Bug was (is) my favorite character from Micronauts and I’ve always wanted a toy of Bug as a kid. So naturally, he was always at the front of my mind as a personal project.

I wanted him in a very dynamic pose over his species’ natural predator, the Reptos, but as you can see, the Reptos’s armored version of his head, in both color and shape, aren’t that interesting to me as a sculpt.

I tried to scratch-build a broken-up armored version of a Reptos, but I don’t know if I like it much. Plus, when I go to paint these up, Bug and Reptos’ colors are very similar. So I think I might just put Bug on a Hornetroid, which is black and red (which I probably  lean towards purple), as this combination will make Bug’s green colors pop. I’m such a geek, I also bought the Hornetroid toy just for reference

On a side note, please go look at Ken Kelly‘s distinctive artwork for the toy boxes. They are truly unique.

I still need to do a lot of work on Bug, but I am taking my time, slowly working the main body up from baked sculpey. The head and hands are going to be finished in wax. The head of the Reptos was from baked sculpey, then styrene and bits of sci-fi kits and circuitry.

I may also add in the distinctive gliders that some of the characters wear, as Bug sported them a few times throughout the comic. Might be too much though. Thoughts?

Here is how I made the Unburied tattered clothing.

I cut/rip up an old t-shirt to fit, then transferred the cloth to cardboard and cut out a pattern to make cutting future pieces faster. I put on some rubber gloves, made a grungy base color in a bowl with some craft paints, and rubbed the t-shirt in the bowl until all the fabric was painted. I then laid out the t-shirt flat on a piece of cardboard to dry. I finished up the paint job with some blood splatters and black nasty splatter using an old toothbrush.I take the x-acto knive, and cut holes or fray edges too.

The fabric dries fairly stiff, and I glue it to the painted sculpture. After I get some creases/folds in the place I like them, I hit the fabric with some fabric stiffener. I take the hairdryer to it to dry it almost instantly, and BAM, perfect clothing. I’m thinking of including the fabric with the kit, it’s so much more fun than just gluing and painting up 4 pieces of resin that make up his shorts.

The new base has been molded and cast up. It fits his feet better and is a bit more dynamic. The rocks look like they are giving way under his immense weight.

Here is the body, it is in 5 parts, and already anchored together by epoxy. This shot does not include the parts of the head or side mouth, but you get the idea.

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This is the Shaman Fallen, read more about him here. I’m pretty much doing this exact pose.

So here is his head and horns. I’ll save the rest for another day.

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I’m completely floored.

Getting this thing to a state where it was showable was a crazy adventure in itself. I didn’t even have time to cast up the tattered clothes he wears. I had to make a base from scratch. Leading up to the submission day, I had bought and studied the ModelMania DVDs to learn airbrushing.I spent 3 hours airbrushing this thing (the first thing I ever painted) the night before I had to submit it. Then, at 3:30 am, I go to put a wash on the guy to bring out all the painting I had done and I STAINED THE WHOLE THING. I just sat and looked at it, realized I had not put a coat of Dullcoate on it at all, and realized I had to keep going. It totally sucked, but there was nothing to do but keep going.

Anyway, here are some pics of  the piece. I will be casting another version, after I make molds of the new base I sculpted, that will have real cloth for the tunic. But I am also scuplting clothes that can be molded and cast, and added to the sculpture, since fabric is another step some might not want to deal with. I want to redo the entire paint job too, add mottling, make his mouth shiny like it is wet, etc.

I want to thank everyone at the Clubhouse and the Shiflett Brothers forum for giving me so much information, and to Rey Hernandez, who is one of the nicest guys I’ve been able to meet from the boards.

I’ll update pics of the new base and a version of the sculpt with real clothing that I’ve made grungy.

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I made this tutorial awhile back and posted on my site and on various forums. However, I coordinated with Gary Overman (owner of  Willow Products and maker of the wonderful wax I use) to package this up and allow people to download. I happily obliged because I want to get the word out on his wax (my favorite is FUSE), and there are not a lot of tutorials out there showing how to work with wax.

You can read Gary’s post here, and download the PDF tutorial right here!

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Full shot

Ok, so here’s our zombie dude, sporting some clothes. The white leg is a actually the resin cast of the leg. The perspective is off, the guy is really 9″ tall

Hand detail

To save some time, I am going to make a mold of  the left arm, make a cast in wax, cut off the spikey ball, flip it 180 degrees and reattach to the bicep. Maybe it will save time. Maybe not.

Give me a kiss

Here is the wax tongue on top, and a cast.

Spinal column

His back in the process of being detailed.

Right-Side skull

Left-side skull

This skull has a little helmet, I need to add another skull to the right yet… here you can also see how the  mouth piece is cast separately and fits inside.

Right Leg detail

Left leg details

How the head is assembled

Mouth Castings

So, the interesting thing that I discovered along the way was how to make the teeth sturdy. I sculpted the original teeth with ends of party toothpicks. When I went to cast, the teeth would break out almost all the time when I pulled the resin out of the mold. Then it hit me… put toothpicks into the silicone mold before I pour the resin. BAM! Perfect casts, and when you paint the teeth, you don’t have to worry about breaking them off. Oh, and they stay nice and pointy too, unlike the resin counterparts.

Experimenting with a base

I am making a simple stone base, with two big slabs from a ruins, and a two-piece skull. These pieces are cast separately so each diorama can be custom built. The ornate piece is actually molding I found at a craft store, more for dollhouses I think, that I just added to the clay slab.

Things I need to improve upon

• Skull anatomy
• More dynamic pose
• Dynamic clothing folds
• Feet

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I roughed this guy out last night… he’s a bad guy from the upcoming video game, Diablo III. Called “The Unburied”…”Being born out of pits of human misery, these beings feed on human suffering. Wherever bodies are dumped together unceremoniously, the unburied may rise.”

This hulking brute is done with Fuse, right from the start. I think I am going to start my sculpts with clay or sculpey from now on, then switch to wax with wastemolds. I am having a hard time getting organic shapes, like folds, etc right from wax, so I need to practice more, especially before Diablo 3 comes out.

I’ll put in a lot more details as I go, refine, fix the skull sizes and shapes, etc.

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1. Keying up the wings

1. First, I drilled a hole into the back of Illidan. The wing is going to be heavy, so I wanted there to be enough mass of the wing that gets inserted into the back of Illidan to support the weight. I filled the holes with Magic Sculpt (I found Magic Sculpt to be a lot cheaper than aves, but they are very similar products). I then inserted a brass rod, and then inserted wire I twisted into that brass rod. I let that sit overnight to harden. The red dots you see are where all the elbows and joints of the wing “fingers” will be.

2. Adding rest of wing joints and "fingers"

2. Here you see I added the rest of the wing “fingers”, all pre-measured for both wings. They are connected by quick curing plumbers epoxy, to speed up time. I then wrapped floral wire around each finger for the wire mesh and clay to stick to later. Repeat for second wing.

3. Adding bendable mesh to wings

3. Because the wings are so massive, I decided to add mesh as the base of the membranes. I think smaller pieces would be fine with thin layer of Magic Sculpt, but the size of the wings would have caused the sheet of Magic Sculpt to droop. I highlighted in red holes I made where each elbow of the finger would be. I think threaded the wire through those holes to help keep the mesh more secure.

4. Adding glue and "pinching" the mesh

4. After I threaded. I “pinch” the mesh around the wire fingers, so that the mesh sort of falls in the half-way point of the finger. This is so that when I add Magic Sculpt, the membrane will look more realistic, like the membrane is really attached to the middle bone like a bat. I also run a little superglue along the finger, kick it with some Zip Kicker to cure instantly, to hold the mesh in place for the next step.

5. Adding Magic Sculpt to the mesh

5. The last part of preparing the wing for clay/sculpey/wax is to further strengthen the membrane. Here I have pressed bits of Magic Sculpt into the wire, as thin as possible, to create the membrane foundation. I used disposable vinyl gloves for this, and dip my fingers in water, sometimes dipping the chunks of Magic Sculpt into the water directly. This softens it, almost like a slurry, and helps spread it out a bit more easily.

I will let this all harden overnight, and begin adding super sculpey or wax (I still don’t know what I’ll use, I have to see if I have enough wax left to do this.

I’ll add more pics in the next week of the detailing process.

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The guys over at World of War saw a posting about my Illidan sculpture, and asked to do a small interview. Check it out!

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I restarted the legs in ZEN wax, lovely stuff. You’ll notice I’m simulating threads in the pants by inserting bits of wire I’ve curved with pliers, heating it up and putting them into the pants. I’m still pretty unhappy with hoof armor. I’m having trouble doing intricate work right now, but with a bit more practice, maybe I’ll add more scrollwork. I have a lot to do yet, so I may just move on.

The base is rough, but there will be some broken architecture, more flint-like rocks jutting out and some crystals.

I’m planning on making a version of the sculpt with an LED in it. His magical tattoos that are carved into his body should glow slightly, along with his eyes (even though he has none, and his eyes are bandaged, they should be glowing green). I would also like the crystals in the base to glow slightly, or at least look “crystal-like”. Figure I’ll clear cast his head and torso for the LEDs.

His wings still need to be finished up (you can see them at the end of the video, I need to complete his hair and had strands that will be blowing across his front as well. I can tell already this piece will have many pieces to cast, but my local sculptor/kit group has an amazing mold-maker that is going to help me make a fully built version, not to mention a great LED guy. Critiques are VERY welcome please! It’s the only way I’m going to get better.

World of Warcraft Sculpture, Illidan from Jason Babler on Vimeo.

My work in progress of Illidan, from World of Warcraft. More pics at www.mantlestudios.com

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Illidan

My first major sculpt that I have been working on is Illidan (above), a character from World of Warcraft. In fact, this is only the second thing I have sculpted and it’s a doozy. I have only recently started to sculpt (around the beginning of 2008) and I wonder if I’m crazy taking on such an ambitious project so soon. If I had thought it through, I would of done something very very simple.

But I didn’t.

Take my advice, when you are just starting out, sculpt simple things to learn the material, then work on balance, anatomy, etc.

About the project

I started this project using ProClay. I heard about it on a forum and was drawn to it because of its high-wax content, and hardness. I want a lot of detail in the project, and Sculpey didn’t click with me at first (although, I did use it on the wings and will start using it more in the future). The ProClay wasn’t hard enough for my liking, and I decided to switch to wax. I built my own wax pen (that’s another post) and read about FUSE, an amazing wax from Willow Products. I bought a bunch and that’s what I am using for the upper half of the body. I am trying Gary’s Zen wax next (his latest and hardest wax).

Last weekend, I took the sculpt I had roughed in with ProClay and started to make wastemolds with OOMO30 and alginate. I poured the wax and started to key the arms and now I am working on adding details (more posts to come. It has been a long road, but I’m less than halfway done, all things considered. I have re-sculpted every part of Illidan at least twice. I sculpt, figure out what is wrong with the pose, form, anatomy etc, and then basically start from scratch.

Here are some pics on the construction of the wings:

I use apoxie sculpt to make the “arms” of the wings. I used wire to make the “fingers” of the wings and put them in the apoxie before it hardened. I then took thin wire mesh and threaded the mesh through the wire fingers, and cut it to shape the membrane. (I don’t have a pic of this process, so I will take a pic when I do the other one.) I cut the mesh to fit, and then pushed a thin layer of apoxie sculpt into the mesh to form the membrane.

After that hardened, I put a layer of Firm Super Sculpey over that so that I could add detail. I know of some sculptors that actually do the detail in the apoxie as it hardens, but my skills aren’t up to that level yet.

After I had most of the details done, I baked the wing, and then took a dremel tool with a cutting bit and drilled into the wing to form ragged holes. I also used the dremel tool to make the edges of the wings look more tattered as well.

Now that it is baked, I’m going back with mores sculpey to add spikes, fix some cracks and add more detail. I use a heatgun to bake the new sculpey.

Now I have another issue. Do I go through the hassle (and money) of making a mold of the wing, pouring in wax, let it harden, and then warm the wax under hot water and try to reshape the wing to bend the other way? Or make the right wing from scratch, as I did the first.

Thoughts?

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I think I’ll post my failures as well as my successes. Here’s a tip that you can file under “Had to learn the hard way…” The character I’m sculpting has a fabric over his eyes, so i thought I’d skip a step and just make a mold of his head with a thick piece of gauze around his head.

Bad idea. Silicone, as we all know, goes into every little hole, so a pourous fabrice like gauze is a bad idea. The silicone pretty much enveloped the guaze. The only plus side is that I was making a waste mold, and the head was perfect, just minus the cloth look over his eye. Maybe this is the Sculpting Gods telling me not to take shortcuts and just sculpt the darn fabric myself. I need the practice anway.

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Needless to say, our “talents” were not so appreciated by our teachers.I kept drawing through high school, but as I got older, I was designing instead of drawing I was working, instead of wondering. Well, that time has come and gone. I’m going to be making monsters again. But this time, I’m sculpting them.

This is my first attempt: I drew this Orc for a project (check it out in my Illustrations section of my portfolio), and I decided it would be a fitting model for my first sculpt.

I’m hooked. I started this site to focus my energies into assembling tips that took waaaay too long to gather, to reach out and interview some of the amazing artists I’ve come across, and of course, to showcase my meager attempts at sculpting. Stay tuned, it should be a fun ride. My first big piece will be Illidan, from the World of Warcraft game.