2-13-10
Some of you know I played PSO on the Gamecube for years. I made a number of good friends that I still talk to regularly, and one of them happened to show me a model kit that someone had sent her. I mentioned that I made them too and she asked if she could commission me to make her character from PSO, named Cranberry. I told her no problem and after some time choosing a kit, I finally got her in the mail.
For those of you unfamiliar with Phantasy Star Online (PSO), see the Wikipedia page. The character Cranberry is of a race called Newman. They are genetically created beings that are physically weaker than humans but excel in casting spells. Basically, like an elf in most RPGs. Cranberry's class is Force, which makes her a FOnewearl. A FOnewearl is a newman force, which has the highest damage potential of all characters in the game.
The kit used is Mitsuki Hayase. This is my first commission and my first time making custom clothing, as well as using magnets.
Changes I will be making:
- Adjust anatomy to fit character
- Change position of head and left arm
- Custom sculpt Windmill weapon
- Custom sculpt magnetic clothing and accessories
- Custom sculpt ears, hair and bow
*Please click for larger images.
Kit Used
First things first, I must correct the kit's anatomy and pose to fit the character. The feet are too long, as well as the thighs and lower leg; all of these will be cut and shortened. It was requested that the head be positioned forward and for the character to hold her favorite weapon, the Windmill. I will need to turn the right arm so that her hand can hold the weapon appropriatly. Also, I will be cutting the left arm at the elbow to have the position changed so that she will be reaching up, touching her face.
Cranberry Reference Images
Test Fitting
^ As you can see here, the legs are way too long. With arms are at your side, the hands should fall about halfway between the hip and the knee. If her arms were not bent, they certainly wouldn't be anywhere near that length. So, I will be cutting the thighs to shorten them and also cut the lower leg area, as they are a bit too long and not to mention, Cranberry is a bit of a shorter character.
Repositioning the Head
My friend asked that her head be turned forward, so this is the result. I decided not to make it perfectly forward, as it can look stiff and unnatural. So, it is tipped at a slight angle.
I have not added any putty to the neck joint yet, that will be done later because right now I am simply getting the anatomy perfected and adjusting the pose. Adjusting the Eyebrows
For some reason, this kit's eyebrows come WAAAAY too far down toward her nose. It's scary, actually :-D So, I took my exacto and cut it where I felt it was more natural, the sanded to shape it up. One of the eyebrows was a bit thinner than the other and looked strange when I got done, so I scraped the entire eyebrow off and made a new one with putty. (I don't have a pic uploaded of her puttied eyebrow, I'll get one later!)
Before...
and After...
I'll take a picture of her fully fixed face tonight and post it tomorrow. Tonight I'll be cutting the legs and adjusting her height to match the character. She has some strange dimples above her butt, which are really ugly and weird lol so I'll be filling those in. I'll also take pictures of her shortened feet.
2-13-10
Indeed, I am going to give her the boots lol. I'm thinking of putting her on a base that's a bit thicker than normal so I can put a pin in each foot, which will attach to the base without glue. Magnetic shoes should work fine, as long as the pin can fit snugly into the base with her shoes on or off. I will just have to measure it right and use a thick pin. I didn't get to saw her thighs in half last night, I got distracted >_>; Went ahead and took some new pictures of the eyebrow work I did, as well as filling in the dimples on her back, and part of the crease in her lower back. The crease was way too deep and looked really odd, so I just filled it in a bit. Also, I'd found a strange thing about the head...
It was strange...right where the end of her jawbone should be was...nothing! I was perplexed by this strange sculpt. Her jawbone didn't curve naturally, lol it just ended! So, I filled it in. Looks much better now ^__^
This last picture shows a correction I made to her ear. The front part that blends in to the side of the head didn't come over enough, making her ear look like it'd been cut or something o_O So I made a small line there to fix it. I didn't bother doing a super job, since I have to give her elf ears later.
Corrected eyebrows. You can also see where I've drawn my guide line to fill in part of her eye. Cranberry's eyes don't slant up at the end (almond-shaped eyes), so I'll be filling in a tiny part of her eye to give her the more european? eyes like she has in the game.
Here you can see the deep crease in her lower back.
Filled in the back crease and dimples TONIGHT I will saw her thighs in half and finish the work on her feet lol I can only work on my sister's during the day, since it requires the dremel at this point >_>; I also need to pick up some wire mesh to help with the making of her skirt...
2-15-10
Puttied an arm. This is the one I'll be hacking up later to have bent.
Here you can see my footwork (que cheesy music) from where I shortened them. I also sanded the toes' length a bit and recarved toenails.
Better look at the toenails ^__^
Filled in parts of the eyes so she doesn't have almond-shaped eyes anymore. Also reattached the head and puttied the neck gap.
This is how her right arm will be positioned once I glue it in. I'm not doing it right now, as I'm going to work on attaching her fingers (some of them are not on her hand >_>) and adjust them so she can hold her weapon.
Puttied back of leg. I noticed this when I was fixing her feet a while back. The small creases in the back of her knee were very....off-center. Not just a little...it made her leg look like it was broken or something, so I puttied it in and will give her new creases.
Here you can get a better idea of what I've done for her height. Still going to saw the thighs in half so I can take a little bit more off, since they were out of proportion. - Recently decided to change the hair strands on top of her head. Cranberry has kind of wavy hair, so this tautly tied straight hair doesn't fit her.
I may fill in a lot of the creases fully, then partially fill in the remaining so they don't look so deeply carved...basically to give the feeling that her hair is thicker and fuller. I also thought about sanding down the hair strands and replacing it with magic sculp...but I wouldn't really know what to do to add texture to her hair. So I think the first option will work out best.
2-20-10
- Sanded down the puttied neck and smoothed it out. - Sanded and smoothed the corrected eye portions, recarved her eye creases.
- Sawed off right shoulder and pinned it in correctly. Waiting for it to fully cure before I fill it in with putty.
- Cut the left arm at the elbow so it can be bent here soon. I am waiting for armature wire to come in the mail, should be here in a few days. May need to heat and bend the wrist, or possibly cut and turn it, to have the hand positioned correctly. Will also need to saw off this shoulder and set it so that her upper arm is raised up, away from her body.
- Cut both legs at the thighs and sanded them down to size last night. Drilled pinholes today so I can reattach them.
- Probably going to saw the lower legs again to take more length off of them, they still looks too long, but I'll reattached the parts I just worked on first and see how it looks.
- Puttied in all of the creases on her head. Had to wait for the putty to cure, so I only got it sanded down evenly. I built up a mound of hair at the back of her neck, as it was only present on one side of the neck and not the other lol. I will be carving a few hair strands and work on the positioning of her ponytail.
I know it sounds like I've done a bunch of work, but it's nothing I can really take a picture of yet since I'm kinda in the middle of a few repositionings at the moment. Once I get a bit more of the dirty-work done, I'll snap some shots for an update ^__^
2-22-10
Still not much progress to show because I'm hacking up limbs, reattaching them and puttying them 500 times lol The neck is filled, only a few tiny spots I needed to fill back in that haven't been sanded down yet. Sawed off right shoulder and reattached it to proper position...which is forward more and a bit further away from her body, for holding her weapon. Sorry for the crappy putty work, wow that's embarrassing lol, I was using the putty mainly for filling the gap in her leg when I remembered I needed to fill the gap on her shoulder. Then the putty was trying to cure >_>;;; Her hair has been covered in bondo XD I'm doing that so I can carve her hair creases to her hair looks thicker, it will also be easier to build up hair on than the resin itself.
2-26-10
I'm letting putty cure and the such, so not really any pictures today. I *should* be able to sand it tomorrow, but I have the distinct feeling the putty will still be a little tacky, so I won't be able to sand it tomorrow either. I've sawed off her left shoulder to reposition it. The shoulder section is being bonded to the top part of the arm right now, and the bottom part is bonding from where I reattached the hand at a different angle. I also heated and bent the fingers appropriately.
(I took these in a hurry, sorry they're a little blurry...light tent still isn't set up :-D I'm going to work on attaching the remaining two fingers to that hand tonight. As soon as I can get things sanded, I'll take a slew of more pictures ^__^
3-2-10
Here are a few pics of a bit of my work thus far....we have the shortened thighs and where I am reducing the breasts. You probably can't tell much about the thighs because the images are so close...but once I attach the bottom parts of the legs tomorrow and let the putty cure, I'll test fit her again so you can see her torso with the adjusted legs.
Haha, you can also see where I drew in some eyes while I was waiting for putty to cure ^_^
3-9-10
Another update. Progress has been slow on this the last few days, I haven't been feeling very well. Reattached her left foot to the left leg, putty is fully cured and needs to be sanded. I have NOT built up her calf muscle yet, nor adjusted the sizing of her lower leg; as I was waiting for the current putty to cure so I could build off of it. Now, the leg is more appripriately sized to the character ^__^
Also, I put a tiny bit of putty on her left breast so it matches the right one, as that one looked a bit more "natural" after I sawed it down to size. Putty is cured and needs to be sanded. Tomorrow I will be reattaching her right foot to her right leg and applying putty.
More to come soon ^__^
3-14-10
My stomach's been killing me the past few days; it's been making it hard for me to work on this =( Shaped leg with added calf. Used magic sculp to build up a calf for her. I then sanded the ankle down a bit and sanded her leg to a nice shape. I also sanded in a shin bone, since she was missing one and the leg looked funny without one lol. Just a tiny spot of putty under the knee that I need to sand and this leg will be done until the magnets demand attention.
I also added a bit of putty to the breasts to even them out, which needs to be sanded lol I drilled pinholes to attach the bottom of her right leg, so hopefully I'll be able to post that one soon as well.
3-16-10
Ok, so while heating the foot to have it sit perfectly flat, the leg separated down the shin where I had sawed and shortened it earlier. I was perplexed and tugged on the foot, which pulled it apart at the seam. wth? I noticed the glue was slightly rubbery. Dammit. Apparently the epoxy glue hadn't been mixed properly, so it had no integrity to hold the parts together.
I used my exacto to gouge out all the old glue, reattached the pins with fresh epoxy glue on both ends and held the pieces together until the glue set. I put the pieces aside and, being that it's about 24 hours later, it is now fully-cured and rock hard. SO, I will be sanding this back to shape and filling the gap with magic sculp. Again.
*sigh*
3-21-10
I've built up the calf on the right leg, but it hasn't been sanded yet, as it just cured today. I had to redo the kit's left leg because the glue didn't cure properly, thus why it looks like I haven't progressed very much since my last update. Still a few knicks here and there that I need to fill in.
Adjusting the breasts so they're fuller. Since they were a lot larger before, they were a little saggy, which doesn't bode well for small breasts, thus the fix. Only the right breast has been sanded. Sorry she looks dirty, that's actually the remnants of primer lol. I sprayed her breasts and back to check my work, which was quite gorgeous. I was pleasantly surprised <333333 I just noticed the breasts were a little uneven and decided to make them fuller. Almost done with that now ^__^
I'll probably be working on thickening the hair on her scalp next.
3-27-10
Okay, here are the pics of the completed breasts and legs. There's still one small area on her left thigh and on one of her feet that I need to sand down, just minor filling work. I'm working on her bent arm at the moment, as well as building up the hair on her scalp. Now that I have word from Cran, I can proceed with the weapon addition.
I will curl her fingers up, so to look like she's grasping is tightly, but will not wrap the fingers around the rod so it can be carefully lifted from her hand. It may not sit perfectly even or straight since it won't be permanently affixed to her hand, but it should be fine ^__^
4-11-10
Small update. Since it's been nicer out, I'm priming my sister's model and giving Cran's hair time to cure. My sister's kit is primered fully now and I'll be back to working on Cranberry now but painting the other kit in my down time.
I've built up the hair on her scalp to make it look more full and voluminous. The hair creases aren't carved deeply enough yet, nor have they been sanded, only one part of it has been done lol it's a little hard on my hands trying to be super stiff so I don't accidentally gouge out any chunks of resin or Magic Sculp :-D so I have to take a lot of breaks on it. You can also see what I've done for the ears. Basically, I looked at where the Newman ears connect to the face, then cut away the parts of her resin ears that didn't match. There were two little tabs of resin left, so I coated them in Magic Sculp so I can later build the pointed ears off of them. Also, you can see where I've drawn her hair line so I will know where to stop carving the hair creases and to begin work for her bangs.
OY. More to come soon hopefully lol
4-12-10
Yeah, I tend to pick up random kits and start clean up prep on them while I wait for the putty to cure. I prefer to use the Magic Sculp instead of Bondo because the bondo seems to sand more easily than the resin, and the Magic Sculp seems to have about the same hardness as the resin. Forgot to post this, just where I puttied the right arm. There was a spot on the top of her lower arm that had a slight oversanding or mold flat line. I also built up a little bit of an elbow for her, it was very pronounced. You probably can't even see it lol, the putty kinda blends in when it's not in the best lighting :-D
7-22-10
Oh my....could it be..? Yes, IT'S AN UPDATE! It's been a while because I've been super busy at work. They terminated the other employee and things were fine, I just had more hours for a while, but then my manager decided to move. A lot of talk of switching managers to our store yada yada crap, and now several weeks later...things are back to normal! This week is the FIRST week I've had less than 40 hours since I last posted. Not to mention that none of my days off have been back-to-back, so I find it hard to get *really* immersed in something.
So here's what's been going on with this...
- Ordered Magnets
- Reattached the right upper arm to the arm itself after repositioning.
- Reattached left arm into bent position
- Heated left hand to move fingers into a more graceful position
- Attached fingers to both hands
- Minor adjustments to handle of weapon
- Worked out diagram to make Windmill weapon
- Gave her nipples :-o
- Began base for bow
- Minor putty work all over
I know it doesn't look like much, but I HAVE been working on her in the little bit of time I've had. So I didn't get burnt out on her, I did a little putty work on some other kits here and there. One of the nipples fell off while I was sanding (OHNOES!) so that's why one is a different color from the other...and unsanded.
I used some Super Sculpy to make the base shapes for the bow and have been filling the pieces in and smoothing them out. It's very incomplete, but it's coming along. I worked out a design for the windmill, but I'm not starting it yet. I'll wait til I'm making more of Cran's clothes out of MS so I can make the Windmill in the downtime.
Sorry the photos blow. I hate this camera cause it eats batteries like it's drinking water >_>
7-25-20
Got the magnets in today. All of them are great, except the discs. The discs were a little too thick to use for her forearms, as the opposite ends would repel each other. I've ordered some more, but a lot thinner this time. I can still use the thicker ones, but not for the spot I wanted. K & J Magnetics is awesome <3 I'm probably going to start working on her shoes next. Need more Magic Sculp...yay waiting for paycheck to buy crap! :-D
9-21-10
Small update. I've been tweaking here and there, puttying, sanding, reputtying, resanding etc over and over. Mainly, I changed a few of the creases in her hair, cleaned her leg joints and am working on cleaning the arm joints. What I mean by cleaning is this...since I'm going to sculpt her clothing, I decided it would be best not to join her parts permanently yet, as it will make sculpting and fitting the clothing more difficult. So I am making sure the joints are as close to finished as possible. That way, when I get the clothing prepared, I can fully bond her joints and the clothing parts will still fit snugly. The leg joints are cleaned and right now I'm reshaping the shoulder areas from when I cut and repositioned the arms.
Cleaned leg joints
Small fix. I noticed her ribcage just below her breasts looked recessed. I realized that when I sanded the breasts away before, I should have filled in part of her ribs. Here is the side I have already repaired the ribcage.
And this is the side where I have not. You can tell it just looks...off. So, once I get that done, all the tweaks to her body should be done.
Here is her bow. I made it out of Super Sculpy to get the basic shape, because I'm low on Magic Sculp lol, and have filled in little defects. I have sanded the upper left part to shape briefly, and the right upper side is not done. Once I sand them to shape, I will make a center part for the pieces to attach to, so I will have a one-piece bow.
More general WIP pics
Once all of this is done, I'll work on making the clothing next.
4-25-11
Oh my, could it be? Another update?!?
It is!
Sorry about such a huge delay in my updates. Since I got Asuka done for my sister, one of the ladies I work with is going on maternity leave, so I've got a bunch of her hours at work and have been working much more.
Since last time, I have since cleanly repaired any of the joints that were not puttied properly, and thus they all fit beautifully. I layered some magic sculp onto her lower torso, which had been covered in plastic wrap and petroleum jelly, and started the hotpants (shorts) that are under the skirt. I sanded it and layered some Bondo Body Filler on top of the existing shorts, which has since been sanded and smoothed. While I was waiting for that to cure, I worked on her bracelet (right wrist). I drew lines where the bracelet should sit on her wrist, then taped off the area with masking tape and applied magic sculp to one side of the wrist at a time. Once those were cured, I sanded them to rough shape and got ready to insert the magnets. I drilled out a hole into the thin side of her wrist and inserted a small magnet for the bracelet pieces to attach to. I then bored out a small alcove on the inside of one of the bracelet pieces and inserted a magnet, but I dropped it while applying glue and the magnet flipped over, thus it was on the wrong side >_____> I didn't realize this until it had cured, and when I tried to remove the magnet to flip it over, I ended up destroying the bracelet in the process.
So, last night I made a new back section of the bracelet to replace the one I broke and I have also installed a magnet CORRECTLY lol. The glue has fully cured but I haven't sanded it down yet. The bracelet will have a raised ridge around the top and bottom edges, like in the 3D render of the character in the game, but that will wait until I have installed the other magnet. The parts don't align 100% perfect yet, but that's because I had to remake that second piece. The former back piece fit beautifully *cries* Anyways, here are the WIP photos. More to come soon ^__^
Shorts
Bracelet tops and undersides
Wrist with magnet and attached bracelet piece
8-31-11
Still chugging along. Bracelet is almost 100% complete, except the primer/paint, of course! Still have a couple of little spots I need to fill and even out, so I'll take shots once it's done. The side meet up nicely.
Making of the back part of the shorts.
I've been fighting with the piece for weeks now, sanding, more putty, sanding, more putty, repeat 40 times :-D Now I've got a nice, smooth shape, sans a few spots I still need to sand back down, but the basic shape is there ^__^ Next I'll ensure the sides meet well, so we'll have a nice smooth seam where the clothing parts separate. I'll be applying some putty with plastic wrap to simulate wrinkles in the shorts, on the front section. Then, carving the fabric seams, like up the front, up the back and around the legs of the shorts. More to come soon.
Another update. Progress has been slow on this the last few days, I haven't been feeling very well. Reattached her left foot to the left leg, putty is fully cured and needs to be sanded. I have NOT built up her calf muscle yet, nor adjusted the sizing of her lower leg; as I was waiting for the current putty to cure so I could build off of it. Now, the leg is more appripriately sized to the character ^__^
Also, I put a tiny bit of putty on her left breast so it matches the right one, as that one looked a bit more "natural" after I sawed it down to size. Putty is cured and needs to be sanded. Tomorrow I will be reattaching her right foot to her right leg and applying putty.
More to come soon ^__^
3-14-10
My stomach's been killing me the past few days; it's been making it hard for me to work on this =( Shaped leg with added calf. Used magic sculp to build up a calf for her. I then sanded the ankle down a bit and sanded her leg to a nice shape. I also sanded in a shin bone, since she was missing one and the leg looked funny without one lol. Just a tiny spot of putty under the knee that I need to sand and this leg will be done until the magnets demand attention.
I also added a bit of putty to the breasts to even them out, which needs to be sanded lol I drilled pinholes to attach the bottom of her right leg, so hopefully I'll be able to post that one soon as well.
3-16-10
Ok, so while heating the foot to have it sit perfectly flat, the leg separated down the shin where I had sawed and shortened it earlier. I was perplexed and tugged on the foot, which pulled it apart at the seam. wth? I noticed the glue was slightly rubbery. Dammit. Apparently the epoxy glue hadn't been mixed properly, so it had no integrity to hold the parts together.
I used my exacto to gouge out all the old glue, reattached the pins with fresh epoxy glue on both ends and held the pieces together until the glue set. I put the pieces aside and, being that it's about 24 hours later, it is now fully-cured and rock hard. SO, I will be sanding this back to shape and filling the gap with magic sculp. Again.
*sigh*
3-21-10
I've built up the calf on the right leg, but it hasn't been sanded yet, as it just cured today. I had to redo the kit's left leg because the glue didn't cure properly, thus why it looks like I haven't progressed very much since my last update. Still a few knicks here and there that I need to fill in.
Adjusting the breasts so they're fuller. Since they were a lot larger before, they were a little saggy, which doesn't bode well for small breasts, thus the fix. Only the right breast has been sanded. Sorry she looks dirty, that's actually the remnants of primer lol. I sprayed her breasts and back to check my work, which was quite gorgeous. I was pleasantly surprised <333333 I just noticed the breasts were a little uneven and decided to make them fuller. Almost done with that now ^__^
I'll probably be working on thickening the hair on her scalp next.
3-27-10
Okay, here are the pics of the completed breasts and legs. There's still one small area on her left thigh and on one of her feet that I need to sand down, just minor filling work. I'm working on her bent arm at the moment, as well as building up the hair on her scalp. Now that I have word from Cran, I can proceed with the weapon addition.
I will curl her fingers up, so to look like she's grasping is tightly, but will not wrap the fingers around the rod so it can be carefully lifted from her hand. It may not sit perfectly even or straight since it won't be permanently affixed to her hand, but it should be fine ^__^
4-11-10
Small update. Since it's been nicer out, I'm priming my sister's model and giving Cran's hair time to cure. My sister's kit is primered fully now and I'll be back to working on Cranberry now but painting the other kit in my down time.
I've built up the hair on her scalp to make it look more full and voluminous. The hair creases aren't carved deeply enough yet, nor have they been sanded, only one part of it has been done lol it's a little hard on my hands trying to be super stiff so I don't accidentally gouge out any chunks of resin or Magic Sculp :-D so I have to take a lot of breaks on it. You can also see what I've done for the ears. Basically, I looked at where the Newman ears connect to the face, then cut away the parts of her resin ears that didn't match. There were two little tabs of resin left, so I coated them in Magic Sculp so I can later build the pointed ears off of them. Also, you can see where I've drawn her hair line so I will know where to stop carving the hair creases and to begin work for her bangs.
OY. More to come soon hopefully lol
4-12-10
Yeah, I tend to pick up random kits and start clean up prep on them while I wait for the putty to cure. I prefer to use the Magic Sculp instead of Bondo because the bondo seems to sand more easily than the resin, and the Magic Sculp seems to have about the same hardness as the resin. Forgot to post this, just where I puttied the right arm. There was a spot on the top of her lower arm that had a slight oversanding or mold flat line. I also built up a little bit of an elbow for her, it was very pronounced. You probably can't even see it lol, the putty kinda blends in when it's not in the best lighting :-D
7-22-10
Oh my....could it be..? Yes, IT'S AN UPDATE! It's been a while because I've been super busy at work. They terminated the other employee and things were fine, I just had more hours for a while, but then my manager decided to move. A lot of talk of switching managers to our store yada yada crap, and now several weeks later...things are back to normal! This week is the FIRST week I've had less than 40 hours since I last posted. Not to mention that none of my days off have been back-to-back, so I find it hard to get *really* immersed in something.
So here's what's been going on with this...
- Ordered Magnets
- Reattached the right upper arm to the arm itself after repositioning.
- Reattached left arm into bent position
- Heated left hand to move fingers into a more graceful position
- Attached fingers to both hands
- Minor adjustments to handle of weapon
- Worked out diagram to make Windmill weapon
- Gave her nipples :-o
- Began base for bow
- Minor putty work all over
I know it doesn't look like much, but I HAVE been working on her in the little bit of time I've had. So I didn't get burnt out on her, I did a little putty work on some other kits here and there. One of the nipples fell off while I was sanding (OHNOES!) so that's why one is a different color from the other...and unsanded.
I used some Super Sculpy to make the base shapes for the bow and have been filling the pieces in and smoothing them out. It's very incomplete, but it's coming along. I worked out a design for the windmill, but I'm not starting it yet. I'll wait til I'm making more of Cran's clothes out of MS so I can make the Windmill in the downtime.
Sorry the photos blow. I hate this camera cause it eats batteries like it's drinking water >_>
7-25-20
Got the magnets in today. All of them are great, except the discs. The discs were a little too thick to use for her forearms, as the opposite ends would repel each other. I've ordered some more, but a lot thinner this time. I can still use the thicker ones, but not for the spot I wanted. K & J Magnetics is awesome <3 I'm probably going to start working on her shoes next. Need more Magic Sculp...yay waiting for paycheck to buy crap! :-D
9-21-10
Small update. I've been tweaking here and there, puttying, sanding, reputtying, resanding etc over and over. Mainly, I changed a few of the creases in her hair, cleaned her leg joints and am working on cleaning the arm joints. What I mean by cleaning is this...since I'm going to sculpt her clothing, I decided it would be best not to join her parts permanently yet, as it will make sculpting and fitting the clothing more difficult. So I am making sure the joints are as close to finished as possible. That way, when I get the clothing prepared, I can fully bond her joints and the clothing parts will still fit snugly. The leg joints are cleaned and right now I'm reshaping the shoulder areas from when I cut and repositioned the arms.
Cleaned leg joints
Small fix. I noticed her ribcage just below her breasts looked recessed. I realized that when I sanded the breasts away before, I should have filled in part of her ribs. Here is the side I have already repaired the ribcage.
And this is the side where I have not. You can tell it just looks...off. So, once I get that done, all the tweaks to her body should be done.
Here is her bow. I made it out of Super Sculpy to get the basic shape, because I'm low on Magic Sculp lol, and have filled in little defects. I have sanded the upper left part to shape briefly, and the right upper side is not done. Once I sand them to shape, I will make a center part for the pieces to attach to, so I will have a one-piece bow.
More general WIP pics
Once all of this is done, I'll work on making the clothing next.
4-25-11
Oh my, could it be? Another update?!?
It is!Sorry about such a huge delay in my updates. Since I got Asuka done for my sister, one of the ladies I work with is going on maternity leave, so I've got a bunch of her hours at work and have been working much more.
Since last time, I have since cleanly repaired any of the joints that were not puttied properly, and thus they all fit beautifully. I layered some magic sculp onto her lower torso, which had been covered in plastic wrap and petroleum jelly, and started the hotpants (shorts) that are under the skirt. I sanded it and layered some Bondo Body Filler on top of the existing shorts, which has since been sanded and smoothed. While I was waiting for that to cure, I worked on her bracelet (right wrist). I drew lines where the bracelet should sit on her wrist, then taped off the area with masking tape and applied magic sculp to one side of the wrist at a time. Once those were cured, I sanded them to rough shape and got ready to insert the magnets. I drilled out a hole into the thin side of her wrist and inserted a small magnet for the bracelet pieces to attach to. I then bored out a small alcove on the inside of one of the bracelet pieces and inserted a magnet, but I dropped it while applying glue and the magnet flipped over, thus it was on the wrong side >_____> I didn't realize this until it had cured, and when I tried to remove the magnet to flip it over, I ended up destroying the bracelet in the process.
So, last night I made a new back section of the bracelet to replace the one I broke and I have also installed a magnet CORRECTLY lol. The glue has fully cured but I haven't sanded it down yet. The bracelet will have a raised ridge around the top and bottom edges, like in the 3D render of the character in the game, but that will wait until I have installed the other magnet. The parts don't align 100% perfect yet, but that's because I had to remake that second piece. The former back piece fit beautifully *cries* Anyways, here are the WIP photos. More to come soon ^__^
Shorts
Bracelet tops and undersides
Wrist with magnet and attached bracelet piece
8-31-11
Still chugging along. Bracelet is almost 100% complete, except the primer/paint, of course! Still have a couple of little spots I need to fill and even out, so I'll take shots once it's done. The side meet up nicely.
Making of the back part of the shorts.
I've been fighting with the piece for weeks now, sanding, more putty, sanding, more putty, repeat 40 times :-D Now I've got a nice, smooth shape, sans a few spots I still need to sand back down, but the basic shape is there ^__^ Next I'll ensure the sides meet well, so we'll have a nice smooth seam where the clothing parts separate. I'll be applying some putty with plastic wrap to simulate wrinkles in the shorts, on the front section. Then, carving the fabric seams, like up the front, up the back and around the legs of the shorts. More to come soon.
