Shop Log – 2/11/23

I say again, I want to cut down on the number of shop log entries this year as I attempt to pivot back to project-specific articles but the lack of updates these past few months irks me. So here’s a top-down look on the projects and side projects that I’ve been working on as of late.

Here’s the progression of the designer action figure project to date, with the original clay sculpt in the back with the successive working parts from additional castings and sets of waste molds (cast in both flexible resin for test fitting purposes as well as rigid urethane and epoxy resins). As I continue to work out the articulation, I’ve been casting the parts in epoxy resin because for working parts/prototypes like these, it’s much easier to sand, surface, cut, and modify parts with epoxy clays if they’re cast in a hard, rigid resin than the flexible resin that I typically use for final action figure castings.

I’ve made solid progress on the articulation phase of my designer action figure project (the Phase 2 article hopefully coming soon), though I have hit a bit of a snag that requires further problem-solving. My method of creating articulation sockets was successful, with snug fits and fluid rotation, but there are some noticeable gaps between the arms (and a slight unevenness where the torso attaches to the waist) that prevents the surfaces from being as flush as I would have liked them to be. The next step is yet more trial and error until I get it right. Joy.

Another recent obsession of mine has to do with creating tiny silicone molds of Glyos figures parts and duplicating them in flexible resin, piece by piece, to eventually create as many custom Glyos figures as I want. Particularly, I want to create molds for each of these two figures from Rocom Toys’ Maniax line of 3” Glyos System compatible figures that I recently picked up on Big Bad Toy Store. Shown here is the glow-in-the-dark Slasher and the Red Gunner Commando (as well as all the interchangeable head portraits that came with them). Obviously, these aren’t anything that I plan to sell and are custom figures for my own amusement, but I’m loving the potential here. I plan to make an article just on this mold making process with a series of separate articles to follow detailing the custom figures I plan to make with the duplicated Glyos parts that I produce from these molds.

My focus over the last week or so has been on making molds of all the parts that have a socket in them where a Glyos joint connects. Since I’m using the run-of-the-mill low viscosity BBDINO silicone from Amazon, these parts in particular need to have the sockets pre-filled with silicone prior to their actual molds being made. The patented Glyos joint has a very distinctive, hamburger-like shape and great care needs to be taken to mold the parts that have the mating sockets for these joints or else the joints won’t properly port into them. But again, I’ll elaborate more about that in this project’s dedicated article. I did manage to successfully create molds of all the socket-bearing parts and I have the molds for the Slasher character’s arms, legs, and heads curing as of this writing (and should be ready for an initial resin casting later tonight). But here’s some sample parts that I already molded and recasted that I snapped onto the original figure to see if they would work. They work.

It’s been a little quiet on the sculpting side of things, but I did get the idea that a good way to get practice and improve my polymer clay sculpting would be to make upscaled versions of tiny keshi figures. I started with making a 5-inch version of Abdullah from the vintage M.U.S.C.L.E. line and this is where I left off a few weeks back. I began sculpting this when I was still at my family’s place in Ohio for most of January and since I’ve come back, I’ve been too busy with all my molding and casting stuff to circle back around to this one. But I plan to finish this M.U.S.C.L.E. upscale fairly soon and start on another one, probably when I wrap up my Glyos project. Expect some dedicated articles on my keshi upscales and the aforementioned Glyos project as well. Also, that head I started sculpted is way too big and I’m going to bin it and start on a new one. Sigh.

I’ve also been wanting to get back into painting more, particularly miniature painting. So to help me along, I’ve been trying out some speed painting techniques using my (still limited) range of Citadel Contrast paints on some random practice projects. I ordered the Army Painter Speed Paints starter set as well, so I’m excited to try more of those out as well. So far, the only Army Painter Speed Paint that I own is Grim Black, but I really like it. Here are two minis that I kitbashed using some Heroclix as a base figure with some extra Stargrave and Reaper Bones bits glued on. I’m going to do an article about this little side project as well, since it was a really fun process that I think is worth writing about. I just need to do some touch-ups here and there and hit them with a clearcoat. Sorry about the lousy picture, it’s been so long since I last painted a miniature that I forgot how hard these things are to photograph.

I’ll close out this Shop Log here. I know 2023 has been pretty light on blog posts thus far, but I’m hoping I can turn that around. If the crafting gods are willing and the creek doesn’t rise, expect a slew of new project-specific articles in the days and weeks to come.