This thread is a behind-the-scenes process of making a custom action figure film prop; or how to completely lose your mind in two months; or Your Free Admission to JM70's Life (No Refunds.) Fair Warning!

Who: Jm7o
What: Custom Action Figure to be used in an Independent Film, "Waabooz"
Where: .mn/.wi
When: In 2 Weeks
How: By any means

Part 1 of 9 : Why Me?

Sometime before 2010, Clint, a co-worker who knew of my customizing hobby, asked if I could make a custom of his friend, to give to him as a birthday present. That resulted in this figure. I say 'sometime before 2010' because I can't remember exactly when I made it, but that's when I submitted it.

Fast forward to early June 2015: I was contacted to gauge my interest in making a custom action figure to be used in a local independent film. The co-producer (Amanda) learned of me from her significant other, the one and only Clint. This film needs an action figure, and Clint suggested to her that she try me. She got in contact and explained her needs: this figure, with no design, only the name "SuperStinger" needed to be created for use in the film, as the main character Rabbit's favorite superhero. Oh, and they needed it in two weeks, as the shoot had been scheduled.

I kicked it around for a weekend, asking for advice from my wife and my customizing peer group. Everyone said go for it. I accepted.

I was in over my head almost immediately ... enter, HypnoHustler!



*Waabooz drawings by Nicolas Selma

Part 2 of 9 : The Team and the Parameters, aka: Scope Creep #1

By this time I had been introduced to Molly (Director) and Wenonah (Writer) and had created a Facebook Group where we could all share ideas and talk design and progress. They had a rough idea in mind, the character 'SuperStinger' would maybe have a black and yellow design, like a bee or a wasp.


But they really didn't have any other direction, including what scale the figure would need to be. They did describe a little bit more of how it would be used in the film, "Rabbit returns home with , and as he goes to place it next to his SuperStinger, MOVIE SPOILERs. This new information had us thinking that we would need two of the figure, one to remain mint,

I reached out to HypnoHustler, who is the only person I really know at the moment customizing in another scale (ML Legends,) although drbindy was also close by, if we needed to move into a 1/6th scale (Johnny West.) Vanishing Point and General Hawk were also on my short list, if we moved into Sigma Six territory. But we still had the problem of not having a design. So Hypno & I challenged each other to come up with 6 designs apiece:

















//I threw that MACH09 Work in Progress in there, just to show them all something besides drawings. Also side note, I used a combination of Mighty Men and Monster Maker templates, as well as Robert Atkin's blank templates to make my sketches. I can't tell if that is cheating or not.

Then a few things happened in quick succession:
1. The filmmakers looked over all the sketches and chose different design features that they liked.
2. It was discussed that the SuperStinger figure would be placed by other 'Marvel' figures -- but not ML necessarily, possibly ToyBiz 5', so 1:18 would be an acceptable scale.
3. They decided on one of my designs as a base figure.
4. Since it moved to 1:18, and Hypno had sold off all of his 1:18 Superheroes last year, he graciously exited the project.

So, I made an additional round of design suggestions:








Then ...
5. It was determined that one figure should be Mint-On-Card
6. It was revealed that Rabbit would actually be wearing a SuperStinger T-Shirt in the film.
7. Panic started to set in right as lady lucky kissed me on the mouth. Dream was between jobs and could handle the package design work.
8. Another stroke of luck was a delay in the film schedule, giving us until the first week of August. We had more time but it was still going to be tight.


"Hey Dream, how about some packaging mock-ups? We'll need a logo, too. And a final figure design. And..."












Well, we had a look. Now it was time to try to make that in plastic.

Part 3 of 9 : SuperStinger

So, now there was a design to work from, it was time to start sourcing figures and trying some different ideas - and I'm going to need some yellow parts and cheerleaders ... enter Kilcarr, drbindy, pluv and Lance Sputnik. Srsly, without those guys this project would still be mired in self-doubt and WIPs. Plus, Kilcarr and drbindy sent me all their yellow parts, both extras, and in Kilcarr's case, directly from his collection. Thanks, yos. And I am sending back everything I didn't use. Most of it, anyway.

One of the features that really stuck out on the figure design was the bug/multi-faceted eyes. I didn't know how I was going to accomplish this, other than sculpt/green stuff, and I was worried about them being a uniform size, especially across two different figures. enter a new shrinker/caster : Angry Nomad Customs, and his Blue Beetle shrinks. I think finding that head was crucial to me finishing SuperStinger with a degree of satisfaction.

I really liked the little lightning bolts on the head, a smaller representation of the chest logo, but I just couldn't figure out how to make that happen in a way that would survive being handled (as I knew at least one of the figures would be) -- in the end I just decided to go with insect antennae, and picked up a Toobz set of bugs off Amazon - I think I wound up using some ant legs for them.


The other design aspect I liked, and had no idea how to translate to the custom was the big pointed boot and glove cuffs. In the end, I moved completely out of my comfort zone of trying to find something close or possibly sculpting it: I took a page out of AdrienVeidt's book and went with sheet goods. In this case, I used a popped snow tube that my kids had trashed last winter and I had put aside, because I'm mental like that. The vinyl worked really well, and after a couple trial/error runs, I was able to get the shape as well as the correct thickness of primer on it.







Here's a good spot to talk about this: I wouldn't have been able to do this project with a base coat of yellow, had I not discovered and became a disciple of Army Painter primer. Yes, it's expensive (and it took two cans!) but this stuff does some amazing things. They also have 'color match' acrylic paint in bottles, and I picked up some of that as well, but eventually found out it doesn't perform any better than any other acrylic paint in coverage - yellow over black is IMPOSSIBLE - but the fact the color is the same is awesome. Oh, the color? Daemonic Yellow. Because of course it is.






One other thing I should note here: Something that was discussed early on was making sure that SuperStinger not really look like any established character, as we didn't want to worry about copyright issues. As I was designing and building, I got nervous that I was crossing over into some "insect-themed superhero design cliches," especially with the collar 'wings' -- this wasn't helped by the fact that I was using an MU figure for arms/legs and possible torso selection. Eventually I went with different torsos with a darker plastic base - again, made possible by the use of the Army Painter primer.










Presenting: SuperStinger







*Electricity effects courtesy drbindy

Thoughts?

Part 4 of 9 : Meanwhile ...

You may have noticed some random figure parts in some of those previous photos. "What was going on there?" you might ask? Well, there were additional designs and ideas that were either too fun or interesting to leave behind, even though there was no call for them. Plus, as most of you know, while working on a lengthy project, it does a brain good to have something else to think about and/or work on just to stay sane.

ScienceStinger aka LIGHTHAWK:
One of the initial design elements that both the filmmakers and I liked was the idea of the forehead spike. Once I drew it, I realized it looked like WO Maverick's mask, and once that was stuck in my head, I knew I eventually had to do something about it. Luckily Kilcarr had a Maverick that he let me have, as well as the Nova figure (from his collection) to start putting them together. I bought a couple of Bail Organa figures, just to get the gun, and I can't remember where the Iron Man came from - probably eBay. There was another Iron Man purchase along the way, a Mark V (or whatever the black one was) -- luckily that design got dropped, as my dog decided that version tasted great. If you look back on some of the original design sketches, I think you'll see elements in ScienceStinger.








BeeZoar:
So, I started thinking of a nemesis for SuperStinger, and I was still stuck in the insect theme. I picked up a couple broken General Grievous figures up off eBay, thinking I would make an 8-arm bad guy. In the end I decided against that, but did add an MU Death's Head for the head (mostly the lower jaw,) and picked up another Dragonfly off Amazon (same as I used for my Wasp figure last year) to give him some wings. I'm not sure what the stinger tail is from. Oh, and thanks drbindy, for the staves!










SuperSidekick : Buzzy
One of the things that was brought up (around the beginning of July, I think) was the need for an additional figure. There was some back and forth on this between the director and myself. She had someone in mind to make a figure, yet that person hadn't started on one yet. I was already well underway with my process, and suggested that I just make an additional one. Although she was worried that she was asking too much, I think she was relieved that there was one less thing for her to deal with. My initial thought was a sidekick. I even had a digital mock up and name picked out. But the filmmakers didn't really want another insect/bee figure. I felt it was a strong and simple enough design to follow it through. I had a Puck figure I bought off Hypno when he left 1:18 superheroes behind, and picked up yet another insect figure (more Bees!) off Amazon, and then used GeneralHawk's idea of using 25th Joe hip friction pads as goggles (see his awesome Sigma Scarlett.) This custom also was the first time I'd tried to use Liquid Green Stuff - in this case to try to fill in the carved 'hair' on Puck's arms and legs. I worked pretty well, and with a thick coat of primer, filled in most of the detail. The filmmakers initially liked the idea of a red accessory on SuperStinger, and I was able to sneak one in here, with drbindy supplying a pegged 'energy band' from Anankin's podracer from SW Episode 1.









Thoughts?

Part 5 of 9 : Sgt Steel, aka Scope Creep #2

Remember that part in the previous post (and spoilered in the first) about the additional figure? Yes, they needed an additional figure. They didn't want it to be an insect/bee theme. That was the only direction. No name, no instruction, etc., Unfortunately, I had nothing other than the three customs you see in the previous post. Fortunately, I have a guy I go to when I have nothing: Kilcarr. When I'm stuck on a custom, he's one of the guys I go to get the gears turning again. Also, when I'm stuck on a bio for the gallery, he's one of the dudes I hit up first to create something out of thin air to go along with something I'd already made. In this case, I just told him that we needed another figure, correction: two figures, and could he just do the whole thing?

And in about a day, he did:




And what's more, Dream took a couple of swings at the key art, and we were off to the next step.






So, Kilcarr sent me a photo of his two figures, all ready to mail!

wait...

Part 6 of 9 : Lucien haunts me still ...

It was now time to stop delaying the inevitable and get cracking on the packaging for the Mint-On-Card versions of the two figures. Being like most humans, when in doubt, I go with what's familiar. In my case, I went all the way back to our site project SPOOKS, specifically the mail-in figure that nova started and I finished, Lucien. As a quick memory refresher, or for those who haven't seen it before, here was the package I made for the figure (from an Avatar Jake Sully figure)



So, off to Amazon/eBay one more time to try and hunt down some Avatar figures still in package. Unfortunately either due to time or a different process, I discovered that the clam shells had now baked some of the ink into the edges, and stuck me with a new problem. Dream suggested that I don't use the original cards, but new boards (I used comic backing boards) and glue the shells down and put the full labels over the top.






Then I needed to come up with a graphic to go over the stand photo:



All that was left was to get Kilcarr to start figuring what was going to go in the text boxes on the cards ...
Oh, and those customs of mine that weren't used for the project? They became the 'gotta get 'em all' photos on the packaging!

Part 7 of 9 : The Final Countdown ...

So, just like every project with a deadline, it comes down to the last few days. Dream was running out of time and patience for package art changes, my customizing peer group was sick as heck of me, and I was at wit's end looking at my customizing work bench. More than all of that though, the filmmakers were on their way to the shoot. No more delaying the inevitable. It was Friday night, I had two opportunities to hand off the figures. The first was Saturday morning, and that just wasn't going to happen. The next was Sunday morning, with the art director. That was my chance.










Friday:
I took Dream's supplied designs and went to work.












Saturday:
Packaging WIPs and final shots





Sunday:
Handed off the figures with literally minutes to spare. Like 10 minutes.











//btw, just like Lucien, these MOC figures feature velcro bubbles, allowing access to figures inside.

Monday: THE SHOOTING BEGINS

Part 8 of 9 : Lights, Camera, Action Figure!

So, the big deadline came and went, and I waited to hear if my/our stuff made it through ok, or if they had any issues or problems ... seems like it went ok. Then the production photos started trickling in, and I started to realize how central to the main character SuperStinger was - needless to say, I'm glad I didn't realize that beforehand!
(film production photos by Art Director Kaylynn Raschke and Eugena Mertig)










Looks like ZombieGuide (and Hulk Hogan and Spectre and ...?) aren't the only JCers to be featured in the movies!

Part 9 of 9 : Group Hugs!

They say it takes a village to raise a child, and it takes about the same amount of people to put a film prop together. This project was tough. Tough on me, my family, my friends, my customizing peer group, people that barely know me, and of course, the filmmakers. Thanks to all of you - if you hadn't carried me, kicking and screaming, across the finish line, there would have been some severely disappointed people, and a summer of shame.

HypnoHustler, Kilcarr, Dream, pluv, drbindy, Lance Sputnik -- take an extended bow, I owe you all and doubt I will ever repay you in kind.

To the rest of you who've soldiered through this thread, thank you as well -- if I was representing us as a group, I hope you feel the end justified the means, or some such saying -- I owe you all as well, and used a little bit of everything I've ever learned or taken from JoeCustoms and all my fellow customizers over the years.

Some parting shots:

















CUT. and that's a wrap!

Go check out the film's Facebook Page, give it a 'Like' and keep an eye out for the finished film!

That's really neat. Awesome figures.

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slow clap........thread of the year

i really enjoyed the step by step. i never would of imagined the work it took to go from, no concept to ready for the cameras.

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Looking at the design, I'm reminded of a character from one of the GIJOE/action figure magazines from the early 90s. There was a character named 'Vespid' and it has always stuck with me.

Actually, I think GITrekker actually had a piece in that issue too.

Nice work all around. Great use of the Maverick head.

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That was amazing JM and all involved.

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WOW. Amazing project with incredible final pieces.

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I was expecting some kind if updated Cobra Stinger but this is pretty damn cool too. Beautiful custom.

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