After a few coats of pastels:

And a few more, plus the beginnings of some white markings:

The sad thing is, she looks better in the pictures than she does in real life. I hope that the finished product will be something my swap partner will like!

And something I just had to share...

...if you are RivnRo, stop reading or it will ruin the surprise!









...So you're not RivnRo? Sweet. Anywho, I decided to sculpt a medallion for my wonderful swap partner, inspired by this picture:

What a cute face! After 2 hours and a lot of squinting, I sculpted this:

It's pretty rough, and I have no idea if the eye area actually worked out, but I'm rather proud of myself :) I think I'll try sculpting some more medallions in the future (but not as small as this one!). I have some Sculpey lying around that would do the job quite nicely.

Still waiting for my copy of the Guide to Model Horse Tack Making by Susan Bensema Young to arrive in the mail. The suspense is so hard to take! The reviews on this book are fantastic, so I'm very excited!

Welcome to my studio blog!

Hello all! Thanks for wandering over to my little corner of the internet. I'd just like to say that I am in no way a professional, in writing blog posts or in customizing and tack making. On this blog I'll be posting photos of my in progress works, real horse related thoughts, and random babbling about whatever is on my mind. I am still in the middle of the learning process, and I hope that those reading this blog who are at the same stage will be able to identify with me and learn from my mistakes. We're all in this together! As I learn new skills and tricks, I'll try to post them here so they can help you too :) Thanks for reading, and I hope we'll see you again on this blog!

P.S. I imagine I'll get a post up 2 or 3 times a week, at least--so keep an eye out!