Slow progress for Harry!

I know, news from Molatero has been scant over the past couple of months, but things are busy busy behind the scenes believe me!

My brother has produced the first clutch of my 'Harry' sculpture in resin, and he is also now in possession of a fine new piece of photographic equipment with which to be able show off his work...

Now, I'm hoping to speak to him tonight and persuade him to send me down some of the prototypes so that I can begin work on some heads for Harry and some other arms (for different poses). But he also noted a few production problems based on the way I had made my figure which I will also have to rectify.

But, progress, albeit slow! But we are taking our time and hopefully this will show in the end product. :)

Body building, FLW style

Very exciting morning for me as the postie dropped off a little package from my brother. It's my eagerly awaited resin castings of my 1/32 figure sculpture, plus my 'blank' heads to go with it...

This handful of resin 'blanks' will keep me occupied for some time. They will form the basis of my very first completely original toy soldier figure. But, there is still a lot of work to do before I churn out my first toy soldier.

The next stage in my production will be to clothe the body in the uniform of my choice and then prepare the neck and shoulder joints for the addition of my scratch built arms and head. I will be drilling out sockets to take my head and arms and then will sent the result back up to my brother for the 'dressed' figure to be copied in resin.

In effect all these 'blanks' are just my working armatures, not finished figures. But they are the basis of my production line - the tools that allow me to work on my original creations.

The skull will have features added and arranged into a 'stick' of four or five variations. This will then be sent back up for duplication in resin as well so that I have a supply of heads to add to my soldiers. It's all very methodical but hopefully be worth all the hard work.

Long term I would like to think that I can make something of a decent quality that others might like to purchase (and in doing so self-fund my hobby). But that's perhaps wishful thinking.

Having said that my brother is beginning to think of metal casting, so you never know - in a year or so I maybe producing my own modest line of metal toy soldiers!

Even more heads!

I know, you are fed up with seeing heads. But today's delivery from my brother's little resin factory marks a real bit of progress in my quest to make a completely original toy soldier. I now have a supply of heads - of my own design - to use in my sculpting and conversion projects...

As usual, resin is a pig to photograph, but this little sample of my Mk II heads get me off the blocks with the next phase of my grand project...

There is actually several things I can do with these; first of all I can convert these heads further - with differing expressions and facial hair - and then send them back up to my brother to have a 'variety sprue' of differing heads cast OR I can start to add them, as is, to my Armies in Plastic bodies. Just two ideas, but the head really sets the tone for any figure project.

Eventually, as my skills improve, I will make a Mk III head (and so on), but for now 'Albert' - as I have named him - will be the first part in my planned 1/32 body kit!

1873 Krupp 9cm field gun build

It seems I have passed on the FLW bug to my brother! While he has been casting resin bits and bobs for me it seems he has also been working on a little project of his own...

He's decided that he wants to produce a model 1873 Krupp breach loading field gun in 1/32.

It's a very interesting gun as it is suitable for a large number of the European armies in the late 19th century. So I will be keeping an eye on this project as I may have to nab one of these for my Molaterian army!

Mk II head in resin

Albert

My brother sent a quick snap of the first of my MK II heads to come off the production line!

It's just to show me that samples will soon be winging their way to me.

So what - you ask - will I be doing with these? Well, I hope to use these in my next infantry regiment, my Molaterian Guards regiment. I also hope to start producing a body of my own design to go with it.

Er, a whole lot of heads!

...Can't think of a suitable pun for this post, but the postman delivered a consignment of resin heads from my brother. These are copies of the custom Romanian headgear I made for my Molaterian light infantry.

My Romanian officer's kepis turned out brilliantly well. I really am pleased with these, my brother's done a fantastic job. Far more than I actually need, but I happen to know someone who will be very happy to have any spares sent their way!

The Romanian capela field cap was a lot more tricky to cast apparently, but he has sent me enough to get me started...

I will be detaching these hats from the heads and then transplanting them onto my AiP Russians. Once I have my own custom head cast I will start adding my hats to this so I have a totally original head/hat combo. But for now just getting the hats on my AiPs soldiers is good enough, my dream of eventually producing a complete soldier of my own design will have to wait! (Small steps eh?)

Well, aside from this, Ian also included a bag of miscellaneous heads for me to play with...The more the merrier. :)

So... Onwards and upwards - let's get on with my test Molatarian light infantry! Let's get some heads on shoulders.

New heads cast for Molaterians

My brother didn't hang about! No sooner had he received the two heads that I sent up - bedecked in their Romanian style hats - that he began the casting process...

As usual white resin does not photograph so well.

What will happen next is that he will send me back a few copies of these and then I will add the hats to different custom heads. I will send these back up to him and he will then cast the final working heads.

In the end I will end up with about 25 or so of these new custom heads which I will attach to my AiP Russians to make my Molaterian infantry. I think the officer's kepi looks particularly dashing!

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Update: My brother posted up this photo of the progress of his casting today...

These are the prototypes he will be sending back to me so I can add my own custom faces...Progress!