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So it begins. I received my first package of materials for this project (from CVTV/FTC) this afternoon and am awaiting an order from Doc Mego for some parts and pieces. This is my first customizing in 8 inch scale or with "action figures" or "dolls" as all my previous experience has been with miniatures for D&D and other tabletop rpg.
The project feels a tad ambitious, as there are a lot of characters I want to get to, but my wife is starting her own customizing projects (dolls in the 12 inch scale) and is willing to help me with some of the sewing and craftier aspects until I get my legs under me and am at least competent in some of those areas.
The characters I hope to get to include:
Raistlin
Caramon (his twin brother)
Kitiara the Dragon Highlord (their half-sister) aka The Dark Lady
Riverwind
Goldmoon (his wife)
Sturm Brightblade
Laurana the elven princess/general
Tasslehoff Burrfoot (a kender-think Hobbit-like character)
Flint (a dwarf)
Sturm Brightblade
Tanis half-Elven
Gilthanas the Elf Lord
Verminaard the Dragon Highlord (a lot of his armor/helmet will be the same as Kitiara but designed for a male figure rather than female)
so a baker's dozen to begin with.
My wife and I have been collecting raw materials (fabrics, fun foam, sculpee, 2 part epoxy, etc.) over the past two weeks (and raiding clearance toy sections and thrift stores for dolls for her to customize). I also dug out the collection of plastic weapons and armor bits, shields, helmets, etc. we collected over the years buying toys from dollar stores & Odd Lots to use as props/material for our rpgs but that was too big for the scale for game, so we have a starting stash of materials to begin with.
Today though, with the CVTV order, I got the foundation pieces to start with.
Here's what arrived...
the yellow body is for Raistlin, whose skin is tinted gold. The two regular female bodies are for Tika and Goldmoon. The teen female body is for Laurana, the elf, whose build is slighter than a human and who is slightly shorter.
The heads in the order include...
Solomon Kane/the Puritan head for Raistlin...
if it had gold skin and white hair it would be a spot on match, as it stands it's the best base I found to work with. I need to tint the skin, repaint the eyes to Raist's hourglass pupils and find a way to either change the hair color or reroot it with white hair. This is going to take some trial and error and some work.
Next was the Kull/Barbarian king head for Raist's twin brother Caramon...
I have one of the buff bodies (not the muscle body) coming from Doc Mego to use for Caramon's body.
I also got the winged knight helm...
to use in kitbashing a helm for Caramon. I have a Viking/Thor helm coming form Doc Mego I will use with this one to create Caramon's distinctive helmet (or at least I hope I will).
I got the barbarian (re: Conan) head with brown hair to use as the base for Riverwind's head.
I will have to touch up the paint job to make it different from the Raist/Caramon look, but it really was the best base head for Riverwind I could find. I have some standard male bodies coming from Doc Mego, one of which will be for Riverwind.
I picked up one of the redhead heads to use for Tika...
that will go with one of the standard female bodies I got today.
The last head I got was this one...
which will serve as the head for either Goldmoon or Laurana. They both have honey-colored hair. Initially I was leaning towards using it with the teen body for Laurana, but upon seeing it in person, I think I like it more for Goldmoon, so it might go with the other standard female body.
For Kitiara, I am going to use either Piper or Kelly Garrett from the new Mego as a base. She is a brunette, but has shorter hair. I haven't found quite the right look for her, so I will have to alter the hair on either one a bit, but both are doable.
I also picked up the Adventure Force Blue Dragon from Wal*Mart to use to create Skie, her blue dragon mount...
it's slightly undersized for the size of dragons in the book, but big enough to be a dragon mount for an 8 inch figure, so I will work with it. I'll need to craft a saddle for it for her, but that's doable. The hardest thing with Kitiara will be making/finding the Dragon Highlord helmet, which is distinctive.
I'm still waiting on the Doc Mego order and my schedule for the next week is pretty packed, so I don't think I will get too much done over the next week, and I intend to try my hand at customizing the 7 inch Mego-like skeleton figures we got at Big Lots last week to work out the kinks on the armor and weapon crafting I will need to do for these before I dive in full force on this, but I will document progress on this as I move forward. I am excited and nervous at the same time to see what I can do and how this will turn out.
-M
The project feels a tad ambitious, as there are a lot of characters I want to get to, but my wife is starting her own customizing projects (dolls in the 12 inch scale) and is willing to help me with some of the sewing and craftier aspects until I get my legs under me and am at least competent in some of those areas.
The characters I hope to get to include:
Raistlin
Caramon (his twin brother)
Kitiara the Dragon Highlord (their half-sister) aka The Dark Lady
Riverwind
Goldmoon (his wife)
Sturm Brightblade
Laurana the elven princess/general
Tasslehoff Burrfoot (a kender-think Hobbit-like character)
Flint (a dwarf)
Sturm Brightblade
Tanis half-Elven
Gilthanas the Elf Lord
Verminaard the Dragon Highlord (a lot of his armor/helmet will be the same as Kitiara but designed for a male figure rather than female)
so a baker's dozen to begin with.
My wife and I have been collecting raw materials (fabrics, fun foam, sculpee, 2 part epoxy, etc.) over the past two weeks (and raiding clearance toy sections and thrift stores for dolls for her to customize). I also dug out the collection of plastic weapons and armor bits, shields, helmets, etc. we collected over the years buying toys from dollar stores & Odd Lots to use as props/material for our rpgs but that was too big for the scale for game, so we have a starting stash of materials to begin with.
Today though, with the CVTV order, I got the foundation pieces to start with.
Here's what arrived...
the yellow body is for Raistlin, whose skin is tinted gold. The two regular female bodies are for Tika and Goldmoon. The teen female body is for Laurana, the elf, whose build is slighter than a human and who is slightly shorter.
The heads in the order include...
Solomon Kane/the Puritan head for Raistlin...
if it had gold skin and white hair it would be a spot on match, as it stands it's the best base I found to work with. I need to tint the skin, repaint the eyes to Raist's hourglass pupils and find a way to either change the hair color or reroot it with white hair. This is going to take some trial and error and some work.
Next was the Kull/Barbarian king head for Raist's twin brother Caramon...
I have one of the buff bodies (not the muscle body) coming from Doc Mego to use for Caramon's body.
I also got the winged knight helm...
to use in kitbashing a helm for Caramon. I have a Viking/Thor helm coming form Doc Mego I will use with this one to create Caramon's distinctive helmet (or at least I hope I will).
I got the barbarian (re: Conan) head with brown hair to use as the base for Riverwind's head.
I will have to touch up the paint job to make it different from the Raist/Caramon look, but it really was the best base head for Riverwind I could find. I have some standard male bodies coming from Doc Mego, one of which will be for Riverwind.
I picked up one of the redhead heads to use for Tika...
that will go with one of the standard female bodies I got today.
The last head I got was this one...
which will serve as the head for either Goldmoon or Laurana. They both have honey-colored hair. Initially I was leaning towards using it with the teen body for Laurana, but upon seeing it in person, I think I like it more for Goldmoon, so it might go with the other standard female body.
For Kitiara, I am going to use either Piper or Kelly Garrett from the new Mego as a base. She is a brunette, but has shorter hair. I haven't found quite the right look for her, so I will have to alter the hair on either one a bit, but both are doable.
I also picked up the Adventure Force Blue Dragon from Wal*Mart to use to create Skie, her blue dragon mount...
it's slightly undersized for the size of dragons in the book, but big enough to be a dragon mount for an 8 inch figure, so I will work with it. I'll need to craft a saddle for it for her, but that's doable. The hardest thing with Kitiara will be making/finding the Dragon Highlord helmet, which is distinctive.
I'm still waiting on the Doc Mego order and my schedule for the next week is pretty packed, so I don't think I will get too much done over the next week, and I intend to try my hand at customizing the 7 inch Mego-like skeleton figures we got at Big Lots last week to work out the kinks on the armor and weapon crafting I will need to do for these before I dive in full force on this, but I will document progress on this as I move forward. I am excited and nervous at the same time to see what I can do and how this will turn out.
-M
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