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Jimbo's 1/12th ABC Warriors (and friends)

Started by Dark Jimbo, 18 January, 2016, 10:42:39 PM

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Dark Jimbo

Time to take a look at the droid that started it all – that's right, it's Mongrol...




I won't pretend that I thought I could improve as such on what 3A did with Mongrol – he's a chuffing beautiful figure, no mistake – but from the moment I got him there were tweaks I wanted to make to get him closer to 'my' Mongrol. Primarily that revolved around the head – I wanted it in classic yellow, and I wanted that trademark Mongrol underbite!

There wasn't much to making the underbite, really – I just re-sculpted the lower jaw with epoxy putty (extremely lightweight when cured, so there was no increased chance of his jaw swinging open on its own).



This was mainly an aesthetic choice, but it did have an added, unforeseen, benefit – the hook that holds Mongrol's chain to his jaw on the 1/12th figure always looked incredibly fragile, like it would be the first thing to snap off if he ever fell off a shelf (God forbid!) With the jaw bulked up around it I could breathe a bit easier!



After that it was all cosmetic stuff. I masked off the relevant areas – most of the head and both arms. Not that the arms particularly needed repainting, but I wanted to make sue the yellow colours matched and didn't jar against each other. I laid down an ochre/brown acrylic base, then worked gradually back up through some lighter yellows – because Mongrol was built from metal that had presumably lain around a scrapyard for years, I didn't want any bright colours but rusted, tarnished variants; and it never seemed to me that yellow would be a particularly battlefield-friendly colour, especially given that he fights mainly on the dustbowl that is Mars. I re-painted his forehead star to make it really pop and re-painted the eyes in a bit more detail, trying to give them some depth and life – the eyes were probably the only bit of the original figure I actively disliked. Bit too cartoony.




I always liked how some ABC artists, mainly Kev Walker, would give Mongrol yellow-and-black chevron patternings on his arms, such as industrial machinery might have, which really suits Mongrol's heavy-duty feel, so I whacked on a few of those.

As I'm sure anyone reading this knows, Mongrol's creator Lara was a battlecomber who scavenged the battlefields for the robot detritus of both sides of the war, so I added a scattering of both US and Volgan markings to bits of Mongrol's bodywork – a hammer and sickle, Kev O Neill's variant of the US flag, some Cyrillic stuff and more stars. The original figure had always looked a bit uniform for what was meant to be a frankenstinian mish-mash, so I deliberately painted these in an asymmetrical way, with some differently-coloured plates to reinforce the ramshackle theme, like he's been cut to fit from larger scrap panels. You'll see I also sculpted a few little extra metal plates here and there – again, just to break things up a bit and stress that he's a bit of a junkyard dog.





Let smushing commence!

@jamesfeistdraws

Colin YNWA

Its a very impressive thing to take a figure that good and make it better... so can we see him alongside Mek Quake in progress?

Dark Jimbo

Quote from: Colin_YNWA on 31 March, 2016, 08:49:53 PM
... so can we see him alongside Mek Quake in progress?

Yes! Scale shots coming with the next Mek-Quake update, as the actual bodywork goes onto the chassis!
@jamesfeistdraws

judda fett

Really nice customising there Dark Jimbo!

SpongeJosh

Love the eye detail! Its made the model look more Mongrol than mong-out.

Brilliant work Jimbo. Cant wait to see the finished Mek-Quake.

Hawkmumbler

Always loved it when McMahon drew Mongrol with and under bite. It just makes his face POP that little bit more. Brilliant sculpt as ever, Jimbob. Brilliant stuff.

Colin YNWA

Quote from: Dark Jimbo on 31 March, 2016, 10:37:24 PM
Quote from: Colin_YNWA on 31 March, 2016, 08:49:53 PM
... so can we see him alongside Mek Quake in progress?

Yes! Scale shots coming with the next Mek-Quake update, as the actual bodywork goes onto the chassis!

That has me more excited than is reasonable.

Steven Denton


Dark Jimbo

Quote from: Hawkmumbler on 01 April, 2016, 01:49:33 PM
Always loved it when McMahon drew Mongrol with and under bite. It just makes his face POP that little bit more. Brilliant sculpt as ever, Jimbob. Brilliant stuff.

I like to think of this as Clint Langley stylings on a classic McMahon sculpt - all the best of old and new styles.
@jamesfeistdraws

pineapplehead


I, Cosh

That repaint job on Mongrol is outstanding. I've just been dabbling in painting a couple of miniatures for the first time in many years and let's just say I've got a long way to go.
We never really die.

Dark Jimbo

Quote from: The Cosh on 04 April, 2016, 09:18:30 AM
That repaint job on Mongrol is outstanding. I've just been dabbling in painting a couple of miniatures for the first time in many years and let's just say I've got a long way to go.

Thanks Cosh. I'm quite modest about, say, my own artwork, but I was really pleased with Mongrol. Some boarders may remember that I did more or less the same repaint some years ago on the big 1/6th Mongrol, whose sheer size made him very forgiving of tiny mistakes - having had the practice doing the paintjob once already, I think that's why this worked so well!
@jamesfeistdraws

Dandontdare

Quote from: Dark Jimbo on 31 March, 2016, 03:18:24 PMthe hook that holds Mongrol's chain to his jaw on the 1/12th figure always looked incredibly fragile, like it would be the first thing to snap off if he ever fell off a shelf (God forbid!)

I can testify that this is indeed the case - it wasn't a fall off a shelf but just me being a bit clumsy handling him, but the ring snapped off within days of receiving it..

teckno viking

Hot Diggity Dog what a Job. Said the Raggity man just before Mongrol squashed him hahaha

Beautiful and perfect improvement :D