The Completed Collection

Thought I'd stick up some photos of the completed collection - they've now all arrived safe and sound in NZ.

I may have taken a small amount of artistic licence with the trout colours:
Rainbow trout

 
and Brown trout

two lambs, two goats.....

two piggies, and one hen

How to make a goat

A step-by-step guide to making your own little goat :-)

Step 1. Make a rectangular block out of your base colour (orange). Round the edges slightly. Add the tail.

Step 2. Make 4 equal size cylinders out of dark brown for the legs. Stick one at each corner.





Step 3. Choose a light colour for the undercoat (white).
Make long strands by rolling out by hand, making sure one end is tapered. 

Start at the back end of the goat, wrapping the first strands round and under the tail.

Keep applying the strands as shown, working forwards. Do the same on the other side of the goat, with a straight line down the back. Make the strands long enough that they mostly cover the body (although don't worry about them being the same length - goats are scruffy!)

Keep going until the whole body is covered - I call this the 'headless ghost-goat' stage :-)

Step 4. Give your headless goat a collar - colour of your choice!

Step 5. Time to make a head. Make two cylinder shapes, of equal width but with your base colour (orange) longer than the nose (pink). Place the two cylinders together and roll until they join together smoothly.

Stick the head onto the goat, on top of the collar - I find the collar helps hold the head in place more securely

Step 6: Make the ears by rolling a long sausage shape and flattening the middle part (where it will sit on the head). Round the ends and flatten slightly to give the ears their long, flappy shape....and....

...stick them on the head. Place the flattened central section round the back of the head. Shape the ear flaps to give them a little curve

Step 7: Time to start on the top coat. Alternate strands of different colours (light and dark brown). Start with two short strands going down below the tail (got to give him a little dignity) ....


.....keep going.....

...and going....


until....

....you reach the front, where.....

.... you can give him an extra, shorter layer - over his chest

Step 8: Make the horns, and stick them on the head

Step 9: Add the facial characteristics - nostrils, eyes, and a big smile :-)

 Step 10: Time for the funky hair do!

Start at the back of the head, with a row of hair long enough to reach his back

 then add another, slightly shorter row. Start to work around to the front of the head.

give him a fringe, with strands going out in all directions. Send some out over his horns, curling round underneath. He's ended up with a little circular bald patch...keep going...

....till its all filled in. The last few strands are the hardest, but they end up going in all directions.

 Last step: add the goatee under the chin!

And introduce him to his friends!

Hen

Just a quick wee postie, critter this time, inbetween the apple-related posts: 

Rather pleased with this one. I've made a chicken before, but he turned out to be a rooster so this time I wanted to aim for a nice brown laying hen. I've also gone for a bit more patterning with the tools, as well as colourful feathers here and there. Not sure about her expression - ??? whats she thinking about?



Busy modelling....

Just a quick post, while I complete the latest collection for New Zealand. So far I've done two lambs, two pigs and one goat....

I'm particularly pleased with the goat - he didn't look right until I added the 'goatee' but now I think he's my favourite.

I've had to order more varnish, and some more FIMO. So now I've got plenty...in livestock colours

Looking forward to the challenge of doing fish :-S

Border Collie (number two...)

Following the previous border collie, I had a request for another one - different colour this time
So I thought I'd just quickly put some pictures up:

right, back to cows....

New Zealand cattle

A request for a selection of four different cattle models got me thinking about which breeds would make good little models. They need to distinctive enough to be recognisable as the breed they are. I'd made a Highland cow before so I knew that would work well:

So here is Highland cow mkII.

I'd also made a black and white Holstein cow before:

So here is the Holstein mkII

So I needed two more breeds. A short browse on google, and I thought I'd try a Hereford:

Fairly distinctive colouring, plus the hair over the withers, but what really made this critter was the curly locks on his forehead:

I'm really pleased with the curls!

So a final cow breed was needed...I decided on a Jersey since they have good colouring plus can have horns. Then I would have a balance of two dairy and two beef breeds, two horned breeds and two polled, and a range of colours and coat textures:

plus a cow bell :-) on this one

and spikey hair style.

Jess the Border Collie

Another doggie commission, this time a Border Collie called Jess.
Had a quick practice in plasticine first...then had a play with the FIMO:

It was very tempting to carry on with the hair but looking at the photo, Jess doesn't really have a 'fringe' as such...
So I stopped. Here she is prebake:

And post bake and varnished:

And she'll be off in the post once she's all dried!

Dopplegangers

Some critters in the original clay, and in FIMO:

Rabbits

original, and then FIMO:

Hedgehogs:

and ratties: