INTERNATIONAL: A replica of a cat's eyeball made from glass, ears made from small tiny pieces of wool felt and a real cat's whiskers... each part is skillfully put together by Japanese artist, who goes by the name Sachi, who is a master in making 3D realistic cat portraits, called “Wakuneco.”

Sachi has a few tricks to make these cat portraits, which she calls "Wakuneco" -- directly translated to "frame cat", which looks authentic. She uses at least a dozen of the same color shades of felted wool out from around the 200 different types and colors of the materials she owns, so that the portrait's head will have an identical texture to real cat fur.

The artist believes that the moment when the cat's spirit enters into the artwork can be presented through the eyes. In that sense, she has been very particular about how to make the eyes.

Sachi has recalled that there was an event, when she made a tortoiseshell cat, it has reached someone’s heart. She has added that the person has wanted to adopt this cat . It's still a vague idea, but she hopes to hold an exhibition with the theme of "shelter cats" in the future, so more people will take them in.

The crafting process takes hours and days. It takes a lot of patience. She begins by first looking at dozens of photos of the real cat she wants to replicate to check the size of each facial part and the color of the fur so she can prepare the materials needed. It takes her at least 10 days just to prepare the foundation of the portrait including the ears, before she starts to mount more felt onto it to add more height and width to the face.

The most difficult part is the eyes. Although Sachi used to leverage eye parts that are sold in arts and crafts supply stores, she adopted the current style which uses hemispherical glass parts in 2019. She mixes different acrylic paint on a plastic board that is layered with sand, and the eye-making process can take up to a week.

To finish one portrait, it takes an average of 10 hours a day for a whole month. Sachi first started to make portraits as a hobby back in 2015, but after she started posting her work on social media, it turned into a job with custom orders from across Japan and overseas. She now has close to 600,000 followers worldwide on her Instagram and Youtube accounts together.

Sachi has said her works have also inspired people to adopt cats. After posting a work of the less-popular tortoiseshell cat on Instagram, she has said people told her of adopting similar cats. She now hopes to hold an exhibition to showcase various cats, including ones with physical handicaps, so she can inspire more adoptions of shelter cats. Sachi, however, did not want to disclose the price tag of her artwork.

^{PHOTO: JAPANESE FELTED WOOL ARTIST MAKING REALISTIC 3D CAT PORTRAIT, 3D CAT PORTRAITS, SOUNDBITES FROM ARTIST, HANDOUT PHOTOS OF CAT PORTRAITS}