Mother's Day

[iago]

I realize Mother's Day is over, but I'm going to be visiting home this coming weekend. So of course, I procrastinated. Actually, I mailed her a couple of stuffed frogs on springs that hang from trees, but that's just to delay it.

In Banff, I found a statue of a wolf with two cubs that I absolutely loved. I thought it would make the perfect give, since me and my sister are my mom's only kids. Here it is, in all its glory:
http://www.javaop.com/~ron/images/pictures/wolf/hpim1844.jpg

She mentioned she wanted something personal, that she could look at and think of me. The statue fits that bill perfectly, but I decided to take it one step further. I'm a bit of a hobby painter, so I figured I'd take a crack at painting it myself. I'm nowhere near finishing yet, but it's going well. There's no way it'll look as nice as the original, but that doesn't matter so much as doing something myself.

I started with a basecoat of light grey. I figured that the neutral gray tones would let me both lighten and darken it to give a subtle tone of realism. Oh, and it's the only spray primer I could find at Canadian Tire, and I didn't want to walk to another store. That contributed a lot.



The mud and grass each use three different shades, to give it a shaded look. I also painted the eyes yellow, with black pupils and white along the edge. They look a little funny because I haven't painted the area around the eyes yet, but that'll come:



And finally, here's another angle. You see that rock in the middle? It took me almost an hour to get the shading right. On a rock that nobody will ever notice! Oh well, that's the life of a pinter, I suppose:



Any suggestions would be great, and I'll post pictures as they come!

[BigAznDaddy]

Make the
Teeth white
Tongue Red/pink or whatever
touch up that green spot near the mouth
othe than that its look en' good

[iago]

Other than the ground and the eyes, nothing else is done on that picture. Currently, I have the teeth and tongue painted, and I've put a brown basecoat on the big one and black on another one. I'm going to experiment with both, see how it looks.

[Rule]

Give one of them blue eyes.  Though most black wolves have hazel-green/amber eyes, some do have blue.

[iago]

I thought about doing blue eyes (since I have blue eyes), but I thought it would look funny. Plus, it's too late now, and painting eyes takes a long time.

[wires]

Freaking sweet.

[iago]

The painting is done now, but I have to varnish/dullcote them. Right now, there is too much glare to look good:


I already re-painted the red cub (pup?), because it looked stupid. It's now brown, a darker shade than the other one.

I'll post another picture once I've finished it completely. It looks way better in real life than in that crappy picture!

[wires]

That looks awesome.  I don't see how you do that, I've never painted a model before but I don't think I'd like it.  I don't think I've ever been a good painter or colorer.  I prefer pencil shading.

Can you post a picture of the brushes that you use?

EDIT: I think your painted version looks better than the original.

[iago]

Yep, I'll get a picture of my work-station (so to speak) when I get the final picture. But if you want to look it up, I actually used a 5/0 brush for most of him. I used a 0/5 on most of the details. Those are my two favorite brushes. Both made by IWM. I'll get a picture.

I think it looks better in some ways, and not as good in others. The original was a totally different style, dry-brushed, there's no way I could get mine to look like that.

I wouldn't have thought I'd be able to paint, but apparently I can. I'm not the greatest, but I enjoy doing it so I'll just keep right on practicing!

[BigAznDaddy]

Dang, job well done. all i have to say is one of the wolfs looks like a bear

[AntiVirus]

That's pretty awesome.  I'm loving the red-ish wolf cub though.  Best one eva.  Does that one represent you or your sister?

[iago]

That's pretty awesome.  I'm loving the red-ish wolf cub though.  Best one eva.  Does that one represent you or your sister?

I guess you missed the part where I said I re-painted that one. Sorry. I didn't like it.

I don't know who it represents, I didn't think that much into it. I'm pretty sure the big one my mom, though.

[Joe]

That's incredible. The only thing that sticks out is the red cub, but you say you fixed it, so it's all good!

I want to see the finished thing when you're done with the dullcoat and varnish. Your mom's going to be shocked if you haven't showed her your models yet.

[iago]

She's seen what I paint, and she knows I paint a lot, but I doubt she thinks I'm going to paint her something!

And yep, I varnished them last night, and I'm going to spray them with Dullcote (note the spelling) tonight to take off the shine.

[iago]

Here are the completed wolves


Before:


After:








And for anybody who's curious about my workspace, here's where I do this:


This is a round-shaped brush that I use for drybrushing. It's getting a little beat up, but it kinda sucked to start with:


This is a flat brush I use for bigger surfaces and drybrushing (it's a 5/0). It's in rough shape, I definitely need another one:


And here's the tiny brush I use for almost everything on the small miniatures, and just the eyes/teeth on the wolf (it's a 0/5):


And finally, here is my case of miniatures I've painted:



Quiz: can anybody identify what that case was actually designed to hold?