Horses and A Day in the Life

I (Me? Never can get those two straight) and my family went shopping this Saturday for miscellaneous things at our not-so-near Walmart. My sisters and I went to the toy aisle as quickly as we could. We went through the blind-bags, feeling carefully through each. I scored on the new mini-whinnies with a mini Malik. I also got the little pinto, thinking it was a mini Wixom. These are for NaMoPaiMo. I also went through the unicorns, searching in particular for the standing mold. We got him, and I plan to shave his horn off, also for NaMoPaiMo.  While hunting, I got a very pleasant surprise. My little sister handed a bag over to me, thinking it was a the horse above. I felt over it and became more and more confused. This wasn't a standing mold. It wasn't the draft unicorn, nor an Alborozo, or a walking Arabian, or a miniature Justify. It turned out to be... A chase piece! WooHoo!!!  I have to admit I was a little let down with the color. The rainbow is defi

As I have been progressing throughout my model horse world, I have been working on customizing and painting my  model horses. I did get a rotary tool for Christmas so pretty soon I will go to drastic customizing. Smarty Jones to an eventing horse anyone? Anyways, I haven't gotten that far yet, but I am planning on doing something like that some year. Meanwhile, I have been busy painting, and I recently did a custom Latigo Dun It (I also have a breyer Bandera in progress. Gloss finish, everybody!). Here he is in all of his finished glory. I use nail polish for the gloss. I know that it's not the "in" thing to do anymore, but, hey, it works! I really have no idea what to do with the bottom of  hooves. Maybe I should look up reference pictures... I was pretty pleased with the end results. The silver mane was originally on the mold. The dark coat was achieved with an acrylic chocolate brown paint layer with pastels as shading. Eyes

As I look back on my (two) previous posts from the *cringe* not so far past, I can't help but smile at my feeble attempts at photography. My attempts are still feeble and sporadic, but I hope I can say that I have improved. More horses have been added (and removed) from my collection, and their photographs have improved. These are my newest and latest, and I hope I can honestly say that they are not too bad. Post Script is the best horse in my collection, and my only Breyerfest model. Hakan is soon going to receive a new coat. I was not as enthralled with him as I hoped I would be when he arrived. Gypsy Pam, while rather old, scuffed, and "vintagy" looking, is still a favorite on my shelf. Ravel's photo didn't turn out as nice as I had hoped. I needed to take the photo from a different angle (I think?)

One of my favorite things to do when I am editing my Breyer photos is to play with the colors. While clarity is key, I find that color is the second most important thing that I look for in my photos. The more color I can get the better. Below are some pictures of a before and after editing. Note how much more beautiful they are when they are more vibrant. Latigo Dun It is my new Breyer and I love him! His dappling is so beautiful, especially with his silver-colored mane and tail. He is soooo photogenic with his stunning coloring! While the two pictures above aren't exactly the same, they are the same horse taken at the same time of day with the same camera and with almost the same angle. As you can tell, the bottom one is much more edited. He can still use a little work as the light around the face is a little too much and is washing it out and reducing the clarity. The image could use a little straightening and cropping, but you can tell how editing can affect the qual

One of my favorite hobbies is photographing model horses. It is fun and also a little challenging because of their small sizes. Playing with color and finding just the right lighting for each separate horse is fun as well. Zenyatta, my sister's horse, is a fun one to use because she goes so well with so many different backgrounds and colors. These are some of my photos from last summer. This photo is very edited, with the color tuned up to as vibrant as I could get it. I have to admit that I find it very attractive. The horse in the back was in a bad spot though. That is something I had to play with. Here is one with the back horse moved. It looks better, but I didn't edit the photo as much. This one definitely needs a little more color to make it a little less bland, although it is pretty as it is. This one I took inside. You can see the difference in the lighting. I used felting wool for footing. I would love to use something a little more realistic, but this is