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I am painting more quaggas! Most of a whole family, actually. I’ve got the momma and daddy unicorn ready to go, and if I can figure out how to hollow out the space for the horn on my one poor unpainted grand uni casting, I’ll do him too. (I snatched him from around the painters’ booths in the old factory – he had a pewter horn without any gold leaf already glued into his head… I don’t know what he was being used for. But we still don’t have any molds for this guy, so far as I know, so it was the only one I was going to get my hands on for a while!)
Anyway, I was looking through my folder of quagga reference pictures, noticing the differences between them. It’s one of the most wonderful things about playing with extinct animals – you never really know if you’ve got the color or sometimes even the muscle structure right. I based my first little guy mostly off of Quigga the quagga, from the Katurran Odyssey, illustrated by Terryl Whitlatch (which, by the way, is an amazing and beautiful book and I recommend it everyone http://www.katurranodyssey.com/. )
I have noticed that Quigga’s coloration, while very attractive, isn’t all that true to life according to the pictures I can find of preserved, stuffed quaggas and various old paintings / illustrations. (I do have a picture of the last quagga in captivity, but it is in black and white and not altogether helpful.)
SO – I am trying out a more accurate quagga color scheme. I tried it on the foal first, to make sure it looks alright (it involves putting lighter paint on top of darker paint, which doesn’t always turn out all that nice, so I was a little wary…) I really like the way he turned out, though the deep richness of his color doesn’t come through at all in these photos. Let me know what you guys think! 😉
"He that breaks a thing to find out what it is has left the path of wisdom."
-J R R TolkienOh why oh why do you TAUNT me. I am so in love, but could never own any of your work. 🙄 🙄 🙄 😥 😥
So I guess that means that they are both pretty! The last one does look more realistic.Wow! I thought the first one was wonderful, but the second one really feels alive. Fantastic work! 😀
(I am VERY much looking forward to seeing the rest of the family!)
Looks good, but I’m not a big quagga fan.
In reference to your title…well I think it depends on the base color of the skin. For instance, hubby and I know the answer to it for one of the male zebras at The ZOO – Northwest Florida is black with white stripes because he let down his privates and they were solid black.
I like the coloration much better on the second one. The brown on top of the white really looks natural.
pegasi1978 wrote:Looks good, but I’m not a big quagga fan.
In reference to your title…well I think it depends on the base color of the skin. For instance, hubby and I know the answer to it for one of the male zebras at The ZOO – Northwest Florida is black with white stripes because he let down his privates and they were solid black.
Ha! Yes, I think the general opinion is that most zebras are black with white stripes, as their skin is black beneath their fur. Though there does seem to still be some room for wiggling on this according to some zoologists. Though I suppose even going by the rule of skin pigmentation, it might be a matter of opinion, because that would make polar bears black instead of white. 😉
I’m glad you guys like the new quagga! I’m going to paint the rest of the family like him, though I do intend to paint a family to match the first little guy at some point too… I do really like Quigga’s coloring, even if it isn’t quite ‘right’!
"He that breaks a thing to find out what it is has left the path of wisdom."
-J R R TolkienI am a big quagga fan, always have been since childhood (all equines, really). I remember being really pissed when I saw an illustration of one in my Zoobooks showing extinct animals. It wasn’t like the mastodon which had been extinct for so long. I remeber seeing the picture of the last mare that died in captivity and thought, someone got to see a real live quagga, and I DIDN’T. AND I NEVER WILL! I was so mad… 🙄 😆
There is much variation, even among the preserved specimens, so I think you should do multiple families! 😀 I actually like the first one. The love the head striping. She’s my favorite! If everyone likes the second color pattern, then maybe I’ll be able to afford the first patterned ones when they come around. Here’s hoping! 8)
And I wonder if Quigga was based off the herd in the Quagga Project?? http://www.quaggaproject.org/
According to the coloring on the stuffed specimens, your new attempt is spot-on. They were not colored just like zebras at all. You’ve done a beautiful job in making it look life-like! I can’t even imagine what the grand-uni will look like… The only comment I have is that on those specimens, they appear to have some black or dark brown hair in the inner portions of the ears. I don’t know if you want to mess with that, but it would be authentic, if there is such a thing! :0)
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