Topic: Yuzzums' Customs

[Tamer]

I liked the podcast better this time out as we just focused on the work and it wasn't so much video the the people talking. Nothing wrong with that, but I think folks like seeing the custom work better than my ugly mug.

Update on the fp by the way Jeff! She looks fantastic.

[mr.Jedi1977]

Great work ! i like it

[Sjefke]

I haven't gotten to sit down and watch the show yet. It's on the High Priority list for this weekend. I was in New Orleans last night watching a Jazz band and eating fried shrimp... that's the only excuse I got.

That Wookie female is looking freakin' great!

Ya'll shoulda been havin Jambalaya n crawdads, mmm-hmmm.  Fried shrimp is fo squeemish Yankee tourists.  You be gittin yosef sawm fresh gatortail next tahm, ya hear.

Great work ! i like it

Thanks guys

[Sjefke]

Hey Yarders.

You've already seen some head shots of my Bastila Shan.  Here's more work.  We're down to the wire again so I have to hustle.  I'm not sure I'll have her done in time, so I'm posting the WIPs in my thread, rather than the Birthday thread.

When I opened my TBS Bastila Shan, I was appalled by the horrible paint job and thought I'd just do a little touch up on the face.  Then, I got annoyed by the hair style of the game rendering and altered it to look more like some of the images I had seen on DevianArt.  By the time I had gotten that far, I figured I'd just redo the whole thing and ultra-articulate Bastila.

     

I started by fixing that shoddy TBS face paint. I scraped the extraneous white paint from around her eyes and those horrible Joan Crawford eyebrows with an xacto blade. Once the canvas was clean, I could see the Hasbro sculpt was amazing.  I repainted the whites, staying within the sculpt line. I used a toothpick tip as my pupil applicator. That allows me to put a round drop of dark blue in the center. I followed that with a second drop of lighter blue on top of the dark, before applying a drop of black on top of the iris. Once I liked what I had I gave the eyes a layer of glossy varnish.

The next step was the eyeliner. I thinned out some black paint, and dipped in an xacto blade, then I traced around the edges of the eyes. The varnish helps the black paint stay in the creases.

I used a fine tip brown Sharpie marker for the eyebrows. To give her face more life, I repainted it with Valejo salmon, but I blended in a little scarlet on the cheeks. Taking a fine brush, I traced around the eyes and eyebrows. That helped get the lines straighter and thinner.




The hair was fun. I laid down some GreenStuff on her forehead. Using my xacto, I pulled grooves down along her facelines down to her neck. Once that had cured, I took some more Greenstuff and tweezed it into long thin strips and attached one end to her new hair and shaped them into the loose locks of hair seen in the reference photos.


       

To add more articulation, I used GI Joe Retaliation Lady Jaye for the legs and torso ball joint.  She's much bigger than Bastila, so I had to file LJ down by A LOT.  By the time I had the size right, I could literally see light shining through the plastic in some parts.  I also shortened her legs by 1/8 inch in the thighs and calves.   I figured as long as I'm cutting the legs in multiple places, I may as well add swivel joints in the upper thighs and ankles for added range of motion.  I forgot to take pics of the ankle WIPs, but here's a schematic.  I used small brad nails for swivel joints.  I did the same thing with my Cane Adiss' arms, but those were larger and easier to work with.
 







 
The skirt and belt were a tight fit over the hips and butt.  Once on, it seriously limited the forward range of motion of the legs, so I cut off some of the plastic pieces from the front of the skirt and glued on flexible neoprene rubber in its place.  I colored the neoprene with a brown Sharpie and even up close it's hard to tell it's a different material.



After reconstructing the legs, I spread a thin layer of green stuff over the legs and added texture with a latex template I made from BS's legs.  The greenstuff is loose and extends over the swivel joints, hiding them.

One of the few original parts I used was TBS Bastila's torso.  I hollowed it out to fit the bare bones Lady Jaye torso joint.  I is a really tight fit.  In hindsight, I should have used the ball peg joint from TCW Aurra Sing and hollowed out the LJ abdomen instead of the BS torso.


   

Here's what it looks like together.  It's a little hard to see because of the hodgepodge of colors.



   



I filed down the legs as thin as I dared and then put a very thin layer of greenstuff over them and added texture from a template made from the BS figure.  The green stuff covers the swivels so you don't see the joints  I think they call that a collette. 

At this point I was advised by guys with really sharp eyes that the legs look too 'Manga'.  That's was a lot of work to re-do, but I do have OCD.   I stripped down the GS coating, filed the legs down even thinner, shortened the thighs AGAIN by at least 3/16ths inch and reapplied the GS layer and re-textured it.  Phew!  I have to say, it was worth the effort.

I've also carved the shoulder armor from the arms and attached them directly to the torso with neoprene rubber.  Now, she can raise her arms up without having the shoulder pads in her armpits.

I also carved a ball peg from a Megablock Halo figure ang glued it to the bottom of B.S.'s neck.  I hollowed out her collar to fit it.  This really improved the head's range of motion (ROM).  To avoid the pony tail hindering movement, I replaced the pony tail berret with packing wire wrapped with thin copper wire.  It's flexible and doesn't hinder the ROM of the double ball peg neck.  I count both those fixes as two more POAs.






After squeezing the skirt as low on her hips as I could get it, I glued it in place.  I also managed to fit the hollow torso onto the ball joint mechanism in the Lady Jaye abdomen.  I cut the abdomen armor detail off of the original Bastila Shan figure and glued it over the belt.  The back armor wasn't worth salvaging since it was an easy sculpt with greenstuff.

You know all that subtle detail on the Bastila Shan boots?  I replicated the detailing onto the LJ boots with green stuff too.  I'll try to make the pics higher res next time too.

 

Thanks Yarders.   More soon.

[Mandalore25]

Love the step by step, and how it's Bastila! Can't wait to see the final reveal, if only Hasbro would make such works of art once more. An ultimate Revan would be a cool project as much as I would hate to see one cut up, but think of how cool it would be next to your ultimate Bastila!

[Sjefke]

Love the step by step, and how it's Bastila! Can't wait to see the final reveal, if only Hasbro would make such works of art once more. An ultimate Revan would be a cool project as much as I would hate to see one cut up, but think of how cool it would be next to your ultimate Bastila!

Thanks Mandaolre25

I tried to cast the details I needed from the original, in order to leave her intact, but my casting skills need work.  It took a lot of nerve to start slicing a figure that's going for $25 on the aftermarket.  Thankfully, I have a friend with an extra BS, in case I need a backup.

I'd love to do a Revan too, but those figures are way out of my budget.  I have too many projects on the back-burner to start sculpting an original head.  If you now someone selling head casts, please let me know.

[Mandalore25]

A seller called stevek8764 on ebay sells them from time to time. He sells his slightly defective heads and, has a group of them listed frequently, but a Revan head isn't always in the lot. I have Revan, and can also see about making you a head. No promises about that because none of my molds have turned out yet, I'm very new to making them.

[Luke Sprywalker]

Great looking female Wookie! Very nice sculpt work on that fur. Bastila Is shaping up nicely and man is she super articulated!

[Sjefke]

Great looking female Wookie! Very nice sculpt work on that fur. Bastila Is shaping up nicely and man is she super articulated!

Thanks, Man
I still have to finish BS off.  I tried to assemble her yesterday and pretty much ruined a lot of detail work.  I spent a couple of hours fixing up the mess today.  All I have of the diorama is the frame work.  It wont be anywhere near as elaborate as your kata. 
The Wookiee has been sitting in a bag waiting foe me to finish her accessories and soft goods.  Her long rifle is gonna knock your clone booties off.
No problem.  Plenty of time to work in the shop between work, driving to the in-laws for Thanksgiving and driving back.  What?  Me worry?

[Sjefke]

Here are a few more steps in the construction.

I'd prefer ball joints for wrists but that usually looks pretty klunky.  The next best thing are ball pegs made from metal pin heads.  You need the old fashioned kinds.  What you find in Joanne's craft store are too flimsy, so you may have to plunder Grandma's sewing kit.








I did some final prep work on the abdomen.  After several unsuccessful attempts to cast the abdominal armor, I just carved it off of TBS Bastila and glued it onto GI Joe Retaliation Lady Jay's abdomen.  I was just a fraction too short, so I sculpted an extension with greenstuff.  It's a little crude, but mostly hidden under her torso anyway.



Has anyone noticed that when you raise B.S.'s arms above her shoulders, the shoulder pads are in her arm pits and am I the only one who thinks that looks just wrong?  I applaud how Hasbro engineered the shoulder armor to slide under the shoulders, but I preferred to see the armor loose and attached to the torso.  I carved the armor pieces from the shoulders and shaved them as thin as I could, then I attached them to the torso with brown neoprene rubber using Locktite Flexible glue.  It's tricky keeping a little tension on the rubber while gluing the armor on.  I cant tell you how many times I messed this up before it didn't look terrible.





Final images up next.  Hope nobody minds that I repost from the Ultimate Action Figure Contest.

[Sjefke]

Here's my Ultimate Bastila Shan with mini-diorama.

FEATURES:

PARTS
Head:  Original TBS Bastila Shan head; repainted face, sculpted bangs with loose locks of hair to resemble some DevianArt images.
Torso and arms: Original TBS parts, repainted to match the game rendering.
Abdomen and legs:  GI Joe Retaliation Lady Jaye, cut down and filed down to size.

ARTICULATION
Pony tail:   Packing wire with copper telephone wire wrapped around it to simulate the beret.
Base of skull:   Original ball peg.
Neck:   Home made ball peg joint made from a Megablock Halo figure.
Shoulder armor:   Hinge joint made with neoprene rubber.
Shoulders, and elbows are original parts TBS.
Wrists: Ball pegs made from metal pins.
Torso:  Ball joint utilizing Lady Jaye.
Hips:    Standard GI Joe metal ball pegs.
Skirt.    Part of the plastic from the skirt was replaced with neoprene rubber. 
Thigh:   Home made swivel joint made from brad nails.
Knees:  GI Joe L.J. Double hinge joints.
Calves at boot level:   Home made swivel joints made from brad nails.
Ankle:   Rocker  joints

 That's 24 POA with the knees counting as two each.


Note the position of the ponytail below



 

 

 



Thanks ISY.

[smeagol92055]

This is such an incredibly cool custom. I'm completely blown away by how rad this is!

[JDeck]

Great work. Appreciate the step by step process. I'm more of a vehicle guy but I'd like to start dabbling a little in figures.

[Sjefke]

This is such an incredibly cool custom. I'm completely blown away by how rad this is!

Thanks Smeagol92055

Great work. Appreciate the step by step process. I'm more of a vehicle guy but I'd like to start dabbling a little in figures.

Thanks JDeck
Funny.  I'd like to start dabbling a little in vehicles.

[I-am-Boba-Fett]

Your Bastila Shan figure is Awesome!
Love,love, love the painting done on her face. She is beautiful!
The super poseability you gave her is spectacular!