Sculpting chestnuts with Aleksander Freda

NaMoPaiMo is all about painting, but there's a certain amount of customizing that often comes with prepping. In today's excellent guest blogger post, Polish artist, Aleksander Freda shows us how he adds chestnuts to his model's legs. Thank you so much, Aleksander. I can't wait to read Vol. 2!

Horse Leg Chestnuts Tutorial, Vol. 1

by Aleksander Freda

So I have been thinking about a useful tutorial for a long while, and I think this is one the hobby needs a whole lot. Not pointing it at anyone, but hobby’s standard for a leg chestnuts are most commonly just a single coloured blob around the leg joint area. Let’s change it!

I have prepared a little photo story, showing (hopefully) how I tackle the topic. This is a sculpting tutorial, but I plan to publish a second part of it about painting soon.

Let’s kick off with some theory. What is a chestnut?

According to Wikipedia: The chestnut, also known as a night eye, is a callosity on the body of a horse or other equine, found on the inner side of the leg above the knee on the foreleg and, if present, below the hock on the hind leg. It is believed to be a vestigial toe, and along with the ergot form the three toes of some other extinct Equidae.

Chestnuts vary in size and shape and colour, not only between species (donkeys have different type of chestnuts than horses, so do Przewalskis or zebras), but also among specimens of the same species. Today let’s focus on horses.

Here are some examples of different horses’ chestnuts. Polish Coldblood foal as well as a Finnhorse’s are back leg chestnuts and rest are front legs. Note: some horses don’t have chestnuts on the back legs at all! It is important when sculpting to work with references. Try finding as many photos, from different angles of the item you try to reproduce.

Of course, we need our victim. My tutorial is shown on two models, Pusteblume and Beatrix, both sculpted by the very talented Brigitte Eberl.

What all will we need? Here is a short list of things I most commonly use:

• sculpting putty (I use Aves Apoxie but any epoxy putty will be fine)
• a bit of water (in the little very dirty jar)
• sculpting tools – for me a rubber brush, hobby knife and a sharp metal stick
• sawblade
• gloves

Before you start sculpting, it is important to clean the area beforehand removing any previous chestnuts, as not to add too much bulk. For this you may cut them off, use dremel, sanding paper – I dunno, be creative!

First thing is to wound the area well enough, for the putty to adhere. This is one really important step. It prevents the future possible lifting of the putty. It is important to do it really well. Better to be safe than sorry.

Next, I put on gloves. Apoxie is extremely allergenic, and it may turn into really nasty business quickly, so PLEASE wear gloves when sculpting. I take even amounts of the two compounds and mix them really well. A small tip, they will mix much easier if you add a drop of water to the mix.

Once the putty is mixed, I take a small pinch of it and place it on the designated and wounded „chestnut area”. The amount of putty here will depend on how big you wish to make them. It also partly depends on what kind of model you are creating. Foals will have them very very small, older horses tend to grow them bigger, sport warmbloods often have those trimmed, draft horses tend to grow them really big, etc.

I smoosh the putty into the wounded area with a soft rubber brush and my own fingers. Again, water helps to spread it around, just try not to drown it completely because then the putty will become too mushy and will be difficult to work with. 

The important part is to smoosh the putty into the wounds, into the cuts of them, so that it sits tightly and there is no air in the crevices.

Once I have it nice and smooth, I use a sharp stick to cut out the general shape of the chestnut.

Then I use the rubber brush, to push the outer edges a bit closer towards the chestnut, this creates the skin and fur around the chestnut. A nice touch to it in my opinion.

Finally I cut the chestnut with a hobby knife, to add it textures, cracks and more a realistic look. And that is it! The chestnuts are sculpted!

The next couple photos are just examples of different chestnuts sculpted by me. 

This is a draft horse, with bigger, longer chestnuts.

I hope you enjoyed this tutorial, I’d love to see what nice chestnuts you have created with it!