1:6 scale miniature Sushi Platters

Phew! This has got to be the most challenging commission yet! Late last year, a request came in from a gentleman who was a sushi fan, and he showed me his impressive collection of sushi-related items, such as pens, fake food displays from Japan, Re-ment sets, and even dollhouse scaled miniatures.

You can check out his amazing collection here!

https://www.flickr.com/photos/10423851@N06/sets/72157619023642386

Thanks Russell :)

Although I had already stopped accepting commissions late last year due to various personal and health reasons, he had already approached 2 other miniaturists and seemed increasingly dejected about not being able to find anyone to achieve his vision. My own fear was that, due to unpredictable and unstable situations at home and with my health, I didn't want to disappoint him a third time!!! So I requested that I could only do it if I was given a flexible schedule to work with...this is a big ask, I mean, what if I left him hanging, right? Not that I've ever done that before, but ...you know....life being what it has been for me, hasn't exactly been 'less than interesting' XD

Anyway,  we came to an agreement, he left me to it, and 5 months later......

1:6, playscale miniature sushi platter. Microbeads, air dry clay, acrylic paint, UV resin, epoxy resin (oke), paper, sealant 

1:6, playscale miniature sushi platter. Air dry clay, acrylic paint, UV resin, epoxy resin (oke), paper, sealant

these were photos before I glued everything down, the actual items are arranged slightly differently, but I prefer this photoshoot/arrangement...trying to allow a bit more asymmetry into my life (I am the type of person who cannot resist straightening a crooked painting, and as a kid would gladly spend hours at departmental stores arranging toys and candies on the shelves. No, not OCD. Really. REALLY. :P) I guess in my eyes, these little imperfections are more reflective of how my life is like, a little wonky. Looks like I've progressed in that department. A little. yeah, i think too much.

He also took the time to list out each and every sushi name, with photo references, which helped me greatly in achieving as much realism as possible. Although these are also referenced against his actual collection of life sized fake sushi items, I decided to go for a little more realism (or at least, from what I've seen in photos, I don't eat sushi too frequently), and I hope it's reflected in the results.

1:6 playscale miniature sushi variety

Just FYI, the Singapore 10-cent coin is 1.8cm, or 11/16 inches in diameter

Each and every sushi, was individually sculpted. Even each individual grain of rice, although not visible here, was painstakingly put together. You can view them in my WIP photos in my instagram account @snowfern, or facebook page at http://www.facebook.com/SnowfernClover. No molds were used, except for the containers/okes, which were made by modifying a random plastic container cover that I found at home ages ago, creating a silicon mold, casting with epoxy resin, and finished by sanding, then detailing the rim with acrylic paint. Although the original oke had a gold image on the sides, the quote did not include it as I have very little experience with painting images, and was afraid it would turn out too primitive/amateur looking. 

The greatest challenge, and why this took so long (apart from real life interruptions) was that I had never made these in 1:6 scale before. The most common scales I work with are in 1:12, 1:3 and some 1:4, and if you've crossed scales in minimaking before, you'll understand that it always takes quite a bit of adjustment and tweaking to cater to shrinkage, the translucency of the clay and paint.....etc. etc. Also, due to this, I had to re-do a number of pieces as air dry clay takes sometimes days to dry fully before the actual colour/translucency is shown, so a lot of it is trial and error. And leftover itty bitty pieces of clay XD

Thus ties up the last of my customer obligations until after my wedding/move in September. People around me are getting more nervous than I am, and I really ought to get that dress and bouquet sewn....so much to do but, yeah. it's not exactly at the top of my priority list. I guess I'm too old to be an excited bride. |||XD |||XD |||XD

(haha those are wrinkles above my brow)

Meanwhile, I will still be working on some 1:12 items and youtube videos, and sprucing up my Patreon page. Plans are, once I've settled into my new life as a wife, and mini-making schedule, I will start work on that book that I keep harping on about. But I need some passive income to make that possible, medical bills and all that :( So if you see posts disappearing or edited to appear 'shinier' and less whingy, don't be alarmed, I haven't changed, I just need to put some spit and shine on this old barn :P

Thanks so much for all the love, care and support this far. *bows* :)

1:48 scale miniature Japanese Teatime items

Happy Chinese New Year of the Goat everybody! It still is Chinese New Year as we supposedly celebrate it for 15 days, but the busiest few days, i.e. New Year's Eve thru till 2nd day of Chinese New Year duties are done with, and the last time for me as I will technically be part of a new family next year :) 

Woah, so many months have passed since my last post, and not much done :( Healthwise, things are still a little more than hinky, but I am trying to motor on with the help of proper dosages of painkillers. Between November and now has been a hazy blur of unbearable ladypains (re: adenomyosis/endometriosis), colds, an upper respiratory infection that wouldn't go away for more than a month, and my old laptop of more than 5 years giving up after I caused a blackout with an improperly plugged in UV lamp :X The weather has also been a lot chillier and wetter, for a lot longer than usual, but it finally warmed up this week, enough for me to head back to the pool to lose the Chinese New Year weight gain :P So I tried my best to continue working on requests that came in last year, while I am able to.......

The good thing is, this lovely customer emailed me last July, stating that she had no problems waiting for this order, and I thoroughly appreciate that. I went about creating the smallest items I've ever attempted!!!

The masters for these, which I have since lost, were turned on my IKEA drill, which has also died :( The humid weather is killing all my electronic gadgets!!! Ah well. As you can see, they're about 2-3mm wide, and I cast them in epoxy resin, because I was fearful that clay would be too fragile at that thinness.....

She had also requested some floor cushions and a tatami flooring, found a lovely floral bias tape with patterns small enough to work for the cushion, and finished it off with a teensy weensy gold knot in the centre. Loving how it turned out! Each is barely 1cm square.

(table is an old Sylvanian family item I collected more than a decade ago! might have been a stool from a sewing machine set, or table from a micro sofa set? or is it Re-ment??! Auf, can't remember, but it's not made by me is what I meant to say.....)

1:48 scale miniature Japanese Tea Scene, UV Resin, Epoxy Resin, Polymer Clay, Cloth, Inkscape, Paper, Acrylic paint

Fired up Inkscape and heavily modified a free tatami texture I found online, did up a sample by scoring along the lines but at 1:48, ey, not sure why I bothered. :-/ I'm not sure if you can see but I've also detailed the Usagi Manju (Rabbit Steamed Bun) with red eyes and brown ears, and the sakura mochi has a teeny yellow centre and detailed indentations.....kind of difficult to detail items approximately 1mm large..... *squints*

I debated over the green, and decided to do a darker and chalkier shade so it 'pops' more, especially since it is sooo tiny, but in contrast, the pink of the mochi seems a little pale in photos?! It is a few shades darker in real life, I promise! Looks like my photography skills have reverted to n00b status after such a long break T-T

OKAY enough self-flagellation, I have another large-ish order which I'm mid-way through, but here's part of what I've completed :) It's 1:6 scale, which I am not often asked to work with, so it posed new challenges for me, which included sculpting with air dry clay since no batch work was necessary!

1:6 aka playscale assorted sushi, WIP. microbeads, paper, acrylic paints, oil based paints, air dry clay, UV resin

Ouf it's almost March.

1:48 scale dollhouse miniature foods

Finally, a 'proper' update for this smaller scales blog :) For those who are keen on my larger scaled, BJD items, I have updated over at http://clover-tea.blogspot.com on where you can purchase some of the items made for SGDC2014!

Meanwhile, here's a quick update on a commission that I accepted in July 2014, but due to a pretty lengthy injury and mad preparations for SGDC2014, I didn't get much time to work on till this week! Luckily, my customer didn't need it immediately, and gave me time to recover and concentrate on his order :)

There are still a few components to work on, but again, I stupidly sprained my index finger taking photos for my new online store, aiee, why do I keep getting into such awkward situations :(

http://snowfern.tictail.com

As I've explained in my other blog, I can't afford the Etsy fees, so I will try to list more over at tictail than Etsy, but I will still keep the Etsy store open for printables and smaller items, scale and price wise :)

Yup. That's the finger I sprained :( It hurts typing and I hadn't realized how reliant I am on it till now. Ah well. :-/

These vegetables were made out of polymer clay, and they are reaaaalllyyyy fiddly. I finished them with highlights using acrylic paints. The onions and leeks were finished off with teeny thread fibres to simulate the roots....not sure if you can see them....not sure why I needed to add them either, guess many people's observations were accurate, I am insane.

They are in 1:35 scale, though I made them thinking they should be in 1:48, so I was relieved to have some leeway in terms of sizing. In case anyone was wondering why I keep going on and on about scale, these food items are meant to go into a 1:35 scale model that my customer is building, and so I wanted to make sure they scale nicely against his beautiful workmanship! I have seen preview photos of the stall, and am so excited to be part of the project! I will ask for permission from him to share his photos once I am done with his requests, so stay tuned for that! :D

Have a great day! WEEKEND IS ALMOST HERE!!!! woot WOOT!

1:6 scale miniature playscale 80s Singapore tidbits

Cross-posted at http://clover-tea.blogspot.sg/

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The DSLR won this round. I am still struggling with the settings, and the macro clip-ons. I suppose the photos look good from far, but are far from good T-T They'll have to do for now because I am a little busy!

The request was for 1:6 items, a rare request! They are double the size of the ones I made for a personal 80s Singapore project. Quite a number of people have asked where I had obtained the images, all the graphics were made by me using inkscape, referencing photos I had found online.

Yotsuba is 12cm tall, which makes her about 1:10 scale, so these are a tad large for her! They would be suitable for playscale dolls like Barbie. Pullip, Blythe etc, but I think my customer ordered them for possibly YoSD sized dolls? I really ought to put them with some Re-ment but eh, already packed them away hehehhe oops

 1:6 scale miniature White Rabbit Milk sweets and Haw Flakes, polymer clay, paper, Inkscape, sealant, glue

1:6 scale miniature Mamee Noodle Snack, air dry clay, decal, plastic, paper, Inkscape, sealant, glue, acrylic paint

Some of these might not be familiar to those who aren't living in Southeast Asia, but I have had people reporting in from Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and even the USA who say they're still available in Chinatown areas! Wooo!

1:6 scale miniature seaweed rings, Spin potato snacks, air dry clay, acrylic paint, sealant, plastic

These were the most time consuming to make, and there are 50 pcs in each package. The Spin crackers used to taste and look slightly different from these when I was younger, and had a flavour other than MSG :X I miss eating them! They also came in a cone, not packaged like this. As for how do I do my plastic packaging, let's just say, I still fail alot and so am not confident in revealing my methods :( But you can try and be creative with an iron, just be careful! :X

GROUP SHOT! I hope she likes them :) I certainly enjoyed making them, quite a challenge!

I have also opened up a pre-order for the 1:3 Ramen and Udon bowls that were pretty popular, you can find more details here:

http://clover-tea.blogspot.sg/p/pre-order-july-2014.html

however there are only 2 bowls left, they were snapped up faster than expected, thank you all :)

Miniature Marie Antoinette inspired pastries - 1:12 scale miniature dollhouse scale

Do these look familiar to you? Yeah, it's more St Honore and other Marie Antoinette inspired pastries! But this time, in 1:12! And...polymer clay :)

The order was for 4 white St Honore, 1 pink Religieuse and 1 pink Nipple of Venus. I have done a version of the Religieuse and Nipple of Venus in larger, 1:4 scale before, but not out of polymer clay nor in 1:12. As usual, I made extras 'just-in-case' and for practice. 

Top view of the Religieuse and Nipple of Venus pastries. The reference photo wasn't clear, and I couldn't find any other good references, so I came up with my own design, which included a touch of actual gold leaf.

Vanity shots! It's kind of difficult to show the little piping details on the 'fat nuns'....click to enlarge!

~fin

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This week has been rather eventful, the fiance and I went down to pick our unit on Monday...as my 'jie' says, SHIT JUST GOT REAL

-_-"""""

The spare bedroom will be converted to my workshop, and I think the theme for the flat will be Minecraft XD SHO EXCITING NA~ more exciting than planning for the wedding, which should be mid-next year. I think. Dad wants me to sit down and plan the list tomorrow...until he told me this afternoon, it never occurred to me that I would be the first of his kids to get married and that he would be interested in the nuts and bolts of it. *blinks*

/whine on

AIEEEEEEEEEEE CAN WE JUST ELOPE AND GET IT OVER AND DONE WITH PLEASE (I know this doesn't work, tried it every chance I could....AUGHSOCIALOBLIGATIONSAUGH)

/whine off

Miniature Patisserie Items in PINK!

 *GULP* I was really nervous trying to put this together. Pink is a recent ....shall we say, acquired taste? Maybe it's age, and I've blogged about it before, but pink is slowly inching into my wardrobe and accessories :O Maybe it's due to over-exposure, pink being a very popular colour with my customers, hence learning to embrace it was what felt to be - at first - a very necessary evil.

But, pairing it with other colours makes me less nervy, like a hint of silver, a flash of gold, tempered by lots and lots of white XD I already find this quite an overload of pink!

 Ta-dah! Now available on my Etsy: snowfern.etsy.com :)

Made pretty much everything, from the pastries, to designing and printing the boxes, the pastry cases for the St Honore, cake boards for the eclairs, plate stands, doily...even the clear pink tray.......

Everything is affixed to the base, except for the macaron tray, and snowfern clover logo, which are loose for added versatility. Measurements are in my Etsy link :) And if you've not already guessed, there're a few more ideas churning in my brain along these lines....to be updated over the next few weeks. ;)

Also...... 

this isn't exactly 1:12 but I made it for a customer who specified the length of the corndog to be 1-inch long. I have re-opened commissions for Nov-Dec and you are interested in anything I have made in larger sizes in 1:12, do contact me (details are in the Custom Request page) and we'll see what can be done.

I'm looking towards putting a number of items as stock clearance, these are my older items and will be going for a special price, not sure if I should list it here or on my FB page, but I will definitely update via FB, so if you haven't already, please 'Like' it! :D

http://www.facebook.com/SnowfernClover

(oh and remember to add my page to your interest links to be updated, it's via the gear icon next to the message button, yada yada yada....)

OR, follow my twitter 

https://twitter.com/snowfern

(I apologize for the spam recently, twitter acct got hacked but I've changed the password and all seems to be well now!)

OR......instagram, where I update more frequently than blog! 

http://instagram.com/snowfern

okay. enough of the social media harping (another necessary evil that is harder and harder to like grrrr)....:P back to work!

Miniature Taiwanese Street Snacks in 1:3 scale

 Happy New Year! I am seldom late in real life, but online, well, let's just say there are too many distractions :P Here's the result of a request I got just before the New Year (I think?) from a friend, I love working with her because her ideas are always in line with what I love to eat (or should I say 'used to' now that I'm on a diet!)...and given the opportunity to make it, of course I couldn't resist the challenge :E

Miniature Bubble Teas - 1:3 scale

 the popular Bubble Teas! :D i love making these, but am quite allergic to the resin, so i think i'll limit production on them for a while.....

Miniature Fizzy Drinks - 1:3 scale 

  Miniature Portuguese Egg Tarts - 1:3 Scale

craving some right now. :X closest I can get some is probably...KFC?

Miniature Sweet Potato Fries - 1:3 scale

Miniature Fried Silver Fish - 1:3 Scale

these are pretty awesome to snack on, though I have only really tried them at this porridge (I think) store at Chinatown hawker centre. see quite a lot of ahpeks (local term for old men/uncles) snacking on them with beer.....

Miniature Taiwanese Chicken Cutlet - 1:3 scale

Used to snack on this quite frequently, probably why i had to get on this diet XD

 1:3 bamboo skewer!!! and plastic bag!!! all made by me too! all 3 fried snacks have different sorts of batter, and i am immensely pleased with the results ^ ^ i know my friend is, her replies to these pics made me blush *^_^*

all made with air dry clay :)

okay, that's all the concentration i can give right now, going off to rest, been a rough few weeks, going for my checkups/bloodwork and taking grandma and brother for -their- appointments/emergencies. Chinese New Year is approaching too, have been doing some cleaning but it never seems to end, ey?

have to catch up with my blogreading soon too, feel a little disconnected....hope 2013 has been good so far for everyone!!