Thing I Made Thursday #30: Baby Stardust Custom Pony
I gave you a sneak peek at this girl back around V-Day, but here's the finished set.
I've put this one up on Patreon, but it's free -- you can go look at it and download the little PDF booklet, or the individual pics. You can also share it on Facebook. The tumblr post is right over here, if you wanna share that. I'd like to pull in a few more patrons this month, considering how rough things have been.
Baby Stardust has kind of an epic story.
Back when Bear and I first met in bellydance class, she had this little G1 Baby Firefly on the dashboard of her truck. It enabled us to strike up a conversation about My Little Ponies, and we sort of formed a friendly acquaintance based on that and on a mutual love of The Last Unicorn. We hung out a few times, she bought some ponies off me, but we sort of fell out of touch.
She moved to Alaska, then Washington State. We reconnected via the internet, she visited a few times, and then a year and a half ago or thereabouts, she moved back here to Oklahoma where she was promptly inducted into our geeky gaming-and-bad-movies group. Everyone loved her, because she's easy to love.
She also brought all her old ponies with her, and unloaded some of them on me for custom bait . . . including that Baby Firefly. I knew it was her because of the sticky on her back hoof from being stuck to the dashboard. I hid her away. Someday, I knew, I was gonna do something really special with her.
We became really good friends. Really good. Like, drift-compatible we-named-our-jaeger good. Hung out all the time, RP partners, dorking about everything, just . . . really good friends.
Meanwhile, everyone in the world -- including a random shop owner in Eureka Springs and The Actual Bear herself -- realized that we were a couple.
Time passed.
Vacations were had.
A clue was found. It belonged to me.
A train ride happened. Certain words were said. And the next morning I woke up early and went out before she got up to grab a thing she'd seen the day before and wanted.
On the way, I impulsively ducked into a little shop and saw a gorgeous dichroic glass necklace (like this one, but not that one) with a tree on it. Stunning little thing. From all the way across the shop I was like "YES THAT I WILL TAKE THAT ONE PLEASE" and I bought it without even looking at the price.
And I brought it back to her in bed and gave it to her and she was so utterly delighted and it was lovely.
But a couple of months later, the glass tile broke off the bail and was lost somewhere along her delivery route. Her beautiful necklace was no more.
Sadness ensued.
Then I remembered Baby Firefly. A plan was born.
I made this little gal.
I wanted her to look like the dichroic glass. I think she does. I had to color correct these photos so they would show the green tint on her legs, and may have gone a little overboard with it in a couple of places, but the first two are pretty accurate.
The pictures simply do not do her justice. How she shimmers. I painted her base coat in pure pthalo blue lightened with pearlescent paint, then sponged more pearl over her to make highlights on her rump, face, wings, and legs. I layered watered down color and watered down pearl paint over her several times, building up a really vivid iridescent effect. I used two different kinds of blue -- one purplish, one greenish -- on her body, used green on her legs near the horizon, and purple on her cheeks, ears, nose, and wingtips.
Then I added a whole ocean of shimmering pearlescent stars among the trees. And when that was done, I rehaired her with Dollyhair nylon in Diamond, a stunning new sparkling white that I adore.
I am very, very proud of her!
I was still nervous, but when I gave her to The Actual Bear, she was delighted. (Of course she was. But I was still really nervous.)
Anyway. That's the story!
Thank you guys for sticking with me!
X-posted from Dreamwidth. Comment count:
I've put this one up on Patreon, but it's free -- you can go look at it and download the little PDF booklet, or the individual pics. You can also share it on Facebook. The tumblr post is right over here, if you wanna share that. I'd like to pull in a few more patrons this month, considering how rough things have been.
Baby Stardust has kind of an epic story.
Back when Bear and I first met in bellydance class, she had this little G1 Baby Firefly on the dashboard of her truck. It enabled us to strike up a conversation about My Little Ponies, and we sort of formed a friendly acquaintance based on that and on a mutual love of The Last Unicorn. We hung out a few times, she bought some ponies off me, but we sort of fell out of touch.
She moved to Alaska, then Washington State. We reconnected via the internet, she visited a few times, and then a year and a half ago or thereabouts, she moved back here to Oklahoma where she was promptly inducted into our geeky gaming-and-bad-movies group. Everyone loved her, because she's easy to love.
She also brought all her old ponies with her, and unloaded some of them on me for custom bait . . . including that Baby Firefly. I knew it was her because of the sticky on her back hoof from being stuck to the dashboard. I hid her away. Someday, I knew, I was gonna do something really special with her.
We became really good friends. Really good. Like, drift-compatible we-named-our-jaeger good. Hung out all the time, RP partners, dorking about everything, just . . . really good friends.
Meanwhile, everyone in the world -- including a random shop owner in Eureka Springs and The Actual Bear herself -- realized that we were a couple.
Time passed.
Vacations were had.
A clue was found. It belonged to me.
A train ride happened. Certain words were said. And the next morning I woke up early and went out before she got up to grab a thing she'd seen the day before and wanted.
On the way, I impulsively ducked into a little shop and saw a gorgeous dichroic glass necklace (like this one, but not that one) with a tree on it. Stunning little thing. From all the way across the shop I was like "YES THAT I WILL TAKE THAT ONE PLEASE" and I bought it without even looking at the price.
And I brought it back to her in bed and gave it to her and she was so utterly delighted and it was lovely.
But a couple of months later, the glass tile broke off the bail and was lost somewhere along her delivery route. Her beautiful necklace was no more.
Sadness ensued.
Then I remembered Baby Firefly. A plan was born.
I made this little gal.
I wanted her to look like the dichroic glass. I think she does. I had to color correct these photos so they would show the green tint on her legs, and may have gone a little overboard with it in a couple of places, but the first two are pretty accurate.
The pictures simply do not do her justice. How she shimmers. I painted her base coat in pure pthalo blue lightened with pearlescent paint, then sponged more pearl over her to make highlights on her rump, face, wings, and legs. I layered watered down color and watered down pearl paint over her several times, building up a really vivid iridescent effect. I used two different kinds of blue -- one purplish, one greenish -- on her body, used green on her legs near the horizon, and purple on her cheeks, ears, nose, and wingtips.
Then I added a whole ocean of shimmering pearlescent stars among the trees. And when that was done, I rehaired her with Dollyhair nylon in Diamond, a stunning new sparkling white that I adore.
I am very, very proud of her!
I was still nervous, but when I gave her to The Actual Bear, she was delighted. (Of course she was. But I was still really nervous.)
Anyway. That's the story!
Thank you guys for sticking with me!
X-posted from Dreamwidth. Comment count: