After all the initial sanding is done, the parts are thrown into a bath of industrial strength degreaser to remove any mold release still on the kit as well as just cleaning it. Soaking over night, the parts are rinsed and thrown into the ultra sonic cleaner to scrub them clean.<\/p>\n
And now the fun begins. Fixing all those gaps lamented in the previous post. There are two different putties at work here. The major filler is a two part epoxy putty that fills the majority of the gap area. It takes about a day for that to fully cure. But once done, I move to light curing putty for quick work. I can putty, sand, repeat relatively quickly.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Once all the putty work is done, time to check it with a primer session. Results were not too bad. I only needed to fix a few areas.<\/p>\n The back of her collar was badly damaged. I’m not sure if it was my over zealous flash tab cutting, or because of the poor cast quality. But it is a very quick fix with some light curing putty. A few sessions to slowly build up an repair the area, but once done and primed, it looks perfect.<\/p>\n After cleaning, the parts are skewered and primed. Then another surface check to fix any additional missed mistakes.<\/p>\n Primed turnaround assembly.<\/p>\n After primer, I noticed that one of the hair pieces looked like it was hollowed out. Looking at some reference pictures, that hair piece was actually broken. A quick drill, glue, and styrene rod replaces the hair piece. Light curing putty to reshape it finishes the repair.<\/p>\n After fixing the front dress gap issue. Time to address the front and back dress gaps. This requires the dress is glued to the body. No removable clothing as decided in the previous post. Once the front and back are glued, I can glue together and work on the top of the dress that loops around the neck. This is also in two pieces. CA glue + baking soda makes for a very strong bond, then light curing putty to finish the sculpt.<\/p>\n Same steps as the front dress. Two part epoxy putty is mixed together and pressed into the gap as the main filler material.<\/p>\n Once the epoxy cures, I can start sculpting the details back and use light curing putty to fix smaller issues and light sculpting. This is where those curved file blades really shined. Very useful in carving and sculpting the gap details. Once done, primer and the surface looks almost perfect.<\/p>\n The same process is done with the upper part of the dress and dress collar.<\/p>\n Another quick side to side mock up.<\/p>\n Sword piece is glued into the hand, sanded, and primed. Gloss black is laid down for the base color. Then steel is painted. The steel is masked off with blue sticky take to reproduce the Tsuchi-Oke technique\/effect on Japanese blades. Once masked, stainless steel is sprayed.<\/p>\n Hair is painted with a dark base color then shaded with white and painted with the main hair color, a bluish purple.<\/p>\n The skin parts are prepared for painting with a layer of base white over the grey primer. Spraying skin tone directly over grey primer makes the figures look like they have dead skin.<\/p>\n Skin tones from darkest, to lightest for highlights, then a medium tone to blend everything together.<\/p>\n Mask off the skin areas then paint the dress with a blue black color as a base. The legs are then shaded with a dark blue black.<\/p>\n After base white for the head, the eyes are masked off to paint the skin tone.<\/p>\n Legs masked off, I can spray the dress with white highlights. Once that is done, the main dark blue color is sprayed blending the white highlights and creating a heavy shaded effect.<\/p>\n Another quick mockup turnaround.<\/p>\n The sword blade and hilt are painted. Mask off the sword parts to paint the hand and arm. The highlight stripes are also masked around and painted in a lighter blue.<\/p>\n Dress is masked off to paint the gold areas. I’m using alclad polished brass for this color which works well with the blue. Once that is cured, mask again to paint the string details a dark blue.<\/p>\n Almost done, just a few more details here and there. But another quick mockup turnaround.<\/p>\n Semi matte clear is sprayed to take off the gloss shine.<\/p>\n The base is a simple wood frame that I filled with some wood filler, sanded and painted in a light gunmetal silver. The top of the base is an inset of a brick wall sheet of plastic painted and panel line washed to bring out details.<\/p>\n<\/a>
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