Outpost 206

 This article is the first in what I hope will be a series that details each part of my toy making process, starting with how I make the most common type of silicone rubber mold that I use to duplicate either parts of or an entire figure: the one-part mold (also known as a “cut” mold). If time allows, I’ll eventually roll out more How I Do It articles about other types of molds, everything I know about resin casting, painting, customizing/oversculpting on existing parts, and anything else that springs to mind. But for now, I want to focus on cut molds. I’ll start by first listing my equipment and materials before getting into what a one-part cut mold is, what it is not, and why I prefer them to two-part molds. My Equipment and Materials: Ablaze 1.5 Gallon Vacuum Chamber and Pump Kit Note that the placement of pressure regulator on my is not in the same position as the kit you can currently buy on Amazon. I don’t know why this is, but the steps for using it remain the same. Specia

I started out this week in crafting with a fresh (and festive) new plastic mat for my casting corner. The old one was so weighed down with cured resin that it felt like it weighed 25 pounds. Progress on the Mr. Boneface series is continuing to trundle along. Despite what I said in a previous Shop Log, I did end up casting all the figures’ base stands in rigid urethane resin (Specialty Resin and Chemical’s Model Pro Slow) because there’s no way to really do these in lightweight Flex-It 90 resin unless I retooled the bases for a third time to be even thicker (and even that isn’t a guarantee) and yeah, I was beyond sick of messing with them at this point. This is probably the last time I’ll ever include bases with a figure I plan to sell, even if that means retooling (heck, re-engineering) the action figure’s feet and legs to better compensate for the weight and balance issues that arise from the figures being cast in a lighter weight resin. I’ve done it before with my prototype werew

Oof, I guess I missed a week. One of my goals is to upload some kind of blog post at least once every seven days, but what can I say? I was busy. I’m still busy. Here’s some of what I’ve been up to… I finally kitbashed the last weapon (well, next-to-last as you’ll see later on) for my Mr. Boneface figures, giving the I, Mercenari -inspired design his handheld sickle. The blade I sculpted out of polymer clay, when ended up looking much better than the previous attempt that I made from Green Stuff and ultimately ended up hating. After making a silicone mold of said sickle, I tried out some metallic mica powder for the first time to pigment the resin and I really like how it looks. I also molded and cast five copies of this cool sword in the same batches. I decided to throw out the nunchuks I previously  made for the Toxic Slime Pit Mr. Boneface design and I’m giving it this sword as a pack-in weapon instead. I just couldn’t attach the little bit of chain in a way that I thought loo

I wanted to get one more Shop Log in before July ended, but I just missed the mark. I did, however, make some progress on the Mr. Boneface series since my last update , casting weapons for two of the figures (with one I still need to make and mold) as well as casting a set of display stands for one of three designs. Unfortunately, there’s some weight and balance issues with the stands. I cast the them in the same lightweight Flex-It 90 resin and unlike the urethane resin master part, it doesn’t fully support the figures and causes some of them to lean. I did rework the stand, adding additional mass by bulking out the underside with a flat layer of Milliput, and re-molding it. I haven’t gotten the chance to cast any of the reworked molds in resin yet. If it still doesn’t work, I’ll probably just cast all the stands in rigid urethane resin since I know for a fact that those will support the figures without any issues. I would just rather not go down that route since I’d rather use that