I personally don't like having my own customs, I only customize because I feel like its a figure that isn't going to be made otherwise. I want companies to make the figures I want I don't want to have to do it myself and even if I think I can do it better I usually prefer the production figure. it just doesn't feel right to me, its like a musician sitting at home listening to his own album.
also i love and admire when i see super realistic ultra detail painted figures and dioramas that look like actual photographs. but i want my stuff to look like toys, i love toys, im a toy collector.

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Personally I like and enjoy my own customs, partially because I wanted them created but they were either never done, or done in a scale that I do not patronize, and the most important part, I can create what I want, and not be saddled with the issues of whether or not it is "kid friendly", adheres to any inflexible canon, or the all too real issue we face of lack of availability due to distribution or worse, lack of vision by those that decide case assortment.

My customs can be as sublime or gritty as I want. While I enjoy toys on an artistic level, for me it is all about fleshing out in a tactile fashion a story that exists in my imagination. That was the main reason years ago I wanted a head cast, so that I can insert myself into the many adventures that I can think of, and go in any direction that my imagination creates. Especially my gaming. When I roleplay in a game that is sandbox, I roleplay deeply. The histories and backstories go much deeper than just simple diversion. I can take a paragraph from any novel I enjoy, and extrude it into another novel entirely. Now I can do this with an action figure. Glorious.

While I would prefer if the companies made the figures in the scale I enjoy simply for the base materials and accessories, I long since tired of waiting. It took me forty years just to see a Legolas in toy form in the scale I appreciate. It wasn't too long ago where the only rendition that existed was a metal gaming miniature. Still haven't seen an Aragorn, nor even a Glorfindel in 1:18. I doubt I ever will. So it is up to me to realize these things. How many Conan's of Cimmeria have I seen ranging from 12 inches to 7? Cartoon, movie, and finally book version thanks to McFarlane, but again, not in a scale that I patronize. I'm damn near 55. The industry just doesn't work fast enough. Thank the Fates that finally a group of extremely talented individuals created Boss Fight Studios, with a vision parallel my own. If they truly survive from concept to blistered figure, this will be my Golden Mean for love of the toy.

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I like both. My customs give me a feeling of personal satisfaction and the production stuff gives me a nostalgic feeling. I think they work together to make the kid in me happy. If I had to choose one or the other I would choose my customs simply because I become attached to them after putting in so much thought and effort.

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I don't do a whole lot of customs of retailed characters, but I do often try to improve what they gave me. There are a handful of figures that would take so much effort to achieve so little improvement that's even there to be made that I leave them wholly untouched.

I know I wish the HACKS had the MU neck hinge, but I think I'm going to be pleased with their named individuals that they'll all stay as sold and I'll work my urges out on the blanks since that's why they're there.

So I guess I'd have to go in the Pro-Customs Camp, even tho I feel like I'm really finished with an item maybe 1% of the stuff I show off, which is like 1% of what I've worked on, lol.

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Well, I enjoy making and having customs, so I would customize either way. But if someone were to make factory quality Stargate or 007 toys that fit my style, I'd not be making my own toys for these properties. Part of why I make few comics characters. When Hasbro released a Union Jack, my custom UJ that I had made just went back into fodder.

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I prefer my customs as nearly every figure I've picked up could use a bit of help to fit my verse. That said there are a few that are just amazing right out of the package, like the POC Snow Job. That is a flat out amazing figure. I've only seen one person update that in a way that made it cooler, and all they did was add cool gear to him. Overall he stays just as he is in my verse.

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Ugh, SJ has the worst headwarp in the entire line going back to 82.

One thing I've learned after at least twenty years of destroying perfectly decent toys is that you gotta love the doing more than the having, as a customizer.

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I prefer everyone's customs to production pieces, for the most part.

There aren't many Hasbro figures that really impress me anymore. Once in a while a figure like Data-Viper comes along that seems so original that I notice it. Today's figures have vastly improved sculpting and articulation over the early ARAH stuff, and the proportions are more "heroic". But for all that, they just don't often have the magic.

Some of the Collector's Club figures are also awesome. In a strange way, I see them as customs that could be made... if you had access to a factory and the talents of Boss Fight Club to create head scupts. They are obviously production figures, yet keep the clever feel of customs. They are overpriced, but credit has to be given for the CC to creating what feels like a grey area between production and custom figures.

I mostly liked the 25th line but lost all interest when it went film line. the only figures I have liked since then have all been exclusives of some sort.
I was hoping the 3d printing would help customizing a lot but the few heads ive gotten just always have a sandy bumpy texture and don't hold paint well.

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starting this hobby just recently and with my ocd/hoarder nature, i set a mental rule that i'll be a customizer and not a collector. i'm not buying any production toys to keep stock, i see only in terms of fodder !

that being said i have a few figures that are still in the box that i won from the forum, and some untouched figures from sinodolls. i also don't plan on letting any of my customs go. i did a lbc for a friend on a gun forum, everything else is just for me!

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I think this is a really good question.

Ultimately, yes I definitely prefer customs - not just my own. I love the designs on some production figures but if they made them in a way that would completely satisfy me I think they would cost $30 each or more. There have been some production figures that come out that I've actually thought, man that is almost a work of art from the engineering to the execution, the colors and just everything looks perfect - and I think they were worth more than what they cost and with a little tweak they are just about perfect.... those figures are few and far between. VOTC Gam Guard is probably the only "perfect" action figure I can think of ever buying and just not wanting to modify it at all because its perfect - in a different time, completely out of context one of those could easily have been on display in a gallery and the fact that anyone could have bought one in a store when they were on pegs is just crazy to me. I don't even care that the figure is Star Wars, it's just cool.

But most figures I look at the parts of like 2DARK2C above me. I see, wow that foot is an amazing sculpt, or those colors look great and I want to put them together in a better way.

My early stuff hasn't aged well. Better parts have become available, my sculpting wasn't as good, and I customized, with rare occasion, to get the character/design out of my head and on the shelf. Very rarely did I actually play with the custom afterward. As I started doing larger projects I saw how the engineering and prepping I wasn't doing on figures made vehicles useless within weeks...or a move here or there. So I strove, nay continue to strive, to make more playable customs. I tell you that to tell you this, some of the most fun I have these days involving toys is playing with the kid or taking custom submission pictures, which also tends to turn into playing with the kid. And both involve playing with customs and action figures together.

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^agreed.

I admit that half the fun of doing a dio shoot is the mental play time that comes with it. Same is true of the act of customizing itself. but before I started doing dios or trying to at least have the photos convey something, with a pose or otherwise, it wasn't nearly so fun.

I don't collect, per se (though you'd not know it looking in my basement), and I really don't display my customs, per se (ditto), so I use customizing as a source of expression, but also as a reason for making dio scenes, and then I use the dio scenes as a way to do all the things I wished I could have done when I was 10.

It's the circle of life.

And yes, AV nailed it also. The love of customizing to a large degree involves loving the process as much as the final result.

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I am perfectly happy with production figures, but I would take my vehicles over Hasbro every time. Even worse if Hasbro were to make my vehicles exactly to the specs I made them I could not afford to get all the ones I want because they would all be expensive.

They would probably want $80 or more for Goliath. Which would make it more affordable for you all to buy then trying to buy mine off of me but over all would be a limiting price.

It depends on what you mean. Are you asking about my customs of existing production pieces or cottage industry vs factory?


If you are talking about my character customs ideas, I really haven't *finished* any customs, but I have tons of WIPS.

The ones I am most happy with are the ones I've fleshed out using the heromachine site. Characters that were lurking in my head I was able to get out and actually start to create them in the real world.

Some early ones look horrible and took forever to do. Now, I can breeze through the basic selection (pants, shirt, shoes, arms, hands, head, facial features, etc) in about 15 minutes. After that, it's finessing the details.

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