"Who am I? That, my dear, is an excellent question. Though not one easily answered." ~Raven Darkholme
This was my first NON friend commission for a ML legend style fig. The person wanted the modern mystique featured below form her stand alone series ( which i have all the frist run of cause it's awesome and she is a rad character who has long been over do to be used correctly...).
I always thought her old white outfit had kinda' outlived its usefullness...as well as that bowl hair cut.
So, I was given the task of taking a ML domino base and making it a mystique by swapping out a blackwidow upper torso from a HML. I was provided a good amount of fodder base materiales from the client. Including guns, an amazing belt, hands, a knife and sheath and a couple heads as well as a package of revoltech joints. ( as well as some gift fodder which is always appreciated :] )
After some back and fourth with the client on what he wanted and what I thought we could/should do we came up with the idea of a concept approach to the modern mystique. He wanted the middrift look the belt modded to hold the knife and its sheath. A resculpted Domino head to fit mystique and Xmen xtream Rouge hair. I suggested a chicks leather jacket sculpted onto her since dominos shoulders look like a jacket. Also on the left arm is a indentation were I would sculpt her trade mark, The skull. The client at this point said basically go nuts. I agreed to run all ideas by him and so far he has loved it all. SO let's get started!
This is the black widow top I dremeled away the arm joints to get revoltechs in them.
Same goes for the neck. Take note of the left shoulder the "patch" will go their.
I cut her open on the bottom so I could re-adjust her to match the lower half I am attaching her to.
My next task was making the domino wast rotate, as she only had an ab crunch. I used my dremel to cut it in half and then sanded it so later I could sculpt over it to make it look like a bare belly. I also took out the knee joints and filled them with sculpt.
I used a magnet to attach the torso to the lower half.
This was my first mock up to see what the proportions would be like and obviously her torso is a little long. The upper half will be attached by a magnet as well.
A big step in putting revoltechs in is filling the previous space left by the hing joint system. Just a shot of everything filled in.
The next thing I did was measure the arms with the Revoltechs provided by the client in. They were Extremely long. I mean she would have fit into a Kohta Hirano book perfectly! But thats not what I was going for here.
So I first had to shorten her forarms then the back where it meets the elbow.
Then I went about making the revoltech receiver joints.
we ended up with this. More dremeling and fine tuning is needed at this point, but you get the idea.
The next move was dremeling out the knee/ leg joints to receive the revoltech joints. This is the Knee on the shin. I ended up deciding to go much MUCH lower when her legs ended up looking freackishly out of proportion.
this is the Knee on the thigh.
Another shot of dremeling down. Its a slow process of making a semi-circle
The next thing I did was use acetone to remove the paint form dominos head and sculpting ears in place so when I re-attach the hair they peek out a bit.
I also am going to sculpt some fuller lips on her since its just not right for mystique to not be pouty.
These are the double jointed knees from revoltech/assemble borg.
As you can see in the background I had to cut off the part i was building and start over on the shins. they were just TO long.
Now what you see here is again the rough RE mock up with the joints in. Just seeing if they can support any weight, and so I can gauge if I needed to make the joint receivers any deeper. Also pictured is the belt the client sent. Its a amazing belt.
The belt is removable and uses a peg system. Pretty awesome. So in order for it to be mystique it needs a giant honking skull on it. I opted to not sculpt one but instead cut it off the mystique sash I had form the ML Legends Mystique the client provided. I sanded the belt clasp down and then simply cut off the skull sanding the back and applied it with crazy glue.
I think it turned out pretty Bad Ass. The belt still comes off as well.
It will be painted silver or bronze later based on what the client wants.
Next step was the client wanted the knife sheath glued to the belt. Although capable of doing this, I thought it would be cooler to do something else. And the client agreed. So I took some small rear earth magnets I had laying around and dremeled out holes for them and glued them in. I got these magnets at the local comic shop/hobby store. but I usually get mine From K&J magnetics do to their wildly advanced selection! ( their a sponsor on this page! check them out on the right hand side!)
Next up was the fact that the sheath was not what I wanted it to look like. I dremeld off the front details and then set about sculpting a clasp for it. I did this the same way I did for
Snake Eyes custom ninja sword. I laid out a small amount of sculpt on a wetted work surface. Then I went about flattening it out, trimming and flattening again until I got the desired diameter I wanted.
For this to work you need the work surface to be VERY wet as well as the blade and sculpt. Just remember to apply water frequently and you should be fine.
This is about the thickness I wanted. now to cut out the shape I want and maybe flatten/ clean up a tiny bit.
This is what we are left with after all my cutting away.
To get it off without completly destroying it, liberally wet the knife and the surrounding area and carefully start prying the piece up, bit by bit, till all of it is separated form the work surface. If it was slightly damaged thats fine. You are about to adhere it to the object at this point, so any small fix's can be done here. you could alternately just smooth sculpt over the surface and shape it that way. I just prefer this way personally.
The finished project! It will be painted black and get a buckle sculpted onto it as well.
a comparison shot to show the size and stature of her scale next to a Electra on a X-32 lower half and a LCBH Ann O'Brain.
This is the magnet system that keeps her torso attached to the lower half.
Hair has been glued on.
Making the rolled up sleeve's also to help cover the revoltch ball joint
A shot of the before and after. (the rightt and left) Lots of dremeling and applying glue to tighten the joint up.
After lots of back and foruth, I finally got them to the right size. the arms and legs gave me a lot of headaches. Proportions did not want to match up but, I finally have them about right here.
They are still a bit long but, I actually like this length. The torso still has to be shortened.
A full shot from the front.
Since I had most of the proportions close it was time for some detailing. I dremeled a spot for her trade mark skull hair pice.
Then dremeled out the shoulder pad for my skull logo.
I sculpted both of these by first making a small orb of sculpting material, then pressing them into place and working them out form their. Letting them set up half way then adding detail.
All in all, I was pretty pleased with the outcome here. As was the client.
another scale comparison.
On the next nipple puckering episode of Automtauntaun!
"THE FOOD OF THE GODS!"
