Painting seamless bodies (NSFW?)

Cool. Was there a trick to how you applied the color? Did you just color directly with the pastel stick, or did you grind them into powder and rub it on?

Thank you for the insight, Ephiane. This will be very helpful. But I do second Stryker's questions -- do you simply paint onto the surface with the pastels?

You mention the color cannot be removed (which can be a good thing), but does it stain other surfaces it comes into contact with?

Can you mix colors effectively, if a ready-made color would not do the work sufficiently well?

Thanks again!

PS -- I only experiment on figures that were already ruined in one way or another. The Jiaou body were I tested acrylics had broken out in blotches after an attempt to clean it from unintentional stains.

Come on, Friends 5.99 $ You have to buy and try it. On my figures the paint is now many months old and the Phicen skin is in excellent condition. That is another reason why I don' share this with the community at first: I have to wait, to see if my idea ruined the figures   But I think oil pastels are good for rubber/silicone, maybe even protect the rubber ?  I use the stick directly on the skin, more than once for deeper skin tone. A nice effect is a darker tone on deeper skin zones. You can see it on the Blue one. You can't mix the colours, but use one after the other on the skin.

Thank you for the clarification and the graphic, Ephiane! It has been awhile since I've used oil pastels (and then only on canvas), but I look forward to seeing if I can replicate your success. I have already ordered three boxes of slightly different kinds, all from Staedtler, from amazon. I didn't see the exact set you have (with the 243 product number), mine have the 241 and 242 product numbers (with 16-24 colors), but I'm hoping they are close enough to what you used successfully and that there will be enough options that allow something close to realistic skintone (or unrealistic, for fantasy figures).

I was wondering -- did you have to do anything special (like apply more or maybe less pastel) to the areas that bend and stretch (like the insides and outsides of knees, elbows, armpits, etc)?

Also, does the oil pastel still transfer on other materials that it comes into contact with after being applies to the rubbery body? I don't mean right away, but after you've left it on for awhile.

Three Boxes you can see on my Box i need 3mm pastel stick for a complete Orc. I use after one layer a make up sponge, another layer.... sponge... and so on. Absolute no transfer after finsih. If You like a shiny skin like the Orc You can use water and soap on a make up Sponge. And don´t forget to clean the figure at first with soap. Phichen use a sort of talkum on the Bodys i think for anti - adhering. Before You start to use the Oil pastels You NEED to have the Skin adhering !
Can´t wait to see Your colored figures

Oh, and No. I don´t need that Make Up Sponge for myself. i´m a natural Beauty

Wow. Thank you so much for all the information, Ephi. Very useful. I may be tempted to try this again.

Wow. I'm utterly fascinated by this. Ephiane, your results definitely speak for themselves. I may just have to muster my courage, and take a shot at this myself. Thanks for posting all the information.

Thanks All. I have to say Thanks to Gubernator Fan for the Thread, that helps many Bash Nerds a Lot

Let it never be said that I don't do my part to help bashers. But this is all you, Ephiane. I will be experimenting on my ruined bodies as soon as the pastels arrive. Thank you again for the tips and images.

so much useful information here and thanks all for sharing what some consider top secret nuclear launch codes !

Very interesting! I will have to try the oil pastels approach. Thanks! I hope they have a lot of colors. I'm hoping to alter skintones to match heads.

Here's what I've tried so far on my Phicens:

- Chalk pastel - Sticks pretty well. Takes a lot of rubbing to remove. No cracking. Not so great as far as control and uniform color application. I grind it down, mix with water, paint it like water color.

- Acrylic - Looks better if you paint VERY thin layers. If you never move your figure (or barely) this is OK. Sadly, thin layers rub off easily, even with minor handling. Dullcoat fixative does nothing except make it all look shiny. In any case, movement will cause cracks to appear in the paint when it has dried enough. Early on, no cracks appear as the paint is still drying, but give it a few weeks or months and they'll come. Or use dullcoat to speed up the cracking

- Acrylic with fabric medium (as it supposedly makes the paint flexible) - Not much better. Movement still cracks it eventually. Also, shiny as hell.

The Phicen skin surprised with how sturdy it is and how well it can be cleaned up. You can really scrub and wash it repeatedly with no visible damage. Certain stubborn chalk pastel stains did eventually come out, but they took repeated hard scrubbing. The way the body held up, it almost felt like working with real skin.

Not really my area of expertise at all, but interesting none the less.

I thought Shovelchop might have pitched in here as he has a lot of experience with paint and different materials?

I wonder if airbrushing the paint on would make a difference, rather than hand painting? I wonder if a thinner layer of paint might be less prone to cracking? But then there is the adherence problem, and would that be more evident with a thinner layer of paint?

Questions i'm afraid rather than answers!!

Sorry

Paul

Thanks, ZombieKev, for sharing your experience.

Paul, if anyone modified a seamless body physically, it wold be shovelchop, but I don't recall him doing so. At any rate, that would have been a requirement before proceeding to messing with the paint.

Speaking of which, if one really really wanted to match skin tones (and wasn't making e.g. Hellboy), one could always repaint the head. Even if you're not super experienced as a painter, if you can match the body's skin tone, you can carefully avoid the eyes and eyebrows and lips and get a decent match. I repainted several heads (to a various extents) for my M35 review photos and other recent projects.

First attempt at painting Phicen/TBLeague seamless silicone body with Staedtler oil pastels (the 16-color pack from 241).

NOTE that these are not jumbo sized like Ephiane's, and it is more difficult to get an even, consistent color. I have also made only one oil pastel application so far, results would presumably improve by applying a second or third. Again, these are just the preliminary results from the initial test.

I used my flayed M31 rubbery silicone "skin" that I keep around for experimenting. I washed it with soap and water, made sure it was reasonably sticky, and applied the Staedtler oil pastel labeled "Van Dyke brown" to mostly just the right half of the body, so I you can see the difference (keep in mind that M31 happens to have the darkest version of Phicen "suntan"). It might have been easier to paint a body with its skeleton still inside it, and the smaller floppier parts (like the arms and lower legs) were the hardest to paint. After applying the oil pastel, I used a makeup sponge (shown) to remove excess pastel. I didn't put anything on the sponge (Ephiane noted if you want shiny skin you can put some water and soap). As you can see, plenty of pastel transferred onto the makeup sponge and onto a cotton q-tip I used to test with. However, after the application of the sponge, pastel did not transfer nearly as easily as before. I dabbed rather aggressively with white cloth, and there was no color transfer; wiping aggressively produced some limited color transfer onto the white cloth, and perhaps that might have been even less (or none at all) if I had done more sponging. It does appear that the color is permanently ensconced onto the skin.



Ephiane recommends multiple applications of oil pastel, using the sponge between each. Ephiane, chime in if you have further advice or clarifications. What makeup sponge type do you use? Do you use anything on the oil pastel other than tidying-up with the sponge at the end of the process?

Wow, I'm impressed. I think if you go over it a few times you build up a few applications, you may get more even tones. That, and it might be worth wetting the sponge a bit when you wipe between layers, just so it helps blend (these are just guesses, based on working with similar materials). And if you want to keep the more matte look, you can probably just use a dry sponge on the final layer. But seriously, I'm really impressed with the results. Thanks GubernatorFan for taking a shot at this, and Ephiane for figuring it out. Maybe it's time for me to finally give this a shot.

ReverendSpooky wrote:Wow, I'm impressed.  I think if you go over it a few times you build up a few applications, you may get more even tones.  That, and it might be worth wetting the sponge a bit when you wipe between layers, just so it helps blend (these are just guesses, based on working with similar materials).  And if you want to keep the more matte look, you can probably just use a dry sponge on the final layer. But seriously, I'm really impressed with the results.  Thanks GubernatorFan for taking a shot at this, and Ephiane for figuring it out.  Maybe it's time for me to finally give this a shot.  

You are welcome -- for my part. Yes, I expect more applications (not to call them exactly layers) would help (or a more deliberate, careful, and systematic approach than mine, which was fairly hurried and experimental). Somewhere I read about using a little Gamsol on the oil pastels to help blending -- it was meant for blending different colors together (which could be valuable here too) on a more conventional medium, but perhaps that too can help make the pastel more even. I am (cautiously -- we don't want to jinx it) optimistic.

Great Work ! You see the parts of the skin that needs a secound layer with oil pastels... and a third.... and a 4, 5 ..... maybe not only in one direction, not only up and down. In a circle to... and again... and again . Can´t wait to see the figure You planed and the headsculpt You choose.

Ephiane wrote:Great Work ! You see the parts of the skin that needs a second layer with oil pastels... and a third.... and a 4, 5 ..... maybe not only in one direction, not only up and down. In a circle to... and again... and again . Can´t wait to see the figure You planed and the headsculpt You choose.

Thanks, Ephiane! Yes, there are plenty of places where more pastel is needed for a more consistent color. I was going to ask you about the coloring technique -- I did use mostly straight-ish lines (though not always in the same direction or angle), but was wondering if going in a circle might be better and you have just confirmed this.

That's great work, GF. I can see where there's a learning curve, but you've taken (and shared with us) the first steps and I appreciate it.

dadrab wrote:That's great work, GF. I can see where there's a learning curve, but you've taken (and shared with us) the first steps and I appreciate it.

Thank you dadrab! I hope to vindicate those supportive sentiments with something more finished on an actual figure. And we owe all this to Ephiane sharing some of the secrets behind her magic.

awesome thread! Thanks @Ephiane for the super interesting insight, I'd love to see more "behind the scene" from your projects, your work is so inspiring!

This is such a useful thread!
I don't have any seamless bodies, but the information here is fascinating and so many people have wanted to do this over the years!
Hat's off to all the great tips!

I finally got around to painting an entire functional TBLeague seamless body with the oil pastels. They do not seem to be very easy to mix where brown colors are concerned, so I stuck to one color (Van Dyke Brown), which matches a couple of the heads I have gotten pretty closely. Matching the result with acrylics for the harder plastic hands and feet has been a pain, however, and still a work in progress (using the pastel on the harder plastic does not work as well, since I was able to rub it off with a q tip). Anyway, here is the result. I am just showing the possibility, so don't get hung up on how suitable the body is for the character or why he's wearing Manchester United shorts.

I used Staedtler oil pastels on the M30 body after having washed it with soap and water (to make it sticky) and dried it. Then I used a makeup sponge on the pastel, rinsed and dried the body again, and applied protective powder. Almost no color transfer from the pastel to the clothing (probably should have done more smoothing with the sponge and rinsing).

Fantastic ! You did it ! Ladys and Gentlemen... the first Phicen African Body !

Thank you, Ephiane! You made it all possible after sharing your discovery.

Really impressive results with the oil pastels, and thanks all for being so descriptive about the techniques. Tempted to try this on a spare white M34 Death Dealer body. I’m curious to know about the stability over time both in terms of colour and any material deterioration. Oil and some types of silicone don’t mix. For example, oil is often used as a destabiliser for silicone sealant to remove it. Some silicones are more oil resistant. No idea what Phicen’s recipe is though!

MarkEl wrote: I’m curious to know about the stability over time both in terms of colour and any material deterioration.  Oil and some types of silicone don’t mix.  For example, oil is often used as a destabiliser for silicone sealant to remove it.  Some silicones are more oil resistant.  No idea what Phicen’s recipe is though!

Ephiane and others can answer this better than me. The African body repaint is only a few days old. My original experiment (on the de-skeletalized M31 body) is a few weeks (actually almost two months) older than that, and no real issues yet. The only minor/tangent issue is that (given my typical lack of patience) I need to do more smoothing with the makeup sponge or maybe more rinsing before applying the protective powder, as there is a tiny amount of pastel transferring on tight clothing. The body does not become discolored, and I have noticed no issues with its silicon surface.

The oil pastels are on my Figures for months now and the phichen skin is in excellent condition. On the green body i used nail polish remover, very aggressiv stuff. I do this because i want the body in his old color for a another bash. no way, it´s still green ... but the effect is it looks more shiny now.

Don´t know what kind of silicon phichen used, but i´m sure they will not tell us

Now I'm going to have to give oil pastels a try. I've been avoiding it out of fear. I'm still using chalk pastels, which takes longer on a M34. does anyone use shu uemara oil products to remove stains?