Cheers
That last one looks pretty good man. What are you using to preserve the body? I'd like to start something like this myself when the idols meet their end.
I've simply put them in a warm and dry room for a couple days and that's the result. I've tried many preservation methods and that one aparently appears to be the best one so far.
I've tried various methods including:
Seal the specimens in a plastic box and cover their bodies on one occasion with rice and another with salt. (not practical when you want to make a pose out of them)
Freezing them for a long period of time both dry or immersed in water and then take them out and dry. (not practical when you want to make a pose out of them)
Used direct and indirect sunlight exposure (very bad idea)
Put them close to a lit fireplace for some days
Put them in a jar with alcohol. (the best preservation method I used but obviously not practical when you want to make a pose out of them plus it wastes quite a lot of shelf space)
Inject their bodies with alcohol.
Cover their bodies with a nice shiny coating of hair spray.
From all these or even a combination of these (my initial usual combination was: Dry warm room + alcohol injection + hair spray) I either get the same or worse result than a Dry warm room.
I'm not exactly sure why some specimens come out worse than others even though I've used the same preservation technique on all 3 mantids. My guess would be some were dead in their moist enclosure for a longer time period than others so decomposition progressed faster on some.
