Monday, January 27, 2014

Fox

Beaded fox

We continue our series of beading tutorials on 3-D forest animals. Today we will make a fox.
We will need:
- size 8 seed beads of orange, white and black colors;
- wire 0.3 mm thick;
- thin nylon line and a needle for cross-linking of finished figure (if necessary).


To weave a fox we will use the technique of three-dimensional beading. We met such a beading technique in our tutorials many times, so I hope that you are familiar with it. But if this tutorial seems too complicated, you should start studying  3-D beading by making more simple products. You can, for example, make a spider - it is quite simple, and its tutorial is detailed enough.

For weaving the head and the body of the fox we need a wire of 130 cm in length.

At this time the 3-D weaving starts at the 2nd row. The 1st row consist only of the upper tier (1 black seed bead as a tip of the nose of the fox).

Let’s start weaving. String onto the wire 1 black seed bead for the 1st row and then 3 white seed beads for the upper tier of the 2nd row. Place the set of beads on the middle of the wire.

Take the wire that comes out from the black bead and pass it through all the white beads on the other wire.




Tighten the wires trying to keep the beads on the middle of the wire.

Then make the lower tier of the 2nd row. String 3 white beads onto any of the wires

and then pass the other wire through all these beads.

Tighten the wires and bend them placing the beads below the upper tier of the 2nd row.

Side view at this stage:




All the other rows we make in the same way.

3rd row:
The upper tier: 4 orange beads.
The lower tier: 4 white beads.

Side view at this stage:

4th row:
The upper tier - string the beads in the following sequence: 1 orange, 1 black, 2 orange, 1 black, 1 orange.
The lower tier: 6 white beads.

5th row:
The upper tier: 8 orange beads.
The lower tier: 7 white beads.

6th row:
For the upper tier string 9 orange beads onto any of the wires, pass the other wire through them and then slightly pull the wires but do not tighten the wires at the moment.

Take two additional pieces of wire of 20 cm in length each and pass them through the beads of the current tier as described beneath.
The first additional piece of wire pass through 7 middle beads of the tier,

and the second additional piece of wire pass through the single middle bead of the tier.

Tighten the basic wires and continue weaving on them. We will use additional wires later, for weaving the ears of the fox.

Next, make the lower tier of the 6th row: 9 white beads.

7th row:
The upper tier: 7 orange beads.
For the lower tier string onto any of the wires beads in the following sequence: 3 orange, 5 white, 3 orange, then pass the other wire through all the beads and slightly pull the wires but do not tighten the wires at the moment.

Take one more additional piece of wire of 25 cm in length and pass it through all the white beads of the current tier.

Tighten the basic wires and continue weaving on them. We will use additional wires later, for weaving the forepaws of the fox.

8th row:
The upper tier: 5 orange beads.
For the lower tier string beads in the following sequence: 4 orange, 4 white, 4 orange.

9th row:
The upper tier: 5 orange beads.
For the lower tier string onto any of the wires beads in the following sequence: 4 orange, 4 white, 4 orange, then pass the other wire through them and slightly pull the wires but do not tighten the wires at the moment.
Take one more additional piece of wire of 25 cm in length and pass it through all the white beads of the current tier.

Tighten the basic wires and continue weaving on them. We will use additional wires later, for weaving the forepaws of the fox.

10th row:
The upper tier: 5 orange beads.
For the lower tier string beads in the following sequence: 4 orange, 4 white, 4 orange.

11th row:
The upper tier: 5 orange beads.
For the lower tier string beads in the following sequence: 4 orange, 3 white, 4 orange.

12th row:
The upper tier: 5 orange beads.
For the lower tier string beads in the following sequence: 4 orange, 3 white, 4 orange. Through 5 middle beads of the current tier pass an additional piece of wire of 25 cm in length. We will use this additional piece of wire later, for weaving the hind paws of the fox.

13th row:
The upper tier: 5 orange beads.
For the lower tier string beads in the following sequence: 4 orange, 3 white, 4 orange.

14th row:
The upper tier: 5 orange beads.
For the lower tier string beads in the following sequence: 3 orange, 3 white, 3 orange. Through 5 middle beads of the current tier pass the last additional piece of wire of 25 cm in length. We will use this additional piece of wire later, for weaving the hind paws of the fox.

15th row:
The upper tier: 4 orange beads.
The lower tier: 7 orange beads.

Next, a fox tail begins.

16th row:
The upper tier: 3 orange beads.
The lower tier: 6 orange beads.

17th row:
The upper tier: 4 orange beads.
The lower tier: 5 orange beads.

18th row:
The upper tier: 4 orange beads.
The lower tier: 4 orange beads.

19th row:
The upper tier: 3 white beads.
The lower tier: 3 white beads.

20th row:
The upper tier: 2 white beads.
The lower tier: 2 white beads.

21st row: only upper tier - 1 white bead.

Weaving the body of the fox is finished. Fix the basic wires. Pass any of the wires through the beads of the upper tier of the penultimate row,

then twist together both wires and cut them off.

Bend the tip of the wires and hide it between the rows of beads.

Side view of the fox at this stage:

Proceed to weaving fox ears. Both ears are the same, we weave them using the technique of flat parallel weaving and the following pattern:

1st row: 3 orange beads.

In order not to pull out the wires when tightening them, you may weave the 1st row of one ear, then the 1st row of the other ear and next weave all the other rows of both ears.

2nd row: 2 orange beads.
3rd row: 1 orange bead.

The ears are finished. Fix and cut off the excess wires. Bend the tips of the wires and hide them between the rows of beads.

Next, make the paws of the fox. Weave them using the technique of three-dimensional beading.

For the each paw use the following pattern:

1st row:
The upper tier: 2 orange beads.
The lower tier: 2 orange beads.

2nd row is the same:
The upper tier: 2 orange beads.
The lower tier: 2 orange beads.

3rd row:
The upper tier: 2 orange beads.
The lower tier: 1 black bead.

4th row:
The upper tier: 1 black bead.
The lower tier: 1 black bead.

5th row: only upper tier - 2 black beads.

Fix the wire. Pass any of the wires through the bead of the upper tier of the penultimate row,

and then twist together both wires and cut them off.

Bend the tip of the wires and hide it between the rows of beads.

The finished paw looks like this:

Using this pattern, make all the four paws of the fox.

Weaving the fox is finished. If you want the figure to be more tough you can sew it with a thin nylon line. To do this, use the technique of cross-linking which is described in detail here. You should sew only the head and the body of the fox. It is not necessary to sew the ears, tail and paws.

The beaded fox is ready!


P.S. Don't want to miss new tutorials? Subscribe for email notifications of site updates!

If you like this tutorial, share it with your friends on social networks using the buttons below the post.

11 comments:

  1. This is so much fun to make! Thank you for the pattern. :)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you for appreciation of my work. I will be very grateful if you share this tutorial with your friends on social networks.

      Delete
  2. Say, what kind of wire do you use for this?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hi! The best wire for making 3D beaded animals is copper wire or brass wire.

      Delete
  3. Hi, is it possible to make the same with the fishing line? I do not want it to stand on a shelf but I want it to be a key ring so it probably needs to be a bit more flexible than a wire... Thanks in advance.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yes, you may use fishing line instead of wire, but in that case the shape of the fox may not be as good as it is shown on the photos above.

      Delete
  4. In your tutorial the length of the wire is written as 130 cm. However, when I used a wire of 130 cm, I could only get to the 9th step. How much wire do I need to get the full fox?
    Thanks.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hi, to make the fox I used size 8/0 seed beads and the wire of 130 cm is quite enough to get the full fox with those seed beads. I can suppose that you used larger seed beads than it was recommended in the tutorial. That is why you need a longer wire. I think you should take a wire of 300 cm. You may also add the wire directly to your beadwork using the tip described here (in Russian, you can read it by means of the automatic translation widget in the right sidebar).

      Delete
  5. I really love your work! It was your brilliant tutorials who taught me to do beading like this. Thank you so much for sharing!

    ReplyDelete