pseudomonas

My first custom MLP modification project! Thanks to LM for introducing me to the idea of pony-modification, and making me a gift of the initial model. It's been great fun to subvert that ridiculous "boy's toys" / "girl's toys" distinction with both ponies and soldiers. Mares can be warhorses too!

It all starts with Lemon Drop , a G1 pony with a helpful Collector's Pose.

She's not in a great state of repair! Though no way would I have done this to a pristine pony :)

First job is to make her a bit more robust, clean her down, and remove all that tiresome hair...

She was then ready to have her head and body separately filled with Plaster of Paris. That meant that at later stages, there was no chance of my accidentally squishing the torso causing paint or putty to crack off.

Re-assembled. You might notice that the head is a tiny bit higher - this was achieved by re-assembling with a matchstick wedging the head and body apart at the front. The join is filled with Milliput epoxy putty (the cheap standard stuff), which is brilliant stuff, used very extensively in this project.

More putty was used to give her a fetching crest, for that "warhorse" look.

You can see here some bits that I built out with putty so as to be able to provide a faceted finish, to look more artificial. There are some pencil sketches for placements of additional features, also made of putty.

This is the nice faceted look I was after! Mainly achieved by filing the putty down with a metal-file, and then polishing with sandpaper. The vents are added by now, down both flanks and on the neck and throat.

Wipe down with acetone to degrease before priming.

One needs to blinker the pony so that ~~she doesn't panic at the sight of a spray bottle~~ the eyes don't get primer all over them; it'd be a real pain to have to re-paint them.

Sprayed

Some more work on the buttocular regions was required to smooth out the lumpiness you can see in the picture above.

Touch up around the eye with white acrylic. Not nearly as nice a finish as the spray primer, which is why I didn't do the whole pony like that.

A basecoat of a pale tan/grey acrylic - mix of Titanium White, Yellow Ochre, and, er, Black Black. It gives her a coat that's wood-like but also pleasantly reminiscent of her original yellow colour.

The lines are drawn on the pony in Burnt Umber acrylic to suggest planks. It's done freehand for a rough look. The bits on the insides of the legs are a real pain to reach. After this, we'll give her a few washes of very dilute Burnt Umber (with a tiny drop of black), concentrating on the edges and ends of the planks and the areas of shadow under the vents.

These delightful 15mm miniatures are by Xyston, bought from North Star Figures. Very impressive detail, and can only hope my attempt at painting them does them justice (my photography certainly doesn't). The hoplite's spear is made from a pin with the head cut off and the point ground flat. They're white-takked to 2p pieces for ease of manipulation while painting.

It's absolutely like magic the way that you put the figures in front of it and suddenly it transforms from a 20cm toy to a 12m colossus.

The observant among you might notice that this is not the trolley I ended up with — but the wheels are. The trolley has wheels attached to the sides and with reinforcing struts down the insides of the wheels, so that the weight of the plaster-filled pony doesn't damage the axles (which are non-turning!)

This was the fiddliest bit of the whole thing. Little splinters of veneer form the ladder rungs and uprights; they're held together with cyanoacrylate glue.

Something's missing!

Cotton string is dyed with tea, knotted, and three strands bound together tightly with nylon thread and sealed with cyanoacrylate. This conveniently forms a neat, er, "plug", of just the right size to fit the tail to the body.

And so Lemon Drop becomes Κιτροκοκκαριον ("Kit-ro-ko-KA-ree-on"; "κιτρον" = citron, lemon; "κοκκαριον" = pill, lozenge). I put my signature on the hoplite's shield, arrange the figures, and it's all done!