Finished the Desert Armodoc today! He’s been on the trail of a traveler for what seems like eons, both of them trapped on a world of endless desert. The Armodoc’s been blasted by winds and scorched by suns, and caked with dust. I left the eyes, gun tip, and top head ‘vents’ GID vinyl to add a little interest, and the color of the glow vinyl fits right in with the desert faded colors. The weathering is a combination of oil washes, filters, acrylic chipping, airbrushed paint fading, and dry pigments, all done in layers to give him some history and depth.
Desert Armodoc Leave a comment
Glyos Armodoc Custom WIP Leave a comment
When I was at Matt Doughty’s house a few weeks ago, he would not let me leave until I took an Armodoc with me with the instructions to go nuts on it. These pics represent about half-way through the process. I am going for a heavily weathered desert-themed figure, I started off spraying the entire figure dark brown, and then worked up the colors, leaving some of the darker colors in the lower areas and crevices, providing a shading that does now show up in the pics right now because the whole figure is gloss-coated for the oil work. Next up are the markings, and then on to chipping, some oil filters, and then some serious dust!
Stealth Mutant Head Leave a comment
Just a random shot. I’m mostly a Chaos guy when it comes to Real X Head, but I really love this Mutant Head for some reason. I don’t know if it’s the wonderful black vinyl or the luster of the metallic paints, but this guy just pops.
Frankenruge Chaos Trooper 1 comment
When I met with Matt Doughty of Onell Designs a few weeks ago, he presented me with a small gift. Matt had for me an extra Mutant Chaos head and probe arm from the making of the recent Glyos System Chaos Custom Corps wave. These parts had air bubbles and imperfections and were not fit for proper release under Matt’s stringent quality control guidelines, but Matt knew that I could clean them up and would put them to good use. I got to assemble a body for the parts from The Junkpile, and then sat down to plan a paint scheme. I knew I wanted to use the colors of a Mutant Chaos release, and I ended on the Frankenruge tribute scheme, one of my favorite figures, which I used for my Chaos Family review on CollectionDX:
http://www.collectiondx.com/review/designer_toy/chaos_family
New Things- Pheyaos Man! Leave a comment
I had the wonderful privilege of getting to see the place where Matt Doughty works his magic at his house, Glyos HQ. He had plenty of cool thing to show me, and wouldn’t let me leave without a few cool things for upcoming projects (and a hint of things to come). Front and center was my getting to see the entire box full of the first Onell release of the Pheyaos Man, and getting to pick mine up early. I know people have been just going mad waiting for this release after seeing the sculpt used in a few Japanese releases so far, and I can say with complete certainty that it is worth the wait. The only disappointed people are going to be the ones who cannot grab one, but I have been assured that more are forthcoming and Matt is going to do everything he can to make people happy. The Pheyaos head sculpt perfectly blends RxH’s Mutant Chaos with Glyos’s Pheyden, as Chaos absorbs some of Pheyden’s power and essence. Anyone who’s seen my previous posts will know that I love the Adult Chaos body, and with the amazing paint work by Goto-san, the whole figure comes together under the head sculpt beyond all expectations. I’ll be reviewing the Pheyaos vinyls, and plan on having the Pheyaos Man review up on the night of the release.
There’s also a pair of teasers here for upcoming customs. One is a Mutant Evil custom I am almost done with, just need to finish some small details. The other is a custom Chaos Glyos figure I got to assemble at Glyos HQ, with resin Chaos arm and head that were flawed and unusable from the recent Custom Corps. I am planning on painting this guy similar to the Pheyaos Man with some fading between a Chaos figure of mine (not sure which yet) and a recognizable Glyos figure scheme.
I also recently published a review of the 3A Toys WWRP Bramble over on CollectionDX:
http://www.collectiondx.com/review/designer_toy/3a_wwrp_bramble_medic
UPDATE: I just published my Pheyaos Man review for CDX:
http://www.collectiondx.com/review/character_toy/pheyaos_man
If you’re into Glyos, don’t sleep on this release.
I am going to be covering all of the 3A Toys I receive for CollectionDX as I get them, next up will be the Portable Berties, hopefully going up before they are all sold out from retailers, so people can actually read a review when looking at buying them.
Gargamel Mini Zagoran Leave a comment
Gargamel is pretty much the single biggest and most prolific of the Japanese vinyl companies, and their most recognizable figure is the Zagoran, based on a vintage bootleg toy. There are Standard Sized, Mini, Crouching, Pocket, and now Micro Zags, enough for everyone to love one. There are mini releases of many of the popular sculpts in true-blue vinyl, intended for customizing. I went back and forth with my little Zag trying to decide what to do… finally I settled on a low-saturation color palette, contrasting with the bright and wild-colored production releases. Initially the figure was all sprayed, but I really wanted to bring out all the fantastic texture and scale detail in the sculpt, so a wash and some drybrushing later I have a very well-textured cute little Zag. I spent some time thinking about how to do the eye as well, and settled on some more color to ‘pop’ against the muted body color. The mini Zag just has such a fun face!
DML 1/72 Sd.KFZ 205 Panzerkampfwagen VIII Maus ’46 Leave a comment
The Panzer VIII Maus is one of the financial black-hole Paper Panzer projects that actually progressed to a working machine. Two Mauses were completed to operational hulls, one equipped with a weight-test turret, and the other with a real turret armed with the fearsome 128mm KwK 44 L/55 gun with a coaxial 75mm KwK 44 L/36.5 gun. A Maus currently resides in the Kubinka Tank Museum, and is a combination of the two vehicles captured by the Soviets.
As a fantastical and completely impractical vehicle, the Maus makes a great subject for WWII’46 fantasy projects. If the war had actually gone into ’46 and beyond, without some of the crippling setbacks that set the Third Reich up for defeat, many projects could have seen completion and implementation. In reality, the E-series of tanks would have begun to replace the aging Panzer fleet, and the E-100 would have fulfilled the role of super-heavy tank. The Maus likely would have not made it past the handful in production during development, but it’s fun to speculate. Even in ’46, operational Mauses would have spent most of their time avoiding harassment by Allied bombers and would probably not have been useful for anything much more than near-static reinforcement of positions.
This Maus is sporting an Olivegrun-based scheme like that of some late-way King Tigers. I added etched-brass turret-side machine-gun covers, and a machine gun to one of the hatches, as well as light conduits and fuel lines, and aerials, and that is really all that the DML 1/72 Maus needs. Even the figure came with the kit! The weathering came out a bit too heavy, with more drybrushing than I should have done for the scale, but I am otherwise happy with it… it’s interesting to note that the 1/72 Maus is about as long as a 1/48 Tiger I. Included in the pics are some shots with the Scaletiger.
Incubot Nekosaurus Crystal Sofubi Leave a comment
Incubot Productions is the brainchild of ToyboxDX founder Alen Yen, and is his venue for his original toy designs. Incubot first released the PVC Nekobot USB Flash drive, with is an excellent little figure, and its USB-ness is a good excuse to leave it in your pocket or backpack. The Nekosaurus sofubi, however, is all toy, and an expression of Alen’s love and appreciation for classic Japanese toy funk. The actual figure is sculpted by Kiyoka Ikeda of Gargamel, and produced in the Gargamel factory in Japan, so it is a pure and perfect Japanese vinyl. This first release is the crystal Nekosaurus, complete with paper inserts featuring mechanical gut detail designed by Alen himself. The guts are just jammed pack with really well thought out detail, and crystal really is the right word to describe the vinyl… it’s perfectly clear and flawless. The vinyl and the guts are fantastic, but my favorite part of the toy is hands down the actual sculpt… it is a perfect melding of classic sensibilities and vinyl toy design, and just a phenomenal toy to play with. It’s bigger than a fight figure, but smaller than a standard sized kaiju, around 6″ tall, and fits in your hand perfectly.
Neko looks good and plays just as well, and there are just a few left after the December preorder, available at the Incubot site here: http://incubot.com/sofubi.html Nekosaurus triumphs over other vinyl toys, and is just plain fun. Pick up a Nekobot Flash drive while you’re there!
‘Heavy’ Phanost Onell/Glyos Leave a comment
The Glyos series is the brainchild of Matt Doughty, founder of Onell Designs, a small toy company dedicated to making some of the most fun and unique toys on the planet. Inspired by his childhood love of Micronauts and all things fun, Glyos toys are ~2″ tall PVC figures with completely interchangeable parts and a variety of designs, allowing you to make just about anything you can imagine. The build-toy aspects of Glyos are really just amazing, but my favorite part comes down to making awesome character figures to match the great character versions Matt has already come up with. This custom was based around a special light-grey Phanost head I received as a bonus in one of my orders, for which I built and painted a special body. We have recently been shown, in the awesome 8-bit style Passcodes Matt produces, some of the origin of the Phanosts, and while I won’t spoil anything, I will say that they are quite powerful. My thinking with this custom was that a Phanost had been captured and experimented on (maybe by the Sincroids?), so I used some Buildman body parts, since the Buildmen are interchangeable mechanical bodies used by everybody in Glyos. Upgraded with Phase Armor and a heavy Gobon Cannon, this Phanost escaped his captors with his new, more powerful body, and means business.
DaJoint 1/6 Zero Metal Defense Capsule 1 comment
Phil Reed (battlegrip.com)’s latest 1/6 figure push inspired me to pull this figure out, which I bought back in 2004 or 2005 and have basically been sitting on since. Before Ashley Wood was pushing the 1/6 envelope with his little Hong Kong firm 3A Toys (expect lots more 3A toy pics forthcoming), Da Joint released small range of really unique sci-fi 1/6 scale figures. Da Joint is a small graphic design-type firm from Hong Kong that has done many interesting TV commercials and such now-a-days. The side of the box reads:
“2037 a.d. An Iron meteor shower rained down from the sky brought the known human civilization to an end. Years later, inside the enormous crater of Hongkong island. Some surviving scientists discovered a large meteorite floating in the air. The phenomenon was caused by the extreme force and temperature generated during the meteor impact, resulting a realignment of matter’s atomic structure. The scientists named the anti-gravity meteorite as “ZERO METAL”. 2067 a.d. The new Hongkong declared independence, named itself “Gang Dao”. A highly mobilized armour unit armed with Zero Metal technology is introduced as a force to police the region’s security. Anger and fearful Kowloon civilians united to fight these troops for their own sovereignty.”
Engrish aside, Da Joint’s little world sounds pretty slick, and it’s too bad more did not come out of it. Regardless of the setting, this Jiu Gang Zero Metal Defense Capsule figure is awesome, but was not perfect. Back in 2004, the base 1/6 person body used in this figure was loose and crappy, so the fantastic armored trooper never really stood up well or could his gun arm out, even though the actual armor was really well detailed and designed. After seeing the new Hot Toys True Type bodies for sale, the inspiration hit me to finally fix my ZMDC trooper, as the first step in expanding a 1/6 sci-fi collection. The new body fit perfectly, and is tight and articulated enough to finally breath some life into this impressive design. I also added a second belt with a pistol holster, and new hands.
Da Joint even went so far as to include decals with the figures for buyers to apply, which were really well printed, and happily, still went down great after sitting in the box for 5 years. Once all the decals were laid down (I used about 2/3 of the sheet, and the rest is just different numbers and artsy stuff to apply to individualize the figures), I did some weathering to beat up this guy a touch. I drybrushed the armor in just about the same color as the factory used to fade the decals in, and then did some sponge chipping with a few spots enhanced with some brush-applied marks. An oil wash brought out the details and added some grime, and then the boots (as well as the guy in the suit underneath) received some dirt and mud splatters using layers of both acrylic paints and weathering pigments. I added some grease leakage to the moving joints of the armor (mostly on the articulated feet) and some grease to the shiny metal pistons on the feet. Without going too over the top, I’m really happy with how this guy looks, and he’s just a blast to mess around with now that he can actually hold his gun arm up!
Prometheus Rising Studios 