Firefly - 1:6 scale Mal Reynolds sculpt

[Too Much Garlic]

Any model kits in planning, currently in production, already available for sale in this lovely scale - other than the MiM River model kit?

I'm thinking about taking a stab at doing a Mal Reynolds... but knowing me... it might not go beyond planning stage... so... I'm just browsing.

 

[Too Much Garlic]

Well, I'm going to take a stab at trying to sculpt this - though, the outfit would be the movie version:


I may crash and burn... but at least I would have tried... one can only succeed if one tries.

Cheers.

 

[Bad Wolf]

i wish you luck :thumbsup
that's a figure kit i would buy..

 

[Too Much Garlic]

<div class='quotetop'>(Bad Wolf @ Aug 20 2006, 11:00 PM) [snapback]1304086[/snapback]</div>

i wish you luck :thumbsup
that's a figure kit i would buy..
[/b]

Cool. Hope I can do him justice.

 

[Too Much Garlic]

Any suggestions as how to go about it?

Should I make the torso and legs/boots as a whole, or should I split him up at the waist... and should I also split him at the top of the boots?

Should the arms be a one-piece with the main body, or should they be separate pieces.

Head is self-explanatory as a separate piece.

Any parts on the sculpt that I should be aware of that might be tricky to accomplish when making the mold or is it a fairly straight-forward pose?

Will make the "under figure" out of regular clay - as that was the only thing available right now, that I could get my hands on. Hopefully I can sculpt up the whole figure with this, depending on which configuration - arms/torso/legs one-piece or separate pieces - which is best. Otherwise... I have super sculpey for finer sculpting, filling and additions if needed.

Any comments and suggestions would be appreciated.

 

[Harry Harris]

Are you planning to sculpt the figure and cast it with a view to selling kits?

If you are I think you'd sell a lot more if you made it the Firefly version instead of from Serenity.

Harry

 

[Too Much Garlic]

<div class='quotetop'>(Harry Harris @ Aug 23 2006, 12:13 AM) [snapback]1305317[/snapback]</div>

Are you planning to sculpt the figure and cast it with a view to selling kits?
If you are I think you'd sell a lot more if you made it the Firefly version instead of from Serenity.
Harry
[/b]

Well... that's certainly food for thought. And the Firefly version seems a fair bit "simpler" to do... but let's just see how good my sculpting skills are before any casting and possible sales are taken into consideration. :lol

 

[Darth Brass]

I can't wait to see what you turn out.

Oh, if you do a 1/6 scale head like one that would fit a 12" action figure, I'd be first in line to buy one from you.

 

[Too Much Garlic]

Again, thanks for the confidence guys... though, I have no illusions of being as great as some of the artisans in here... I'm aiming for a "as close likenes" as possible...

I'm unsure how a head for 12" action figure is constructed, especially at the neck... any examples you can show me of how it attaches to the body?

 

[Darth Brass]

I'm getting some pictures of a body I have here. I'll post them in a few minutes.

Hell, if you do one and I can have one or two castings, I'll SEND you the body to work with.



EDIT:

Here's a .zip file with about 5 pictures of the body I have. I know that different manufacturers use different head-connection styles. I think that when folks to customs, some create the head on an extra-long neck so that it can be altered to fit whatever body-type the end-user has available to them.

The file: http://www.matthoorman.com/onesixth_body.zip

Hope that helps.

 

[Too Much Garlic]

The link doesn't work. But I think I'd just make the head with an extra long neck, just to be sure. :rolleyes

Started working on the head yesterday... it ended up looking human, but was unfit to continue working on, so I scrapped it and started again from scratch. Got the basic head shape down - blank face, no details yet. Think I will work some more on that later.

Also started shaping out the torso - still undecided as to whether the figure should be a one-piece figure with a separate head or in more parts... I'd better figure this out before I get more work done on it.

Can't really show any progress pictures at this time, as it is basically only two lumps of indiscribaple clay, though rest assured... pictures and updates WILL come...

 

[Darth Brass]

Hmmm...apparently I'm unable to spell my own name.

Try this: http://www.matthoormann.com/onesixth_body.zip

 

[pennausamike]

Just as a suggestion, the face makes or breaks a figure because the face determines whether it looks like the sculpt subject or just something similar.

I would suggest doing the face first to see what kind of interest/ buzz/ purchasing liklihood a figure generates before investing time to make one for sale. I know some of my projects are just to suit me and not commercially viable.

Whatever the outcome, I admire any sculpting talent, given that Gumby is probably beyond my capabilities.

Good Luck.
Mike

 

[Too Much Garlic]

I know. Though, I will concentrate mainly on the body, getting that done, all the while messing with the face sculpt on the side to really take my time with that.

The face is going to be the trickiest part of this figure to get right, so I imagine there will be a lot of trial and error on that. The rest, being difficult as well, won't give as many problems as the face...

This is going to be fun. :rolleyes


'Cause if all goes south I will simply have to commission someone to sculpt the head for me and it'll just be a one-off figure. Here's me hoping that it won't come to that...

 

[DrMcoy]

I'd be interested in a kit if you make one...although I would love to see a pose that shows off his pistol, whether in hand or in his holster with coat pulled back to reveal it.

 

[Too Much Garlic]

<div class='quotetop'>(DrMcoy @ Aug 26 2006, 03:40 AM) [snapback]1307219[/snapback]</div>

I'd be interested in a kit if you make one...although I would love to see a pose that shows off his pistol, whether in hand or in his holster with coat pulled back to reveal it.
[/b]

Been thinking about that too. The solution to that would be to make the back and bottom part of the coat a separate piece - 2 versions: a version like the pose in the picture in the second post, the other pulled back somewhat like in this following picture, though, still with the hands resting on his belt:


Man... some plans I got for this thing... really hope my skills match my expectations. :rolleyes

 

[Too Much Garlic]

First crappy picture of my progress so far:

That's supposedly the torso and the right leg and the head on a stick on the left. :lol

I'm using my Gotham Industrialist kit as size reference.

 

[Patattack]

<div class='quotetop'>(Harry Harris @ Aug 22 2006, 06:13 PM) [snapback]1305317[/snapback]</div>

If you are I think you'd sell a lot more if you made it the Firefly version instead of from Serenity.
[/b]

Actually, I'm partial to the overall costume of Serenity Mal. Now, I will concede that the original Firefly browncoat is sharper than the one in Serenity, but I think the rest of the Serenity ensemble - the fancy shirt strap closures, custom suspenders, and all that - is much more interesting.

 

[Too Much Garlic]

<div class='quotetop'>(Patattack @ Aug 26 2006, 04:46 PM) [snapback]1307407[/snapback]</div>

<div class='quotetop'>(Harry Harris @ Aug 22 2006, 06:13 PM) [snapback]1305317[/snapback]

If you are I think you'd sell a lot more if you made it the Firefly version instead of from Serenity.
[/b]

Actually, I'm partial to the overall costume of Serenity Mal. Now, I will concede that the original Firefly browncoat is sharper than the one in Serenity, but I think the rest of the Serenity ensemble - the fancy shirt strap closures, custom suspenders, and all that - is much more interesting.
[/b][/quote]

Well, the suspenders won't be visible at all, with the pose I had in mind, so no worries there.

Can do both tv-series and movie version boots for people to decide the look for themselves.

The rubber(?) add-ons to his pants and coat can be made in separate thin rubber/plastic pieces to be glued on.

The shirt is the only thing that would create some difficulty with the tv-series/movie look, as it will be difficult to sculpt two versions. So, I'll have to decide which I wanna do (leaning towards movie version) and then hope people are okay with the movie shirt on the tv-series version as well... even though he DID wear a normal shirt at the end of the movie, one without that strapping system. Though, with the figure probably being cast in resin, when I come to that, it would be an easy fix just to sand down the straps and create a normal style shirt. I'll work that out when I get to it.

A new tricky part will be to make his pistol in that small scale... that's gonna be a fun project. A part of the holster could be made in thin bendable plastic sheet and then glued on to the figure for that natural non-solid feel.

As you can see... there are a lot of ideas floating around in my mind as to how to do this figure... hard to keep track of them all. :lol

 

[Too Much Garlic]

Set-back. The clay model broke apart. Guess I wasn't paying enough attention. Have decided to take a different approach - making the figure up from clay (stick figure) and then do all surface details with super Sculpey, as the clay, when stretched out thin tends to break apart, whereas Super Sculpey does not.

This sux though... though, tbh: I'm glad it happened now and not later when more details had been added. Also, the leg I had made seemed to be too thick anyway. No loss... except time... knowledge gained by trial and error.

So far, the new details look okay... will show more when I have progressed further.