small scale feathers?

I have been attempting to make feathers in 1/35th.  I tried sculpting them, they came out amazing, well, the side that wasent face down, the side that was down ended up flat and no good...

HEY! SMEAGOL try this.I do wood carving when I am not working on models and this trick was taught me by a more senior woodcarver.You get some .010 sheet. Then carefully ,with a scratch-awl draw line on one side about six inches long.Then you come back and carefully scratch the other angled lines in the feather. When you are done check them carefully to make sure all the lines are clean.Then flip the piece over and VERY LIGHTLY follow the lines from the other side. You will NEED to do this under a magnifier.When you have done the obverse side, then carefully clean any plastic dust off with a toothbrush.NOW,carefully cut the area you,ve engraved to the length you want.Because of the .010 you can even curve the stuff with your fingers.Just remember to keep the lines light (but noticeable) and almost on top of instead of next to the line before. You don,t need to be perfect, Just careful! If you are careful ,you should get quite proficient at the art of making iddy biddy feathers! I hope this helps you some!    tankerbuilder

Hey, SMEAG!!! I just have to add something I forgot. With plastic there is another advantage.You can texture the feathers with a stiff wire brush on either side of their spine.When you do this try this,Take a strip about 6" long and 1/4 inch wide (or narrower) score a line right down the center of the long axis.Now add .050 or .010 rod and glue it in the groove you made.Now , take the stiff wire brush and at a shallow angle (about 30 degrees do this on the other side of the strip as well) . now cut out the feathers you need. I wish I could show you in a picture.Check with the site mgr -you may send me an e-mail with your phone number and I,ll walk you through it , okay??? tankerbuilder

I appreciate that.  I did have very good success with using the aluminum foil.

Aluminum foil is very fragile, would your technique work with lead foil? Its my favorite medium for any type of scratch building or mold embossing. (pressing over to shape to a similar form)

I double it up and super glue it to double the thickness, the glue and foil make it nice and sturdy

Hey , SMEAG! I got a crazy thought.Do you know anyone who has a pet bird?My Parrot is in moult and I thought of you when I saw all those teensy tiny feathers  on the cage floor.I bet you could do something with parakeet or canary feathers. Give it some thought.  tankerbuilder

Tanker you're right. I have a macaw whose chest feathers are very small and stubby.If  you cut the sides of the feather in order to narrow it down you would end up with a pretty good end product. I use my birds feathers for making palm trees and I dont think any manufacturer can make a more realistic palm frond. I hope I don't end up being responsible for a sudden epidemic of naked birds.

John Read on the dio forum used to do a lot of wooden bird sculpting. He may have some good suggestions on how to go about this. Another good source of material is dryer lint. It could work well for fluffy feathers.

The naked bird comment had me laughing so hard.  Beside being a model builder, I also tie my own flys for fly fishing, and for the life of me I had never ever thought of using feathers for palm trees.  Well you have my two thumbs up on that one.  I have feathers gallor, and now that I'm using them for making palm trees, is just the cats meow!  I don't know what you use to get them to hold their form so they don't keep straighting out again (a problem I had) I spray them with a fine mist of a fixative. For this; so I don't end up ruining my good airbrush, I purchased for $20.00 an airbrush set made by Testers.  Easy to clean and it makes a great airbrush for spraying Varnish, syscone and weathering dust mixed with water. Save your good expensive ones for paint and fine details.

That's great!  I just noticed that this was posted back in 2009!!! Oh well better late than never i always say. And anyways your my first post.