Topic: Clonehead's Custom Figures reloaded

[Clonehead]

I carried the chest markings around to the back using the Fox figure as a guide.
  Since I was working with Model Master flat white, I went ahead and got the primary layer of white paint on some of the snow mando's armor plating, also.

[Clonehead]

Got yet more painting done on this fig.
I got the strip going down from the chest symbol but havent painted it extending down into the belly area. This figure has the ball type waist and when the figures upper body is facing forward, the lower belly area doesnt line up to the center. I might paint the lower part of the stripe off center in this area so that it lines up with the upper part.
I painted the markings on the back of the upper arm area and swept them to the sides to terminate in front of the elbow as shown in the Clone Wars visual guide. I noticed the graphics in the CW factory figure don't look like this.
I also noticed that the graphics shown on the CW factory figure's lower forearms below the elbow are not shown in the examples in the CW visual guide but I will probably add them anyway.
  Notice how that one elbow plate on the right is molded turned to the side a bit.
  I have a small touchup or two to make to the chest symbol that you can't see from these shots.

[Clonehead]

This figure is starting to shape up, I think.
  There are a few touchups that I still need to make on the parts that I have painted so far. And I have to touch up the factory black paint on his undercoverings.
I will wait to do the mods to his belt until I get a second matching guard this far along.
He does look pretty good posed next to Fox.
What do you guys think?

[Clonehead]

Thanks for that,Lighuen. And you can leave out the "sir". Just call me Clint or CH. It's interesting to see so many takes on a Legacy version of Rex out there already. I noticed that none of them had altered the belt, though. I am juiced now at the prospect of doing one but it will have to wait for a bit until I finish up another project or two. For me, it's never a good thing to have too many projects going on at once as it tends to intimidate me a bit.

I painted a little more on Coroscant guard #1 and finished his belly stripe as well as painted some similar graphics on the back of his lower forearms as shown in the pics of the CW figure version's pictures. I also did some touchups to the graphics on his helmet and chest logo areas.
All that's left on this one is to touch up the factory black undercoverings and alter and paint the belt.
  Now it's time to open up and start primary paintwork on Coroscant guard #2.

[Clonehead]

Got a few more pics to post, here.
I touched up the black areas on Guard #1 and posed him next to his partner, another clone trooper sargent, from the Saga line, this time. I was interested to notice that his factory paintjob appears to be by hand where the Legacy version was all sprayed.

In pic two, you can see that I have givin Guard #2 his primary flat white paint job.

In pic three, you can see that I have started his markings on the shoulders, head, and chest but havn't touched them up, yet.

In pic 4 you will notice that I still manage to work on the snow mando, when I get time. I have painted more of his armor white, and have started adding a wash of flat black at the outer edges of his armor, at the inside corners of his gauntlets, his holsters, and to the seams and outside edges of his ammo belt.

[Clonehead]

I thought you guys might enjoy a couple of shots showing me working on a custom from a different perspective.
This is usually how I like to detail paint my figures. On the floor, work real close, contact lenses out, looking over the top of my glasses, with my faithful furry companion either keeping me company or in the way

[Clonehead]

Ok folks, I don't have a lot of progress to show but I got a new camera today, and I need to experiment a bit to see how the pics turn out.
  I worked on touch ups to the chest emblem of Guard#2 today as well as added that triangle piece to the bottom.
After months, my favorite detail brush crapped out on me in the middle of this detail work so things went kind of slow.
  I picked up a new detail brush at Wallyworld today and I will try it out, a little later.
Now for some pics.
  I have posed Gaurd#1 and #2 together so you can guage how closely these painted-on details match each other on both figures.

[Clonehead]

These were shot in a medium light area, using a macro setting without a flash where with my old camera, I would be using a normal setting with a flash and still get darker shots. I can't wait to see how this camera preforms shooting in my light-box.
  The true test of how well this camera's macro function works will become evident in the last shot, here.
My old camera would never be able to focus this close.

[Clonehead]

I still want some snowey walker pics from you, Shawn, when you get a chance.

I took these shots, today, of the progress that I made last night on the one guard on the right. I painted his lower leg markings which still require some more touch-ups and the arrow shaped markings on his elbow plates.
  After that, I still have the markings on the backs of his upper and lower arms to do. Then, we can work on modification to their belts.

Progress is coming along on the snow mando figure, slowly but surely.

And, I'm still not dialed into how the camera's settings work best, yet.

[Clonehead]

I will tell you one thing Clint, you are the most level headed artist I have ever worked with.

LOL! Thanks buddy. Artists are usually a bit excitable or grumpy, arn't they?

After our chat, I stayed up a bit and wrapped up the painting of the red markings on Guard #2. I still need to repaint his flat black underclothing to clean up Hasbro's paint job and to cover up any of my misstrokes.
  I couldn't resist taking a shot of Fox with his Guards at this point. I will try to work on their belts, tonight or tomorrow.

I also painted a bit more on the snow mando. I have some more of those thin black detail lines to add to the leg area but I did clean up and tighten the black lines that I had painted on his gauntlets to the desired effect.

[Clonehead]

Earlier in the thread, I had told Masterfett that I had painted up a few Pre-hasbro shock troopers some years ago that were a bit rough looking. Well, I was digging around in the pic archives of my PC's hard drive yesterday, and came up with these shots of a blue shockie, and an orange shockie and his custom card.
  These shots could be 3 years old.





Shawn, please dont put the blue one on the custom page as he could be more pretty. I don't know about the orange one either. Perhaps his custom card shot.
The custom clones that I do now don't appear nearly this rushed and I'm a stickler for trying to work with their paintjobs until they are as perfict as possible, to me.
Folks,It just goes to show that like with anything else, you improve with practice.

[Clonehead]

How bout some more current pics?
  I wanted to get some work on the two guard's belts done today so I started by marking on the factory stock belt where I wanted to relocate the square ammo boxes to using a mold line on either leg as a reference.
I then cut off the belt, cut off the boxes, and then cut the belt to the mark that I had made.
To rejoin the boxes to the shortened belt, I drilled receiving holes on either side of the belt into the inner ring that rides at the recessed part of the figure's waist. I also drilled receiving holes where that end of each box would meet the shortened belt and used some thin gauge craft wire and superglue to pin the boxes to the belt, being careful to position them in a straight manner.

[Clonehead]

After repositioning the ammo boxes, I drilled one receiving hole on the new inside end of each box in the same inner ring area to receive a wire that will wrap around the rest of the recessed waist area of the figure and terminate in these drilled holes and form a frame to support the front part of the belt that we will scratchbuild, next.
I repeated all of these steps for the second guard's belt, positioned the belts back on the figures, trimmed the front waist wires to fit, and then glued them to set of receiving holes on either belt.
All that remains is to scratchbuild the front parts of the belts, and do some painting there.

It's coming along, Tamer, thanks.

[Clonehead]

Ok, cutting strips of the build a droid plastic packing, once again, I decided on two layers of the plastic to make up the missing length and thickness of the belt. I superglued the first layer on and then measured and marked where the separations in the belt would be with fine tip pen. I then used the trusty hobby knife and scribed in the cracks to the top layer of belt. I glued the top layer in place and then added a wash of flat black to the cracks to add definition. Afterwords some touch up in flat white brings us to the almost complete look in the last pic. All that remains there, is to paint the dark red onto the square ammo packs and that one will be done.

[Clonehead]

Well, I got the belts done and detail painted and I painted the dark red ammo boxes plus, I touched up the factory black paint on the one Guard.
  I think I'm done with these, finally.
I'm still figuring out my light settings on the camera but I sure do love it's macro setting. There is no way that my old camera would ever be able to focus on something this close.