The saddle cloth on my Hussar figure is a Leopard skin (with the head). Can anyone tell me how to paint a leopard skin? I have heard that the "spots" are more of a horse shoe shape rather than just a dot.
Mick

Leopard spots are easy. The skin color of the leaopard goes from white at the edges to a very deep reddish ochre at the back. The spots themselves are almost burnt sienna rimmed with bands of black in either two or three segments. Here is an illustration:

Here is a picture of Alexander the Great who has a leopard skin on his horse that I painted:

The other side:

Your a legend btavis. Thanks for the help. and so quick too
mick

hello mick i will tell you how i painted the skin from the leopard on the Diana,

first, Acrilic white as primer, then i applied gold yellow from Andrea Color whit some of white, then a thinned coat of burnt sienna (the yellow and the burnt sienna just in the middle body and back) the lower body is still white, after that i blending the edges between the white area and the yellow and burnt sienna areas to obtain a gradation of colors, after a one day to let it dry, y draw the spots whit acrilic black very thinned star in the face and finish by the tail, trying to draw diferents kinds of spots.

i hope you can use something of that .

Cheers
Ed

and other view , sorry, the pictures are the only ones, i have in this moment...

cool. Thanks Ed
mick

Hey, Mick Well, I guess this seems insanely obvious, but the first thing to do is find a photograph of some leopards, usually easy in the kids section of the library. I really got into this on my big Le Cimier Hussar. Though the spots appear random, they are not at all, and as with pinto horses, the whole pattern originates just in front of the rear legs, as does the color gradation. I wish I had a buck for every beautiful Napoleonic mounted figure screwed up by a poorly realised leopardskin shabraque. The problem, I think, is a standard one for us-- we look at other painter's work( including 2d artwork and illustration) for the wrong kind of inspiration when the "real thing" is readily available to us.
john

this might help

Great!! THanks Bosko b !!
Mick

johnegert,

So obvious and yet so true. Why accept substitute when it's so easy nowadays (with the Internet) to get the real McCoy?

A little nit-picking just for the sake of it. There's often a confusion between LEOPARD and JAGUAR.

http://www.cathaven.com/education/leopard_or_jaguar.htm

A shabraque is obviously LEOPARD. Also note how small single spots on the extremities (head, legs, tail) develop into gradually larger 'rosettes'. Not as random as one may think.

Quang

Great shot Bosko. Take a look at that point just in front of the back legs from which the pattern emerges almost like a gameboard, curving around the legs and moving up the sides. There are evolution-advantageous things going on all over, including the spot sizes being largest at the sides, the color changes from belly to back, the eye patterns on the face, etc. Then the trick is to imagine this all opened up like those interesting world map projections. Even the wonderfully painted MM Hussar Col., which I gather is Simon's subject, leaves room for improvment in this area. A figure within a figure......
john