Saarlooswolfhound's custom repaints: 3/23/24 Special update!

Saarlooswolfhound wrote:

Oh thank you Jill! Your comments, especially coming from a zoo keeper background, mean a lot!

To be fair, my taxonomic knowledge has been absolutely bested by the crowd in this hobby. I am floored by the breadth of knowledge!! (But equids have always been a passion!)

EDIT: Also very impressed you even attempted that melanistic zebra, even more that you managed to get it right!

The knowledge on this forum is diverse and deep indeed, I have felt out of water a few times. Google is a great help sometimes for me. BUT we are all here for the SAME reason, a deep passion for animals and a love of this hobby! We all learn from each other. I myself am a canine enthusiast mostly, but I have enjoyed painting these other kinds of animals too, surprisingly I think my pirahna was the most fun and best unexpected result so far! My raccoon dog my best over all though with a lot of work and patience... thank you for your words on my zebra too. Not my favorite work result but it was challenging and showed me how to do it better and it will probably be touched up at some point. I shared it so anyone who is also trying to repaint can see that it doesn't always pan out but its good to try anyway. I have some more "re-dos" coming also from childhood paint mistakes...  but I hope they work out better on round 2.   Anyway long story short... thanks again! 

Enough late night rambling from me...

Ohh, I've also been thinking of making a melanistic zebra for a while, maybe with a different pattern variation.
I'm amazed the raccoon dog custom turned out so well without having to edit the sculpt.

Saarlooswolfhound wrote:

The knowledge on this forum is diverse and deep indeed, I have felt out of water a few times. Gpogle is a great help sometimes for me.

Yes, I feel like it's time to break the text books back out! All my -ology classes were a number of years ago now.

Quote :

surprisingly I think my pirahna was the most fun and best unexpected result so far!

You know, I think piranha are one of the most underrated fish for how beautiful they are. The way they sparkle! I love that you painted one. :) Also your red wolf. I'm in North Carolina, and I have worked with red wolves for a number of years (in zoos, not out at Alligator River). I have even had a chance to participate in the care of a litter of four (raised by their parents) and have been to a few red wolf SSP conventions. I love that you chose to represent them as well! I recognized it immediately when scrolling through, before I saw what you said it was, so I would say that speaks highly of your skill. After all, they are so easy to confuse with a coyote even in real life, to get the key markers in a figure it impressive!

Thank you burgerenby and jill again!

The raccoon dog needed no resculpting at all, the paws gave it away for it should have been; short digits and paw pads, not handlike for a raccon at all. So the decision was made for me really.

And Jill, you flatter me! I am extremely jealous of your work with red wolves (a dream to me), they need more people like you on their side! Unfortunately they have hybridized with coyotes extensively in some populations which makes each one (whether its hybrid or not) precious. Thanks again for your words of encouragement. 

Great new repaints! The zebra variant is really cool and I don't think I've seen a lot of repaints like these before. And the fox and the squirrel have such nice unique colours too But the one drawing my attention the most is the tanuki/racoon dog A lot of times I worry while layering different colours that it won't work out too, but in my experience every piece goes to an "ugly stage" before it it all seems to work together in the end. I think you did an excellent job with this model

You mean you haven't seen many repaints of different color morphs and mutations? I have several more planned... And thank you, I am quite proud of my tanuki and how it came out. 

I am naturally excited about the grey fox but just as the majority of the people posting here, my favorite is the racoon dog. That racoon figure is being debated also for a long time and I believe we have no idea of what it is. Your fantastic repaint, without any sculpts changes, has really worked perfectly and you turned an ambiguous figure into a fantastic model.

Thank you Roger! It is a really strange sculpt overall. But I am glad my paint job worked so well and people like it! I might post a new family photo of my raccoon dogs soon to show comparison... might be biased but I like my repaint best of the 3 I have. 

Saarlooswolfhound wrote:

Thank you Roger! It is a really strange sculpt overall. But I am glad my paint job worked so well and people like it! I might post a new family photo of my raccoon dogs soon to show comparison... might be biased but I like my repaint best of the 3 I have. 

It is fair that you are proud of your work and how perspicacious you were about this figure. There aren't many racoon dog figures but I am sure you have a beautiful little family to show.

Thanks Roger. 

My painting rate was a bit stunted this week from being busy, but here are my first 3 to show of the new batch! The before:
[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

First up is my favorite dinosaur. The weather is rainy so these don't have the best lighting. Didn't quite achieve the effect I was hoping for but I haven't ever done a dinosaur before and the texture was a bit difficult on this one.
[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

Then I wanted a little more interesting coat pattern for a brahma in my herd.
[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

And then a more controversial species. A kabomani tapir (whether you consider it a new species OR simply a color morph of the brazilian tapir, I just wanted something a little different species-wise albeit simple to paint)
[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

I love how you have chosen to repaint each of the models- each style/ pattern fits them perfectly and adds something really unusual to your collection!
I love the colours on the dinosaur, you have painted them so well- they complement each other beautifully and look so professional, as though they are printed! And I alos really love the mottled pattern on the Brahma!

Ohhh I remember the kabomani tapir from the TetZoo podcast, such an interesting choice.
The speckles on the Brahman are interesting to look at.
Interesting colour choice for the Spinosaurus, a nice blend of bird-like and tropical fish aspects.

I love especially the tapir! Such a good idea regardless of what we consider it. I suspect Susanne will love your dino.

Oh, the brahma is really fun! I love that pattern and those colors, great choice, and I like how you executed it. Lots of variation and "randomness" to the pattern. And I learned something knew via your tapir, very awesome!

Great I have a bias for the Emerald toucanet and Melanistic zebra. It seems the pics of teh melanistic foal is spreading the plague everywhere. These photos gave me the inspiration to paint an eohippus from Tams7prairie

What to tell about the Kabomani tapir Despite I love your idea, this model have very long legs and this "species" is known to have shorter legs than the other tapirs, maybe it's the right figure to try a custom ?

Thank you very much everyone!

I know the scientific description for kabomani says that the femur length is shorter than in other tapirs, but from the dark nighttime photos of them they look proportionally about the same. Alas, given my poor skills with heavy customizing I probably won't for this model. *I also fixed my mistake above regarding the species involved.

I love the tapir

Beautiful repaints,the Brahma is really great.If you have another spare may I suggest a cherry red Santa Gertrudis or a black/white speckled Nguni.

I almost did a pattern similar to the speckled nguni. I don't have another brahma but I do have some china cattle I was going to paint sometime at least for practice. I will for sure ask you for some ideas!

Thank you Andreas and Taylor!

Beautiful repaints

I agree!

Thank you Luke and Alain!

Here are the other 3 from the batch. First off the one that again didn't quite turn out how I hoped but was good practice. Safari toob croc into a smooth fronted caiman.
[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

Then the two I like best, a white throated toucan from a Schleich copy.
[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

And a baby mountain tapir for my family out of the nayab mini model.
[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]