The Wonderful World of...

Jellibabies in their shiny ceramic coats, remind me of handfuls of colorful candy- the kind that makes your eyes gleam, and your mouth water. Painting these colors is ever so fun- I enjoy pouring through old mini magazines & going through websites for inspiration, always taking into account what has already been done, and what folks tend to like. Today I've completed 30 pieces. 30 so far! Makes me feel like I'm making progress! Batch #6 is about ready to go up for sale today; here in the studio, that means batch #7 is looming in the distance! A herd of little blank canvases, crying for colors. I had a thought today, as I was starting to ponder these colors- why not ask y'all? Is there something you've been waiting for that you haven't seen? Something you want more of? Post a comment in the comment section, and who knows, maybe you will see it in the next batch, or in others! I cannot make any promises, and I can't reserve individual colors for people, but now's the time to cast a vote for your favorite!

Jellimom??

Happy Friday!

Jeepers, it's been a while since I blogged! I need to work on that... But it just means that I have been busy in the studio, making things! You will see evidence of this soon, let me assure you. Anyhow, I thought I'd share today a little thought that's been buzzing around in my head lately- Jellibaby needs a mum! A pair would be too cute I think, and then I'd have another pony to paint, in even more colors, as adults can be dappled! That said, I finally sketched out a rough plan of what I'm thinking... I'm not completely satisfied with it (and can you tell I got tired of fiddling with the legs? Horses have too many legs!), but it is the start of an idea. Without further fuss, with the working title of "Toot Sweet", here's the momma! Click for a larger image:

I wanted a pose that I could stand Jellibaby next to, and kind of have the mare keeping an eye on her...

More to come!

:)

A Sweet for NAN

Wow, look at me- two blog posts in one day! I think that's a record for me, considering my track record when it comes to posting... Anyhow, I was thinking it might be fun to share the process behind the claybody custom Jellibaby I'm creating for the NAN Auction this year. Yep, I'll be contributing to the shininess this year! Anyhow, this little girl had a flaw in her pelvis region, so she immediately became claybody fodder. The stage you see now, I like to call "roughing out" the piece. It is not a pretty phase, but you begin to get an idea of what the final pose will look like. The clay is almost leather hard at this point, as I let it sit in the wet box some time after my first tweaks, and making sure the head would stay on*. The main changes I made were tucking the head, straightening out a front foreleg, kicking out a hind leg, and flipping the tail. So she's doing a sort of running/snarfy/kicky thing. You know, happy pony foal. She still has a way to go (actually, she is a bit further along than this, but I don't have a pic of that yet!), but I wanted to show you the start. Enjoy!


*A little saying I picked up from Joan Berkwitz- "It was fun until the head fell off."

Resin Run!

Yes, it's just about time to release the Jellibaby Resin Edition! There will be an announcement with all the nifty ordering details on Wednesday, April 1st (along with Ceramic Batch #5's debut!) on the VelasquezArtistry Yahoo Group. So soon there will be more Jellibabies out there for more people- plenty of itty-bitty mini fillies to take over the show halls! A stampede of sweets! And just think of all the colors you can paint her... That makes me smile. I'm still having fun painting all of the shiny babies, but I may just have to try my airbrushing skills on some resin Jellies. We'll see! It's pretty tempting... Anyhow, look for the announcement, and in the meantime, enjoy the above sample Jelli, painted by the wonderful Jenn Danza!

Nice and smooth... save the fuzzy bits!

Batch #4- Coming right up!

Happy Thursday, folks!

Coming to you live-ish from the Velasquez Artistry studio, here's a little update & sneak peek of Jellibaby Batch #4! Yep, they are getting ready to make their debut as their shiny little selves soon; hopefully on Monday (I can't believe the month's about half over all ready!). Here's an in-progress pic I took yesterday of the batch. I regret that there are but four again (had a little issue with one of the molds- it is solved now now. I think I've determined the problem to be "Daft me didn't strap the mold tightly enough". Easy fix, I surmise. Anywho, I'm going back to work now, so these babies will be ready in time. In the meantime, enjoy!

Blog on a Blog

I was excited to get a mention on artist Jenn Danza's blog. She is cold-painting a bisque Jellibaby for me, for a very special reason, and I am very excited to see how she turns out! She's just at the primer stage right now, but also included in that article is a rather stunning dapple bay resin Jenn painted that shows off her super-painting skills! (Plus there's a porcelain bisque of her new rat, "Listen", for all you rattie fans!) Fun stuff! Back here in my studio, I'm feverishly trying to finish Jellibaby batch #3 (there should be four in this batch- about all I could manage as I'm still trying to play catch-up with my work, darn that cold!). But if all fires well, they should be done by Monday... and I'm thinking maybe an evening debut this time....

'Til then!

:)

A Pleasant Morning

Happy Friday! I'm very happy that I forced myself to get going early this morning, so I could go sculpt at the track. What a pleasant place to work! Well, it helps that I got to enjoy a warm CA winter morning. It was in the 50's when I took off on my bike for the track, but warmed up quickly to the 70's by the time I left. And such sunny clear skies... I am truly spoiled! Anyhow, good weather aside, the best part about working at the track was of course all of the live models! And handily enough, they run in both directions in the morning, enabling me to work on both sides of my sculpture. They move fast, but luckily there are enough horses out there to catch glimpses of the muscle groups I'm working on at any particular moment. Though today I was concentrating on getting the overall shape right, particularly the hindquarters. I know I have loads of work left to do on the legs & hooves- my TB's just aren't dainty enough! It amazes me just how refined they are... Anyhow, it is nice to have such a great source of inspiration nearby; I am very blessed. It's given me a good amount of enthusiasm to get it done. I'm starting to be able to see more shiny goodness down the road...!