Next Slew of Experiments!

I'm at it again! More tinkering with design and construction ideas, presumably I'm after that 'ideal peg soldier'. But, in all honesty, I just like messing about and I'm really enjoying trying out new ideas.

Don't worry, though, there are several 'proper' projects waiting in the wings. So bear with me (please)! 😊

So, what am I trying out now? Well, it's all about poses - can I make my characters' look a little more characterful with the way I make the arms and add objects? My original peg soldiers are fine, but that one pose I used can get a little tedious after you've done several figures.

So let's get going and we start - as we always do - by cutting down some dolly pegs (these will be my 50mm sizes figures)...

... Still don't have a tabletop sawing machine so it was out with the good old-fashioned hand saw! (I'm hoping to add some sort of power saw as hand sawing multiple figures can be a bit of a pain.)

Body Types, No Longer Just Straight Up & Down!
I'm embellishing my figures more and more, seeing how I might add touches of character that will make individual figures look even more individual, without actually being full-blown caricatures. I still prefer a simplistic approach allowing the viewer to enjoy the fun of a cartoon style. 

I'm slowly approaching the limits of how far I want realism to creep in and here I have suggested body types by shaping the pegs to indicate a smidgen of physicality...

Here I suggest some portliness or a slimmer figure simply by how much I round the lower body and I make a long dress by cutting the peg slightly shorter and adding some legs onto the very bottom...

As you can't actually make a peg fatter or thinner (except by perhaps sculpting bulk onto the basic cylinder or filing or carving some of it away) these small touches are the closes I want to go to customising a peg into a recognisable physique.

Making identical dolly pegs look like different people is something of a challenge. Though dolly pegs of different manufacturers can differ slightly (note the head shapes in the following photo) most of the character traits have to be done by slight modifications to the basic shapes and perhaps by making the peg figures taller or shorter...

The rest of any individualisation has to be done by either adding recognisable objects related to a specific character or during the painting stage.

Facial Features, How Best to Do Them?

While my multiple - individually unspecific - peg figures can be perfectly adequately painted with exceptionally simple and generic cartoon features producing figures who are intended to represent individuals need a little more features to imply who they are. Again (sorry to repeat myself) I'm not trying to produce caricatures - the limitations of how much you can modify a simple peg shape sort of prohibits real individuality.

If I want real caricatures I might as well go the whole hog and start sculpting my figures out of clay! (And I don't want to do that.)

Speed of production is at the heart of my peg models and I simply want to imply specific features by means of very simple marks or 'bumps'. 😊

But for cartoon versions of people I don't mind adding a couple of  'blobs' to indicate noses or ears. Here's a little production line as I decided to use up some left over Milliput...

I have to admit, as I consider larger production numbers my mind has mulled over the idea of making generic blanks of different physical types, heads with an assortment of features and a wardrobe of hats by casting a range of resin pieces. In this way I could assemble figures from a selection of basic parts...

BUT, is this straying too far away from my idea of making wooden figures. Hmmmm... 😒