Basket Case

Painting Leopard Appaloosas

It can turn you into a basket case! This is my youngest Payton, who loves to "camp out" downstairs sometimes. The basket case is Pixel, the cutest little cat ever. She was dropped off at our farm last summer. We have no idea how old she is, but is still only 5 pounds of sweetness that has to be involved in everything

I start with reference pictures, I think the key to painting a nice appy pattern is to learn to align the spots with the direction of the hair coat. Here you can see how the spots follow the hair lines on the face. You don't have to copy the pattern exactly, but following the hair lines is key.

Below is a black leopard appaloosa remade Alborozo. This horse is a multi live show winner and is owned by Gail Aspenwail. I paint all my appy spots by hand. I just do not like the overspray look that can come with airbrushing spots on, but that is my taste. Everyone has their own technique, thats what makes it fun!

I start out by shading all the indents with a light pink color by airbrush, with a layer of warm white over it. Then if I want a semi roan look a brush on some grey, chestnut (or black), and white pastels. I dab the powder on with a soft round brush. I use all kinds of pastels, even eye shadows. BUT the softer pastels blend super easy, so dabbing the color on works best, otherwise the colors just smear together.

Sorry for the low light, but you can see I only put color on the forehand and legs of the horse with the pastels, leaving the butt area white. I use dull coat to fix the pastels, it give the paint some tooth so the color layers up more.

Then the basic spot pattern. I use a small Filbert shaped brush and stroke each spot on following the direction of the coat. The spots are thin, you can see through them a bit, but this is only the first layer. Also, Kathy got to thinking and this horse has more arch in its tail than a Jennet should, (pasos hold their tails flat) so I am going to flatten out that arch tail tonight. Do NOT be afraid to change something you notice as a bit off once you start. Trust me, if you don't, it will call to you in your sleep!

Heads away!

Little Helpers....
Does anyone else have helpers like these? We have many farm cats, a few are true pets that come inside as well. This is my Geeza, who insists on helping me with everything. I had to finally bribe her with treats to keep her out of my way. I did get a tripod, horray!



This is the memphis belle resin with the new head. I also braided her up with a mud tail for a different look. With this resin I made metal ear shapes that I inserted in the head and sculpted over. I use thin aluminum sheet that I get at a craft store.

Here is a close up of the head. Keep in mind, this resin was fine the way she was, I just wanted to give it a new look. To me the biggest problem with resins is that when you go to show you end up with so many of the same mold in the class. I am always trying to improve my paint jobs, but I don't have the ability to do thousands of dollar paint jobs, so I try to do something else to make my pieces unique.

Below is the Godiva, a totally new look with relativly little work.

Here is her off side, she will be sporting a chestnut leopard appy paint job next!

And finally the stablemates from last week! These new molds are great! The reiner already left to his new home, but here are some others!

This stablemate is a head swap too, a combo of the G3 jumper body, walker head, and wire hind legs for stability. Freddie the Fabulous Flyer is a special piece for a friend that really wanted my NAN mule from two years ago. Now I WILL NOT copy special pieces, I will do a lot of Lady Phases with their heads down, but never the exact same color. I won't remake another Lady Liberty, but plan to make a parked out big lick walker stallion...so my point is, be original!

Lastly the little drafter, he got sold too, a simple custom, but a totally new look!

next I will do a painting bit, showing how I do leopard apps. I am by far not the best at it, but its a technique I think everyone can do.

Losing my head!

Technical Difficulties: &&^%%$*!!!!!

I still have not gotten a tripod, so many of my pics planned for today were very blurry, GRRRRR I am going to get one after school, pinky promise!
But here is another head swap...this is a Memphis Belle with the Lucas warmblood head. Now this model I did NOT use the ears. Instead I drilled a hole and inserted pieces of metal sheet that I sculpted the ears over. I did this a while ago so I didn't think to take pictures, but I will do a demo on this soon. Ears can be a tricky thing, sometimes its best to just start over. The extra head is how I swap plastic heads. First I cut the head off, fill with foil and apoxy, then stick two sculpture wires into it. Once its dry, it give me a stable head that I can adjust the position and length of the neck with. Make sure to use two wires though, otherwise building up the neck is way too difficult....will do one of these for you too! Sorry its so fuzzy, will take a better one tonight, WITH A TRIPOD


Here is the Godiva. Now these are the Lucas ears...BUT to put them on, I drill a small hole into the ear then into the ear hole in the skull and but a piece of wire to pin them together. Again, poor focus!

Swapping heads is a GREAT way to make a really cool remake without having to do major resculpting...Below is "Kiss My Purdy Azz" (for the record, I did NOT name him, blame Linda!)

He is a multi multi live show winner and was National Champion CM longear in 2008

Man this pic is way too small, but this is the Miz Charisma/godiva cross that was featured yesterday...Charismatic Gentleman

And here is a resin with a new look, a CM ravenhill revisted. Stacy herself kept him for her collection! Now my unpainted I got in exchange for this guy is spoken for (another tack goddess sacrifical victim), BUT I just found out that I will be getting another one....any ideas????

And for the record Stinky....you know who you are ;) I am a SCIENCE teacher, not EANGLISH so forgive my grammer! giggle