Start to finish with Maddie Harder

As of this morning, there are fifty seven models in the NaMoPaiMo Winners' Circle, all of which have their own unique creation stories.

For the next week or two, I'll be sharing some of those stories here, starting with Maddie Harder's star spangled Via. This story has all the classic NaMoPaiMo elements: concept, execution, disaster, perseverance and, ultimately, triumph. There's even an evil twin! Thank you, this story - and your model - is awesome!

The Making of Via

by Maddie Harder

January 21: Reporting for painting duty with my chosen victim and a plan that is… well… a little…

*Scary*

If it works, I think it’ll be super fun! If it doesn’t… well… what’s that about the journey being the part that matters?

Steering a little away from my comfort colours of bays and purples, my current plan is to give Astrid a full nose to tail metallic rainbow paint job (Neila medallion as a reference), including possibly reversing the colours down her tail, or just repeating them. After that, I want to employ my Cricut to make some sort of masking patterns with temporary vinyl - likely some actual ‘star’ dapples, and possibly some little swirly galaxies. I’ll see what I can figure out that looks fun. Theeeen cover up her magic rainbow in black on her body with pan pastels, and lift the vinyl for crazy metallic colour pops.

It’s ambitious for me, and scary, but I’m also SUPER excited! And if it goes entirely wrong… sorry Astrid. I tried.

February 1: How today started and how it ended! 

Full basecoat achieved!  I hadn’t actually planned on doing her in a full holographic wash but… I wasn’t going to argue with her!  And considering how much we were fighting about her gold-green-blue-purple transitions - red-copper-gold behaved SO WELL - the holographic wash experiment pulled her together in a way I didn’t expect.  

So happy with day one!  (And now quietly crying that so much of that pretty *extra* rainbow will get buried under black, but the effect will be worth it I think)

Next step:  Cut her masking out with the Cricut and apply a tonne of stars to her, and then coat her body in black

February 4: Day Four of NaMo, Day Two of actually working on my project.

Currently waiting for a bajillion little vinyl stars to cut. It’s step two of my experiment. Starting to think I should have tried this ahead of time. Oh well. Too late now. 

If you need me, I’ll be applying said bajillion stars to her, and saying goodbye to ninety percent of her current colour. 

An hour later: One side is starred up! And I’m starting to sliiiightly panic. I did not originally plan this many…

Send help!

Final day four progress… 

a mix of triumph and… 

setback.  

Astrid has decided to riot a little. And I don’t know what happened. She got a thorough bath before primer, her primer cured for a good few days before I started on her. No weird moisture during drying. She threw zero issues during her gloss layers.  Nothing felt unstable, especially during her pastel layers. Super solid. 

So now rather than being close to done, I’m trying to figure out how to approach fixing this. I scrubbed her hard again in the problem area and this seems to be as far as it extends. Seeing as the vinyl behaved in every other area, it seems to be something else.

So yeah… she’s SUPER fun in every other spot. Gonna give her a few days to think about her behaviour before I try going back to fix her.

February 11: We got somewhere! 

Astrid #1 remains as an example to her twin sister of what not to do, and as a reminder to myself to keep going and trust the process (a second time). 

While nothing is as disheartening as starting all over again entirely from scratch, seeing her evolve from thought to reality again really is the coolest thing. 

Today we started solidifying the colours, and I stressed less about blending as much as it’ll all get hidden under her top coat. Once she was more solid and less ‘streaky nightmare basecoat mess’ looking, she got her holographic glazes. … Maybe an extra layer or two.  In the wrong light she’s a little washed out, as proven in the photo laying side by side with her sister. 

In the RIGHT light… she’s epically blinding. Now to give her a few days to cure up well. 

Next step - weekend edition of cutting 473743843384 tiny stars, hand applying them, and turning her black again. Despite having to start all over again, I’m happy with the steps forward we made today.  

Bryn tax included - he’s the other reason I’m behind. Mum painting = optimal time to demand snuggles and lap time. Alternatively, optimal mischief time to drink paint water and steal brushes. 

February 15: I’m so happy right now.

Astrid 2.0 got about seven hours of work today, between re-Cricuting all her stars, applying them one by one, and then doing her pastel layers of black and letting her dry between them.  Then came the scariest part - pulling all her stars and PRAYING to the art gods that she won’t do weird peeling like her twin sister did.  

I need to count the stars because they took SO much time. But! Success! Astrid 2.0 is officially out of danger zone.  

Is she perfect? GOD no. She’s got weird bits of underlying gloss. She’s got little bumps of pigment that didn’t fully dissolve when I mixed them. But did she teach me a lot, and prove that my insane idea would actually work? She sure did!  

Tomorrow: details and reglossing/holo-ing her hair, and hopefully the finish line!  

February 16: We got there!!! Despite her sister throwing a rather *unnecessary* tantrum about being a crazy deco, Astrid 2.0 behaved her way to the finish line!  

Today she got her final details - corresponding hoof and chestnut colours to her body colours, a refresh for her mane and tail before everything coloured got more holographic washes. She’s now ridiculously sparkly - even her black coat has a bit of sparkle thanks to the pearly Pan Pastels.  The contrast from the matte black to the holo sparkle in the right light is WILD. 

Is she perfect? Again, no. She is not.  She’s got wonks, but I’m sure I’m the only one that will ever notice. Because raise your hand if you’re your own worst critic like I am. But tiny wonks aside, she is SO COOL, and I’m happy I didn’t give up on the idea, crazy as it was.  Thankfully Astrid 2.0 embraced being a deco, and I’m proud of her.

So, meet Via. 💜

Congratulations, Maddie. 

Via is amazing and so are you! You are definitely a NaMoPaiMo Champion.