Bumble the Snowbot
came from Cybertron
With a bristle broom and a carrot nose
And two eyes made of Energon

Bumble the Snowbot
Is a Kup Tale they say
He was made of snow, but the Pretenders know
How he came to life one day

There might be an Allspark Shard
In that old top hat they found
For when they placed it on his head
He began to dance around

Oh, Bumble the Snowbot
Was alive as he could be
The Pretenders say he could laugh and play
Just the same as you and me
​

With the coming of Christmas Optimus Prime I felt that you can't have an Optimus without a Bumblebee. Originally I toyed with the idea of doing an Elf Bumblebee (using the film Elf's Green and Yellow design for him) but remembering we had a white Bumblebee, as well as my brother (when he was a baby) believing Frosty brought presents on Christmas, I decided to make a snowman Bumblebee to go along with Santa Optimus. And this thread will not only showcase him but also teach you how to make your own!

STEP 1- PREPPING YOUR FIGURE

As stated this came about because of Bugbite being a thing, meaning I only had to do a little work on creating Bumble. I started by using Isopropyl alcohol (50%) and some q tips to remove Bugbite's faction logo. Dip the q-tip in and then apply to the chest. A few times I let the alcohol sit on the chest for a minute or too before I began to scrub. You'll notice at first only a small black mark come up on the q-tip but as you work the black paint will weaken its hold until it all scrubs right off. Took about 5 to 10 minutes AT MOST​

STEP TWO- THE FACE

For this you will need some blue and orange paint. Find the smallest brush you can and put the bare minimum of blue paint on the tip before CAREFULLY going into the eye and changing it from red to blue. I used a bright blue testors paint that I love to use for Autobot eyes, as it just has the right bright glowing color. If you get any on the face use a pin to carefully scratch it off; Testors sets quick but doesn't lock on fully right away so you can scrap off excess.

For the nose do the same thing as the eye, carefully using your orange to paint it in.


STEP 3- BODY DETAILS

This is all up to you. I decided to go rather basic and just painted the little circles on his shoulders white and do the coal buttons. But as you can see the figure as a ton of detail work so you could easily go in and paint more white areas to make him even more snowy. I considered briefly doing the shoulders white, for example, to make it look like snow had fallen on them. But I decided I wanted the black to remain as much as possible.

The big thing is the chest. Three black dots for his coal buttons.

STEP 4- The Scarf

I tried several different things but in the end good ol fashion crafting ribbon worked best for me. You can pick any color you want but I went with Blue as that felt good and Christmas-y. Tie it like you would an actual scarf and then slowly bend and work the ribbon until it lays down as you want. Thinner the better for the ribbon, as that way it doens't hide his face. There are other options, of course, like actual fabric, but ribbon is your best bet.



STEP 5- THE ACCESSORIES

Okay, this is where many of you will need to step out of your comfort zone.

Sculpty is a wonderful molding clay that I love to use for art projects. Cheap but solid. And paintable if you want to go that route OR you can get it already in all the colors of the rainbow. I personally now use white sculpty blocks (or a similar brand) but that is up to you... though you'll see why white might be best in a bit.

I created three accessories for Bumble: His battered top hat, his broom, and a snowball for his bazooka. I"ll go over each one's build process now, starting from easiest to hardest.

SNOWBALL- Get a bit of sculpty and roll it into a ball that is a touch bigger than you want it to be. Pinch the bottom to form a cone-like shape/plug. Take this and press it lightly into the bazooka barrel, this will help it lock in later. While its in the barrel take a seamstress pin (or anything small with a round top) and begin to dimple the surface of the snowball. Light rapid presses, over and over, to give it the 'made by a child's hands' look. Carefully remove from the bazooka, redipple any spots that get smoothed, and put on some wax paper or tin foil.

BROOM- Take some wire (I like to use old metal coat hangers... thick and strong) and cut it to the length of the broom handle. Take sculpty and cover the whole thing and then begin rolling that against a flat smooth surface. As the clay stretches cut off the ends. Your goal is to BARELY have the metal covered. As you go keep checking the handle by sliding it into Bumble's hand; when it can slide in easily you are there. I left a slight swelling of clay near the top of the broom to stop it from going all the way through so he could properly hold the broom.

For the broom head take the clay and make a rectangle. round off the bottom and then lightly press the sides to give it the banded broom shape. Now, using a pin, begin to rapidly scrape the claw from bottom to top, going around all sides. Do several passes. This is to give it a broom bristle texture. Lightly lift it up and at the top poke a TON of holes into the clay; shallow but rapid pokes. This again helps make it look like its a ton of bristles. Finally, roll a thin strip of clay and press it lightly at the pushed in part of the broom to create the bristle brand.

Take the end of a paint brush and push it into the broom head to make a hole for the broom handle to go in and then press them together. Do a final check on the bristle for places you smoothed out but touching and correct. Put with Snowball.

HAT- Roll out a cyilinder to the size your want and then cut off a coin-size piece. flatten this to make your brim. Attach the two by lightly pressing them together. Next, take the clay and gently press the hat onto Bumble's head, wiggling it as you go so it isn't a super tight fit. You want to create indents for the head and horns. Remove and then use a pin or knife to cut a line where the band should be on the hat.

When you are done back. And this is why you should be ready with paints... the clay is gonna burn with how small everything is:



STEP 6- PAINTING ACCESSORIES

Luckily you are almost at the end! For each item do several coats of paint. For the snowball I did basic white. For the broom I painted the bristles yellow and the band brown. I didn't paint the handle as the burnt clay was the right shade of brown. The hat is up to you... I did blue with a yellow band to homage Bumblebee/Goldbug. I also switched his bazooka for the one that I believe SG Goldbug came with but you could keep the purple and do a purple hat. Or repaint the bazooka.

Do several coats (I did three because I wanted the hat to not be fully a solid color for the worn beaten look) and then seal with a matte finish.

And with that you have Bumble the Snowbot!

 

Very cute.

 

Thanks. I think he'll real nice next to Christmas Optimus, or as I'm calling him "Christmas Convoy". I have a collection currently where each Optimus has a Bumblebee with him and I felt bad the Christmas one was missing out.

 

Damn, can't believe I didn't think of this!
My fiancee L-O-V-E-S snowmen and she just ordered Holiday Optimus Prime.
I gotta get on this ASAP.

 

I would HIGHLY recommend it.

I would say it took me, over the course of 3 days, about 4 hours to complete the project. And that was me taking a lot of breaks to watch tv.

I did have a couple other ideas I didn't do that people could go with, to make this there own:

1) Instead of a snowball make a clay wreath that goes around the gun, that way you could still have blast effects.

2) Get a tiny christmas tree from a dollar store winter wonderland knickknack and make that a tree that is tied to the roof of the car.

And as for customizing there are a ton of options... different hat designs and colors, using different ribbons for the scarf, so on.

If you need any further instructions let me know! And I'd love to see your version!

 

Brilliant! This is a very clever custom.

 

I will never ever, support the celebration of Christmas before Thanksgiving

But I also happen to always, ALWAYS, support epic customs.

This snowbot is beautiful. I love the backstory too! The Christmas botbots and the snowball launcher are both great. Keep on with the good customizing!

 

Normally I don't either but I'm in a Christmas mood this year so I'm slowly getting stuff set up in my apartment. Bumble is standing next to my Christmas Lego "A Visit From Santa" set I am building and will be right next to Christmas Convoy when he comes out.

As for the backstory, to got a tiny bit more into detail, I see Bumble as being a snowman the Pretenders made to look like Bumblebee that came to life.

And finally the Snowball launcher was a last minute addition. I came up with the design of Bumble and was going to have him just not have a gun but then I began thinking how cute it would be to give him a snowball launcher. I am debating making a second snowball but this one has a snowman face on it. He can hold the snowballs also in his hand.

Now I just need Nonnef to come out with his Chirstmas Optimus upgrade kit. People are asking him to do the Roller for that kit in brown with a red orb and antlers so it can be Roller the Red Nose Drone.

 

Understandable. To be honest with the last 3 years the world has been having, people deserve to celebrate the happiest season early. Still love the backstory aswell!

 

I get in weird moods with the holidays. Like this year I was ready for Halloween in August when normally Halloween isn't that big of a deal for me.

Anyway, I do hope other people make their own Bumbles, or own variations! I could see someone doing this with a Jazz, for example.

 

I feel like hound would be very likely to be wear a Santa outfit, given his love for human culture

 

Honestly I have wished for a LONG time that Hasbro and Transformers would begin doing, much like they do with Star Wars and Lego does with their sets, a Holiday Series.

Each year produce a different Transformer character in a christmas/holiday theme. This year is Optimus as Santa Optimus/Christmas Convoy. Next year do Bumblebee as an elf. Give us a winter wonderland Ironhide with earmuffs and a song book so it looks like he is a caroler. Do a Soundwave that comes with cassettes that list public domain christmas songs. It would be something fun to collect and slowly watch the Transformers Christmas Village grow.

 

On a side note, I REALLY want the rest of the classic horror monsters to go along with Draculus.

 

That is something I really wish had continued to. I've heard different reasons why they did not continue it ranging promise being Target's fault to being Universal's fault. But I do truly hope that they do get it together and begin producing the rest of them. At minimum The wolfman and Frankenstein seem like the easiest that could be done.

 

Bumble The Snowbot Was Very Happy Jolly Spark!
With A Corn Cop Pipe And A Metal Nose And Two Optics Made Out Of Energon!

 

reminds me of the gobot TUX

 

It's perfect. Now get an dk-02 guard and paint him up to be a UPS van! (Ups delivers for Amazon, which no doubt will have a lot of Christmas drop offs)

 

I've mentioned it before but I would LOVE IT if every year Hasbro put out a Christmas Transformers figure. They do that with Star Wars so why not Transformers?

Give me Christmas Caroler Seekers that have little hats and scarves and music books. Give me Jazz with reindeer antlers and a red nose on his grill and on his bot mode he has antlers on. Give me Gingerbread Man Ironhide. Christmas Soundwave with his cassettes being jingles.

 

I Got A Idea Megatron As Santa Claus