Rainbow Unicorn

Towards the end of my pregnancy I had horrible pregnancy insomnia, often sleeping for only a couple of hours each night and spending the rest of the time desperately trying to get comfortable and living with my own thoughts.

It was whilst I was in this state of sleep deprived insanity that I decided I really wanted to paint a rainbow pinto model with gold mapping around the markings. So of course, like any sensible person, I decided to give effect to my sleep deprived desired and create said model. I had a prepped Magnolia unicorn and thought that would be the perfect victim for this particular project.

I started by finding a reference of a real pinto horse whose markings I liked. This actually took longer than you'd think it would as I was very particular about having the right balance of white and colour. I wanted an approximate 50/50 split so you got a really nice hit of colour but it was balanced against the white.

Once I found the reference I then started by blocking out the white with Maskol. Once the Maskol had dried I then measured the horse and used a pencil to mark out approximate divisions so that each block of colour would be around the same width. 

I then started on the airbrushing, working from red on the head down to purple on the tail. There was a bit of a delay whilst I had the baby, spent a week in hospital and then managed having a newborn at home but we eventually got there, finishing off the last few airbrushed colours last week. I decided that the mane and tail would be purple but added some pink fading into the purple on the tail to give it a bit more depth.

Once the airbrush rainbow colours were done and a layer of sealant had been applied to protect the paintwork from being scratched I started THE PEEL. I carefully removed all the Maskol to reveal the pinto pattern. This was the moment of truth, would it look as good as I hoped? I was absolutely delighted with how it turned out, it worked so well! The colours had faded into each other perfectly and because they'd been applied over the Maskol rather than each marking being hand painted they all lined up and the model really flowed.

Once all the Maskol was removed I then used a gold acrylic to go around each of the markings, creating mapping. I used the same gold for the horn and hooves as I didn't want to add too many colours to an already colourful horse! I also hand painted the purple mane as for some reason I'd put Maskol on the mane but then decided I actually wanted it purple. I suppose technically it should have only had colour where the markings touched but I mean we are painting a rainbow unicorn we don't have to follow colour pattern rules exactly!

I finished by giving her a gold and purple eye and then adding some glitter to the mane and tail. This was mainly because the purple on the mane had come out incredibly matte which didn't match the rest of the horse so I felt it needed something to create some continuity. 

She was signed and gloss added to the hooves, eyes and horn and is now ready to find a new home.

Unfortunately she's not perfect, the primer cracked at some point around the head and I didn't have the mental energy to strip her completely. Thankfully it's on her non-show side so she should be great for photoshowing. I was also not happy with the shade of red, it was a lot more of a deeper blood red than it looked. I'm definitely going to do another one at some point with different markings and will pick a different red. Because of these issues she has a reduced price of just £25 which honestly is a bargain because she's so pretty!

Sale link: https://chestnutridge.co.uk/products/youll-be-in-my-heart

I definitely want to use this technique again to create another rainbow unicorn but I also think it would be fun to create other colour combinations and different markings. Now to prep a few more of the unicorn bodies I have so that I can create a whole army of pinto unicorns in different colours! I think a blue, pink and purple one would look gorgeous <3