Everyone, great work! Keep it up, we're coming up on the home stretch!

Shiv: Really nice work there- looking forward to seeing Spidey perched there.

Jack: At the rate you're moving I assume you're done by now!? 

had to take a little break from all the webbing so I did the base up. I used oils to paint the base and the black is just a testors spray can.

hoping to get Spidermans legs done this week end, after the hockey game on sunday that is.

Awesome!

Hello fellow modelers, thanks for posting the compliments on Red,  much appreciated.

I've got her hair 'extensions' completed with the green stuff, so tomorrow it should be dry and ready to paint.  Also solved the problem of the arm holding the staff - just needed some build up of putty at the back of the upper arm.

regards,
Jack

As I said my hats off to you Shiv, I'd have only gotten maybe 30% of the way done with all that webbing before I ended up bummed out, shoved him back in the box, and buried him back in the closet with all the other started and never finished kits.

Man, you guys are killing me with the detail you have in your builds!  Amazing stuff everyone!

Eagle90

Greg-I only spend about 30-40 mins at a time on the webbing or my eyes start to go buggy on me so it has taken me about 2 months to get this far. The strips line up fairly easy using the engraved lines already there and just trim them to length with a sharp #11 blade.

Tim you'll have some fun getting her head onto that neck.

Also, I somehow missed giving props to Pmitch on finishing your superb Ironman. That mixed metallic finish is stunning.

Also, welcome back, Mike!

(There. I think I'm all caught up, now.)

Tim, thanks. After seeing jack's work, I think taking his advice is a good idea. Painting flesh has always been an issue for me, I would never dream of doing a figure with that much skin on show. I will check out that on line extra, I already have an idea of what I am going to do, but always worth checking out ideas.

Greg, thanks, I am rather likeing the effect it gives.

Tim - Artwork for the mugs looks great!
Conan looks to be shaping up nicely. Your work in adding necessary bits of clothing and fixtures  (as well as restoring those pesky bits of fly-away hair) is inspiring. Like the others, I've never seen the limb attachment points so inconveniently located, but it looks like you've got it all under control. Having to assemble it all before painting is a major pain. Base is looking good.

Jack - Truly outstanding work on Sonja! The trompe l'oeil effect on the armlet is superb--I wouldn't have known it was "faux" if you hadn't pointed it out. Face and skin tones are beautifully.done. I am genuinely in awe.

Bish - I really like the toned-down red effect on the cape. Very natural effect.

Shiv - Spidey's looking most impressive. How long (more or less) did it take you to strip on all that webbing?

After a good day off working on it, my Superman's more or less done. Since I did a lot of shadowing and highlighting with oils, I'll give it a week or so to let everything dry thoroughly, then apply a matte coat and post some pics. (Thanks again to Tim and Aaron for the deadline extension. Makes things quite a bit easier.)

Great work, one and all..

Wow all of those look awesome but you've just knocked the ball outta the park there Jack!!!

Tim-the spider on his chest is already molded raised. The one on his back is just an outline though.

jgeratic

.

NOW THAT"S WHAT I'M TALKIN' ABOUT! Well done, Jack!

I love the non-metallic finish on the armband. I'm hoping to pull off a similar feat the metallic finishes on my build. I've done it with success on small figures, but want to give it a shot on this one now. The only thing I can think of putting in that reflection is a little image of your face. HAH!

Can't believe Red's almost finished. Again, I feel behind. But, I'll not let that happen in the next group build. "Diligence with all things" will be my new motto, replacing the far older Kidwell family motto, "We leave the weak and eat the dead." It's a Welsh-Irish thing.

Bish - I think the work you're doing on Vader's cloak is spot on. I'd like to give you a helpful critique, but I think Jack has done that and you've run with his advice. Nice going! Muzyka's story is a good one. There's an online extra that shows his process for painting, too. I used his techniques on the D.VII's base for the WWI Aeroplane Group Build. I'm glad someone else is getting some use out of it, too.

Shiv - Great progress! I can't remember, is the spider raised on the uniform already? And if not, what did you do to punch it up?

Good work, everyone. Every time I visit here, I get excited to see what you're all doing. 

Bish - I think the cape is looking very good.  Black absorbs light, and imitating cloth which is flat, that in turn also does not reflect much light.  This is why introducing colours with no, or very little tone shift, brings interest into the subject - quite successful I'd say.

Shiv - very detailed (and dedicated) work there, it's going to put new meaning into the phrase 'amazing' Spiderman.

---------------------------------

Thanks both for the positive comments.

arm bracelet - this was painted with flat acrylics, using white, yellow, green ochre, brown and some blue in the darkest areas.   I'm already thinking of doubling the width of the highlight as seen from the front.  Did a test in photoshop, and it should look better.

eyes - nothing but acrylic paint.  It is just the contrast of the colours in close proximity creating the shiny look.  Note too the whites of the eyes are anything but white - this helps the spot of white on each iris to pop even more.

regards,

Jack

Thanks shiv, that's one thumbs up.

Love what your doing with Spidy, there's a lot of work going into that.

Tim-looks like you might have a bit of work cut out for you there.Coming along very nicely though and again nice job with the wood. Can't beat the look of actual wood.

Jack-incredible job on Sonja.How did you get the eyes to have that shine to them?

Bish-love the effect that the red gives to the cape.

finished the chest on spiderman and ready to get started on the legs and hands.

I like where your going with the base Tim. I just started mine tonight, I have taken some ideas from the article in the July 13 issue by Mike Muzyka.

Jack, now that is amazing. In regards to the bracelet, has that just been painted one colour. on the bigger pic is looks as if light is reflecting off it, or have you painted that effect. What ever you did it works for me. And the metal work is really nice, I like the effect you have got on the one on the right leg.

Just got one pic for you guys as I am keen to see what you think before I carry on. My first attempt at the blue I was pretty happy with. But my first go at the red was far to bright, so I went over that in black and tried again. Second time around I did a darker red, I then added a touch more black and added that to the sides of the high point. I have never tried this before and I do rather like it. This pic is in direct light from my desk lamps, but the result does seem to vary depending on the angle and amount of light.

So what do you think. 

Tim - some more great wood working.  Once stained and everything, it should add a lot to the overall model.

-----------------------------------------------

Red is no longer armless, both appendages are painted, but waiting to further sort out the weaponry before attaching her left arm.  Something has gone askew with her stance, and a dry fitting of her holding the staff ends up being on a slant.  A quick fix would be to cut the wrist in question and rotate to a better position ... but will see.

Didn't have any gold metallic paint for her arm bracelets, so tried to achieve some sort of reflective look by using flat paints.  Not sure of the success, it is difficult to achieve realism since the model is viewable from all kinds of angles.    I do have some metallic powders to try, but will wait and see if the current solution grows on me - any opinions?

So just an arm,  three weapons to attach, and it should be done.

regards,

Jack

edit:  forgot to mention I did have to cut off a section of her hair over her upper left chest.  There was no other way to make it look right while adding the metal discs.  More green stuff to the rescue, should be an easy fix.

Gamera

Tim: Looking good! Makes me wonder though why on earth they didn't cast the separation line for his arms at a pair of wrist bands or something similar!?! Just odd engineering there.

The base looks great, but GM has a good point- the time periods there are... odd... makes my head hurt...

Thanks!

It's hard to see after I did the work, but Belit's left leg and torso, and Conan's left arm, up to the elbow, are one piece. His right hand is molded onto the underside of her left leg, just above the knee. He is wearing an armlet around his wrist. Belit's right leg and Conan's right arm are another piece. The seam between the right hand and arm is ostensibly hidden by the armlet.

To your point, I think they could have done precisely as you suggest, and hidden the connections with more jewelry, or some such on the arms. However, it wouldn't represent the cover art the model is based on. I think Moebius was trying to capture the art as accurately as it could. Thus, I'm left with some cleanup. However, it's nothing that I'm unable or unwilling to tackle. I'm just always second-guessing myself and over-thinking, which makes my builds take longer than they should.

GMorrison - You hit all the points that I've been wrestling with the last few weeks, and why I've waited until now to do the base. I considered that the ship might be more of a dhow or junk, or possibly even a longship.

What it came down to, in the end, is what would be expeditious. I'm best acquainted with ships of the 18th-19th centuries (monographs up the wazoo). So, I did what I knew. Not the best reasoning, I admit, but it's what I've got. (Ma always said I was lazy ...)

In the end, though, I'm happy with how the base is shaping up. So much of the deck will get covered by other stuff that it probably doesn't matter a great deal, but, hey, at least I gave it some thought!

Tim: Looking good! Makes me wonder though why on earth they didn't cast the separation line for his arms at a pair of wrist bands or something similar!?! Just odd engineering there.

The base looks great, but GM has a good point- the time periods there are... odd... makes my head hurt...

I always make sure not to use "factory edges unless the piece is 1/4 " or less in this case you should rip the pieces you need ( see my other post where I suggest you use twigs) and keep the extras in a box. cut 3M blue tape down the middle and use that cut.

Just saying.

Hmm this is a cause for sitting down and giving it a bit of thought.

The Hyborian age that Howard created is so long ago that ships or boats of the era have to be considered to be the most primitive thing anyone could imagine.

On the other hand the whole story is presented as a fantasy so extraordinary as to be possibly an earlier version of a time much more recent or even in the future

Revelation comes to mind.

Dunno and the philosophy of it makes this thinker struggle a little when details come into focus.

But then the confusion is that the art associated with the books represents our hero and his main squeeze on the decks of no less than a medieval era ship.

As with all things in art its all about the message.

So your build of the deck might just possibly be too modern. It's correct for Nelson's Navy BTW the stagger pattern is well done.

But... Imagine in the tenth century the Vikings basically laid short chunks of timber fore and aft over the frames that their hulls were based on, for decks. And the subject here is 21,000 years earlier.

I've read the Black Coast story a few times. It's a real not- fun and depressing thing. Belit is dead, Conan is in the worst part of his existence.

Maybe the deck should be mean, desperate, gates of Hell.

Take the look on his face and draw it down past his feet to the base.

Shadow of death over his head kind of thing.

Thanks, guys.

Worked on the base today.

I made a template of the top of the base out of paper and transferred the shape to a sheet of styrene (actually two sheet I glued together with Tamiya plastic cement). Then I marked where two beams would be and laid my first plank of 1/2" basswood and super glued it to the plastic.

Before we go further, here are my issues: I tried to find 1" wide basswood locally. That would have given me 6" deck boards (at scale). However, it was not to be. I could have bought 3" wide basswood, and ripped it to a width, but I didn't want to deal with the time and waste. SO, 1/2" from Midwest was the best the local shop could provide. Second, I was prepared to imagine the ship beams spaced 4' apart (8" on the model. That could have essentially limited to the base to showing deck planks running across a single beam. Since I had already gone with 3" boards (at scale), I figured either the ship is far smaller than I'd initially imagined, or the Black Coast simply doesn't have trees readily available that can be harvested for large boards. Either way, I decided that he ship has beams 2' apart (4" on the model). Both of these compromises, I think have allowed for greater visual interest.

I planked the deck according to the three butt shift system. I used pieces of plywood left over from making the chest as spacers while laying the planks. After they were all glued down, I went back and removed most of the waste from the plank ends and then sanded them even with the plastic subdeck. I attached the deck to the base with 5-minute epoxy.

The dots for the treenails are there just to help give me a visual cue while I was working. I'll go back and add treenails later this week. I'll fill the space between the planks with string dyed with India ink and stain the deck oak.

Tim, that's really nice. I didn't realise this was two figures.

I took jacks advice and did the blue and red tints last night. The blue is nice, the red needs a bit of work. Unfortunately, our power went off at Midnight Fri and has only just come back on, so will have to touch it up tomorrow.

Tim Kidwell

Hi John! Dark Power (or Kid Kidwell as I now call him) and I went to a children's play yesterday. I haven't been on a school bus since high school. They're as bad as I remember.

Can't you find a Mickey Mouse or a Goofy for "Kid" Kidwell to build?  They gotta be heros!

Ah yes, the school bus.  Lots of band trips, all bad rides.  Cep't for a girl or two that happened to also be along.  Too  bad geeks weren't in fashion then.