More Updates on Cerridwen!

Since I wanted to take you through all the crazy stages of sculpting, I did some more update or progress photos (I should call it slow progress, lol) on Cerridwen.  She's the riding pony I am working on.  She is still very RAW to say the least.  I changed a few things from my original idea.  I probably will continue to tweek her till I get what I want.

I really want her to surpass Sundance in detail and feel.  I have over 40 photos of similar Welsh ponies, mainly older mares.  I was surprised to find how many of these photos were taken where people are holding a treat for the pony to stretch out and get.  The halter photos are the same.  Stretch out the neck pose.  So my concept was assisted by tons of references.  Yeah!

Most of her is still roughly blocked in.  I wait until I have all measurements correct before I start adding any detail.  Until I get it I won't start adding the find muscles or really working on the head.  Now that Levi is back I will be able to take her to the barn and use on of his boarder's ponies to get the 3-D details I need.  That's how I did the final cutting and blocking of Sundance.  There is nothing like a real horse as a model.

Here's the story behind Cerridwen.  She's actually going to be a bronze.  The little girl Breyer you saw standing in front of her will be the idea behind the bronze.  The pony will have a bridle on with a blue ribbon.  One version will be English and one Western.  So the child will have her show duds on (yes I am sculpting the girl from scratch of course) and giving her champion pony a kiss on the nose.  She will have to lean forward to do this.  The Western girl will have her hat on her back with a string around her neck holding it as she leans forward (the hat was in the way).  She will be holding a big carrot behind her back with both hands.  The English child will have a braided mane and tail pony with her English duds on, including the helmet.  She also will have her hands behind her back with a carrot.

That hind toe will be totally pointed.  I can't do that right now since the leg gets squished when I push down on the clay.

The bronze pieces will be displayed for sale in Victor Issa's studio in Estes Park and my web site.  My idol of all living sculptors has given me a kick in the bootie to do this and called me on my excuses.  So the honor is huge thus the creation of this piece.

Since I like how she was going, I decided to do a resin for the hobby as well.  It will just be the pony of course by herself.  I have been going back and forth on the mane.  Jennifer Buxton says a braided mane but I have a lot of Western people that want a pulled mane saying they can get away with both English and Western events without having to customize the horse.  Most of these horses in Europe are shown with a long full mane.  So I'll be doing a poll on my Yahoo Group.

Haven't finished blocking in this side yet.  Yes Jen the stifle will be behind the other, lol!

Feel free to throw in suggestions.  You won't offend me.  She's really rough at this point and I know what I need to work on but opinions always matter!  I measured her neck head and body a million times.  They are correct.  Most these ponies have long necks and the pose she's in accentuates it.  If it still doesn't translate well to the model (we hobby people have grown accustomed to short necks and backs) I'll shorten her neck.

So that's it for now.  Good thing is she is very much a traditional riding pony made to fit the Breyer doll perfectly.  Great size!  I'll post some more photos of her next to some well known models so you can see her scale even better.  I was careful with this since Sundance ended up being a large traditional.