Mutant Toy: Thing From The Fur Dimension

Character: 

Another Mutant Toy. The Fur Thing  doesn't photograph well, because his fur is so clear an expression of his black treacherous soul, that he throws off the white balance of my camera.

Construction: 

I was digging through my bins, looking for inspiration, when I came up with this all at once. I love this project. He looks much better in person, though.

The Fur Thing is almost entirely a X-Men Movie Cyclops. His head was sculpted over with Kneadatite, and I loosened up some of his joints by shaving off pieces of the plastic that inhibited movement.

In Progress

He got new claw-like fingers over his hands, hand-sculpted out of Kneadatite. He was sanded, painted, and covered with fur. The 'fur' is a mixture of synthetic hair and black feathers. I also added a little red paint around the eyes. 

Why Cyclops? I also cleaned out his battery case and replaced his batteries.

DOOM!

More Pictures Below Completed 2011

Mutant Toy: Pirana Man

 

Character: 
Another Mutant Toy. Pirana Man isn't especially friendly, though he's more likely to claw than bite.

Construction: 
Pirana Man's base is a loose Batman figure, origin unknown. He has hands from two different Witchblade figures, and his head crest came from an armor piece from the spare parts bin.


I removed much of the original paint first, and cut off Batman's ears. Then I used Kneadatite to fully re-sculpt the head, add the panel over the torso, attach the new hands, and sculpt the fin on the right arm. 

In Progress

After Painting

The tube on his back is a piece cut off of an X-Men Movie Toad. The holes in his back that the tube is glued into were drilled with a Dremel. All non-green parts of the figure were hand-painted and sealed.

Pirana Man retains the articulation of the original figure: Shoulders, hips and neck. Completed 2011

Mutant Toy: Squid Face

Character: 
Squid Face is a decent sort of fella, even though some people find his tentacles...unnerving.

Construction: 
After my success with the Rabbit Demon, I've been digging through my bins to come up with more fun mash-up characters. I found plenty of inspiration in a box of old Batman figures that I purchased in a loose lot on eBay. 


Squid Face was constructed from a loose Batman figure, several bits of plastic cut from accessories, and a piece from a Witchblade figure. The additional tentacles were added with Kneadatite.

In Progress

He was fully repainted and sealed. His head is removable to allow the articulation to be retained. 

More Pictures Below. Completed 2011

Alicia

Character:
Alicia is an original character, a gothish-punk vampire, who I played in a 2 yr World of Darkness campaign.

Construction:
After working on Calendar Girl and Poison Ivy, I had a few headless Animated Witchblade figures. Looking at them I realized one would be perfect for Alicia, and that’s when I decided to make the figure in the first place (I had initially shied away from doing gaming characters.) She may have the dubious honor of being the figure who sat on my worktable in pieces for the longest time before being completed.

Witchblade Figure/In Progress Picture:

I carved down the right arm, and replaced the right hand with a JL Hawkgirl hand I had to spare.

The new head is from a B:taS Harley Quinn. I had to do a lot of work on the neck joint, since the original joints did not match at all. I removed all the paint, smoothed down the mask lines (much easier said than done), and chopped off the jester hat points.

I used Kneadatite to give her a new hairdo and to form a new jacket cuff on the right arm. This is the first figure I've used Kneadatite on, and I love the final effect-it's flexible and sturdy. I did find it challenging to work with, but I think I just need more practice.

I left the undershirt red, gave the rest a nice coat of paint, and she’s out on the town. Completed Oct 2008

Bat-Suit (in a Bat-Case, with a Bat-Light)

Character:
Another Erin "commission". Behold. BatSuit in a case!
(Can I even say how much I like the fact that there is a Wikipedia article just for the Batsuit. I shouldn't be surprised, I know...)


Construction:
The Bat-Body is a B:tAS "Battle Scars Batman" from a 2-pack w/Catwoman. I removed the "scars" with acetone, and painted over his blue gloves/boots, etc. to black. I went over his belt with better colors, including some shading. His arms and head were removed. I chopped down his blocky shoulders, and reattached his arms closer to his body. The cape is made out of umbrella fabric.

Between the time I started and finished this project, unfortunately, I lost his head, so the cowl is from a head pulled from a random old aqua suited Batman. I carved out the face portion, then extended the bottom edge down and the ears up with modeling compound. It came out okay, but up close it does look a little... battle damaged, maybe? Maybe that's why it's in storage. Added a post to "hold up" the cowl and make it easy to see there's no person in that suit.

The case is from a Code Lyoko set picked up cheap. The light is a small round LED light, which is not attached so that it's easier to turn on and off. I removed all the Lyoko stuff from the inside of the tube, then cut a huge hole in the top, and sculpted a lip to hold the light at a good height. Painted the whole thing black, then brushed thin silver over the outside to give it a metallic gleam. Cut a piece of mirrored paper to fit the inside, added the Bat Figure, and we have a nice addition to our Bat-Shelf. Completed May 2008

Starcrossed: Group

Full Starcrossed group Shot.
One of these days Clark and J'onn will get added. One of these days.

Starcrossed: Shayera

Character:
Shayera Hol, aka Hawkgirl. As seen in Thanagarian armor, in the Justice League episode: Starcrossed.

Construction:
Shayera was made from a Justice Lord Hawkgirl, all detailing removed except the helmet. Hair donated from a standard Hawkgirl. Armored breastplate, shoulder pads, gauntlets, belt, boot-tops added in Magic Sculpt. She needed a full repaint so her skin tone would match throughout. I chose (as I often do), to give the colors the depth, that I think they would have in three dimensions, as opposed to staying strictly on the 2d animated model. I think this helps the figures stand out more. For example, in the episode, she's painted with a goldish yellow, and I went with actual metallic gold. I gave her hawk symbol, and some of her armor, a coat of gloss, and she's done.

Starcrossed: John Stewart

Character:
John Stewart, aka Green Lantern. As seen in civilian disguise in the Justice League episode: Starcrossed.

Construction:
John is a Justice League GL, and a whole lot of sculpting. Edge of the sweatshirt is vinyl, pants, shirt hood, cuffs, and hat out of Magic Sculpt. Careful paint color match to the episode, and that's all.

Starcrossed: Wally

Character:
Wally West, aka The Flash. As seen in civilian disguise in the Justice League episode: Starcrossed. An episode notable for revealing that it was in fact Wally West in the Flash costume, and not one of the other bearers of the name.

Construction:
I'm fairly proud of this one. He was entirely sculpted off of a JL Flash. That means sanding down the mask, sculpting ears. painting eyes from scratch, etc. Vinyl attached at the waist creates the lower edge of his shirt. Everything is Magic Sculpt, pants, sneakers, shirt cuffs, hair. Head to toe paint job, and he's safely camouflaged as a normal joe.

Starcrossed: Bruce

Character:
Bruce Wayne, also known as Batman. As seen in civilian disguise in the the Justice League episode: Starcrossed.

Construction:
Bruce here started life as an Undercover Bruce Wayne from B:TAS. This puts him slightly out of the scale with the others, who are the smaller Justice League scale, but I couldn't get his head out without wrecking it. His legs from the the thighs down were donated by a JLU Batman so he could have working knees. (Eventually I want him in a scale chair for this display.) I took out some height when I added the new legs. Square shoulders rounded with knife and Dremel, jacket, pant cuffs and little hair (tuft? bangs? Whatever it is.) added with Magic Sculpt. Paint, gloss on the jacket, and he's done.

Aren't they cute?

Starcrossed: Diana

(A year since they first appeared at Custom Con, I'm finally uploading these guys)

Character:
Diana, Princess of the Amazon island of Themyscira, also known as Wonder Woman. As seen in civilian disguise in the the Justice League episode: Starcrossed.

Construction:
Made from a JL Wonder Woman. She was the first one of the Starcrossed gang that I did. I would make her taller, were I to do her over, but overall she looks good.
Her awesome flared pants and shirt are done out of Magic Sculpt. I cut off all her hair (no fun), and the ponytail was made separately out of Sculpey and attached with a pin and glue. A new paint job and she's set.

Supergirl (Old-School)

Character:
Supergirl. Kara is, uh, the last daughter of Krypton. Younger than Superman, she lives with the Kents and hangs out with her "cousin" when she can. As featured in S:TAS.

Construction:
Kara was another rescue from the box o'figures I bought last summer. She had some damage to her hair and shirt, which I sanded down and smoothed over. I gave her almost a complete repaint, to fix her color scheme. For some reason, her hair was bright primary yellow, while her boots/skirt were done in muted red and blue. Changed that. I cleaned up the paint on her shirt, gloves, and face, added the black edging on the shirt and her headband. To save myself the headache of redoing it, the S symbol is original. I also added the cape tabs with Magic Sculpt, and the cape, made of a light plastic-like fabric, cut from an ugly skirt donated by an urban type Barbie.


In the end, she's not a perfect animated Supergirl, but she goes well with the Old School Superman. Besides, I prefer her to that tiny mutant thing they released for Justice League, who looks as if she'd be about 3' tall and 20 lbs. I have one of those, and eventually she'll become somebody, but not Supergirl.

World's Finest

Well, it's been 9 months since I stopped posting here. I haven't been doing much toy work, been too busy with life and pay-the-bills work. I do have a backlog still, some projects I submitted to CustomCon last March that I'd like to also put up here, and maybe I'll finally get to that. For now, here's a minor project from this summer.

Character/Construction:
So this summer I bought a box of action figures on Ebay. One of the more interesting was the Supes you see on the right. After some searching, I've identified him as Quick-Change Superman, from the line for Superman: the Animated Series. I thought he was neat, as we don't have any Animated DC figs from the early waves. I know he isn't terribly accurate to S:TAS, but his look is so different from JLU, etc, that I think it gives him a real old-school feel. He had some serious dirt and paint-scuffs, particularly in his hair, which I touched up.

But the real project was to give him a friend. So, I took a fairly generic Bats, cleaned him up, took apart one of those ugly clip-around-the-neck capes and carefully glued the fabric onto his back, like Kal has his, along the line where the paint color changes on the back of the shoulders.

Tada! World's Finest Batman and Superman, complete with matching fabric capes.
Simple, I know, but I think the end effect is nice.

Poison Ivy

Character:
Poison Ivy, as seen after the redesign on Batman: the Animated Series.

Construction:
Mostly based on recipe from Inanimate Objects: Hawkgirl base, Animated Witchblade head. She has sculpted hair, glove- and boot-tops. My Ivy also has her dress made out of glue-stiffened nylon, which takes away from the animated look, but lets it lie flat over her hip joints without gumming them up. I'm not thrilled with the way her hair came out, but it was my first time working with Magic Sculpt. I also experimented with the paint to try and capture the strong highlighting seen in the animation, and I like the way that turned out. Completed 2006

Talia al Ghul

Character:
Talia, daughter of Ra's al Ghul, and love interest of Batman. Here's hoping she'll turn up in a movie, when we see Ra's again.
(Side note: Say it with me... Raysh Al Ghul. Long A sound. There. Now you know.)
Seen here in her costume from the wonderful B:tAS episode "The Demon's Quest".

Construction:
Head from a Talia figure on an unknown body, some sort of catlike warrior figure. Dremeled off all the armor and removed the paint to find a nice flesh tone underneath. Slight resculpting on the hair, repainted hair and facial features. Skirt, top and bracelets added with various sculpting compounds, paint. Completed 2006.

Catwoman (and Isis)

Character:
Batman: The Animated Series Catwoman.
Just my design tastes really; for the more villainous Gotham girls, I worked off of the redesign (AKA:The New Batman Adventures, AKA: BtAS:Gotham Knights), but for Selina Kyle I decided I preferred the older style.
Selina/Catwoman is, of course, a cat burglar, sometime wildlife activist, and major love interest for Bruce Wayne/Batman.
Isis is her beloved cat.

Construction:
Catwoman is made from a Talia body and Wind Blitz Batgirl head. Took off all of Talia's detail work with knife and Dremel, then cut off one leg and one arm at the elbow to reposition them. She's not as awfully bowlegged now. Cut off and reversed Batgirl's 'ears', did major reconstruction on the back of her head, and minor resculpting on the mask and mouth area. A full paint job, added the belt and whip, made Isis out of bendable Sculpey, and she's out for a night on the rooftops. Completed 2006

Harley Quinn

Character:
My favorite Gotham Girl, Ms. Harleen Quinzel. Ain't she cute?

Construction:
Based on New School Harley recipe from Inanimate Objects. (Many Awesome DCU Customs. Much better than mine.) JLU Hawkgirl body, Harley Head. Transferred boot-tops from Harley figure. I kept Harley's hands as well, filled out the hat tassels and added the neck tassels with Magic Sculpt. Bright clean paint job and she's ready for trouble! Completed 2006

As you can see, I'm a bit of a fan... Here's my new Harley with her store-bought cousins.

Calendar Girl gets no love

Character:
Calendar Girl. I like her. Nobody likes her. Maybe it's because she's from one, single, kinda mediocre, episode of Batman:TAS. Based on the lame old supervillain 'Calendar Man', who based crimes on things like seasons and the days of the week, Calendar Girl is a has-been supermodel. Her MO: attacks/kidnaps the jerks who won't hire her now that she's 30, and has multiple different colored outfits over the course of the episode, based on holidays. Seen above is the final, Halloween. I think she's fun.

Construction:
Calendar Girl was my first true foray into action figure scale, and she's certainly not perfect. She is part of a set of Girls of Gotham. Made from a JLU Vixen base, with an animated Witchblade head and Sculpey hair. Her skirt and glove cuffs are nylon soaked in glue and painted, which is my own technique as far as I know. Completed Spring 2006