Now that most of us are stuck at our homes, some have tried their hand at being creative. I'm among them. I have been working in my first custom figure, Lord Tirek, using a KO Captain America, a cheap horse that had a pink carriage, KO Bionicle joints, and Parsecs Artesano epoxi. Changed the front legs a couple of times. Will change them again. Haven't found good articulations that can hold the heavy upper body but also bend a lot if needed. Wanted to keep shoulder and bicep, but ruined it too much when adding articulation. Ended up using sculpted arms with bionicle skeleton. Still need to sculpt more detail.
You're doing a really nice job on the sculpt work. I bet he'll come out really good. Fun facts: Tirek predates FiM and was originally voiced by TF narrator Victor Carolli. Guy's got a perfect villain voice. Looking forward to seeing him complete.
It's an undersized KO Bionicle (or Hero Factory, I don't know) blade. Got a bunch of those little figures for like a dollar each, to have access to plenty of ball joints for customs. The tail, wrists, and front hooves use those ball joints. Head, neck, shoulders, elbows and front and back horse legs use normal sized Bionicle KO joints. Thanks! Once the sculpting is done I'll have to wait for the quarantine to end here before I can paint it. I know, right? Luckily this one ended up a good size to pose next to the Chrysalis from that Chrysalis vs Spike set.
Thanks. It's nearly there. Lego products are kind of a premium toy here, and one of my goals is to use as much salvaged junk and cheap toys as I can. I once got a Ninjago movie polybag that had lots of small joint pieces (set 30428) for a couple bucks, and will use that in some future project, but the KO stuff is cheaper and good enough (most of the time).
I'm in Paraguay. Toys have added prices here, for example a Studio Series leader class transformer is over 120US$ in any store. But bootlegs get here by alternative, sometimes less than legal means, so combined with their cheap production, they can be purchased cheap. As I'm just looking just for some somewhat decent connectors, not any good sculpt or paintjob, the cheap stuff works just fine.
Wow, that's fricking expensive. I just heard lately that LEGO is a premium product in China because of their new Monkie Kid line they produce and release their which is especially aimed at the Chinese market (but will be distriputed internationally, as well, so no worries there) and is pretty expensive their but therefore designed for customers who don't worry about their wallets.
This is where I got the new front legs, a bootleg vintage Saint Seiya figure. Knees are very weak, but added a big kneecap so the leg doesn't bend backwards and works as a stopping point so the leg can hold the weight of the figure.
And here is Lord Tirek with his new legs, sculpted tail, and sanded features. I think he's ready for priming and painting. In the process of sculpting the legs a little drop of glue leaked into the joint and it exploded when moving it. I had to reconstruct the entire femur (it makes me very proud how well it ended up working).
After waiting for stores to slowly reopen, got close-enough paints of all the colors I needed. Tomorrow I will clear coat it if the weather is nice. After I reassemble it, should I make a new thread for the finished thing or just post pictures here? Paint got under the painters tape in some parts, but as the guy is covered in fur (I think) well defined color divisions shouldn't be important. What did give me problem was the paint and even the primer unsticking from the captain america parts where I applied tape (I had removed the toy paint, sanded and washed it all before painting). It was mostly in black areas, so I repaired it with sharpie. Note that I purposely left some joints unprotected when painting to build them up. Those were the loosest joints only.
And it's finished! Last minute changes: Inserted a strong wire in the ball joints of the wrists, because those have broken before during the building. Added a layer of textured EVA foam to the soles of the hooves, because even after using sandpaper and then paint, those were still too slippery. With 12in electronic Hulk. With Guardians of Harmony Queen Chrysalis. With regular sized pony. You may notice the tip of the beard is missing. This thing is heavy and has fallen a lot of times, and it falls hard. Not the only part that has broken, just a part I decided i would not repair. I learned a lot working on this and would probably make it a lot better if I do it again. Thanks for following this experience with me, everybody.
