Off With His Head!: An Open Head Swap Topic

[Rat13]

Having just finished this for my friend's birthday I figured I should share my first head swap.

[Jordan Peacock]

2 hours ago, Chris Palmer said:

You did a great job on it.  Did you do anything particular about the furry legs, or just paint over them assuming they looked close enough to scales? 

 

 

For the front, the "furry" areas were so soft-edged that it was pretty much a non-issue: I just painted them "alligator green" like the rest.  For the back, however, I used some putty to give him a tail and some thicker gator scales.  (The results weren't all that fabulous, however, so I'm content with just having a photo of the FRONT of the figure.  ;)  )

 

Also, since my earlier post I've had the Pineapple-Pen song looping in my head, and I HAVE NOT MANAGED TO GET IT OUT OF MY HEAD YET.  Argh!  (I've also seen the Japanese Sesame Street version, because there are too many people who enjoy sharing strange things with the intent of tormenting me.  ;)  )

 

[Bruunwald]

5 hours ago, SisterMaryNapalm said:

 

Warlord Games for the Russians and the heads are Statuesque Miniatures

It would sound weird out of context, but they make the best lady heads in the business.

I have some, myself.

Great stuff.

[Chris Palmer]

Today I blended the elephant head to the body; then added some ears and tried to blend the furry back of the bugbear into a bit of hair on the elephant head.  I also added the missing finger on the pointing hand.  Not the greatest sculpting, but I hope serviceable enough.

 

 

 

I also tried to blend the bugbear head into the elephant body, and then tried to blend the furry head into a bit of hair running down the spine.

 

Edited March 6, 2018 by Chris Palmer

[Bruunwald]

I famously add Hello Kitty heads to things. This one is from about eight or nine years ago. I had searched around for a head of the right size until I found a cell phone charm. I molded it, then cast dozens of heads in resin. Since then, I have made Kitty soldiers, Kitty zombies, Kitty Kung Fu masters, etc. This pic is from my Facebook page.

As a conversion addict, I swap, change, add, modify heads on all sorts of stuff. I recently had a convention. Here are some early-stages pics of some stuff I was working on in advance of the con. All sorts of head swaps here. I have more space skellies, too.

[Chris Palmer]

Wow, those are all great! I love the Hello Kitty and the Space Skellies!

[Jordan Peacock]

The Space Hello Kitty looks FAB-U-LOUS!  :D  
"In the grim future of Hello Kitty, there is only war."

 

Those undead trooper conversions look pretty sweet, too.

 

One thing I really admire, though, is how you took those "starship generators," and carefully made some bolt heads to go on bases to frame them.  Did you find a supply of hex-cross-section plastic sprues?  Or did you have to shave corners to get hexagon heads like that?

Edited March 7, 2018 by Jordan Peacock
silly quote

[Bruunwald]

4 hours ago, Jordan Peacock said:

The Space Hello Kitty looks FAB-U-LOUS!  :D  
"In the grim future of Hello Kitty, there is only war."

 

Those undead trooper conversions look pretty sweet, too.

 

One thing I really admire, though, is how you took those "starship generators," and carefully made some bolt heads to go on bases to frame them.  Did you find a supply of hex-cross-section plastic sprues?  Or did you have to shave corners to get hexagon heads like that?

Those are cut from Styrene hex rods from Plasticraft. They come in various sizes. Very good for a quick, bolted-on look. In this case, I cut some normal rod and glued that on top to look like these had been screwed down.

 

I used to hit Frys up for tiny plastic nuts in about the same size, but it was pricier and took more work. This is a lot easier.

 

I like the little gennies, but I felt they needed a little "value-add," so I mounted them on Plastic Soldier rectangular bases. They painted up nicely. I have after-pics somewhere.

[Jordan Peacock]

3 hours ago, Bruunwald said:

Those are cut from Styrene hex rods from Plasticraft. They come in various sizes. Very good for a quick, bolted-on look. In this case, I cut some normal rod and glued that on top to look like these had been screwed down.

 

I used to hit Frys up for tiny plastic nuts in about the same size, but it was pricier and took more work. This is a lot easier.

 

I like the little gennies, but I felt they needed a little "value-add," so I mounted them on Plastic Soldier rectangular bases. They painted up nicely. I have after-pics somewhere.

 

Now I want to try making a bolt head / nut head like that, and glue it to a flat piece of card, and use some Japanese plastic clay (AKA "Instant Mold -- but cheaper!") to make a press-mold.  I can see value in churning out a bunch of little green-stuff rivets/bolts for future steampunkery and "industrial" pieces.  I approve of the "value-add" to the generators!  I'd really like to see how you painted them up.  Tech-wise, they seem to fit a very nice middle-space between "clunky tech" and "high tech."  That is, there's enough mechanical-looking bits to it that I could justify painting it up rusty and dinged-up for a Fallout-type or Warhammer-40K-ish retro-futuristic industrial scene ... or I could see painting it for what passes for more glossy and futuristic these days by mostly painting it in sleek white and black, with some "glowy neon" accents (such as the recessed "corner" segments on the large round segment on one side of the generator that MIGHT be a huge wire coil, OR it could be some sort of fancy-schmancy micro-particle-accelerator).

 

Adding a few bolts/nuts like that helps to nail down going in more of the "retro-futuristic" direction, which seems friendlier to any plans to add grunge and dings and rust effects and so forth.  :)

 

[Bruunwald]

On 3/7/2018 at 2:14 PM, Jordan Peacock said:

 

Now I want to try making a bolt head / nut head like that, and glue it to a flat piece of card, and use some Japanese plastic clay (AKA "Instant Mold -- but cheaper!") to make a press-mold.  I can see value in churning out a bunch of little green-stuff rivets/bolts for future steampunkery and "industrial" pieces.  I approve of the "value-add" to the generators!  I'd really like to see how you painted them up.  Tech-wise, they seem to fit a very nice middle-space between "clunky tech" and "high tech."  That is, there's enough mechanical-looking bits to it that I could justify painting it up rusty and dinged-up for a Fallout-type or Warhammer-40K-ish retro-futuristic industrial scene ... or I could see painting it for what passes for more glossy and futuristic these days by mostly painting it in sleek white and black, with some "glowy neon" accents (such as the recessed "corner" segments on the large round segment on one side of the generator that MIGHT be a huge wire coil, OR it could be some sort of fancy-schmancy micro-particle-accelerator).

 

Adding a few bolts/nuts like that helps to nail down going in more of the "retro-futuristic" direction, which seems friendlier to any plans to add grunge and dings and rust effects and so forth.  :)

 

D'oh! MFG of said hex is Plastruct. Don't know why I typed "Plasticraft."

 

I mainly work in silicone and resin for duplicating stuff, so if I were to mold those, I would probably mold the whole base (and I have given it some thought, and might eventually get to it, but at the time I made those I was on a deadline).

 

One of the benefits for me of doing it this way, is that I can opt to cast the whole base, or alternately just drop a tiny bit of resin into each nut section to cast just those.

 

EDIT: Pics of the painted gennies here.

Edited March 9, 2018 by Bruunwald

[Chaoswolf]

There's some very cool stuff in here, good work everyone!!

 

Here's my most recent head swap:

 

[Dr.Bedlam]

I've found that with enough HeroClix and Necron parts, one can produce an infinite variety of droids for Star Wars games. It started with a Fantasy Flight C-3P0 whose head got switched with a HC Checkmate mook, but it works with arms, legs, and even torsos.

[Chris Palmer]

So, for the sake of completeness, here are the Elephantman, and the Bugaphant, all painted up: 

 

 

[Dr.Bedlam]

Those both actually look pretty good.

You've got me thinking now about where I can find cheap figures dressed in Napoleonic style uniforms with flintlock pistol and sword... and a supply of cheap hippos.

 

[Glitterwolf]

13 minutes ago, Dr.Bedlam said:

Those both actually look pretty good.

You've got me thinking now about where I can find cheap figures dressed in Napoleonic style uniforms with flintlock pistol and sword... and a supply of cheap hippos.

 

 

Toy animals and Plastic Napoleonics?