Updates and A Wonderful New Tool

I decided to take a bit of a studio break after launching my Patreon page, the building of which has taken up a lot of my time and brainpower, particularly over the past couple of weeks.  I'm SO excited to have my first patron on there already (Thank you again so very much, Katherine!) and I'm having fun getting my blog and picture sharing going over there.

One of the challenges I was having was to make a cool banner picture.  I had a vision, but was really struggling to make it work.  I stumbled across this site which has a FREE photo collage builder!  They have other photo editing tools as well, but the Collage Maker was the only one I tried.  It was an awesome find and without much trouble at all, I created this:

(another tip: the center image is actually another collage that I made, saved, and inserted into the one with the larger Japanese horse pictures)

Afterwards I went on to make a collage of pictures to advertise one of our laser products (with lots of options) and I will be going back to make many more collages I'm thinking.

Also in the update department, the response to my custom horse giveaway/incentive program is promising and exciting.  I already have a few people offering show homes to my creations and I'm very much looking forward to getting all of that up and running!

If you are interested in participating, feel free to send me an e-mail (horsetender@gmail.com), or message me on my Facebook page.

Aside from taking a minor studio break, yesterday I went back into "laser mode" for our laser cutting/engraving business, which is my "day job".  Worked on some orders, did some design work and ran the machine for a little while.  I'm still trying to work out a schedule to fit in ALL of the things.  I had thought I'd do a few hours of each (ie: laser and studio) every day, but it seems to work out better if I devote most of a day to one or the other, really get into the zone.  So maybe I'll alternate days and see how that works.

In the travel department: We have two trips coming up.  In early February we are going to the Sapporo Snow Festival.  It should be quite an adventure!  We'll be riding an "overnight ferry" to get up there, a first for me for sure.  Sapporo is on the island of Hokkaido, north of the main island, Honshu, which we are on.  I've been wanting to go to Hokkaido for quite some time, as that's where most of the Thoroughbred breeding farms are, including Big Red Farm - home of Kentucky Derby winner, I'll Have Another.  Alas, on this trip there will be no horses, since it is a guided tour we are going on.  I suppose winter is not the best time to visit anyhow.

In April we will be going back to the U.S. for a visit!  It promises to be a whirlwind tour of most of the country.  We are quite spread out, having family, friends, places to be, in just about all four corners, plus the middle - I'm talking to you, Colorado and South Dakota!

I think that about covers all of the updates on the goings on here.

Oh, yeah...  it's been SNOWING!  :D

THE NEWS

Okay *gulp* here we go!

First up, a few days ago I posted asking "Do you show?"  I've always been curious about that, but it also ties in with my first announcement.

That is:

FREE CUSTOM HORSES TO GOOD SHOW HOMES

I am going to be giving some horses away.  That's right: FREE.  I'll even pay the shipping to you.  It's not a contest or drawing and there are no strings attached, but a few small conditions.

Basically, I'm looking to get more of my custom work out there in the world, and showing.  I had planned to do that myself, after coming back from my hobby hiatus, but, then, well...  Japan.  So I've decided that I'd like to give some of my work away, with some conditions:

1 - I'm looking for people who show and will show the horse that they get.  You don't to be hardcore, I don't even have a "minimum" number of shows in mind or anything like that, but since I'm doing this to get my creations out there, at least some shows would be good.  I would prefer them to go to live shows, but if you are active in photo showing and will add them to your string, that's good too.

2 - You have to let me know how they do at the shows!  I'm wanting to get better and better with my work, so I would welcome any feedback, good or bad - as long as it's constructive.  And of course I'd love to brag about them if they do well.  ;)

3 - If you ever decide to sell them, please offer them back to me first.  I'd like to keep track of them and I'm not doing this so that someone can "flip" a free horse.  I'll have quite a bit of time into each one of them and I'd like to keep track of them if I can.  At the end of the day though, they will be your horse, to do with whatever you'd like.

That's it!

Overall the horse will be "artist's choice", but I would like to match everyone up with horses they are interested in - and more eager to show! - so I plan to at least ask what type of horse you'd like and if there are any that you don't want.  As far as more details on what is offered: for now they will be Stablemates, repaints only or possibly repaint/hair if you are interested in that sort of thing.  (I still enjoy doing them, but I realize they are apparently "SO ___ years ago"... haha)  I have many Stablemate remodels too and eventually might add some of them to the program.

I really have no idea how much interest there will be in this, so I don't have a limit set right now on how many I will give away or when this ends, but you might want to act fast in case the response is bigger than I'm expecting!  ;)

For now I am ONLY offering this to the followers on my blog and Facebook page.  I don't plan to "go public" (if I do at all) until you guys get a chance at this first.

I'm still gathering some of my thoughts for down the road with this.  I'd like to turn it into some sort of incentive club.  Possibly after you show the horse X number of times, you can have another horse if you like.  Also, anyone in the "club" would get a discount on any horses that I might sell in the future.  Things like that.  It will be evolving over time, but for now: let me know if you are interested, and willing to commit to showing your new horse.  Then I'll start playing matchmaker.  ;)

I aim for LSQ with my work, which is a subjective term, so I won't jump up and down and say that I absolutely do LSQ work.  However, before my hiatus, I had man NAN-qualified custom horses, as well as a small handful of Champions and Reserves in limited showing.  I'm a bit rusty now getting back into the swing of things, but still managed to get fresh NAN cards on a bunch of my horses (old and new) before our big move.

My herd of custom minis with their winnings at a live show in March 2015

That's announcement number one.

*deep breath*


Number two is:

I NOW HAVE A PATREON PAGE


What is Patreon?  In a nutshell, it's a platform that allows creators and those who wish to support them to get together.  I learned about it several months ago and thought it sounded like a really fun thing to try and, well, I'm finally doing it.  It took me a while to decide what I'd like to focus on there and I settled on, no surprise: horses.  My page will be a fusion of photography - focusing on horses and events here in Japan - along with my model horse projects.

What does all of this mean for my blog?

Nothing, really.  I still plan to post here regularly (aiming for everyday, or as close as I can to that) and I will still be sharing a lot of things from Japan on here, just like I always have.  More tutorials are also in the works.  However, I've got some really big plans for my creative and horse-loving journey, starting this year, and I thought it'd be fun to explore Patreon as a platform to develop and share some of them.

It's uncomfortable to "ask for money" and that is something I certainly don't enjoy doing.  That's the number one reason why it's taken me so long to launch my own page on there.  I certainly don't want anyone to feel like they *have* to pay me anything, but if you'd like to support what I'm doing and what I have planned, that's great.  Either way, I will still be creating a lot of free content, like I always have - but I thought I'd give a try to a new platform that puts a lot of emphasis on community building and growth between creator and patrons.

Please take a look at my page here:  Horse Tender Studio on Patreon

I've put a lot of work into it and I'd love to know what you think!


And now I'm going to take a nap.

The very first picture I put up on my new page, appropriate for new beginnings.