With your schedule I can understand the difficulties of time and the desire of becoming a Taxidermist. If I were you I would contact my State Taxidermy Association and ask them when is there next meeting. Then attend these meetings and you will see what we call accomplished artist mount different species. The best thing about this is that it's rather inexpensive by just paying a yearly dues fee to your state Assoc. You must have a hands on experience because you can watch all the video's and read all the books in the world about this business but you are nothing until you get your hands involved in mounting that specimen. This is just a start. This taxidermy business takes time to learn and you will not learn everything is just a matter of days, weeks or months. You must continue to hone in on your hand skills to arrange that skin the way it suppose to be arranged and arrange it so that you can depict that expression that makes that animal just like it was in the wild. This is what separates the accomplished taxidermist from just the regular guy. The accomplished knows how to arrage that skin to get that almost impossible expression because he has studied that animal and knows what it takes to pull it off. A little knowledge in this business and common sense will go a long way.
So, my advice to you is to get involved and don't worry about speed or time because to be good in this business you certainly will have to put in the time and study as many references as you can. Most people who are just your everyday taxidermist just can't read references. I.E what does this eye, ear or muzzle really look like. Does it appear to be rectangular, oval etc. Then the finishing aspect is where it really comes together. The smoothness of the finishing and the blending of the colors together is a real challenge. Any accomplished taxidermist will tell you that you have to be able to distinguish between shape, contour , thickness and color. I preach this everyday to my students and these are still what I preach in trying to get the point across to every new student that comes to my classes.
You ask about the week, monthly courses offered by some schools and what advantage you would receive by going to one. My advice to anyone out there is to zero in on what you really like to do and learn as mush as you can about that subject or species. We have several schools here in the U.S. that offer you just about anything you want to learn. I believe that these work shops really offer you a real deal because these artists are usually the Best at what they do. If you want to learn fish then research these schools that do nothing but fish or ones that specialize in game heads or birds only and check out the instructor's credentials to see is he has experience in teaching. Some guys are Outstanding taxidermist but very poor Instructor's. Yes, there are so many things to think about as to what to do and when to do it that it's a real challenge. Usually a really good school will get you on the right track in your learning and training techniques and then you can persue it on your own once you have a good foundation as to what's going on in this business.
So, basically what I have said here is that if you think that you can learn everything in a short period of time you will be sadly mistaken. This is an art that takes time, knowledge of the specimen and the skill to arrange that skin the proper way to make that Outstanding mount reach out and say " I am REAL".
Hope this helps some.
John Griffith
www.griffithtaxidermy.comStearns, Kentucky
606-376-4380
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