Dryad, Capricorn, Phoenix & Oriental Garden

[Valloa]

These were my entries for Reapercon. They didn't place but I'm happy as they are the first things I've gotten to paint for myself since December. 

Klocke Dryad:

http://www.valloasvale.com/dryad1e4.htm

Capricorn:

http://www.valloasvale.com/capricorn.htm

Phoenix:





I had tons of fun playing with the "base", the Koi and the turtles.  Oriental Garden:








Maya~

[Keeper]

They're all excellent :)

But I think my favourite is the pheonix - superb!!

[Theomar Pius]

love the garden. It's a nice little slice of life.

[Bungle]

the garden.. spill the beans....

:tip-hat:

fish.. turtle... everything ... how? what did you use?  c'mon spill  :icon_suspicious:

[Valloa]

the garden.. spill the beans....

:tip-hat:

fish.. turtle... everything ... how? what did you use?  c'mon spill  :icon_suspicious:

LOL alright.   I did everything, on all the Reapercon minis, in less than a week and a half so I used shortcuts as much as possible.  If (more likely when) I do another similar one more will be handmade. 

The bowl is a normal glass bowl from Michaels, the land was built up using a generic bulk airdry clay.  Be warned, even though some say they won't shrink, they might shrink some inside the glass after a few days. So if you use that be prepared to gap fill at the top.  Small gravel, sand and white glue was the side of the land and the bottom of the pond.  The grass and gravel are flocking mixed with white glue.  It plays nice with everything else and if you mix it with enough watered down glue it'll be hard enough when dry you don't have to worry about stuff shedding into places it shouldn't.

The tree was a short cut and clipped off an old Christmas village willow tree.  However, its very simple to make one, it's essentially just wire with brown textured electrical tape around the bark and branches, the drapping leaves are just flocking glued to fishing wire.  If you wanted to get fancy its easy to add bark with epoxy putty over the tape. 

I made the pier from Balsa wood and stained with Reapers Pro Paint wood ink.  I don't think they still make it though, pity because it's awesome for staining real wood. 

Cattails are brass etchings, the fish and the two turtles were charms found at Hobby Lobby.  I took off the loop, removed the finish and resculpted parts of them (a fish with half a head or an eye nearly to the chin because of mold slippage was too scary looking and the turtles needed undersides and flipper/head repair to be useable).  Because Koi grow so large the charms actually work and because of the depth in the water, and the size of most turtles, charm size worked for them too. 

The water is Quick Water for silk flowers.  It sets quickly and you can make single deep pours with it.  When properly contained this water will also allow you to do pours that you don't plan to be encased when dry, like this one.  http://www.valloasvale.com/mermaid.htm  When dry you do need to seal this brand of water with gloss sealer as it dries tacky.  If you want bubbles in it, stir vigorously it does self debubble large bubbles after a pour.  You can multi layer this, but it takes some practice to get it to look right and uniform if you do.  For this stuff I'd suggest creative gluing or supporting of anything you want to suspend and doing a single pour.  An upside to this is if you don't like it, it's cloudy, too bubbly, etc you can immediately pour it back out (carefully! and assuming you pour it as close to the end of your mixing as possible) and try with another batch.

Anything else you'd like to know about the dio?   :icon_cool:

Maya~

[Bungle]

superb and thank you.

I always wondered where people got Koi from. Water.... a great idea.... I may have to pinch that  :icon_wink:

[Valloa]

superb and thank you.

I always wondered where people got Koi from. Water.... a great idea.... I may have to pinch that  :icon_wink:

Go for it!  Just make sure you post pics!  The water doesn't uber heat set so its very gentle on items.

Maya~