Antler Repair Painting Question

Not sure about pictorials, but the best stain assortment is sold by Marshall Ray Pinchback. He does great antler repair and coloring seminars. I think McKenzie sells his stains.

 

Personally I’m a fan of using acrylic and water or oil base paints. IMO their way better than any stains sold by our suppliers.
I like parchment in acrylic paint to get a good base coat and from there I use others like raw, umbers in brown, sienna some grays made from mixing colors.
I’ve learned a lot from reading taxidermy today articles and personally talking with a master of casting and painting antlers, horns etc Eric Jason Carter. He has many articles that will help you.
The idea is getting the base coat to match the bone then other colors are washed , dapped or sponged on and sealing in between coats. Don’t rush if you want a good looking antler.

 

Like above but I airbrush the final marks, "artery" lines and the like. Look at the rest of the rack and just duplicate the details. I never had any luck with stain.

 

To your question about the photos in the tutorials, many of the people who originally posted used a program called photobucket to upload, the repost photos. It was a free program and made uploading to forums like this very simple. The problem is photobucket started charging. I’m not sure if the people who posted had to pay or the people wanting to see the photos posted, but regardless, they blocked the photos. Some of the old post’s photos have been preserved, some have not unfortunately!

 

I've spent hours over the years refurbishing antlers and horns, repairing/replacing tines, etc. I've even gotten to the point that I've learned the process of bringing back chalky antlers so they look life-like. This can be simple or complex depending upon the antler and how realistic you want. Similar to fish taxidermy the best results takes an incredible number of layers that takes an amazing amount of time. It's possible to bring life back to antlers quickly but for best results it takes time.

In regard to bringing back colors, I use a variety of types of paint/stains and colors depending upon the antler. Items I use on a regular basis include minwax stains, color pencils, water based paints, wood putty, and apoxie sculpt. Some of the tools I use are a drummel tool, steel wool, sand paper, and sanding block. Steel wool is my best friend.

There are so many details bringing life to horns/antlers and it really depends on the repair required for each individual antler. If you want to send me a personal message I would be glad to send you a few photos or description of what I do.