1/72 scale Photo-etch Upgrade for Airfix Jeep

The 1/72 scale Photo-etch Upgrade for Airfix Jeep was featured on Armorama, thanks Jon! You can order the item through the online store here.

Trex Mech on Toys R evil

My little Trex-Mech got featured on Toys-R-Evil blog. Thanks Andy and glad to see you back in action!

STGCC pics

Here's my collection of comics and sketchbooks from the STGCC2010. Click thru for more pics of the event.

Magenta in Full Color

Hey all, finished this about a week ago but was busy with the STGCC event. Glad to be able to finally post the full color pics here. Click thru to see more photos

STGCC - Day 1

Ok ok, we do a bit of time travelling to day 1. This I must say is the highlight of day 1 for me was meeting "Parka" from parka's blog. It's a love hate thing with his blog, just love to see all the art books he reviews, hate myself for all the money spent in the never-ending quest of all those lovely lovely art books! I have to admit, Parka is much taller in real life than on his blog :)

STGCC - Day 2

I know, I know - you're all thinking "where's day 1?" Well, I got caught up in all the excitement of day 1, meeting so many talented and friendly artists that by the time I got back, I'm all tired out. Well day 2 is no different, more awesomeness on display and more awesomeness to meet and greet. I'm all tired out, but I really want to take some time to post this. Twas the highlight of today - to meet Andy Heng of Toys R Evil fame. The stroke might have slowed him a wee bit, but I am most happy to say that it has most certainly not put him out of action. Despite still being in the process of recovery, he couldn't stay away from the STGCC and we were all the better for his presence. More power to you and get well soon Andy!

Orange 3D Iconography

Orange 3D Iconography is a series of 45mm pin badges. Each piece is meticulously cast in epoxy resin and painstakingly hand painted to depict various icons and themes that influence the art of orange 3D. Series 1 will be available at booth K-12 STGCC 2010.

STGCC - the loot!

My prep for the STGCC 2010 is almost done. Here's a pic of the stuff that's gonna be available at booth K-12. Come visit us!

only 10 days till STGCC

Woohoo, only 10 days till the Singapore Toy And Comics Convention 2010, I'm so excited! We'll be there at booth K-12 Suntec City, drop by and say hi to us. Get a chance to see Magenta up close and personal. Also get a chance to win an exclusive orange3d iconography badge!

Store Now Open!

Couldn't wait so we're opening a week early! Online shopping now available by clicking the store button on the top left corner of the blog. Get your magenta figure kit now before it's too late - da da da...

Magenta Blogged

Check out an exclusive interview we did on popular toy/design blog Everything, Anything better than Nothing for the upcoming release of Magenta.

New Look!

Orange3D plastic has a new look! Stay tuned for more updates in the next few days, it will be coming in fast and furious.

magenta is born!

Ladies and gentlemen, here she is! Magenta is finally born and is available for pre-order at US$45.95, send me a message with your location if you are interested so I can send you shipping cost and payment modes. Our online store will be up soon. For those who have already expressed interest (you know who you are :), I'll be getting in touch with you ASAP. For those who haven't, hurry...we have very limited supplies at the moment.

magenta wip

More progress, I've done up the staff and all she needs are the photo-etch bits.

magenta wip

Ah, I sat down and did this in one sitting. To be honest, I haven't built a resin kit for quite some time now. I was pleasantly surprised with the quality of the resin my friend used. It's easy to saw, carve, sand and drill. The feel is quite similar to working with model kit plastic. Because of this I was able to build up to this point in one sitting. Happiness...

magenta (photo etch)

A bit of a surprise for all you detail freaks (myself included) who's following the development of this figure kit. If the pic is not enough of a clue, Magenta's kit will come with photo-etch parts! Have a look see at all the details in the preview pic of this lovely piece of metal.

magenta wip

Bad news, the master for Magenta's body has suffered some seemingly irreparable damage...but wait, with every bad news comes some good news.

magenta (molds)

I wrapped up the sculpting of the masters last week. The past few days have been busy with looking for local resin caster and so far no luck.

magenta (base)

Back to magenta. Spent some time to sculpt a

O3D logo (part 1)

Taking a break from the Magenta sculpt, I did a quick sculpting

magenta (filling gaps)

We're on the nearing the end of the sculpt.

magenta (head & helmet)

After 4 days of sculpting and re-sculpting Magenta's head, I have a new found respect for the Roger Saunders.

magenta sculpt in progress

Spent the whole day working on the data staff today and managed to get it to 90%.

Magenta (accessories)

Fun but tedious, spent the past couple of days to come up with Magenta's gear

Magenta Sculpt (uh oh)

Since this sculpt is planned as a kit, I sculpted the arms separately. The danger with this is that you can't see the overall shape of the figure and you might be heading in the wrong direction as I found out.

Magenta (boots)

After a sculpting surge this weekend resulted in the completion of the boots.

Magenta (arm sculpt C)

Arms finished for now...

Magenta (arm sculpt B)

Time to dive in , there's no avoiding it. I've labeled the steps on the image.

Magenta (arm sculpt A)

So not totally convinced on what I should do with the boots, I proceeded to sculpt the arms.
The photo shows the steps.

Magenta (second bake)

It's been 8 months since the last post on the body sculpt and now I've decided to go full time sculpting this figure.
Since the last images on the body sculpt, I've added

Portrait of Porco Rosso 3

I'm trying a different technique, for the hilites, I'm using oil paints!

book binge 2010 part 2

Part 2 of the book binge happened because of holiday trip to taipei.

Portrait of Porco Rosso 2

Boy am I glad I stopped procrastinating on this figure, it's a joy to paint! I laid down some shading, again using a mixture of Vallejo and Andrea Color vinyl acrylic paints. Sorry I can't list the exact color mixture as I mix them as I go.

book binge 2010 part 1

Hmm, seems like it's that time of year again - book binge! We start of this year's edition with 5 books ordered from amazon US and japan

Portrait of Porco Rosso

Been wanting to do this piece ever since I got this FineMolds kit of the Savoia S.21 Seaplane from Hayao Miyazaki's animated feature film Porco Rosso. I must say that this is one of if not my most loved animated film of all time.

Bazooka Joe = done

The actual title for this piece is "david beats goliath".
The base was finished off with some drybrushing and pigment dusting. Also found a nice 1/48 scale photoetch barbed wire set from Eduard which seems to work for 1/72 and just nicely rounds off the base.
I'm quite happy to finish this in a reltively short amount of time. The final result was close to what I originally envisioned and I hope you all enjoyed it.

Bazooka Joe 5 almost there

The weekend proved to be as if not more hectic than the weekday. Lucky to have managed to do 95% of the painting done in 2 sittings, I guess that's the beauty of 1/72 scale figure modelling.
I used vallejo acrylics, they're pretty good for a quick sit n paint. And clean ups are a breeze.
Next step would be to spray a dullcote, mount on the base and dirty up his boots to sit with the environment. As usual the week ahead is gonna be hectic and I foresee the weekend will be as well. Fingers crossed I can get him finished.

Bazooka Joe 4

...and more progress on the fig. Actually "Bazooka Joe" is just the working title for this project. I've got a more appropriate title in mind, more on this later. In the meantime:

Bazooka Joe 3

I've really wanted to get this one done, and I've managed to get some good progress this weekend.
Starting with the base:

Bazooka Joe 2

Some good progress on B. Joe. I decide he'll be wearing a winter coat with his web gear worn over it. He's got a scarf wrapped around his head too.

Bazooka Joe

Quite some time ago, I bought a bag of short wooden cylinders from a Jap thrift shop. Didn't know what they were for but they looked like they would make nice little bases for 1/72 figures. The wooden cylinders though nice and smooth were in an unfinished light basswood color. More work needed to be done, and of course I needed a figure. That was almost a year ago,

Magenta Helmet

Some progress finally...I started building up the helmet around a cast of head number 4. Used a mixture of precast details, magic sculp, brass tubing and a piece from a plastic kit. Something still quite not right with it yet. Gonna let it simmer in my mind before moving on. Should get back to sculpting the body. More to come soon I hope!

Magenta (head part 4)

I made a mould and a few casts of the heads. I primed with Mr. Surfacer and painted with Vallejo Model Color and Andrea Color vinyl acrylics.

Magenta (head part 3)

So I ran out of Sculpey Firm just as I was about to start head no. 4 I scrounged my stash and found some normal sculpey (which I feel is too soft for small details) and some old Fimo. I decided to use the Fiom and re-constituted it with some isopropyl alcohol and diluent, I shaped a cube around some wire and baked it. This was then carved and sanded down to an oval shape close to the size I wanted the head to be. I then proceeded to sculpt details on top with more unbaked Fimo.

Magenta (head part 2)

So here's head number 3. Again done with sculpey firm, this time, without the epoxyputty or beads inside. The image above shows how far I sculpted before the first bake and also the final result after adding details and baking again. This time no problems with cracking whatsoever. The result with this attempt was decent. I felt I achieved the following things:
1.) The face should look feminine.
2.) It shouldn't look too caucasian, a mixed racial look would be preferred.
So although I was not able to hit the mark in terms of look, I felt the head was usable. That is until I compared it to the Krote Mechanic. Head no. 3 felt small and under scale. The scale issue is not so obvious in the photo but was quite severe in reality so I decided to embark on head no. 4 This time, not only would I sculpt a larger head, I would also try a different approach to sculpting the head.