Thursday, July 28, 2011

Below The Belt

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I asked on my facebook page a few days ago for questions and topic suggestions, when this particular--eh hem--topic came up again. By far, this has been my most requested topic to date: resculpting horse genitalia.

I’m going to cover the different genders separately. Ironically, I first thought about this as a topic because of the number of customs I’ve seen where the artist managed to combine both genders on one model. Yes, hermaphrodite horses are running amok in our hobby.

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No picture I could put here would be appropriate.

Obviously, this is somewhat of a delicate topic. The model horse world is full of a lot of young kids, most of whom haven’t grown up on a farm or been exposed to animal husbandry. Even amongst us adults, an understanding of the birds and bees doesn’t equate to knowledge of sheaths and udders. Horse parts not only look dissimilar from ours but they are in completely different and surprising locations.

I’m sure I’m not the only one too afraid to Google “horse genitalia” without a bottle of eye bleach nearby. In the interest of sensitivity, I’m going to try to keep the dirty jokes to a minimum. My close friends will be able to tell you this is a herculean feat for me as I rarely pass up the opportunity to tell stories that would make a pirate blush.

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Capt'n Jack Brighty by Sommer Prosser

The Breyer and Stone companies--God bless ‘em--have done little to clear up confusion. First, there were the old Breyer models. At best, you can hope for shapeless, seam-covered blobs, completely open to interpretation.

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G1 Morgan "Stallion"

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MesteƱo

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Proud Arabian Mare


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Sham

With the founding of Stone and as Breyer introduced more detailed sculptures, we entered an era where you could actually tell a stallion from a gelding. It was a giant leap forward in the realm of model horse male reproductive organ sculpting. However, as you might expect, the mares were still being overlooked:

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There is supposed to be something here and here. There is not.
And my Ruffians need dusting again.

The Stone company responded by introducing factory custom mares with proper udders. However, they often did this by grinding off the sheath of a stallion, leaving the testicles to simulate udders.

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Plastic models aren’t perfect and none of this would be a big deal if Stones and Breyers weren’t the primary reference source for sculptors. I’ve done it, you’re done it--we’ve all referenced Breyer bits at one point or another when trying to sculpt or improve the bits on our custom models. Frankly, it’s practical to reference a model when you don’t have access to the real thing, and the alternative is a entering the hellmouth to the internet known as Google Image Search.

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Om nom nom

As an alternative to that, the thumbnails below all go to large, high resolution (but tasteful!) images of mare bits. They are big photos, so I wouldn’t recommend opening them at work.

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Next week, I will add girly bits to a plastic Breyer mare. I’ll also talk about variation amongst udders and other “high school health class” topics like lactation and heat cycles. A fun time will be had by all.

11 comments:

Ramie said...

The most....... educational?.... day I ever had on the internet was in the process of tracking down reference for a drawing of a man riding a horse with no saddle. You can't just delete the saddle and expect the result to look accurate; the legs drape differently.

Sooooo I did a Google image search for 'riding bareback.'

Adding 'horse' did NOT help.

In other news, I laughed so hard at 'Sham' that my boyfriend came in here to see WTF was going on, took one look at all the plastic bits, and fled the room immediately. Poor boy!

Anonymous said...

The small number of reference photos I have accumulated over the years live in a well-buried folder on my laptop entitled 'other details'...

Laura Skillern said...

@Ramie - I live to traumatize my readers' boyfriends.

Anonymous said...

First, I can only imagine what your horse was thinking while you were taking pictures of her, ah, private parts. Second, I'm so very glad I didn't visit your blog while I was at work, and third, I can see right now that my Breyer running mare who was formerly the big-balled Breyer running stallion is in desperate need of a makeover of her nether regions. Thanks for posting this, and I can't wait to see what you come up with next.

Stockstill Stables said...

I think the most detailed of the mares I have is my Toriano Palouse as she does have an udder.
And I was very surprised by the Classic drafter actually having an anus(Or as my husband put it when I unboxed it) "This horse has a butthole!" *facepalm* "Yes, Dear you don't have to scream it out."

Niur Tarow said...

Thank God for you, my dear! I've been "tentatively" combing the internet for a good tutorial on this, and have found basically two camps: "Kitbashing your model horse: lets chop off some legs!" and "Horsey privates! *gigglesnort*" I am so glad you're embarking on this adventure for us model horse people. Thank you so much.

Kirsten Lenz said...

Whew! I'm not the only one wondering what the heck was going on in the gender department on my breyers. Though I *have* noticed my newer Traditional scale stallions *DO* have fairly decent equipment. Though I'm thinking of writing to Breyer with some thoughts on things to improve on.

RobinHoodFan said...

Hey, did you ever do the tutorial on actually sculpting them? It would be a HUGE help!!! Still not brave enough to attempt either sex b/c I have no idea what I'm doing ..erm...down there. So please, please, please tell me you've got a tutorial for sculpting horsie naughty bits :)

~Christina
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Sandeyes said...

Have you ever seen the Blue Box Blue Ribbon Ranch models? I found an old set I'd had as a kid, and went on to repair and repaint them-- I was relly pleased to find that my "broodmare" had a nicely, well sculpted udder. I haven't looked at any of my stallion molds from this group (I'm just devastated with how disgustingly warped their faces are) but I know that both foals in this set have properly sculpted genitals as well.

RiderWriter said...

Hi there,
I'm a new visitor who came over from Braymere. And I am cracking up at this post! It always drove me batty that my Breyers were not more anatomically correct (Barbie and Ken annoyed me, too, for that matter). Details are important, people! :-)

The other funny thing is just last weekend my son and I were out shopping when I discovered a display of Schleich (sp.?) models (the very detailed little German plastic things). I was admiring some of the horses, and in the process of looking at them upside-down, I noticed that they actually - gasp! - are pretty doggone anatomically correct! Of course I had to mention this to #1 son, who looked at me a little, um, strangely. I think he said something like, "You WOULD notice that, Mom..." :-)

Spearcarrier's Ghostfox said...

And thus even with the stallions being equipped with proper equipment in detailed models, they still can't get no satisfaction from the mares. Cruel, I tell you. Just plain cruel. (please delete this when you're finished reading my naughty thought of the day)