LOG015: EARLY CUSTOM FIGURE: GAOFIGHGAR

Heck I've been too busy with other projects on hand I don't have time to work on Prime at the moment but I've just uploaded a bunch of photos of an old figure I made long long time back in uni days. Couldn't afford the toys I liked so I start making them outta wire. S$50 got me a lifetime supply of wire from the hardware store so it became a hobby making figures of characters I liked and later I started selling them through commission and it funded my early collection of robot toys.

This particular one was made when Studio Halfeye made and sold their resin Perfect Change GaoFighGar and I bloody well can't afford that so only choice I had was to made one for myself that transform and combine outta that cheap wire. This was one of my proudest piece besides the 24" tall Evangelion EVA01 figure (with full articulation down to the fingers) commissioned by someone else. It stands at 10" tall and GaoFar transforms into PhantomGao and combines with the Gao Machines to form GFG. It's a personal piece and I still own it today :)

It looks pretty ugly to me now by my current standards but still this piece has a very special place in my heart.

LOG014: HOS Prime WIP 05

Made major modifications inside the leg for the sliding mechanism as well as a locking mechanism for the foot in train mode. Thank God things went smoothly. It's darn tedious and boring to make the same exact mods for the other leg though.

LOG013: PAST TF CUSTOMS: CYBERTRONIAN BUMBLEBEE

Another commission job from JDP sold as garage kits back in 2005. This little guy was one of my favorites though he's full of kibble. Bumblebee's design was partially inspired by Crazysteve and you can get the details on his fabulous little project through that link. The figure was made to be in scale with the G1 toy so he's about 3" tall and has 14 poa and fully posable. He's made of 29 parts and the first transformable figure I made for JDP.

LOG012: HOS Prime WIP 04

Finally an update on Prime after so many disruptions in between the last update till now... Managed to solve two out of the three most problematic areas that's been bugging me since the 10" version: the hip joints and the sliding mechanism in the leg and thigh. Pretty happy with the smooth assembly and results so far and hope that the rest of the parts won't give me too many problems to fix. I have to think of how to make the joints work because of the simplification of certain parts and reduction of number of parts used.

LOG011: PAST TF CUSTOMS: DEVASTATOR STATUE

The Devastator statue was one of the many commissioned customs I did for JDP. It's made up of diecast vehicles and sculpted portions and based loosely on the artwork drawn by Dreamwave Productions in Transformers: Ultimate Guide published by DK.The whole statue is 15" tall and weighs about 5.5kg (12lbs).

LOG010: PAST TF CUSTOMS: QUINTESSONS STATUE

The Quintessons statue is one of the earliest commissions from an old friend of mine David aka JD. The kits were sold online intially through JDP and later through Hal who owns Rabid Squirrel Productions (RSP). The statue is about 5.5" tall and sculpted fully with epoxy putty.

LOG009: PAST TF CUSTOMS: EPSILON ARCEE

Arcee was the very first sculpture I tried making (inspired by Botcon Japan '98 Arcee), not the first that I completed though. She was 5" tall if I recall correctly and made up of epoxy putty and styrene. I didn't have a dremel back then or even know about it so she's basically shaped by a pen knife and loads of sandpaper.

This figure no longer exist as it was modified into version 1.1 based on comments received that she looked too young and anime styled. The modifications were made when no one in my small team Studio Epsilon (STEP) have any expereince in molding or casting so revisions were made on the original sculpt. Personally I do not like the revised version one bit and deeply regret making the changes without keeping the original figure. Limited copies of the revision were auctioned off on Ebay. The figures were extremely fragile due to the size and design.

LOG008: DREGG

Dregg is a 7" tall statue based on one of the 10 playable characters in the upcoming Xbox 360 game Dark Sovereign by Redeye Studios. Dregg is modeled in Zbrush by my friend who is the owner of Redeye as well as the head of the development team for DS. Due to the bulk of figure and the high number of polygons in the model the prototype parts were milled out with a low level of finish and details added by hand.

LOG007: TWIZTID

Long overdue sculpts of the two members of the hardcore rap group Twiztid. The figures of Madrox and Monoxide are 7" tall and supposed to be released as vinyl figures. Personally I think the look is still off and I didn't really capture the likenesses of the duo but they seemed to like them so... thank God.

LOG006: HOS Prime WIP 03

Finally completed a project that's long overdue and started on the assembly of HOS Prime. The details on the head are hard to add in as it's pretty tiny. I regret not separating the face from the helmet like what I did for the larger version. But anyway it's coming along pretty nicely though I had to do quite a bit of cutting and sanding to get the parts to fit properly.

LOG005: HOS Prime WIP 02

All the parts are finally machined out after two long weeks. Next step is to put clean up and put them together and modify parts that do not fit. I've not added the joints into this model to reduce the number of parts I have to machine so they gotta be done by hand.

106 parts so far. Not that much of an improvement from the 10" version that had 144 parts but there are many that I need to combine together before molding.

LOG004: LADY RAGNALL

This is a 8" tall statue I modeled and prototyped for Chivalry Entertainment Studios based on the concept art provided. Ragnall's my very first attempt at anime styled figures and a pretty interesting experience.

LOG003: HOS Prime WIP 01

Not much of an update, just a shot of how some of the parts look after milling one side of the block.

There was an error in Prime's head model that I overlooked so there's a hole on his faceplate that I'll need to repair by hand.

LOG002: Blast from the Past

LOG001: Back in Action - Hearts of Steel Optimus Prime

A brief history:

The HOS Prime project began in Jan 2008 as a test project for transiting from traditional sculpting/scratch-building to computer aided design and prototyping.

A 10" tall model was made through CNC milling and due to overwhelming responses from Transformers fans, the figure was to be offered as colored garage kits. After two failed molds it was decided that the costs of production was too high to sell the kits at the price promised to the fandom so the project was eventually shelved.

The project was picked up by my long time friend Hal Zucati and offered to the public once again, but at a more realistic price for a figure this size and complexity.

But HOS Prime is back in more than one ways, as promised to many who asked of a more affordable figure, the 6.5" version is in development. I'll keep progress updated here so stay tuned...