STS model painting month: WIP photos and discussion here

As there seems to be some dead rats included in the full set, your slip-of-the-knife rat could be a survivor of accident or predator, who got away but without the tip of his tail!

The collie is making good progress, the bit of colour going on really ties the newly added fluff into the original sculpt, and it's interesting to see the colouring build up bit by bit

My Quagga is complete!
As we're supposed to be using this special month's forum event to chat and discuss and share techniques, as well as just inspire ourselves to get on with painting, I'll talk a little about adding her stripes in this post, before I post the final set of better photos in the thread for our finished projects.

Starting on the striping was the only nerve-wracking thing about the entire paintjob.
Something I'd never done before, I haven't even painted a normal zebra, but I really wanted to create this quagga and convinced myself I'd be able to do a decent job - it can't be any harder than intricate horse patterns like appaloosas or the more fiddly kinds of pinto, it's just familiarity and experience which makes those seem less daunting.  
Sure, quaggas are animals I've been aware of for a really long time. I've seen the photos and the paintings, read the history, looked at the modern project to create quagga-looking zebras. They're not horrifyingly unfamiliar in the same way someone saying 'hey, paint this species you've never heard of, here's a google image!' would be.
But stripe painting is new territory, and no amount of poring over photographs of museum specimens can really teach your hand how to make that happen. Sometimes you just have to try, and hope for the best!

As I said in the other post, my mini quagga is both a portrait of her species, and of one individual, the famous London Zoo quagga - the only one ever photographed alive. Luckily, we have photos which show both sides of her, and a couple of angled shots, so I didn't have to make up the stripe pattern on the less-often-seen side!

I started by choosing a single stripe to copy onto the model at a point mid-way down her neck, to try to avoid the stripes clustering either too high up the neck and running out by the time I reached the shoulder, or vice versa. From the first stripe, I could count out how many more she had in each direction, and painted in the mane streaks first, to make sure I spaced them out the right amount.

The paint I thinned a little by licking the fine brush to a point then touching the paint, this just helps it go on in a translucent way, which looks less 'painty' and more natural on the finished animal. Pleeeeease don't do this unless you're SURE your paint is non toxic!  
Two or three layers of paint were enough to get the stripes as pale as I wanted them, applied in tiny brushstrokes which follow the direction of the hair growth, not the direction of the stripe. I used a little pure white just to brighten them in the most distinct places, and darkened the roots of the mane hair where dirt collects.

It's hard to interpret the fading out of the stripes onto the body of the quagga through a black and white picture. At some points our London mare seems to have darker stripes as well as paler ones, especially behind the shoulder blades, so I've added just a hint of darker paint to back up the paler stripes and blend them into the body colour as they fade out.
As with all custom painted animal models, there's an element of artistic interpretation, and with an extinct animal with a lot of known variation in colour and pattern, there's going to be even more variety in how we make our models.
Many modern illustrations of the quagga show them with a strikingly black and white striped head and neck, but I just don't see any evidence of that look - every single museum quagga I could find good pictures of shows cream stripes on a brown coat, so I've made the choice to stick to that colour scheme.

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Here she is just a few moments after I'd decided she was done

But I wanted nicer photos than that. Wait til a sunny day, right?

Well, yes, but I decided my usual scenery just wouldn't cut it for this special portrait model of a very specific animal we know from 19th century natural history. She lived in London Zoo, so it was only right to create her little corner of the zoo for her photoshoot...

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Her wall, the door painted green because in contemporary colour-tinted copies of her most famous photo, the door is shown green - either by choice to give the photo a bit more life and they happened to have some green, or because the doors of London Zoo really were painted green at that time! Either way, I had no reason to decide any other colour would look better or be more authentic, so green it is  

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And the yard floor, which looks like block paving, or possibly very neat rectangular stone (used a lot in stableyard buildings of that era), but you can't tell the colour, only that it's lighter and more uniform than the bricks of the wall, so I chose grey.

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The set put together, but not glued. I like to leave my pieces separate so I can combine them mix-and-match for other models in future - this yard could go with a fence backdrop instead, or I could use the wall with a road in front of it, and so on.

Edit : Her good photos are now posted [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.] (I don't know how to link to a single individual post, but she's first up on that page after Ana's intro, so you won't have to scroll far to find her )

This topic is very useful for learning about painting and customisation techniques.

Your rough collie is beginning to look very good Kelly, looking forward to the finished collie. And as I already said in the other topic, the quagga is absolutely amazing!

It's wonderful to see everyone's progress! I love the collie project, the tiny tiny rats, the fennecs, and of course the quagga This topic makes me very happy

I'm really relieved to have finished early, now I can sit back and relax and watch everyone else's projects progress

I can't get over how beautifully and delicately painted your Quagga is! I'd love to know more about the technique, and the ratio of water to paint you use- it's so realistic! I always try to get that more dry texture but struggle to do it- and would love any tips you have!

The paints come quite sticky and thick, like the texture of double cream, and I use them straight from the pots (or, if I'm mixing colours, dabbed onto a plastic bottle as a palette). Never any water for the body colour and shading, just thick sticky paint rubbed as far as I can make it spread, to avoid brush strokes and get smooth blending of colours.
The only time I use any water is for dappling, or defined detailed markings - stripes in this case, but also when I'm doing the edges of any patchy pinto colours. And then I don't really have a ratio formula, as I said I lick the brush so it's wet when it touches the paint, and by the time you touch it onto the model, the paint's gone thinner. It's because the paint is so expensive, I try not to waste the tiniest amount, and watering it down then not using it all would be wasting drops of paint I could've had on a model

I'll stay in the Africa area for this WIP topic here and give you a little update on my fennec:

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I've been trying to mix different colours of paint on the figure while to paint is still wet. I normally don't use this technique but since I'm trying different ways of painting for my foxes I thought it would be fun to try this one on this fox. I'm not really sure what to think of it. It is sort of fun, but I actually had more fun working from dark colours towards light colours that I used on a different fox. :)

Thank you George, this is so interesting!
And what a beautiful Fennec so far A-J!

Here I've added a bit more detail:

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Oh, he's coming along nicely, the pale rings around the eyes are really starting to show now, and the colour's lovely and soft and well blended. Do you use acrylics?

George wrote:

Do you use acrylics?

Yes, I do. I have used pastels in the past, but I'm more comfortable with acrylics, especially when it's a textured model. Also I'm a 'water mixer' (I'm a big fan of watercolours when painting on paper) and I enjoy switching between very watered down washes of (dark) paint and very dry drybrushing of (light coloured) paint

How fascinating that you like the paint thin or thick depending on the darkness of colour! I don't think I've ever heard that approach before, most people are either firmly in the 'thin it like milk!' camp, or more comfortable with sticky paint and dry brushing for shading. One of my artist friends swears by flow aid to make the pigment particles spread apart from each other, but gave me some and I hated it (so much that I only partly finished one side of one small horse, and had to paint over a lot of that just to rescue it )
One of the most interesting things about the online community is finding out about other people's paint techniques (and either nicking tips, or thinking 'blimey, no!' and being glad there's other ways, hahah)

Soooo beautiful!

That fence is really starting to pull together! And George, your quagga is a stunning girl!

I agree it's really interesting to see all the different paint methods, and how they all work beautifully for the right person. I started painting figures on a fantasy sculpture line, and used the paints they recommended. The method is largely learned from a talented painter there's tutorial. You usually antique those though, not dry brush, so I'm just now trying to learn that.

Here's my current update on the collie. Unexpected company after a very busy work week, so not getting much done. I plan on giving it white markings, though probably not a collar or on the face.
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Oh, and though I hadn't painted the eyes in for the pics yet, promise they're not just black blobs!

I have refrained from commenting thus far, but couldn't help lurking and checking on everyone's progress. Great job everyone! That quagga is stunning (way better than mine) and great detail to learn about the dorsal features. The rat is so small but yet so detailed. The fennec is such a great sculpt and perfect shade so far. And the collie is coming together so well also, great layering floof added on such a little guy/girl.

I am cheering you all on and can't wait for more updates!

Ohhh a gorgeous collie, so recognisable!!!
You have painted this breed so well- everything from the light fur on the trousers/ tummy and face, to all those beautiful sable shades- and the face is just so similar to Bonnie's!
I love the range of oranges, it really adds depth to this wonderful dog- I can't wait for the white ruff to be added!

Wow, what a lovely Collie! I like the shading on the fur
And fennec looks super cute too!

The collie is coming along nicely. And I hadn't realised it is so small!

I had some time for painting yesterday evening so here is the fennec with a few more layers of paint:
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Ooh, that little face! I don't know an awful lot about any foxes apart from our native ones, what do you call the dark markings from eye to mouth? Those are beautifully done!

All those shades of cream and beige- your Fennec gets more and more realistic each time! And she's so sweet!

That fence is looking great! The teardrops really make it pop.

I am maybe finished with the collie. I haven't clearcoated it yet; still time to change things. I went with rather minimal white like the collie I had was like; I can add more if you prefer Bonnie.
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Maybe add a little more white to the neck to make it more visible from the display side? And it has pink paw pads, though the photo isn't good. Off to work now can't change it till tomorrow!

Wonderful fennec with such a sweet face, and the collie looks great! I like that is has less white, makes it different than the typical collie we are used to seeing (aka Lassie).

Your collie is absolutely wonderful!!
And I love how you have given it less white, it's so lovely that you could base it off your own collie! I also love it because it makes him/her look more like the original working collies who weren't bred with huge perfect white ruffs- even though these are beautiful- I think some breeders are trying to keep this line going with a breed called an Old Time Scotch Collie . And I think I'm right in remembering that your collie was also called Bonnie?
I also love all the shades in the coat, especially in the photo third from the top, so beautiful!