Here are my fist customs. I did 5 total: Flint, Duke, Footloose, Law, and Crazylegs. All the pieces I used were beat up in one way or another; they were either broken, really loose, yellowed, etc. I used a lot of clear coat tightening the joints, but they're fairly stiff now.

All in all, I'm quite happy with them for my first try. Please let me know what you think of them, I'm open to ideas for improvement, what you like/don't like.

On another note, I wasn't able to get the paint on the weapon handles to stay on. Even with clear coat, the paint strips off. Any ideas?

For your 1st time they sure do look good to me can't wait to see what you come up with next. Keep up the good work my man.

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Excellent work, the paint job looks sharp. Congrats!

I like how Footloose and Crazylegs seem like two entirely different characters in that new color theme.

great paint apps.

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Solid painting this early on from you. Crazylegs looks really good. Footloose could use a third color for some simple detailing like painting the grenade. The red on Flint makes him look more like he belongs to the Oktober Guard. Not bad, but it caught me by surprise.

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These are all very good. Flint and Footloose had acceptable colors on the original figures, and the new colors are very workable. Crazylegs, however, really shines because your color scheme is such as vast improvement over light grey and red.

Nice painting, too.

Nice job on your first try out, gi_jeff.

My favorite out of these three has to be Crazylegs. He was always one of my favorite figures and this color scheme really does him some justice.

As for painting weapon handles, one trick is to paint the handle, then once the paint dries, brush over it with brush-on glue then repeat twice. That has worked well for me. Another thing is to not put too much stress on the handle after doing that. It can cause the paint and glue to crack and chip.

Now that you have begun customizing, one thing you should be sure to do is check out the Customizing Guide here. This place features excellent tutorials and articles on customizing, many with pictures and are authored by fellow members here. This is an excellent resource to learn from to hone your skills.

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Very nice paint. Suddenly Crazylegs got some coolness to him, once he lost the red and grey. I agree about Flint looking like a member of the OG with the red on him. I think you should definitely work on trying some camo.

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Thanks everyone! I enjoy hearing what everyone thinks. I enjoy even more that you think these are fairly good. I didn't even think that the touches of red on Flint and Duke would ring of The Oktober Guard, but I guess it makes sense. I personally just thought it worked well with the colour scheme. Also, somewhere in my mind I thought that the US or maybe even UK forces had touches of red on their desert uniforms somewhere in the past. No matter, it's something I'll consider in the future.

I have two more custom projects I want to try: I have a beat up Stinger Driver and Hiss Driver that I want to do something with (not sure what yet), and I want to make some Dreadknocks. I think Outback's head repainted would make a great Dreadknock, same as Crystal Ball or possibly even Gung-Ho V2 (sort of a rock star/biker look if you repaint the hat).

On another note, I'm selling the five custom Desert Joes on ebay. Is it faux pas to mention that on this site as a sort of second form of advertising? The whole point of these figures in the first place was to get rid of beat up figures that I couldn't do anything with, and to try my hand at customizing.

Thanks for your feedback everyone! I'll post more when I make more!

Sad to see you're letting these ones go, but I can understand if you need the money.

I'm sure it's fine to advertize them on these forums, but make sure to post a topic in the "marketplace" section of the boards.

Of these three, I like Crazylegs best, but they're all painted very well. I have my doubts of the red on Flint. I don't think it makes him that much less Oktober Guard, if you removed the red.
Of all five, I think the Law is the most beautiful custom. But where's Order...........?

Tim 121RVC

those are frickin awesome man.

what kinda paint did you use?

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