Finished!

Even though I only had a few more hours of work on the Hatchling since the last time I posted before I could call him finished, it still took me nearly an entire month to put in those few hours. (It is the end of our fiscal year at my day job and coping with the year-end details sucked up a lot of my energy.) BUT, here he is at last.


And from the other side.


I finished him off with lots of layers of different colors of acrylic paint. What really made his color come to life was the final glazes of Luminarte's pure pigment powders. You have to be careful with those as a little goes a long way, but I think I got it right this time. You can see the faint wash of Sun Gold on his face in this close up. It's a cool effect.


I owe a huge thank you to Sprite for teaching me her technique for creating skin textures. These show up best in this photo on his hips, thighs, and tail. I need a little more practice with this method, as I tend to squish one side while working on the other, but I'll get it eventually. (If you like baby dragons, or fantasy sculpts in general, you have to check out her blog!)


Sprite also gave me the idea to line the inside of his shell with the illusion of crystals. I don't know how she did hers, but I created mine out of several sizes and colors of shard glass glitter, micromarbles, fine glitter, and thin washes of the luminarte glazes again. I love the way the silver shards catch and reflect the light.


I have always loved dragons - I definitely see more of them in my future!