CUSTOMISING ACTION FIGURES
Not happy with your Total Justice:
Green Lantern? --Always wanted a Grand Admiral Thrawn figure? --Wonder
when the Lara Croft (From TOMB RAIDER Duh!) figure will be made? Well then
it sounds like customising is for YOU!
This is a hobby I recently picked up and I just Love it! The whole idea
of taking a crappy Kenner "Jungle flame throwing arsehole" Batman, and
turning it into an ACTUAL Batman totally appeals to me. "How do I get started?"
you might ask. Well one Great way is to buy TOYFARE by WIZARD PRESS (See
Links). This magazine is a figure collectors bible, and it has a handy
section on Customising. You might also want to subscribe to the Customize
mailing list, here you can ask questions about customising, and get answers
from people who have been customising for ages. Very helpful.
Tools of the
trade
To really get into customising you will have to spend a bit of money (A
bit?!?!) One thing it appears all customisers need is a DREMEL. It is a
multipurpose tool for sanding, grinding and drilling. I don't have one
myself (YET!!), but I will be getting one
as soon as I have the funds. Anyway here is a list of some of the tools
you'll need...
X-Acto Knife (Since I just started
I'm using a Stanley knife)
A paint Primer (I'm using Humbrol
Base Cote, doesn't however work as a colour primer)
An airbrush would be good
Paint thinners
Paint (Duh)
Variable brush sizes
Variable Sandpaper grains
Super Sculpey (I couldn't find
it over here in NZ, so I just use Tamiya epoxy putty)
Various Sculpting tools (Such as
Pins, paperclips, needles etc...)
A Dremel (Lucky for some :( )
A Base figure (Since building a
figure from scratch is hard it's best to customise a Base figure)
A Target figure idea (Basically
the figure you want the Base figure to look like at the end) You don't
need all of that stuff but it helps. Now you can create your figure, go
nuts, practice on old crappy figures.
Recipes
None yet, but coming soon are my Tomb Raider one, and Kyle Katarn
from Jedi Knight!
Anatomy
This is a new feature on my Figure page, If you've ever
wanted to pull apart your valuable POTF2 figures but your afraid you'll
screw it up royally, then you'll love this. I've put together a series
of pics which are schematics of Action figures so you can see how they
are constructed. I'm kicking it off with one of the more popular figure
lines out....ENJOY!!!
Mikes'
Gallery
Ok...I finally
got some customs done, so check 'em out.
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