Time for Halloween

Check these out, they are a new release by Crazy Owners just in time for Halloween. I thought the shirt was very cool, so I pre-ordered a couple of these for the shirts.

My first Diorama attempt

I've always wanted to try my hand and making a custom diorama, but to be honest I've never thought I have enough patience or skill to do one. Today my wife and I needed to stop into Home Depot, so I decided to bite the bullet and by a 4'x8' sheet of styrofoam, the kind you see carpenters use to insulate houses.

One of my biggest problems has always been that I rush into my projects and try to accomplish the entire thing at one time... I want this to be different. So far I cut two 20"x20" squares - one for the ground, one for the actual wall. It's very very basic right now, but my plan is to work on it a little bit each night after work until it's completed...

Suggestions are definitely welcome... This is going to be a huge learning process for me.

New from Very Hot: US Army MP

Just saw this listed over on Very Hot's website. I'll definitely have to pick up a few of these sets when they are released... (click on the picture for more images)

Just preordered from Loading Toys

I just preordered this head-sculpt from Loading Toys. I am not sure where it will fit into my collection just yet, probably on my ODA team. As soon as I saw it, my initial thoughts were of Eddie Price from Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six book and video games. I can't wait until it arrives. This is the Loading Toys Primo Head with gas cylinder.





Primo

Beard Project

I've seen several people do some amazing custom work using different products, and I have been wanting to give it a try for some time now. After talking with Dave B, he told me what product he uses, and where to buy it so I figured I would give it a try.

The product blue/yellow epoxy or Green Stuff. It's basically a 1:1 mix that allows you time to work the epoxy before it cures. The thing that I really liked about this when Dave told me about it, was that you don't have to cook it...

Please keep in mind that this is my very first attempt, but I thought it wasn't half bad for a beginner....

First thing I did was picked an older joe body out of my spares box....
Then I cut equal portions of the green stuff....I wanted to keep this clean as possible, so I used a small piece of wax paper to place the green stuff on while I was working with it, and I used a pair of powder free latex gloves. This stuff is great to work with, it's just like playing with a sticky clay from when you were a kid... Once you work it for a few minutes, it turns a nice green color...Now I just started working with very small portions, adding it and smoothing it as I went. I don't have any clay sculpting tools, so I used two different style 1:6 scale daggers to work the details into the beard, and to shave of excess epoxy.... This probably took me about 45 minutes total, and a lot of it is just trial and error. Here's where I am at this point. I'm going to let it sit overnight, and will try to paint it tomorrow.I plan on doing a few more of these just for practice, so that I can move on to a couple ideas that I have floating in my head.... please feel free to let me know what you think... Thanks for looking.

Horse Soldiers

A couple pictures from the recent snowfall....Inspired by the book "Horse Soldiers" by Doug Stanton.

GO JOE!

Just received General Clayton Abernathy "Hawk" from my good friend Jim Merzke. Thanks again Jim, now my Joe team is complete - or at least as far as the ones from Rise of Cobra.

Tactical Santa

This is a bash I did this year that I've wanted to do for some time now... He was actually the topper on our Christmas tree this year...

Heavy Duty arrives

After seeing the new GI Joe movie, I decided I would pick up a few of the figures from the movie. Here's my latest addition to my "Joe" team, Heavy Duty. Of course I swapped his head to a different body that had better articulation and is a little more buff. I really like this headsculpt, he kind of has a pissed-off look which works well for Heavy Duty.

GI Joe Duke Figure

I passed on this figure initially because I don't like when Hasbro does the molded shirts or upper halves of figures. I thought they did a good job on Tripwire, and then just fell short on Duke. After about my third stop by Target, I decided to pick him up anyway. Here's my take on Duke in Iraq or Afghanistan, the Hasbro headsculpt has been transplanted to a DML body. The dish-dasha (man-dress) is from the Hasbro ROTLA Cairo Swordsman, I just cut a few inches off of it so that it didn't go to his ankles. The AK-47 is from Soldier's Stories PMC instructor figure.


Thanks for Looking!

My Latest figure

Soldier Story PMC Instructor

Mini-me

Here's my 1:6 version of myself....

Joelanta 2009

This past weekend, JJ and I drove to Atlanta to take part in Joelanta, which was my very first GI Joe convention. For more info, check out my Joelanta page here on my site. Thanks.

(Below: My wife JJ and I in front of the massive "War of the Worlds" Dio)

Custom 1:6 knives

I've been meaning to post pictures of these for a while, they are custom 1:6 knives created by Mike or (Sir Eaton Flipflop) over on the OSW board. He does amazing work, enjoy!

Thanks Mike!

One step closer to Snake Doc

Enterbay finally posted some production pictures of their President David Palmer. I still cannot believe I pre-ordered this figure considering the $160 price tag, but this is one of the figures that I have wanted since the first episode of "The Unit"

ODA 521 XO

ODA 521 Team Sergeant

Snake Eyes

I normally do not pick up the regular GI Joe figures, but yesterday someone posted the coolest bash of Snake Eyes on the OSW forum, and I was blown away by the headsculpt, then when I found out that it was the Hasbro head I knew I had to have it. Hasbro could have done a better job by putting this head on a super-articulated body, however the uzi that he comes with is also spectacular...Ihave to give kudos to Hasbro for the head and uzi, however the katana is way over sized and the molded black body sucks...

Here's my Snake Eyes v2.0 - meaning I made the changes that I wish Hasbro had.. plus gave him a little more fire power. Thanks for looking.

Quick Photo

I recently posted on the Flash Force website that I was looking for the Cairo Swordsman since he was not available in my A/O. Thanks to a few great friends, I ended up with three of them, and almost a fourth. One of the things that I noticed right of the bat was that he was very short, so I thought I'd use one of them for my ODA team. Well, without further adieu, here's a quick photo...
Thanks for looking!