Emeralds custom bloks (pic heavy)

So after weeks of waiting only to find out it has been lost in post and getting very annoyed with the whole thing, my replacement finally arrived. Yes I finally got my TMNT 2003 Battle Shell bridge set. With the new series reingniting my TMNT fandom can you guess what my latest project is?





Had to mod the battle shell build a little to fit the WOW bodies. Need to get some more clay!!!
Gonna go for a hybrid of the 2003 and 2012 turtles. Not quite as beefcake as 2003 and not quite as slim as 2012. Thinking of making the shells in the same way as my wargreymon brave shield and weird lion thing shield where I can clip the weapon holding peg onto the peg that goes into the turtles back, so I can have my WOW figs using a turtles shell as a shield.

Cowabunga.....

Oh man, I'm loving the Turtles! Modular shells is a great idea!

Can't wait to see what other characters you come up with...

Thanks man. The modular shells are actually more simple than I thought. Magnetos shield makes a perfect base.

Deffinitely need to make a shredder and splinter. Think I might wait for the new LEGO sets and use their heads.

I want to make custom Battle shell. The one I have is awesome but a bit small for my liking. In the show it was a huge armored truck with 4 seats and a small computer station in the back and still had room for the shell cycle. Anyone know of a good source of green bricks since I'm going to need alot of them. I'm looking a the Ben 10 car from character and looks pretty good. 200+ pieces for £10 seems like a good invesment.

A bit of unsolicited but well-meaning advice: Even if you prefer the milliput or whatever you're using, try adding the final detail stages with green stuff. It's a shame that such good sculpting is coming out with that rough, cracked finish. If nothing else, you can use small bits of GS to fill in those cracks.

Mike

If you are using milliput, try using just a little bit of water on a fingertip and smooth out the fingerprints, swirls or small cracks. Don't wait until the 'put is completely cured, but not too early either. And don't use too much water. Then let air dry...

and make sure you let the milliput "setup" for roughly 15 minutes after you knead it before you start sculpting with it. When its not sticky to the touch is a good way to know, won't have as many cracks that way.

Phoenixrising wrote:If you are using milliput, try using just a little bit of water on a fingertip and smooth out the fingerprints, swirls or small cracks. Don't wait until the 'put is completely cured, but not too early either. And don't use too much water. Then let air dry...

and make sure you let the milliput "setup" for roughly 15 minutes after you knead it before you start sculpting with it. When its not sticky to the touch is a good way to know, won't have as many cracks that way.

Huh... didn't know about the 15 minute thing with milliput. Maybe that's why I never had any luck with it.

LOKACollector wrote:A bit of unsolicited but well-meaning advice: Even if you prefer the milliput or whatever you're using, try adding the final detail stages with green stuff. It's a shame that such good sculpting is coming out with that rough, cracked finish. If nothing else, you can use small bits of GS to fill in those cracks.

Mike

I use apoxie sculpt. Its the only clay I have ever used and I really can see myself using anything else.

What is this green stuff? I don't think I have ever heard of such a thing. I don't think my sculpting is really that good, since I dont plan on ever selling my customs, I am generally more lax than I should be. Thanks for the advice and I'll be sure to apply it to my future customs..

Green stuff is Games Workshop's sculpting compound. It also come in Gray stuff and Brown stuff.

Is it really called green stuff? Seems a bit odd. How is it to use?

The proper generic name is kneadatite (which is the same stuff but a lot cheaper).

Using it is like sculpting bubblegum

The thing is, you can get really good results with bubblegum...

Its been a while since I updated this thread but with no materials to work with, there wasnt much I could do. My new supply of clay came in today though so I finally have some updates to show. The clay wasnt what i was expecting though. Instead of the strong white apoxie I got a softer grey kind. Im of 2 minds about it. On one hand its soft to carve details and doesn't sitck to my fingers as much, on the other it cant stretch as far and its hard to see any fingerprints I may have left.




Updated my turtles base. Finally have some shape to the legs and shell. I think the shell is looking a bit too big. It was sculpted on a web shield and is removable. So if I want it can be used as shield by other figs. Belt is a simple elastic band but im not sure if this will stay, could result in a lot of paint chipping...




Heres how the head is connected to the body. Since I like to keep my heads unaltered in case i want to put them back on the original body I take a megablocks head (usually Iron man) and cut it up enough to make a neck stump. Then push the head on. This is same method I used for my power ranger helmets.




Speaking of which here we have a shiny new Tyranno staff, donated buy a small statue I had lying around and smaller scalled WIP shark sword to work better with the samurai bloks. The other one was WAY too big.




New heads, female heads....



Since Garrus is a bad ass and laughs at pain, he took a nose dive and broke his ball joints. So I decided to resculpt him a new torso on top of an orc. Resculpting it is actually a good idea since there was a few mistakes i made on the first body that limited the play options I wanted to include. Now I can correct them.



Decided to finish my cyberman. Not much change on this one just fixed the wonky mid section. Now its just a simple paint-job.



If anyone can guess what this is going to be, I'll be seriously impressed. Doesnt look like much now but hopefully it will turn out well.

I do have one finished custom...but thats a secret

Great update E! I love the turtle, looks a little tall, but it's very good! The shield idea was brilliant, I'm glad you're sticking to it. PR weapons are coming along great, Female heads, always a plus, and WOW at that Cyberman, Did I miss him? Don't think I saw him before.

Thanks brave. I think its the angle of the first shot that makes the turtle body look a little tall. Also the front shell (not sure what a turtle's belly is called) is a bit too high up. Its meant to be in line with the under arms. I just need to shave it down. Whats the best way of adding elbow pads? I could just paint em on but that wont look as good. I want to shave the wrist bands to make room.

The cyberman isnt new by any means, I forgot about it a long time ago but I've decided to finally finish it. All it needs is a coat of paint.

those anime heads are perfect fit for cortana's female body.

JonRyan wrote:those anime heads are perfect fit for cortana's female body.

Yeah they work better than i thought they would. The second one need modding to properly fit on though.

Finished my turtles body.


Pretty happy with it, just wish I wasnt sculpting with this clay. Its too soft and doesnt cut right.

also

Diggin the turtle! Wow! And that robe is really well accented, very well done!

Somehow, you've actually made that turtle look like a teenager.

And I agree with BF - nice work on the fur trim.

LOKACollector wrote:Somehow, you've actually made that turtle look like a teenager.

And I agree with BF - nice work on the fur trim.

Well they are called "Teenage mutant ninja Turtles" I was aiming to replicate the slim figures of the new series. The older ones are too beefy for my liking. Looks like I succeeded.

Good to know you guys can tell its fur. I wasnt too sure on how it came out. Thanks.

Since LOKA expressed great interest in these when i offered them for casting, i decided to experiment with those microman hands. Here we have the smaller female hands and the bigger manlier superman hands modeled buy my Let it Snow contest entry. (WIP of course)


I'm going to f*** you up.


Swish!


Braaaiiiiinnnsss.....

The smaller scaled hands look the best IMO but i still like the superman ones. Ans ive just noticed his legs are on back wards

also iv had to restart another custom. The first one was too small, not enough room to work with.



Insert "witty" comment here.

Hmm - they are bit large, but definitely have potential.

That secoond custom is looking great!

I was annoyed when I found the need to restart it but now that it is finished, It was worth it. I give you the Mass Effect Blood Dragon armor.




Not having the right coloured paints and spare cash hard to come by right now, I had to improvise in some areas. I dry brushed the black parts with silver and applied a dark wash to the silver parts. The Dragon decal was always going to be a pain but It came out well on my first try no less. I didnt want to risk trying to make a better one. If theres one thing I not entirely happy with, its the sculpting. I swear this new clay is too different for my liking and my sculpting is hindered by it. The extra armor on the hips is limiting articultion slightly and has caused a couple of minor paint scuffs. Fortunatley the clay I used is grey and makes the paint scraping difficult to see. All in all, really proud of this guy.
Should have probably saved him for the let it snow challenge but no, He has another purpose.
Ref pic:


Also finished my Cyberman.




The paint wash was a pain in the ass on this guy. Halo body and legs, Ironman arms and Cyberman head. (duh!)


I opted not to paint the hands cause thats really hard to minimize without fucking up the grip. I'll just wait till I can find replacments.

Sculpting is beautiful on the Mass Effect Blood Dragon, E! You've done extraordinary work on this one, I think. Best custom yet from you! Cyberman is way too cool as well!

Great custom bro, you nailed every detail perfectly.

Wow! Nice work. Thanks for the ref pic. I'm not familiar with Mass Effect, so I needed something to compare.

Excellent job on that Mass Effect guy. I too haven't played the game but it looks spot on to me. Keep 'em comin!