Original G1 Designs
Plum Blossom
The Customization: Four legs and an ear had to be made out of clay, the remaining hair was dyed deep purple, and the body painted an even darker shade of purple. Black hair was added where her mane plugs had come out. A lot of glue was used to fill in cracks and gouges in the plastic.
Finishing Touches: The symbol outlines were transferred to the pony in pencil. A teeny little blossom was painted under one cheek, and her eyes and eyeshadow were painted in metallic silver. I christened her Plum Blossom in honor of the smell of that dark purple paint.
Baby Bluet
The Customization: First I had to remove those broken beddy bye eyes and open the eye sockets. Though her hair was lovely, some of her mane was ripped out during the exploratory surgery. I used white hair and tinsel from a wig for the missing plugs and three strands in the tail. For new eyes I used clear rhinestones (they could have been a bit bigger) and secured those using tacky glue and modelling clay. Like Plummy, cracks and rough spots were filled in using glue and rough edges were sanded down.
Finishing Touches: My idea was to make her Plum Blossom's baby. Her symbol is a simplified version of Plummy's, and I gave her silver eyeshadow like her mommy and varnished her. I flipped through my flowers of North America books and found bluets resemble her symbols, and thus she was named Baby Bluet.
Khamsin
The Customization: I got a really bad condition Twilight and Firefly in a lot. I swapped their heads. I was amused.
Finishing Touches: The hair is Restoredoll katsilk, with Thermal Orange in there for fun. The symbol is a TAF pattern like Pillow Talk's, with bits that extend up to the head like the a Merry Go Round pony. Once I finished her, I found the name Khamsin -- a hot Egyptian wind.
Steampunk Pegasus, or Una Pegassus
The Customization: This girl was a sad Magic Hat. She was repainted in woodgrain and decorated with some Gothic Revival type accents.
Finishing Touches: The wings are made from paper (yes, paper) and a lot of found/broken jewelry was incorporated into her. I didn't really have a plan here and just added things until she felt finished. Moorcock fans may recognize the nod in her name. She's not terribly steampunk in the final tally, but neither is Una in a lot of her appearances. I say we're even.
Shubunkin-chan the Hippocampus
The Customization: This pony was only Baby Tiddlywinks' head. It's all sculpted from the neck down. The frame is locked into the neck ring, and the body is wire and aluminum foil armature covered in Super Scupley.
Finishing Touches: She's meant to mimic the nacreous sheen of blue calico goldfish, so I used my trusty pearl pigments to produce the proper effect. The eyes are even sort of "fishy" looking in real life.
Lucky
The Customization: Decoupage and glitter. I love them both.
Finishing Touches: The necklace was giftwrap ribbon glued in place and accented with glitter. You might be able to tell the hair is a bit stiffer than normal; it's kanekalon that needs to be styled with a hot iron. Lucky is off living with one of my internet pals now.
Spun Sugar
The Customization: Like Lucky, this is decoupage, only in pink!
Finishing Touches: The hair is yarn that I've untwined (it was originally 4 ply, I think.) The necklace and headbands were leftovers from some ATC work where I cut up paper doilies. Spun sugar is another name for cotton candy. I could just as well call her Fairy Floss. It makes no difference.
Roseate Skimmer
The Customization: More newborn fakie customs!
Finishing Touches: Roseate was my chance to try out fairy wings. She's supposed to look more like a bug than most of the fairy-winged ponies yout see these days. She's based on the dragonfly of the same name.
G1 Reproductions
Baby Sunlight, Baby Moonstone, Baby Skydancer
The Customization: The Family Dollar fakie newborns are awesome.
Finishing Touches: The hard part is the glitter symbol. All I can say for this is that it takes a lot of patience -- especially small things like the rays on the sun. I think the brush size I use is around a 5/0...for the eyes, it was 10/0. In other words, tiny.
Purple Haze Peachy
The Customization: Peachy was in good condition, but I had stolen her hair for my Macau Peachy. I found a picture of Freefall's Greek Peachy with purplish hair, and decided to make an homage to that color combo.
Finishing Touches: I call her Purple Haze because that's the name of the hair color (at RestoreDoll.) It dosen't match any official Hasbro colors that I'm aware of, so I didn't have any excuse not to use it on a custom to clear out my supplies...I also went over her hearts with a darker pink paint.
Argie Heartthrob
The Customization: This Sprinkles was nasty. Actually, I think every Sprinkles I've gotten is nasty. Yuck!
Finishing Touches: This hair color aparrently isn't even authentic to Argies, but it's called Nitro Lime, also from RestoreDoll. The symbols were freehanded. The inspiration pony is from Leaper's green-haired Heartthrob.
Sherbet Redux
The Customization: I did a head swap on my Sherbets, and this one ended up with pox on the head and pen on the body. Nothing to do but repaint....
Finishing Touches: BANE OF MY EXISTENCE. Nothing seemed to go well, not the hair, paint, inspiration...nothing.
I forced myself to finish her, and that's about it. I can't even think of a good name. Can I say I'm glad this one's over? Because I really, really am.
Sweet Scoops
The Customization: She started life as a horrible So Soft Sundance. The deflock went awry, but I was able to salvage the hair for my Macau Peachy. I decided she needed to stick around for that sacrifice. Sweet Scoops was the obvious choice.
Finishing Touches: A pretty simple repaint and rehair, and that's it.
Alternate Sunlight
The Customization: This sad Sunlight had a harcut and no symbols left. I decided to try to go for a Brazillian Sunlight look in the cleanup and rehair.
Finishing Touches: This was my first tme using Folk Arts metallic paints. I really like the way they came out. She doesn't look terribly Brazillian, but that's okay.
Argie Sparkler
The Customization: This was a Majesty with a badly discolored head. I used her as an experiment in repainting the head and body to a similar shade.
Finishing Touches: Again with the Folk Arts Metallic paint job. I believe the authentic Argie Sparkler doesn't have a colored stripe, but it seemed appropriate to use that beautiful deep blue on her.
Re Unicorno
The Customization: Obviously, this was a Majesty at one point. She came to me covered in purple paint and with no symbols. I spent most of my time prepping her and very little time actually painting.
Finishing Touches: Another Folk Arts Metallic paint job. This ought to distinguish it from a real Re Unicorno.
Ladybird
The Customization: This only took seven years.
Finishing Touches: She started as a badly discolored Seashell. Do not ever ask me for a peach-bodied pony. Do not. I am so sick of painting this color.
Original G3 Designs
Inara
The Customization: You'd think that a pony straight out of the box would make for an easy prep. Not so with Inara! Her hair was a snarled, tangled, glued mess. Some was so bad I had to take the scissors to it, which I never do.
Finishing Touches: I wanted to gradient dye her hair, but evidently my purple dye has become too watered down and it only gave her a slight wash at the tips. For her symbols, I went in with an image in my head, rhinestones, and gold paint. I superglued the confetti and rhinestones on and painted some swirls. Then I added the gold glitter and varnish. Her name means "ray of light." I bet she listens to Madonna.
Daisy Pink
The Customization: First, I drew this sketch of Daisy to get an idea of what I was going to do. I swiped off the butterfly and painted a daisy, and changed the hoof heart to a daisy. She also has blush (harder than it looks) and freckles (so cute!)
Finishing Touches: I gave her spiral curls, and then made her some clothes and sewed a flower and some beads to her hat. Her scarf is tacked in place with a small gold bee pin. See her all dressed up in this picture.
Calico Kitty
The Customization: She was partially inspired by the Succubus asking if there's a gingham themed pony after she dreamed of one. I told her the closest was Sew-and-So; naturally, when I got an extra, she was appropriated for her custom. You can see her original sketch here.
Calico was stubborn. The purple shading on the points was aggravating and redone about four times. I went blind doing tiny white flecks in the "calico" material of her quilt square. I could not bring myself to put in the "stitches" on the quilt, since I found it was too busy.
Finishing Touches: The dark points made my mother constantly call Calico "he" and ask when he was going to get a shave. Aggravated she turned out butch, I painted on eyeshadow. The purple still didn't really make her look feminine, so then I added wine red glitter.
Calico had now morphed into a crossdressing pimp daddy.
I attempted blush as I had on Daisy; it consistently came out too red, making her look like a cheap whore. I decided I prefered the pimp daddy look and took off all the blush.
I had a hard time figuring out what clothes to give her. I decided for the red and gold theme, giving her a skirt made of ribbon, a gauzy scarf/ascot, and a lined cape with fully functioning drawstring. You can see her all decked out (sans the cape) here.
Autumn Rose
The Customization: No big inspiration here, other than I had an extra Toola Roola. You can see her original sketch here. Rose was easy. I cleaned off the symbols, repainted them and outlined the symbol in ink. Her hair was dip-dyed in scarlet RIT dye for about ten seconds. It is gradient dyed, so the bottom is nearly red (looks darker in the scan than it actually is) and the top is barely pink.
Finishing Touches: I haven't yet decided what accessories she should have. I guess I'm running low on sewing inspiration.
Baby Snow Sparkle
The Customization: Another easy one. I took off all the flowers but left the flashes (those green bursts are original, in other words.) Then I repainted Winter Snow type symbols in the empty spaces. I dyed her mane in purple RIT dye, but didn't get it as dark as I wanted it, sigh. I also dyed her hooves and ears in the purple dye, just for the hell of it, I guess.
Finishing Touches: Nothing much, but she has this top hat I snatched from a lot of doll clothes. It looks great on her, heh.
Dragon Treasure
The Customization: I was a bit stumped as to what to get my friend for her wedding, but their wedding invitation had a lovely image of two dragons. I wanted to reproduce the invitation image exactly, but the jewel in Peri Winkle prevented that. I had to cut back to one dragon wrapped around the jewel. The paint was a custom mix of blues and silver metallics, painted in thin washes, which is what makes the dragon look so detailed. I added jewels in my friend's favorite color to trail down the leg and to make a little tiara.
Finishing Touches: I was stuck on what to do with her hair. I tried a few different things, but finally settled on wrapping some beads around the base of the tail and braiding a small section on the mane. I ran out of time to give him (I think of Dragon Treasure as male) a bowtie, but I meant to. Honest.
Adoraflora
The Customization: Pretty much the same as Inara: I had confetti and rhinestones, this time in the shape of flowers. I painted on vines/stems freehand. Her hair is subtly gradient dyed.
Finishing Touches: I gave her spiral curls like the Fancy Hair Precious Gem (only prettier,) and then made her some flower hairtie thingybobs. The hard part came in naming her, since Hasbro has scarfed up many of the flowery type names. I played the Hasbro "grab an adjective and a noun and blend liberally" game.
Chromatone
The Customization: The Succubus had admired my Alphabittle on one of her visits, and when I was able to purchase one in a bonus pack, I knew I had to customize her for the Succubus.
Finishing Touches: The hard part, as you might imagine, was painting the rainbow designs that wrap under the belly and around the legs. I messed up one part and had to redo it, but I don't think you'd know that unless I told you... All in all, the hard part was trying to get the purple pimping hat to work out, and then the name. Very hard, I tell you.
Moonlight Sonata
The Customization: PJ and I share a love for Andrew Lloyd Webber musicals. I wanted to do a Phantom-y type pony, but she sort of morphed into Sarah Brightman halfway through.
Finishing Touches: This was, I think, the first time I ever spontaneously created a design in glitter. I was not completely happy with it, but she's already been given, so I'm not going to take the pony back for repairs. Repairs never go well, anyway. Her mask was custom-shaped to her head and made from blue cardstock covered in glitter. I even got her hairdo the way I wanted it.
Luna Corona
The Customization: Mmm, bonus pack ponies.
Finishing Touches: Silver Lining just had a little bit of alteration. In fact, I don't even think it deserves a description. She was just a needless bit of fun for me.
Verilee Violet
The Customization: Extra ponies...extra customs.
Finishing Touches: Verilee is my "improved" TAF style birthflower G3, which I made for the Succubus. I was going to get her the real one but this is better. My version has glitter.
Bittersweet, Teaberry, Highbush Blueberry
The Customization: I had to get them, you know. Had to. They were my excuse to myself to use the non-authentic pony hair colors.
Finishing Touches: Didn't do much, other than the rehair and the symbol painting. I did try a new way to color the eyes, but that's about it.
G3 Reproductions
Winter Snow
The Customization: As she was a brand new Crystal Crown, most of the prep time was spent in freeing her from the box.
Finishing Touches: The only thing you have to do to make Crystal Crown into Winter Snow is to change the symbols. I only had to wipe off and repaint one snowflake, and actually did the smaller flakes freehand, sans pencil guides.
Rosey Posey
The Customization: One of the hardest things was finding a Sweet Breeze.
Finishing Touches: It took me quite a while to get her hair out (I am going to use it in another custom, plus I used some for a Baby Firefly's tail for PJ.) Actually rehairing her was a snap. The hard part was the symbol. I'd never done anything this intricate before, so I wasn't sure I could pull it off. For reference, the smallest bubble is less that one millimeter in diameter, and all of the white section is smaller than a dime! I deliberately chose to leave the text off (following the Licensing Show ponies -- this would be the "normal" release of Rosy Posey.) Her eyes have also not had the star painted on them; I left the heart as well.
Bay Breeze
The Customization: I used a Lovey Dovey for this one.
Finishing Touches: I refused to dismantle a perfectly good Paradise Palms to get the symbol, so I cast a mold around it and made my own. I think it looks fine. She's in a different pose than the real Bay Breeze, so I don't think anyone would mistake her as authentic. Maybe.
TAF Project Pony
The Customization: The body was Misty Blue, and the pink hair was from the DG version of Gardenia Glow, with the white from Dollyhair.
Finishing Touches: This was just labor intensive. I used the poster from the Pony Project to get the symbols right, and did a lot of hunting to find the "off" side symbol placements. I did not scan the off side, but it IS painted. Kar Red Roses, one of the biggest fans of the Pony Project, and Diet Otaku, one of the biggest G3 fans, both weighed in and said she could pass for authentic from a distance. My job here is done.
Frisco and Trolley
The Customization: The hardest thing about these G3 repros is that the symbols are so much more intricate than G1s. Good ref pics are lifesavers.
Finishing Touches: The symbols are painted, not stamped. I think I used a quarter to get the round outline. And yes, I did my best to write "Heaven is a place on earth" under the bridge; it's almost legible. I did cheat and use a pen for that, though. Trolley is my favorite of the pair.
Surfstar
The Customization: I believe this was Butterdrop.
Finishing Touches: It must be boring to see me write, "I painted on the symbols," so I also rehaired this one. Simple and clean, the way a pony should be.
Goodie Goodie
The Customization: Gardenia Glow, who gave her hair for the TAF Project Pony, gave her body for Goodie Goodie.
Finishing Touches: I know. I could probably buy her for under $10 now. Too bad I started her years ago, when her price was high.
Commissions
Sekrit the Tattoo Pony
The Customization: The pony started life as a fakie. This means I had to punch more hair holes and cut out a proper tail hole.
Finishing Touches: The fun part of this pony was the painting. I was given a sampling of tattoos and transfered them to the pony. The display picture is an Ed Hardy signature, an Ed Hardy koi, and a mini tribal pattern on the hoof. The other side has paw prints, a "mom heart," and a rose. The back has a guitar, while the front shows off the jewelry and eye makeup.
Hajime
The Customization: I think this was a Cotton Candy. Josiekat requested a persona pony from me during my simple custom sale on the TP.
Finishing Touches: Those kanji were annoying. That is all.
Owen
The Customization: This was either Sprinkles or Firefly originally.
Finishing Touches: Owen was based on a drawing by blackestbird of phoenixdown's real horse. I translated her drawing into a 3D pony. His eyes freak me out a bit...but those swirlies were a lot of fun to do.
Queen Asrid
The Customization: Moondancer gave herself up for this custom.
Finishing Touches: She was similar to Una, only in white. This pony was made for bluemoondreams. She's named for one of the silverskin queens of Melnibone from the recent "Making of a Sorcerer" comics.
