do i really need finishing wax to use on the eyes and nostrils of a whitetail. i am trying to keep the cost down cause this is my first whitetail mount and to want to get carried away with the price.
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Matt, the eyes should be finished off with something. Be it wax or epoxi-sculpt with paint, then clear gloss paint. It's your first deer; you can do anything you want to it. If you want to keep the cost down, don't do anything to the eyes or nose, and see just what it looks like. It will look like my wives face when she wakes up in the morning. A little make up sure helps. The cost of finishing a face is less than a dollar after you pay the upfront cost of brown and black and some epoxy to fill the small gaps around the eyes lids after some drying and shrinking. If you want it to look nice, put a little money into it.
Videos of finishing of mounts are made for a reason. Why only do 97% of the job?
There are bunch of different brands of epoxy putty on the market, you can get a 16oz kit for about $10. And that will go along way when using it for finish work. You HAVE to finish out the eyes, nostrils etc. Wax is an old school way of doing it, epoxy is the best way in my opinion. Then you need to touch up the epoxy with some thin paint to match the surrounding natural color. I prefer a satin finish around the eyes, and a gloss on the nose. But it is up to you as the artist to use what you prefer.
But that kind of comment is going to fire me up every time. So it's your first whitetail mount and you hope that you can do it dirt cheap so when it turns out like crap you won't have lost much money? Well, that's a self-fullfilling prophecy. You pay for what you get. Why waste your time on an effort if you don't intend to do the very best job you can? Why learn techniques that aren't in your best interest? You should ALWAYS use the very best products you can find and do the job the very best you can. Taking shortcuts and being cheap tends to follow along and I don't have much patience for people intent on wasting their time. They're usually wasting mine as well.
you really don't need anything to finish it. Just put it where the light doesn't shine on it and you'll be fine. A closet works for me.