Worm bust done and resin casts, plus some Terminator Genisys

Casting of the Worm bust (need a real name)

So on my worm bust I finished off a few little areas and smoothed everything down ready for casting.  I use PinkySil for my silicon moulds.  For the housing of the mould I used a plastic cup as the container as this means when I am doing castings I can just use the same type of plastic cup to hold the mould together.  This was important as I knew I would have to slice the mould at least half way down to get the figure out.  Once the silicon was set I did the standard curvy cuts in the silicon so that the mould halves would mate back together well.  I unfortunately cut the bust in a few areas while cutting it out.  Also the head was at the bottom of the mould and the head crest and buggy eyes are quite hard to get out of the mould.  Harsh words were spoken.

Master and test casts

Then it was onto casting use Easycast resin.  I made a mistake on the first few castings by over shaking the resin and this resulted in lots of bubbles in the cast.  The next few were better, but still some bubbles.  I then switched from mould release spray to talcum powder to coat the mould.  I had read that the talcum powder draws the resin into the small areas of the mould better.  Turns out that is correct.  Had the best cast of all.  Just a few minor bubbles that I filled with Milliput and I added some putty to the front collar.

Collar redone and brass tube glued in.

Like all my busts I made a base for it first as I don’t like to have to do that after the figure is painted.  I also glued in the brass tube into the base of the figure.  I undercoated the figure black and then did the white zenithal highlights as per normal.  So now it’s ready to go.

I found the whole process really rewarding.  Key was to take it slow and only do one small area at a time and let the putty dry.  There were at least 7 sessions of putty work and quite a bit of scraping in between.  My hand made 2mm micro chisel was great for that task.  The second pair of eyes/opinions my wife added helped a lot too.  When you have no clear idea of what you are trying to produce (i.e. just winging it) it’s good to have someone else point out the defects.

Terminator Genisys figures

While I was waiting for paint to dry I cranked out 4 more Terminators.  These guys are going to be pretty easy to do.  Pretty much the sci-fi equivalent of skeletons.  Of course the humans are going to take much longer.

Before I paint my worm bust I really want to get back to Adokul the Monk.  However I still don’t have a good idea on his armour.  Getting a mental log jam on that.  I think I’ll just have to take the plunge and get some paint on him.

Worm bust sculpting

So just did more sculpting this week.  Also tried some Milliput Superfine (white) and green stuff (GS).  However that didn’t work as well as I hoped.  It was a bit too crumbly while I was working with it.  However when it set and was hard it was fantastic is smooth out.

I’ve learnt that having different materials (straight Milliput, Milliput + GS, Milliput fine + GS) it not a great idea when trying to smooth things down with a scraper (i.e. knife blade/chisel).  Each material has a different hardness level so scraping across materials means you bite out more of one material over another.  So despite trying to eliminate bumps between putty areas you can add to them.

I’m always annoyed when reading some tutorial/blog and the author does the “forgot to take a picture of this stage..”  Oh well, joined that group now.

Going thought the stages:

Added some more to the shoulders and made the lower back shell segment into a cloak.  I needed some more material on the bottom of the bust as it was looking very top heavy.  Also added some detail around the eyes.

Collar added

Adding in some nose ridges (missing photo ;) ) in Milliput superfine/GS, hence the area that looks like toothpaste.

Head ridge and nose area done

Redid the top of the head and added a head frill and top ridge.  Also some more on the top of shoulders and added some more neck ripples.  I extended the neck area behind the eyes to make the eyes less sticking out.

Neck/eye area

I then put some two part epoxy on the base to smooth it out and reinforce it.  Then the wife mentioned I needed a mounting base so scraped out that a bit and added in a base made from Milliput.  I also fixed up the collar with some GS.

Great idea, wrong time

Next up is to clean up the base and slice off the shoulder edges to make a clean edge.  I’ve also smoothed down all the figure with 800 grit wet and dry sandpaper.  With the base done I’m seriously considered casting the bust in silicon to see how to do that for a complex figure.

Mounting base added