Whitetail Shoulder Mount Critique

There are lots of mistakes which we all make when we are starting out ; but that bottom lip is sad!

 

The thing that strikes me is the eye shape.. way off. Reference Reference reference!! The antler repairs look good though...

 

Antler repair doesn't look too bad, on the mount there is a lot of work that need to be improved on, the finish work on the nose and bottom lip is way off. The eye and tear duct shape isn't correct, hair patterns on the face are off, ear butts aren't right, the ears themself don't look bad for a beginner though and the brisket seems as if the hair patterns aren't correctly lined up or it isn't combed correctly one. Your best bet is as Inkedspider said, get you some good reference photos and study them, not only prior to mounting but as you mount one, get them out and try to recreate what your looking at, I know how I was as a beginner, I always thought I will just try to make the next one better until I finally realized there is no time like the present.

 

X2 what GWebb said and Inkedspider I also noticed allot of paint left in the hair. I take a tooth brush and get all that out after paint dries. If I cant find mine I just use the wife's and wash it out good before I put it back lol

 

Quit being cheap and purchase a set of good eyes for your next mount. You will never get an accurate eye with those cheap rounded ones. Try an eye that has been molded from the real thing like Meder or Eppley.

 

Dollar for dollar you can't beat some in this link. Scroll through and find the ones MichaelP put up, a few taxidermist on here have access to deer pens and have taken the time to take and post some nice photos here.

http://www.taxidermy.net/forum/index.php/board,20.0.html

As for the eye comment by black coyote, not trying to be an a$$ but regardless of the quality of the eye, be it a $5 pair or a $20 pair....it isn't the color or shape of the glass eye it's self that makes the eye.

 

I may be wrong, but it looks like the head on the form was too small, and you tried to get the skin to fit anyways?
That might be causing a lot of the issues with the face, eyes, lip etc

 

Not again,, like the right size form will fix his issues? The "issues" are from him not knowing how to do them right yet. He could use a lesson or two face to face with a pro, that will help him more than us throwing tips at him.
Dreamer, if you are going to remake the lower lip, texture it to look like a lower lip, just guessing will not do. Find some photos, or go for a drive and find a fresh dead deer, whack the head off and take it home for study. The hair patterns on the head will tell you alot.

 

I didn't say it would fix them, but it's definitely not helping. Trying to line up the face on a form that isn't the right size, sounds like a bad idea to me.

 

The form doesn't have to fit the skin perfect to have a good looking mount. Extra skin will fit on any form just fine if you know where to park it.

 

http://www.taxidermy.net/forum/index.php/topic,269877.0.html

 

Extra skin is better ;than not having extra,your mount is going to dry and shrink some in the dry period ,but that's just my opinion .

 

I also agree with the guys saying extra skin is a good thing.

I can make things look more "plump" and "alive" if I have a little extra skin....the way a real live deer looks. Their skin doesn't look like it was pasted rock solid onto their body without a millimeter to spare. It looks mushy and sometimes a little droopy, and plump.

As for whacking the head off a roadkill for reference....that's a great idea!!!!

Just make sure it's legal where you are. Here you need to have a permit from the police...afterall, this is NJ. LOL

Also, do a visual, followed by a 10 yard downwind wiff test for freshness. LOL...
You know what to call a deer that's been on the side of the road for too long in the hot summer sun, rotting, right? Got me.....I have NO EYEDEER....

Ok, that was really bad, I'll stop.

I may take flack, but I actually like the way you recreated the nose nodules, not perfect, little sloppy, but not bad. Better than a lot I see that are too uniform or way too small..... Problem is, the color is off...too brown, more grey, and the cracks in between should be a lighter gray or even flesh colored especially as you get towards the lip. I've started recreating the nose pad by applying a layer of apoxie sculpt and then drawing in the individual nodules with a pin dipped in safety solvent. It's still not perfect, but it's closer than any of the other methods I've tried. I can get all the mishapen nodes which are not quite flat, but not quite bumps either.... Still fine tuning it though.


Ears are not bad. Just watch the edges...are you carding them till dry? Deers left ear is a little different than the right, but...could just be the deer...I have found a few deer with mismatched ears. Goofy buggers.

Eye shape is the biggest flaw in my opinion. Followed by poor hair placement on the face which gives you rattly looking areas. Example, his right cheek/muzzle area...

Finally, I see this a lot, but never said anything before...and yours is far from the worst, but deer don't have combs in the wild....So try to get rid of the perfectly straight comb lines when you groom it out.


First and foremost, fix the eyes, then clean up the finishing work, watch hair pattern placement and you could produce some very nice mounts.
Sounds easy right? LOL

Good luck. ---Matt


Forgot to add, the antler repairs look really good. If you didn't mention them, wouldn't have noticed. Good job.

Wish I could have wrote more, but I'm short on words.

 

I see what you mean about having extra skin. Maybe it's not that there's too much, but that the skin that is there is misplaced, and that's what I was noticing.

 

MR T
X2X2X2X2X2X2X2X2X2X2X
ABSOLUTELY

 

You can keep putting those round 5 dollar eyes in your hack mounts if you want to. Mounting over an accurate eye shape is 100 times easier. Maybe they should make square eyes for guys like you if shape does not matter.

 

I like what the others said. A tip for you is to take "triple thick" and a syringe put ONE drop of black in a syringe full of triple thick. Then mix it well, then you can dot each nodule with the syringe, just follow the deers nose nodules and dot each one. The bottom nodules are bigger than the ones on the top.

I prefer tripple thick because it does not run at all, alot of guys use modge podge but i find thats just to runny and dosen't give the same result. I used triple thick for paintings and it works wonderfully on a deer nose because you can litterally trace each little nodule. It takes about 20 min to dot the nose this way, but the result looks much better.

this is what it looks like. http://www.google.com/products/catalog?q=triple+thick&hl=en&client=safari&rls=en&prmd=ivnse&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.&biw=1024&bih=611&um=1&ie=UTF-8&tbm=shop&cid=8218873780142187204&sa=X&ei=zCIOTpyyCoTm0QH0v-m9Dg&ved=0CGgQ8gIwAA