1/12 WW1 Figure scratchbuild

[Model Mate]

First a warning – you’ll have to bear with me before I get any actual build pictures up for this – it may run for a while as I’m attempting something I’ve never tried before and lockdown is limiting what I can actually do at the moment.

 

I’ve also prepared quite a lot of this and done a few experiments already off-line, so to speak, so there’ll be a bunch of posts in quick succession to start off with.

 

I’ve returned to model making a few times over the years since my first forays into the hobby as a kid. Each time I re-trace my childhood steps, starting with 1/72 Airfix fighter planes, moving up to 1/48 and then diverting into AFVs and figures. Each time, I push the boundaries a bit more in an attempt to learn new skills and discover new techniques.

 

This time round, I’ve reached the figures stage and I recall as a kid, making use of Tamiya’s 1/12 racing driver kit as the basis for a couple of Napoleonic Hussar/Dragoon types. This seemed a good plan at the time – the racing driver was pretty cheap and modestly attired (separate helmet was a bonus) allowing various bits of lead foil, filler and scraps of plastic to be slapped on him to turn him into a variety of soldier types albeit sporting fetching 70’s Jackie Stewart hairdo’s.

 

Now I’ve discovered a 21st century alternative. Bandai make an artist’s posable 1/12 mannequin called “body Kun” which is anatomically correct (well, there are a couple of bits missing, if you see what I mean) and in terms of movement, he can be posed in pretty much any position a real person would. My first thought was to use one of these, fuse his joints with superglue and simply dress him up, but at £20 a pop, it seems a bit pricey for each figure, especially as it’s something of an experiment and could all end up in the bin. I’ve ordered one anyway, to use (as the manufacturer intended) as a guide to my model-making/sculpting.

 

In carrying out my research into all this, I also discovered that there’s quite a healthy world/market out there for 1/12 action dolls – I think GI Joe may have kicked it all off, being a little smaller than Action man. As a result, beautifully sculpted resin heads are available on the web for about £15, although they tend to be spiderman/Wolverine/Brad Pitt and so on; remarkably realistic and so instantly identifiable, but a good starting point. I’m keen to try sculpting, but a bit scared of tackling faces.

 

Clothing is another area I’m more than a bit wary of – basically I’ve no sculpting experience at all, so I need all the help I can get.

 

A diorama is building up in my mind’s eye…. WW1 British soldier has stormed a German trench, wildly brandishing his fearsome trench club, swinging at all and sundry in a berserk frenzy with his trenchcoat billowing around him. His foe is broken; a shellshocked German sits holding his head in his hands, resigned to his fate, photos of his sweetheart fluttering out of his bloodied hands and into the mud. The aim of all this carnage (for me) is to practice and hopefully achieve a realistic full-on action piece. My Tamiya racing squad were all stuck in the same rather louche pose and I want to see how far away from that I can get.

 

So here’s the plan:

·         Dress (me) up in something approaching WW1 British uniform, at least in shape. Pair of old corduroy’s, walking gaiters for puttees, long sports jacket and trenchcoat.

·         Use 4 friends (may have to wait until lockdown has eased of course) to video front, back and both sides of me as I “swing into action” on their phones whilst one of them counts out load. I’ll also have a “measuring stick” on view so I can scale the resulting images accurately later.

·         Load these videos into basic editing software and align them (that’s where the counting comes in).

·         Capture a suitably dramatic/animated moment from each video to get front, sides and back views. I’ll print these slightly larger than 1/12 on paper, with the contrast pushed up to highlight clothing folds.

·         Pose the body-Kun doll in the correct position using the printouts behind (hence printed a bit larger).

·         Copy the pose using wire to form an armature.

·         Bulk out the body with (standard) miilliput to match the body-kun.

·         Create clothes using scaled sewing patterns I found on the web for WW1 British uniforms out of…. I’m not sure yet; some papery material TBC. Perhaps fag papers for thin cotton and J-cloth for thick wool. Maybe I’ll use superfine milliput or metal foil instead – not sure yet.

·         Apply the clothes piece by piece, supergluing spot points and sculpting (with PVA if I use “cloth”) to match the profile photos.

·         Stick on head and hands (body-Kun comes with a variety of hands, so I may try casting some resin copies).

·         Add 1/12 3D printed Lee Enfield I’ve seen for sale online.

·         Scratchbuild various apparel and stick on.

·         Paint.

 

The same will go for the German, and then it just remains to build a trench diorama to place them in. Should be fun!

 

[Model Mate]

First a trial for the basic body shape. I downloaded some figure proportion charts/profiles from the web and scaled these on my laptop’s screen to match 3 different scales – 1/35, 1/24 & 1/12. For this test I’ll try 1/24; big enough to mirror what I’m likely to try in 1/12, but not too much of a waste of material.

 

Not currently having access to a printer, I traced these from the screen onto paper at each scale.

 

I then folded up a 1/24 armature from copper wire to match the wireframe sketch and plopped him on a piece of cork.

 

My milliput is stuck (not literally I hope) on my boat, while I’m at my girlfriend’s flat for lockdown, so for my first trial I used blu tack. Not the finest modelling clay, but it has the advantage of being re-usable and may not be that different from milliput in terms of application. Also, if I can get a half decent shape using this, it should be a walk in the park switching to proper modelling clay.

 

The first efforts were awful – I’ll not embarrass myself by showing them here. They don’t need to be great, just bulk out the body shape fairly realistically, but even this is much, much harder than online sculpting tutorials would have you believe.

 

[Model Mate]

My Body-kun has arrived! He’s lovely….

 

…and his hands look pretty good, so I’ll definitely have to try copying them in resin. Casting tutorial coming soon(ish).

 

Here’s a simplistic photoshop mock-up of the general idea for the vignette. The tommy will be carrying a Lee Enfield rather than a samurai sword of course!

 

Whilst I hone my rather pathetic sculpting skills, I set up a few experiments for the clothing. I superglued the tops of pieces of different “fabric” onto some old sprues – from top left: Rizla, J-cloth, teabag and kitchen towel.

 

I mixed up some PVA, water (about 30/70) and a drop of green-grey using Vallejo model-air, and daubed it liberally all over, creating folds and creases using a paintbrush and toothpick. I did this using teabags on my P-38 diorama and it worked pretty well, although I used model-colour acrylics for that and the colour was considerably denser. These trials will need further coat(s) of paint once dry.

 

Here’s how they turned out…

 

The cigarette paper went a bit “waxy”, with the glue and paint seeming to separate out. It’s reasonably stiff and very thin. The J-cloth is still a bit flexible and doesn’t take sharp creases particularly well, but then that could be a fair representation of a thick wool coat at 1/12. The tea bag looks pretty good – takes paint well, folds nicely and is stiff. The paper towel moulds well and is really stiff and brittle, but the embossing is still visible and it’s a bit “hairy”.

 

In the meantime I’ve been studying sculpting videos and seeing how to create clothing using clay. It’s making me realise that I’m coming at this whole thing from two perspectives:

 

1.       As a model-maker, adding parts using whatever materials seem best

2.       As a (novice) sculptor, fashioning everything from clay/putty

 

I also realise that there’s a third way – go digital. i.e. scan and 3D print.

 

So, the experiment widens as it continues. I’ll now approach the figure using three techniques.

 

1.       Clay sculpt the main anatomy and add model clothing

2.       Sculpt the lot

3.       3D scan (photogrammetry), digital sculpting to refine and print

 

What I suspect I’ll find is a combination of each of these works best, but we’ll see (and hopefully learn) along the way.

 

The main figure will be a bit of a challenge in every respect, so I’ll start with the sitting figure. This will allow me to capture the images I need using a single camera/phone as he’s sitting still. If it all pans out ok, I’ll try to come up with a way to “scale it up” using videos to capture a moment for the moving chap.

 

[Model Mate]

As with most things, it seems the way to go with sculpting is practice, practice, practice… If I’d started doing this many years ago, I might be quite good, but I’ve now got a lot of catching up to do!

 

I’ve been practicing with my 1/24 armature. I fused the hip and shoulder joints using green stuff. This keeps the shoulders and hips in line and stops the arms and legs pulling them out of shape when posing. I also added a little green stuff to the torso and upper and lower arms leaving the joint areas free. The idea being that I can still re-pose the figure but the limb sections will remain straight and proportioned and that I start to bulk-up the body a little so he can be “clothed” after.

 

I abandoned the blu-tac after my initial experiment. Firstly it was awful to work with and too far from “real” clay/putty to be useful practice and secondly, I got a delivery of a bunch of essential supplies:

 

·         Small needle-nosed pliers

·         Green stuff

·         Milliput superfine

·         Fimo pro – grey

·         Plasticine

·         Assorted wire scrapers, shapers, spatulas etc.

 

Switching to plasticine for practice is much better. I tried a standing character copied from a Tamiya tank crew figure which was much improved over blu-tac man, but still pretty poor, so he got stripped off, and I started again, copying a 1/16 resin running SS machine-gunner figure.

 

This has gone much better – good enough for me to brave exposing him to scrutiny. I bent the armature to copy the pose of the resin figure and also posed body-kun to match. I then built up the bulk of the body using small pieces of plasticine squeezed into place using my fingers. I based this on the body-kun, but tried to leave him on the skinny side, so the clothing on top wouldn’t have to be scale thickness. I then added further rolls and sausages of plasticine to create the folds of clothing based on the resin figure. It went pretty well and by smoothing, blending and scaping the sausages into shape it started to look reasonably convincing, though I could have added a bit more bulk to the frame earlier – he’s still a little on the thin side.

 

These photos show where I’ve got to – legs have been roughly done, but the upper parts are yet to be shaped.

 

Ok, so a big improvement over the course of three partial attempts. It’s also helped me refine the approach I plan to take in modelling my 1/12 fellas. It’s occurred to me that it would be great to photogram-scan the figures, but if I want to capture him(me) in action, I’d need at least 100 iphones/cameras – that ain’t going to happen, so the option of simply scanning, tidying and printing is gone (for the moving figure at least).  I still plan to capture 4 (front back and sides) shots from video though – hopefully enough to provide reference for the pose and the clothing, to be physically sculpted.

 

I’ve also re-thought the sculpting medium – I had planned on milliput for the most of the work, but its limited working time will be a real disadvantage. Reading up on the subject, I’ve selected Fimo pro as the main sculpting material. This needs firing (well, cooking – 130 degrees) to set, so remains workable any time up to that. It can be fired multiple times, so once say, the legs are done to my satisfaction, they can be baked and the rest worked on without fear of nudging the legs with a thumb and screwing up what I’ve already done. The surface can be smoothed with isopropyl alcohol before firing. I plan to then use milliput for the finer, more fragile details, diluting with alcohol/meths to create various consistencies from paint to slurry to clay. Foil, wire and plastic bits may well feature here for belts and so on.

 

The photogrammetry still may have a part to play though. I can scan the “finished” figure and refine details in the digital world using Blender before 3D printing for final “physical” tidy up and paint. This would also provide the opportunity to cut him into pieces for resin moulding rather than attacking the real figure with a saw if I decide I want to give that a try. He could then be printed at any scale….hmm.

[593jones]

Looking very good, will be following this with interest  

[TonyOD]

What an interesting project. Figure's aren't my thing but I'm going to be following your progress with interest.

[Niall]

I would not recomment the Milliput white for any use were the finished item is to be painted. It is very sticky and difficult to get mixed right. I use to the standard green/yellow. Once mixed leave it for 5 minutes or so before using it and work it with wet tools, when sculpting figures.

 

My 1/16th scale US army pack -

 

 

[Model Mate]

Thanks for that Niall - I've used milliput for various bits and bobs over the years, and yes, it is rather sticky and I suspect doesn't sculpt as well as some other alternatives. I'm aiming to use Fimo for most of the work, and just save the milliput for belts, buckles and flying cloth as it's a fair bit stiffer than Fimo for that sort of thing, but we'll see how it goes.

[Model Mate]

And so the trials continue….

 

I co-opted my girlfriend’s sons to assist in my attempts to get photos for scanning and copying. This entailed me dressing up like a complete prat in flasher-mac, corduroys tucked into long socks, tweed jacket and cycle helmet. We took a whole series of photos to attempt photogrammetry scanning and made sure to get 4 clean, front, back and sides shots to show how the clothing folded.

 

I replicated this pose with the body-kun and made up a fresh 1/24 armature for the next test.  

 

The armature got some basic bulking out done with superfine milliput.

 

I took a further series of photos (about 100 in total) around the body-kun from all angles, to try a photogrammetry test. I downloaded a piece of software called “meshroom” and loaded the photos. All seemed to be going well, with a reasonable point cloud model building up as the processing churned away. Unfortunately, the software eventually threw it’s toys out of the pram, complaining that I didn’t have the correct GPU to allow it to continue. I turned to another freebie software called “regard3D” which doesn’t require an Nvidia graphics system. This really struggled, and though I started to get a few photos lined up and a very basic, partial point cloud underway, it really wasn’t enough.

 

I decided to park these digital experiments for now. I’ll just have to get better at sculpting….

 

…Which luckily is going rather well!

 

I stripped the plasticine off my running man armature and re-did it with Fimo pro. This stuff is great! Plasticine was a big step up from blu-tac and this stuff is the next level. I ended up using only a small handful of tools; mostly a small, spoon-like metal shaper and a spear-head shaped one.

 

The beauty of Fimo is that it stays workable until it’s fired/baked, so I’ll super-glue the figure’s cork base onto a jar lid to enable him to be safely shielded between sessions.

All this was done in a single sitting. I was a bit slap-dash about the accuracy, as I really just wanted to get some practice working with Fimo and find out how it behaves. I understand that it can be smoothed with isopropyl alcohol amongst other things, but I don’t have any. I’ll try smoothing half the figure with meths and see how that turns out.

 

 

 

I’m really pleased with how this is coming on – this is only my fourth pass at sculpting, and it’s really improved from what was a dis-spiriting start. I’d really recommend trying this and perservering.

 

The sitting figure will be a test of a couple of other aspects:

 

·         Copying clothing folds from the photos

·         Adding various other materials and multiple firing/baking of the Fimo

 

From what I’ve seen of Fimo while working on running-man, I see that very thin pieces of Fimo are a challenge. To get the coat falling around sitting man, I think I’ll need to switch to something else. I’m considering wine-top foil and green-stuff in lieu of superfine milliput, which Niall has correctly advised is a bit of a sod for delicate sculpting. The plan is to model his legs and torso with Fimo but leave his arms bare. Fire him and then add the coat (one half foil, one half green-stuff) with the arms being Fimo’d to blend into the coat pieces.

[Crayons]

VMS do a very good product called paper shaper. I can't recommend this product highly enough. Amazing at softening paper and allowing you to make it into the very realistic shapes and representations of real world cloth/canvas/material. Much better results than PVA will ever deliver IMO. Just another option you might consider.

[Model Mate]

Thanks Crayons - I may well, give that a go, although I think I'll need to re-fire/bake the figure if I end up adding Fimo, at least for some of the clothing, so I need to find a solution that'll withstand 130 degrees - I don't know what'll happen to green stuff under those conditions - anyone out there tried baking green stuff?

[Model Mate]

update..... green stuff in the oven is apparently a no-no.  I'll have to turn back to superfine milliput then.

[robgizlu]

Like what you are doing.

I flirted with basic 1/35 scale figures in a previous reincarnation

At the risk of teaching granny to suck eggs, are you awre of Magi Sculpt and Apoxie sculpt?  They would seem far more apt to what you are trying.

My guru then was Luc Klinkers who no longer has a web site it would seem, but does have a Facebbok page 

And the book the for wrinles was this..

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Dynamic-Wrinkles-Drapery-Solutions-Practical/dp/0823015874/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=Dynamic+wrinkles+and+drapery&qid=1612205702&sr=8-1

don't be put off - I have it and it's better than the cover suggests.

Fascinating stuff - keep it coming - I think you've captured correct anatomical proportion and movt 

Rob

[Model Mate]

This Granny has lots to learn, believe me!

That's all really helpful stuff Rob, thanks.

 

[Model Mate]

More testing….

 

I thought I’d try my hand at a head. For the planned Tommy, I have a nice resin head, but for the beaten German, I don’t. He’ll have his head in his hands and won’t be very visible, so I may get away with making my own eventually. I had a crack at a 1/24th head – eyes screwed shut and weeping:

 

Not Michelangelo, but not terrible, and as the final thing will be twice the size, I might just get away with it. All good practice either way.

 

Back to the clothing.

 

To recap – I’ve concluded that using green-stuff for the draped coat(s) is no good if I need to add any later Fimo and re-bake. The same goes for paper/cloth options, but metal foil should be ok, so in preparation for the next experiment, I cut out some foil patterns.

 

I’d found some dressmaking patterns for WW1 uniforms and had already scaled these to the various scales I’m playing with. I cut out a front section of trenchcoat from thin aluminium wine-top foil, and used a blank piece to test out folds/creases etc.

 

The foil creased really nicely using my new sculpting tools as burnishers and details like stitching and button holes etc. can easily be embossed, which is good.

 

I am still concerned about how to blend this into/with the clay/putty elements though, so I thought I’d have another go with the Fimo.

 

Rolling it between sheets of greaseproof paper and placing card packers either side should mean I can regulate the thickness of the “cloth”.

 

Not bad!

 

I slapped a piece onto a 1/35 character:

 

Again, not too bad, and I found that with care (and thinner card) I can roll out thinner segments. They’re extremely floppy and fragile though. This may not be a problem for the sitting German but will need an armature of some sort for the raging Tommy.

[Bandsaw Steve]

Very instructive. Of great interest for one two future possible  projects I have in mind.

[matti64]

This is a title that I have found a useful guide Creating Lifelike Figures in Polymer Clay: Tools and Techniques for Sculpting Realistic Figures by Katherine Dewey. I think I downloaded it as a .pdf some time ago and should be able to find it on a cd smewhere if you'd like me to look, otherwise it is well worth buying.

 

[Model Mate]

thank for the tip Matti - I have a couple of books I'm reading through at the moment, and there's some great stuff on-line. It's a great learning experience all-round. I've had a look at the book you mentioned and it looks like I should order a copy.

[Big Dave S]

Sculpting is another world... one that scares me right off. I'm always impressed by how people can do this part of the modelling process.

Will watch your thread with interest.

[Model Mate]

Don’t be put off big Dave, it’s amazing how quickly things improve once you get stuck in and Fimo pro is a pure joy to work with. I’ve baked my running man and head and all went well. The result is a nice softish plastic that carves, cuts and sands really well. I tried smoothing half of him with meths before baking, but I can’t see if it made much of a difference yet. I’ll try slapping some paint on him to see how that goes.

[Model Mate]

I thought I’d step away from actual sculpting for a little breather, so did a bit of painting practice on a 1/16 head. I’m still very much in the learning phase of figure painting (let alone sculpting) so I need plenty of practice. I also need some new brushes. I got a set of cheap miniature brushes a while ago and they’ve served pretty well, but they’re not keeping their points anymore, so it’s becoming a bit of a trial using them. I’ve ordered a small handful Da Vinci Kolinsky ones and can’t wait for them to arrive.

 

I also started on the Tommy’s gun (not Tommy-gun, but Lee-Enfield of course). I was going to use a 3D print, but if I can’t throw together a reasonable 1/12 scale rifle, I’ve no place calling myself a scratchbuilder, so a piece of 3mm thick plastic card was roughly hacked into shape against my laptop’s screen which was displaying a web-sourced blueprint, zoomed to scale. The piece of plastic I had wasn’t quite long enough, so I had to pin and glue an extension on the end. This was whittled and sanded till it was about the right shape for the wooden parts of the gun.

 

Slap on a few scraps of plastic and one gun done!

 

As well as brushes, I've ordered some "blue stuff" to make copies of hands, so I'll try copying this too.

 

Back to the clay tomorrow....

[Big Dave S]

Ding-dong!

Nice work.

[robgizlu]

Absolutely Cracking job of whittling!

Ding dong! indeed

Rob

[Bandsaw Steve]

That rifle looks outstanding,

[Model Mate]

Thank you chaps - don’t forget this is 1/12 though, so it’s pretty big compared to what we’re used to!