@Wildthings
How long does it take you to do a piece like that Barry?
Well, I do them in batches now a days instead of working one all the way through but if I had a thawed or fresh duck at 8:00 am, I could have him mounted, posed and carded by about 4:00 pm. Then give about 10 days for drying, a little finish work, glamour shots and contacting the client.
Now I batch them. For instance, I'll take 4 frozen birds out tonight to thaw overnight. The next day I'll skin them all. Then flesh them all. Wash and rinse them all four times each. Do any repairs and take notes on damage. Produce and order list for those. Package, label and refreeze them.
At a later date I'll spend a morning prepping the forms, preparing wires and injecting and posing the feet that I previously separated from the skins.
On another day I'll paint the previously injected now dry feet and the reproduction heads.
Finally, the day comes that I'll take back out the frozen prepped skin, grab the prepped form, the painted injected wired feet, painted head and of course wires for the wings, neck and attachment. Then treat the skin, dry the feathers, install wires in the wings, install prepped form in skin, reinstalled prepped feet into skin on form, sew up the incision, install head onto neck wire, insert eyes, glue skin to head, tuck the eye skin, install attachment wire to bird and then to driftwood, Then I begin preening starting with the wings after I positioning them. Pin the flight webs, then shingle the primaries, then secondaries, then the tertiaries. Next comes the coverts upper and lowers. Then I set the tails feather with silicone caulking and preen them. All of those get carded after the preening.
Let's see, did I leave anything out. Hmmmm yeah but I ain't giving up all my secrets
Just love the composition and execution- that little bit tiny bit of regal blue violet (noble purple) and that Hermes’s orange at the left corner gives it that "je ne sais quoi". Excellent work of finding the correct back ground of variegated grays to work with the natural fauna earth tones along with the rustic wood panels which really create that “layer” of foreground, middle ground and back ground! Your masterful work needs to be seen and exhibited in the right gallery Barry
@Wildthings!
Well said Arn. Exactly what I was trying to acheive!!