My little crime horse has been chugging along on and off in the background. She takes a backseat to commissions and academic stuff so progress has been slow but I'm learning a lot from her!
When we left off, I was bulking her out with Free Form Air putty. Once that was done, I switched to Pratley Putty for refining. The putty is not intended as an art medium, but I'm learning to work with it. It's the most readily available putty of the sort for me since it's produced here in South Africa! The bead I used for her eyes are slightly too big. They were the only ones I had in the house at the time but they were later sanded away.
I got a bit enthusiastic with the wrinkling on her neck, which was later redone. I like the stylised look, but not for this sculpt. She's supposed to be realistic. I am very happy with the muscling on this shoulder though. It still needs sanding and refining, but its definitely on the right track.
In November, this was her. Her foot had been snapped off because it didn't quite align with the leg, and I was keeping it on with tape so I didn't lose it. Her neck had been smoothed out (still a long way to go). I was still blocking out the face, and forgot to fix the fish lip before the clay cured, so that had to be dremmeled later.
I chopped off two of her legs for repositioning. Poor girl couldn't stand for a while. I'm very glad I didn't lose her legs, cos they would have been a pain to remake.
At the start of 2024, this is where she was at. I'd left her alone for a couple of months and come back with fresh eyes and decided that I didn't like the position of her head and hindquarters. So she was scheduled for plastic surgery (hence the dotted lines)
I don't have any photos of her immediately post surgery. But I started properly sculpting the details on one of her legs. I'm pretty happy with how this one turned out, though the scale is a little off and it will probably have to be redone. I'm finding Pratley's to be a fairly good, versatile putty, though the large grain size (as it's not intended as an art medium) is causing some grief.
SHE HAS A FACE
Not a great face, but still. This was the first version of her eye. It wasn't perfect but I learned a fair bit about both the anatomy and the medium, and the fact that Pratley was not intended as an art product became very obvious at with such fine detail. But it buffed fairly well with the metal tools and even though this version of the eye was drilled off, I still think it was worth it for the learning.
And now we reach the present day! Last night, I resculpted her eye, and it came out waaay better. I think I've gotten better with the medium and the anatomy and expression are a vast improvement. It still needs a couple of touches but I hope to be able to do those without having to resculpt the whole thing. Still considering switching to a Milliput Superfine for the very fine details but that'll have to be ordered in so we'll see.
So that's where she is! The Marengo of crime, the arch nemesis of Sherlock Horse and Doctor Trotson...Mareiarty!
