Marvel Universe Action Figure Customs -Eternity

Without a doubt one of the most interesting looking characters in the Marvel pantheon, I knew I had to add this cosmic entity to my collection. I waffled back and forth on how I wanted to make him for a few years, always thinking about working on one of the old Marvel Legends icons silver surfer bucks like so many had done before.

What it all boiled down to was either waiting for the custom to be perfect or wanting to get it done, and I wanted to get it done. I had scrapped some test pieces I had made and a fabric cape and started in on a Marvel Titan hero figure I got on sale for $7.99. These guys are actually great for crafting some of the larger cosmic characters that don't do much but stand around, I wound up picking up another one to make The Living Tribunal.

I started by sanding down some raised features from the Electro head (I know, I know, I left the ears, but they didn't really bother me, and they still don't) such as the lightning bolts on his forehead. All the cut and sanded areas were then polished with finer and finer grits of sandpaper and finally smoothed and cleaned with acetone.

The figure was washed with a mild dish detergent to remove hand oils and mold release agents. I can't bring up enough how important it is to do this BEFORE PAINTING. It's terrible to nearly complete a custom figure, finish painting some details and rip half the paint off with your masking tape. Trust me, spend five minutes washing it in the kitchen, let it dry for a few hours, THEN begin your painting.

The rubbery bits of plastic (Head and hands) were primed with Tamiya gray primer brushed on from a jar. It dries ultra fast so he was ready to paint in quick order. I painted his main under coat with Model Master black gloss lacquer from a spray can. He was then sprayed in a foggy pattern over the whole body with a metallic blue lacquer.

I followed up the spray paint with some airbrush work, trying my best to give him the look of the famous "Pillars of Creation" Hubble image. I used yellows, blues, fluorescent red all sprayed to give him cloudy nebulous look. In the meantime I stayed away from certain areas and made sure other areas carried over between his arms and cape.

Speaking of the cape, this one was made from plastic as I was able to achieve a desired effect of transparency with it. His headpiece and cape were both cut from an old action figure package and then heated over the stove until they began to droop, they were then formed over the figures body to give them some shape. I loved being able to make the pieces slightly transparent during painting and the effect looks killer in person with light behind him.

Once areas were blocked in with the airbrush, good old fashioned brush painting began. Using many of the same colors as I airbrushed, edges were delineated, more tiny effects were added and finally Stars were picked out throughout. I also gave certain of the stars a lens flare effect to bring them ever closer to my reference photos. Finally he was coated with a few layers of Future floor polish run through the airbrush. This gave him great shiny factory finish.

All in all I wound up thrilled with this big guy. He looks great on the shelf with his cosmic brethren and after about 5 years he's finally done. As a bonus it also gave me the jumpstart to finish the Living Tribunal as well. He is featured in two of the shots with his head mounted and his neck trimmed down to the shoulders and the resulting hole blanked off with sheet styrene. After I sculpt the rest of the head, probably in Apoxie Sculpt, I'll begin painting  and final assembly.

Custom Action Figures- General Hurst Romodi

After watching Rogue One a few times I have had the uncontrollable urge to begin completion of certain subjects of my action figure collecting. I went back and started gathering some more of the Imperial officers present at the Death Star briefing in A New Hope. Fortunately Hasbro tackled a few of the officers in their SAGA boxset. Aside from the box set there had been a fantastic figure of Admiral Motti made during POTF2 which I customized and wrote about in a previous blog entry. But we were still missing General Hurst Romodi who popped up again in Rogue one as well as Trech Molock. Also on my list of figures to make are two of the Imperial Security Bureau officers that walk by the Death Star elevators in A New Hope.

 General Romodi would be the first of the two ANH officers that I would tackle to complete the briefing. Facilitating this is the (I think) Fantastic Director Krennic body that came out in the new Rogue One toy-line. Do I wish it had more than 5 Points of articulation? Sure do. But am I happy with it as an easy base to customize Imperial Officers? ABSOLUTELY!!! The base figure has great proportions a nice detailed sharp sculpt and can be easily modified and painted.

After trimming off the holster from his skirt portion his whole body was sanded with a fine grit sanding pad and he was then washed with a mild kitchen soap to remove any oils and release agents he may have had from handling and molding. His rank badge was trimmed in half to get a single row of six studs.

I had to source a new head for him and luckily I had a Vintage Collection Darth Sidious head rolling around in my spares box (His body was turned into the ROTJ Emperor in a previous blog entry). The head had all the hair trimmed off including eyebrows and was then sanded down and smoothed with a q-tip soaked in lacquer thinner. He was then completely repainted except for his eyes. I declined to sculpt his very thin hair opting instead to simply paint it on with an ultra fine brush in layers to give it the look I wanted to achieve. I looked to reference from the new Rogue One Visual Guide for how to paint his features, as well as any reference stills I could find of the original character form ANH. I think I wound up striking a nice balance.

Paints used were all Testors Model Master acrylics. They had great adhesion once the plastic was washed and sanded. They also brush on wonderfully smooth. Neutral gray was used on the fabric portions of his uniform, it strikes a nice balance with the grays of the other officers from Hasbro. His uniform was also shaded in some deep areas with Vallejo model color paints, Green-Grey and Grey Black, to add some visual interest. He was finished off with a light coat of Krylon Matte spray to seal him up and help avoid paint rub.

Next up were the two gentleman from the Imperial Security Bureau. They were painted to a lesser degree, but were still a fun 2 day project. I began again with the awesome Krennic body from the 5 POA line.They had their holsters cut off and the skirt portions were sanded and smoothed with lacquer thinner. The badges were cut off, which in retrospect was not the greatest choice, while I made replacements form styrene, they came out a little chunky in comparison. I plan to potentially redo them at some point.

The officers also had belt boxes added made from styrene chips. I had looked at options for adding hats to the figures and pricing it out, I just didn't want to spend the money on trying to get heads wearing hats, whether they be resin casts or plucked form fodder figures. SO I sculpted the hats from Apoxie Sculpt. I wound up really happy with them. Once cured, the circular hat device was added from a slice of styrene rod. The heads themselves are both Indiana Jones heads from the 2008 figure line. They fit perfectly onto the bodies, and with some slight mods and paint (Bushy 70's sideburns were important!) they looked different enough next to each other, one had a mustache added with Apoxie Sculpt.

All in all, these three figures make a great addition to the imperial side of things and I'm super excited to continue finishing off some more baddies using the new figures from Rogue One. Ahead on my slate I'd like to try to make some more officers seen throughout the Death Star, including the officers wearing pants and shoes instead of breeches and boots, i'd also like to take a stab at the greatcoat officers seen on Jedha before the Death Star attack.

Coming up sooner than that are my Grand Moff Tarkin repaint, Trech Molock and my more articulated K-2SO, as well as some Marvel Comics custom figures.