A CROWN IS BORN../ The Hobbit Dwarves etc.. WIP's & Finished Builds Part 2

Done pretty much the figure itself just need to do all his accessories such as long sword, bomb igniter flare, maybe a Rohirran soldier's head? Some arrows to stick into him and lots of blood! He's looking a bit purple for some reason, maybe it's the lighting, not sure but red ink for the blood should sort that out as he will be covered in it, if it cracks, well so does real drying blood. Lurtz is in for a wardrobe makeover, needed more leather and it all needs to be painted with black ink, had to mod his head connector. Funny how he dwarfs the Beserker, no idea where that body came from, thought it was a WWE one but nope, totally different.

The Berseker looks great. If I were you, I'd leave him arrow-free -- as in before he gets shot. But you are more adventurous than I. It's not just a matter of piercing the TPE, but also the practical challenges of having a figure with arrows sticking from all over it. The size comparison with the other figure is interesting. These are probably TBLeague's beefiest bodies, but not their tallest.

He looks amazing! I'm am especially impressed by those foul teeth you painted there!
The hands and feet work really well with the leather. I was skeptical at first about their size, but you obviously know what you're doing, and now they are perfect.

They look great side by side.

GubernatorFan wrote:The Berseker looks great. If I were you, I'd leave him arrow-free -- as in before he gets shot. But you are more adventurous than I. It's not just a matter of piercing the TPE, but also the practical challenges of having a figure with arrows sticking from all over it. The size comparison with the other figure is interesting. These are probably TBLeague's beefiest bodies, but not their tallest.

As for piercing the silicone, you have to break eggs to make an omelette (or in my case throw a grenade into the fridge, shut the door and make a diorama and and robot figure out of whatever's left ). I still have no idea where Lurtz's body came from, maybe a 13" DC Direct figure? On the positive side the actor who played Lurtz also played The Witch King of Agmar in full armour and was pretty big!

Diana wrote:He looks amazing! I'm am especially impressed by those foul teeth you painted there!
The hands and feet work really well with the leather. I was skeptical at first about their size, but you obviously know what you're doing, and now they are perfect.

Thanks Diana! It's all just part of experimenting and having fun, if the hands hadn't worked I'd have used others .

shazzdan wrote:They look great side by side.

Cheers Shazzdan! Neither are finished yet, well Lurtz was but he's getting upgrades.

I recoloured the body again (10th time?) with red ink, got fed up with pastels, seems to work fine, I then added the black war-paint/camo with ink again so now he looks like he should as you can see next to the 1/12 version, might need to touch up the white here and there but minor stuff. Lurtz got some black ink too for his leather to be more movie accurate and I'll be giving him new one piece greaves as the others were cut half way up because of his weird ankle articulation.

I think the Berserker body already looked fine, but very impressive new results. Remember you can change the position of the shoulders as needed (there is a special thread in Tutorials in case they get stuck while rotating). Lurtz looks much more striking now.

GubernatorFan wrote:I think the Berserker body already looked fine, but very impressive new results. Remember you can change the position of the shoulders as needed (there is a special thread in Tutorials in case they get stuck while rotating). Lurtz looks much more striking now.

Thanks GTF! Cool tip!

I like all the new coloring. Really impressed how he’s turned out.

Stryker2011 wrote:I like all the new coloring. Really impressed how he’s turned out.

Thanks Stryker!

Had a bit of a DOH! moment when trying to make passable Elven styled arrows completely forgetting I had just received 20 perfect 1/6 Elven arrows with my 2 new Elven archers...
Anyway.. Sharpened a very narrow chisel and pushed that through the body to cut a self healing channel for a complete arrow with broadhead tip (even the perplexing Elvish ones that seem to be designed not to penetrate like small game hunting tips) which was then inserted with silicone oil. The third arrow, a Rohirrim one, had to be cut in two as it was too short and the metal frame of the body was blocking it. I've since added paints for blood, super glue to the white hand symbols (then gone over with matte clear), 3D puff paint to create blood rivulets (yet to be painted as still curing); rust and gloss clear coat on all the armour/helmet. I've started making the igniter for the explosives set off by the Berserker and have bits to start making his Great Sword.



















USE SILICONE OIL ON THE ARROW!

EDIT - after a false alarm about images not posting from Imgur, they seem to post. It just takes forever, but it works in the end. Hopefully it will speed up.

Wow. That’s impressive. Like all the arrows, and the torch is coming along.

More excellent progress, Alex. Your approach is intrepid and not for the faint of heart. But you know what you're doing, and doing it very well. This is probably a different medium, but I was reminded of the hair dryer method of quickly drying running acrylic paint on top of a rubbery surface, so it stops running/crawling.

GubernatorFan wrote:EDIT - after a false alarm about images not posting from Imgur, they seem to post. It just takes forever, but it works in the end. Hopefully it will speed up.

It's Saturday night over here (and the rest of Europe!) so might have something to do with it.

Stryker2011 wrote:Wow. That’s impressive. Like all the arrows, and the torch is coming along.

Cheers!!

GubernatorFan wrote:More excellent progress, Alex. Your approach is intrepid and not for the faint of heart. But you know what you're doing, and doing it very well. This is probably a different medium, but I was reminded of the hair dryer method of quickly drying running acrylic paint on top of a rubbery surface, so it stops running/crawling.

I'm sure I tried that, you need very thick paint or it blows it all over the place! Not having much luck with my blood effects right now, I know 'they' say only a bad workman blames his tools (of course 'they' don't know s**t or they wouldn't need a workman! ) but my paints are pretty old now and misbehaving, my puff paint went flat and my Gory Red paint is so dried out it won't even mix with hot water. I need to order some new materials! The last time I remember using that black puff paint was back in Greece working on my super BD Vader from the computer game! 15 years ago?!

Yeah, 15 years may be a bit too much to expect from paint. But I'm sure you'll overcome the problem beautifully.

GubernatorFan wrote:Yeah, 15 years may be a bit too much to expect from paint. But I'm sure you'll overcome the problem beautifully.

15 years ago is when I last used it, probably bought it in high school! . I don't know about beautiful but I've cleaned the 'mess' up and gone with the Less Is More Bauhaus principle on the blood. Still have 3 arrows but they are placed more accurately to the movie for the suicidal Berserker's charge to the bombs (I guess luckily Middle Earth as opposed to Middle East didn't have bomb vests). Finished up the igniter torch and ready for paint sans flames/smoke etc.. Made a start on the Great Sword and now the hilt finally fits in his hands after a stupid amount of sanding with different machines and by hand too. Nothing exciting sorry.























JUST ORDERED THIS FOR THE NEXT BUILD, KING OF THE DEAD. SAYS 35cm TALL BUT THAT'S WITH THE STAND/BASE AND THE FEET HANGING VIRTICALLY SO HOPING IT WILL BE CLOSER TO 30CM!







TO MAKE

That should be really cool. Hopefully you’re right about the size.

Nice progress, and exciting new build on the horizon.

Very cool really, that torch is looking really good. The uruk and his clothes and helmet is also spot on.

Stryker2011 wrote:That should be really cool. Hopefully you’re right about the size.

Cheers! Hopefully but at the end of the day he's a magical(?!) King and leaders tend to be tall anyway... I'll probably only be using parts incorporated into a regular body, think Zombie builds.

GubernatorFan wrote:Nice progress, and exciting new build on the horizon.

Cheers GTF! Ordered another bag of mail for it too.

Theboo-bomb wrote:Very cool really, that torch is looking really good. The uruk and his clothes and helmet is also spot on.

Thanks TBB! I'm hoping to get the 'torch' to light up as well, but it's not regular flames because it's burning black powder, more like a very big sparkler!!

Built an LED system with power source that is enclosed inside the igniter's body which is sealed around it because who ever changes the batteries in their figures? As an owner of a stupid amount of HT and custom built Iron Man figures I can tell you I never have, the lights are nice for taking pics of the finished builds or a new figure but rarely get used again (except for EL wire stuff that has an external power source with normal batteries and an accessible on/off switch). This will simulate the black powder (could be thermite I suppose) flaring white/blue hot as per the movie (I guess it was more dramatic than lighting a fuse but too wet for both in reality lol). I'll be cutting up the translucent Star Wars 'hologram' base to use for this effect covering the LED.









SWITCH

Very cool work and effect. I recognize the visual continuity with other Middle Earth baddies.

That torch is going to be so cool all lit up. Awesome stuff, Alex. Where will you hid that switch?

Stryker2011 wrote:That torch is going to be so cool all lit up. Awesome stuff, Alex. Where will you hid that switch?

Isn't that the switch, in the base of the torch's crown in a couple of the shots?

Ahh, yeah. You’re right. Good eye.

GubernatorFan wrote:Very cool work and effect. I recognize the visual continuity with other Middle Earth baddies.

Cheers GTF! What generally spikey and flamey? Well you need to praise the costume and prop designers for that.

Stryker2011 wrote:That torch is going to be so cool all lit up. Awesome stuff, Alex. Where will you hid that switch?

GubernatorFan wrote:

Stryker2011 wrote:That torch is going to be so cool all lit up. Awesome stuff, Alex. Where will you hid that switch?

Isn't that the switch, in the base of the torch's crown in a couple of the shots?

Stryker2011 wrote:Ahh, yeah. You’re right. Good eye.

You had me laughing there Stryker! I obviously hid it VERY well even with the pictures titled 'SWITCH' and using a macro camera setting!

Painted the body up with a mix of primers and black matte top coat but have yet to finish the painting to make it rusting iron. I cut, Dremelled, sawed the translucent base up to fit together like jigsaw bits and avoid the spikes while still completely covering the LED. Gluing them was a nightmare, super glue wouldn't work (no idea why) so mixed it with Revell model kit glue (both clear transparent glues which is what I wanted) but that wouldn't cure properly either so I had to use Bison glue (translucent but has a yellow hue) with super glue to finally get the stupid plastic to bond but now it's not a transparent bond so I've been scraping away at the glue as much as I dare to minimise the effect on the lighting feature. Took quite a while for something I thought would be simple but I'm not in a rush and it's starting to look the part.

Very creative solution!

It looks gorgeous! Sorry about your troubles with the glue, but glad to see you surmount them. As for the continuity of baddie design, I mean the pairs (or double pairs) of spikes -- like the wraith king's crown, or the tower of Mordor, or this torch, etc.

skywalkersaga wrote:Very creative solution!

Cheers! It's kind of like a very stumpy lightsabre!

GubernatorFan wrote:It looks gorgeous! Sorry about your troubles with the glue, but glad to see you surmount them. As for the continuity of baddie design, I mean the pairs (or double pairs) of spikes -- like the wraith king's crown, or the tower of Mordor, or this torch, etc.

Ah good point (pun?) ! I wonder if they represent the cardinal points on a map? Indicating Sauron's plan to spread in every direction?

That is so cool. Well done.