Figure modding

It’s been a long time coming. Today I’ll be briefly going through the process of modding a Konami Mecha Musume trading figure. In an earlier post I went into details on another Mecha Musume, the T-34, so for a more in depth tutorial, go there since this post is mainly just an overview.

So, let’s get started!

The goal of this modding? To turn this German Sturmgeschütz III Ausf.G Mecha Musume:

The original figure

To a Finnish “Sturmi”. The differences between the two are quite large so I had to see what could be done to the trading figure to give it the same look.

The Tools

Before we actually begin, we’ll take a look at the tools and materials which I used.

• Putty – Mulliput Standard
• Acrylic Paints – Tamiya Color
• Wooden Stick – approx 2-3mm thick
• Strip of brass/metal – approx 5-6mm wide
• Wire – approx 1mm thick
• Hand Drill
• Hobby Cement – Tamiya Cement
• Cutter – small
• Sandpaper – high grit
• Cotton buds
• Acrylic Paint Thinner – Tamiya

Milliput Standard

An assortment of Tamiya Color

An arm to show the scale

The wire and hand drill

Preparation

First thing to do was to take apart the figure. It was a little hard since some parts were glued together, but nothing a little tug would fix…

Looking like a garage kit

Next up, the individual parts would need clean up before we can start anything. Using a high grit sandpaper, I gently sanded off the paint off flat surfaces while using the cotton buds soaked with paint thinner to strip off the paint off more curved surfaces like the arms.

Legs

One of the main changes is the side skirt armour that the German StuGs have, the ones in Finnish service didn’t have any so they had to go.

Legs without the side skirt (left) and without the mounting pegs (right)

Basically, I used some cutters to snip off the skirt armour and the mounting pegs, then sand down the paint. Next is to prepare the logs and the holders before we paint and glue it.

Before painting

Cannon

The cannon is also another area where significant modding was needed. To make clean up and painting easier, the cannon was split into three parts.

Ready for modding

This is where the wire and drill come in handy. Use the drill to well, drill a hole into both sides of the connecting faces of the cannon. This will allow the wire to slip in and keep both pieces steady when glue is applied.

Ready for glue when needed

Putty

Now that we have got the parts ready, it’s time for putty! The Milliput putty comes in two sticks which are mixed together in equal parts before the colours completely blend. The result is:

Ball-o-putty!

Two areas of the figure which will get the treatment are the cannon and the legs. The cannon will try and mimic the turret cement re-enforcement and the legs will have zimmerited sides to closely replicate the Finnish Sturmi.

Puttied up areas

Paint

The final step before putting the parts together is painting! I tried to mix the paints to get as close as the green used for the Finnish Sturmi, but I have no idea on the exact formula.

Before painting

Painted legs with logs glued on

Before getting the logs attached and any weathering

Final painted and weathered Finnish Sturmi

So there you have it, a conversion of a Mecha Musume trading figure.
Sorry for the sloppy write up, but I hope you enjoyed looking at how it was done.
There are still areas which I left out such as decals, but I haven’t found any Finnish armour decals anywhere, perhaps I’ll need to print my own…

Any questions feel free to ask and I’ll do my best to fill in the details.

Mecha Musume

German Sturmgeschütz III Ausf.G Conversion

OK! I’m going to be doing another Mecha Musume post over the coming period. Featured this time is the German Sturmgeschütz III Ausf.G found at the Konami Mecha Musume figure site

The StuG III will be converted to a Finnish StuG III “Sturmi”, specifically the Ps.531-33

Like the previous customised T-34 Mecha Musume, I’ll provide photos of progress to give you an idea of how I went about things.

If anyone has any suggestions on how to get Finnish tank-swastika model decals (besides printing them myself) I’d be more than grateful!

Newish stuff

Figures everywhere!

Since this blog was inactive for quite some time, I think it’s a good idea to show off some of the new figure additions! This also gives me a chance to ask you guys which figures you would like to see featured in future photo shoots as well. Some of these figures can be classified as “old”, but I did receive them within the last few months ^^;;

Before I start I’d like to take this time to thank pp of Otakurean for sending me this lovely clearfile of Yoake Mae yori Ruriiro na (The bright blue light before the dawn). I know it’s been months since I actually got this prize, and it’s been a looooooooong time coming. So, thank you pp~ :3

Figure Acquisitions

Since I have some spare time, I decided to show you guys the new stuff I’ve gotten over the past few months. Surprisingly I’ve managed to keep the figure purchases steady, I had to cancel a few figures since I was running low on cash and not to mention the falling Aussie dollar =/

Mikumikumiku, I snagged the Max Factory and Volks figures of Miku, but in the end I parted with the Volks to a friend of mine. I still hope that Max Factory could make a Haku Yowane figure ;_;

Blanc Neige was kind of an impulse buy for me, but her hips are…are just so distracting! She accompanies the old Max Factory Kureha on my shelf. Seriously… look at those hips! *drools*

One of the most expensive and biggest figure in my collection, second only to my Dollfie. Asakura is part of the FREEing 1/4 scale bunny girl set of The Melancholy of Suzumiya Haruhi series. She was shipped, and subsequently paid for on the day that the Aussie dollar fell to 55 Japanese yen… ;_; paincakes were had.

Griffon figures can be hit and miss for me, so this Sasara was a pleasant surprise to me when she arrived in her school swimsuit and maid apron. Her delicious pose just makes my skin tingle with anticipation….of…something… o_O

Nekomimi Nono Nekomiya in mizugi. I just LOVE cats, and thus nekomimi has a special place in my heart, so I couldn’t resist this figure. Now, some of you may notice a school swimsuit trend, but I assure you it isn’t a huge fetish of mine XD

Shana’s first appearance in my figure collection! With this particular figure, they released a regular version, and two store exclusive versions. The regular was the black haired beauty, one was a pink haired and blue uniform with striped stockings which has a resemblance to Alice in Wonderland. This version you see is the Strawberry Version exclusive to the GEE! online store. Not sure why strawberry as it could prolly be more appropriately be called Cherry or Peach…. but oh well~

iDOLM@STER

Alter released the second half of the FA4 iM@S trading figures a while back, so now I managed to grab myself a full set of the girls! Well, at least the black version of the set ^^; These trading figures are quite the build, and I must say Alter has done an excellent job on these.

Max Factory has also released Miki Hoshii in two versions, the blonde in green, and the brunette in blue. I opted for the blonde since I’m a sucker for Miki in blonde. The friend who has been supplying me with most of these figures went for the brunette, so if we ever get bored we could always trade XD

Kaiyodo’s latest iM@S Fraulein girl to take the stage is also Miki Hoshii. I had to grab her to produce the various poses I had imagined. She comes with an additional head for those who love the brown, and since they are using the Revoltech joints I used a spare Saber Alter body XD

Nanoha StrikerS

Reinforce Zwei! I love this lil figure and it’s mini-ness. It’s like a 1/1 scale of her XD I’m not a huge fan of the StrikerS season, but Reinforce is so cute!

Hayate has recently come out as a figure as well, and in my opinion she’s aged the best >.> She also comes with a mini-mini-boss! Reinforce is even smaller now. Alter has done a nice job of sculpting and painting the really tiny figure, it’s about the same size of those Warhammer miniatures! Hayate’s box is also a force to be reckoned with. It’s even bigger than the massive Fate Testarossa box!! Now where to find space to put the box…

Alice in ???

Alter has been doing the 3D incarnations of the POP Wonderland series, and I decided to pick one up! The photo is a lil bland so it does little to bring out the wonder~

Alice from Queen’s Blade was love at first sight, I remember picking up the Hobby Japan magazine…or was it Dengeki Hobby… and seeing the first unpainted prototype. That point on I was watching the pre-order scene with the eyes of an eagle. And here she is.

Queen’s Figures

Speaking of Queen’s Blade, Ymir has been released as a black coloured princess now. I couldn’t resist at the time, so I had to pay for her presence. As like the regular version, she can undress nearly everything, even her pantsu! o_o

Next up is the Hobby Japan magazine exclusive Queen’s Gate Ink-tan from Moetan! I had to cut a tiny lil stamp out from the Hobby Japan magazine and send it to a friend of mine in Japan….express…since the cut off date was approaching. Which means that huge envelope in the background with ALL THOSE STAMPS was used to deliver a stamp the size of my thumb…

Queen’s Gate Ink-tan is awesome! Lots of her armour is cast off and it shows, her armour was practically falling off when I try to get her to grip those button batons. It’s highly distracting trying to do something when you get constant mune flashes @_@

Mecha Musume

Aaah, how I love Mecha Musume~ I just had to buy these two figures when I saw them, not to mention they’re both based on Shimada Fumikane’s artwork of Sky Girls/Strike Witches fame.

The M4A1 Early Type Sherman “Elizabeth” has a lot of accessories, you can even de-mechanise her but…why would I do that? o_O Her nonchalant expression is big boon for me :3

The Kawasaki Ki-100 Type 5 Fighter, the main appeal was admittedly the cast off feature >.> BUT her fierce gaze was also appealing for me :3

Blackout

A few months ago my apartment had a blackout and I had nothing to do… so I decided to take a few photos for the hell of it. My room has changed a bit since then…more figures…less ceiling space for posters… I also took a few photos of Saber, and it turned out somewhat ok, so I decided to share it here too~

Photo shoot choice

With all these bland photos, I was wondering which of these figures you people would really like to see in a photo shoot, mind you, I tend to do outdoor ones XD
I’ve updated the poll which should appear shortly on the blog as well, so please have your say :3
I’ll see which figures on the poll have a higher demand so I’ll place a higher priority on them when I decide to go on a photo shoot~

Again, thanks to those who visit regularly too~ :3

Moé Idolatry Article

T-34 Tutorial

In the three-ninth kingdom, there was a T-34 tank, of Soviet origin that stood at the ready for months on end, gathering dust that would only very occasionally be cleaned away. She stood patiently until a hand from the sky came and held her, and took her to the wide plains below.

Only to be striped and disassembled XD

Today I’ll be going through the first parts of weathering a Soviet T-34 (T-34/76 as the Germans knew it). For those interested, read on!

T-34 disassembled for repaint and modifications

So, that is what the T-34 would look like after taking it all apart. This is only because I’ll be modifying this T-34 a lil.

A clean T-34

A note before I go on, while I do show you how I go about weathering, most of the tips could be used on most other Mecha Musume (notably the tanks), and probably military tank models as well since the techniques are derived from it. Experiment with my techniques to see which suits you best :3

The aim of this weathering effect is to get a dry muddy look on the T-34, the idea is that it was fighting in the muddy battlefields on the German eastern fronts before moving to an urban area. This is a simple process, I won’t be going into more hardcore approaches such as using surfacers, pigments and synthetic grass. I’m trying to keep this easy for the average figure collector who might be interested in moving into the modelling scene.

Washing

This is a simple technique that can give depth to the figure. In the earlier volumes of Mecha Musume, they didn’t have any pre-weathered figures, which made it easier to wash. With Volume 3, I noticed they applied some simple weathering to them which causes me more trouble =/

What I’ll be doing is putting a brown muddy, greasy look as a base for the other effects.

So, this is what you’ll need:

• Ear cleaning buds
• Acrylic paints – Tamiya Acrylic Paint XF-10 (Flat Brown) and XF-1 (Flat Black) used
• Acrylic thinner – Mr.Color Thinner 110 used
• A pallet of some sort
• Paint brushes

Most of the tools, besides the paint

Because mud from rich soil is very dark, I’ll be mixing the flat brown with a only a hint of black to get a lil darker than normal.
You only need a little so when you do mix them, don’t overdo it! We’ll be diluting it in thinner so there’s no need for a lot of it.

Don’t have your palette as dirty as mine…

Mix in thinner to a runny consistency. The idea is that it’ll be watery and will cling to corners and such, and the thinner will evaporate once the wash starts to dry.
Grab your bud and wet it in the solution, then wipe it over the armour sections. Capillary action will take place on the nooks and crannies.
If you put too little thinner, don’t worry! You can still fix it by wetting a bud with more thinner and just wipe away the excess paint, sometimes I do this on purpose to get a grimier look.

If it looks messy, then we’re doing good!

This is the first step done and it’ll give a good base to work with for a muddy look :3

Mud Painting

Ok, now that we have a nice base we’ll start with the “wet” mud paint. We’ll basically paint on some mud splashes on the figure.

What you’ll need is:

• Acrylic paint – Tamiya Acrylic Paint XF-10 (Flat Brown) used
• Paint brushes

This is the fun part, paint on some brown where you think mud would splash onto. Try to remember which areas would most likely be affected, such as feet, knees, elbows, and the like. Ultimately it’s up to you, which is the fun aspect :3

Try to keep the splashes fairly large, as they’re the areas which mud is still moist and hasn’t dried up.

Getting there~

Dry Brushing and Splatter

Ok, so now that we have the “wet” muddy look, we’ll need to paint on a layer of “dry” mud. To do this, I’ll be using the dry brushing technique.

As the name implies, you brush on paint with a dry tip by wiping away most of the paint.

Tools needed:

• Disposable/old paint brush
• Acrylic paint – Tamiya Acrylic Paint XF-52 (Flat Earth) used
• Tissues
• Toothbrush

Earth aint flat issit?

Dry brushing is easy, all you need to do is dip your brush into the paint, then wipe away most of the paint with a piece of tissue. Make sure the brush is “dry” enough that it doesn’t leave any large streaks when you brush it on a piece of paper but rather specks of paint.

Test to see if it’s dry enough

Take the figure and brush on the paint, you’ll need to do quite a few strokes to get a good looking affect. This will hopefully look like dried mud.

Effects are subtle, which is good

Now for those minute mud splashes that dry quick detail. We’ll be using a toothbrush for this effect, and it’s also easy. Basically put some paint onto a toothbrush and using your thumb stroke it back so it’ll flick tiny drops of paint onto the figure, easy no?

Dried mud splatter on the side

Chipping Detailing

So, since this lil T-34 has been out of the mud and presumably been fighting in an urban area, scraping and chipping would be common. To do this we’ll be using one of man’s greatest tool, a pencil.

All that you’ll need is:

• Soft (B grade) graphite pencil – Derwent 9B pencil used

9B is the softest I have

This is straightforward, draw in the details on the edges of likely areas of abrasion, such as corners, knees and tip of the feet. Don’t forget the tracks on her legs, while they probably don’t actually touch the ground, real tanks would have wear and tear on them. Add as much as you want, generally a more realistic look is one of subtlety, the viewer would only see it if they are pointed out. A more stylish look is one of extremes, so basically use your judgement on what you want it too look like.

You don’t need to go overboard

Exhaust Detailing

And here we are on the last step! If you look closely, the T-34 has some exhaust vents on her thigh, and of course, her 76.2mm primary cannon. I’ll be using something that I hardly ever use for this purpose before I started weathering Mecha Musume, art pastels.

What you’ll need:

• Disposable/old paint brush
• Black pastel – Mungyo Pastel black used
• Piece of paper or sandpaper

Keep the wind away!

Ok, a fair warning, do this in a well ventilated area, or better yet, do it outside if it isn’t windy. Having dust particles is never a good thing so using a mask is a good idea if you can’t get good ventilation.

Now this is simple, grind up some of the black pastel on a piece of paper or sandpaper, the latter making it much easier. You’ll need only a lil bit of the grounded up “dust”, so grab your brush and try to pick up as much as you can. With the brush, rub the pastel dust on the exhaust vents and the tip of the cannon barrel.

Perhaps I overdid it? ^^;

The result is a nice effect, you could apply this to desert dust and the like. I actually got this technique from the old Mecha Musume online diary, and I’ve been using it on my collection of Mecha Musume ever since.

Finished

So there you have it, a regular T-34 turned into a seasoned fighter on the eastern front.

While I’m no expert modeler, I hope the tips help in some way or another, or at least give you some insight to how I weather my Mecha Musume figures. If you do have modeling experience and see that I could of done something easier or more efficient, by all means tell me, I’ll try to use it for the next tutorials :3

Sexy rough metal…o_O

I’m also pretty open to suggestions on how to improve these kind of articles if you have any problems with it such as being hard to understand or whatnot. I already noticed that I should of done a standard comparison shot for each step so you can clearly see the differences between them. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this, and if you do decide to try to paint your Mecha Musume, give me a yell! :D

Polls polls polls

New poll!

The last poll indicated that people wanted to see the Soviet T-34-76 as the subject of weathering. Right now I’m half way through the actual weathering, I should be able to post the tutorial and results early-mid next week (I forgot I needed some moddleing supplies…).

A new poll is in effect, I couldn’t think of anything so it’ll be another list of Mecha Musume I have that I’d like to start weathering in the near future. Click on the name to see a picture~

I’m doing a lil more work than usual for this particular Mecha Musume as I wanted to challenge myself a lil so it’ll take longer than a normal weathering session. The effort should pay off tho, so stay tuned!

Nintendo DS

NDS Skins

Ok, so I lied =/ Sorry that this isn’t a post of a figure shoot, that’s planned for this Sunday/Monday.

Right… I splurged more money… Story goes (it’s a short one) that my friend who visited me at work brought along his DS like usual, cept this time he brought what we both have been waiting for a while. Doki Doki Majou Shinpan, that’s right, it’s the game that makes touching good~
Anyway, I caved in, there’s simply more games on the DS I want to play than the PSP =/

Now, a NDS isn’t a cheap thing (comparative to figures…) but at work, I found a customer who actually worked at EB Games at DFO. He offered to help me get a discount on the NDS which was fine by me.

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R4, Revolution for DS, a flash cart for the NDS, it lets you play er, “homebrew” games and other multimedia files. You can also skin the interface to your own liking which is what I have done. Here ya go, these skins work on the R4 and apparently the M3 as well, go ahead and try them out if you own either of those flash carts.

LucyRuu

A ToHeart2 skin for those Lucy and Reona fans. Both images are from Kantoku who has been featured in the previous post Moe Moe Overdose. A nice skin for those who have a pink DS and want something appropriate with it.

Mecha Musume

ACH TUNG! Shimada Humikane’s work in a skin :3 For those who like a more darker skin to match their black DS.

ARIAn

ARIA, who doesn’t like a cute udine~ Gorgeous artwork from Kantoku again. Great for white DS owners I guess~

Yayoidolatry

Aaah, Yayoi Takatsuki. One of the goddess’ of my moe world ^^; The first picture is still a mystery to me of who drew it. The second is by Yomogi.

Oh well, there’s my lil creative output for the NDS for the past day or so. Enjoy~

Details

Name
Nintendo DS Lite
Colour
Black
Place of purchase
EB Games Melbourne Central, Melbourne, Australia
Retail price
$199.00 AU
Bought it for
$165.00 AU
Availability (at time of writing)
Plenty :3
Links
NDS Themes
My NDS themes page

British Tank, Infantry, Mk III

Asuna-Valentine

Remember the one Figumate that didn’t have a ball joint for the head?
I managed to fix it… by using Asuna’s body instead :3
I’ll cut the talk and go straight to the pictures:

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Being Figumates, they’re expected to be interchangable, and if this is any indication, they are. The parts fit snugly and she’s basically good as new :3

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aaah poor Asuna… but at least she looks happy right~? ^^;

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A note, the blog is going to be slowing down since I’ve posted all my photo shoot material, so sorry that I won’t be able to update as frequently as I have. I’ll try to get a photo shoot running soon for you guys.

ACH TUNG!

Mecha Musume Figumate

SIXTEENTH POST~! Today I received my package of Konami’s new Figumate series, Mecha Musume, along with my friend’s very healthy Beat Angel Escalayer by Alter. Mecha Musume trading figures have been around for a while, being based on Shimada Humikane’s work, who I idolise greatly, which is in turn an amalgamation of moé girls with various machines of war. Mecha Musume has now entered the Figumate realm! :3

These are just some photos of the items, I don’t really expect a full blown outdoor photo shoot with these lil cuties, but who knows.

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The Figumate uh, figures are basically chibi trading figures similar to Pinky Streets, they have movable arms at the shoulder joint, feet at the ankle, and ball jointed head. As such, it’s possible to interchange some parts from the other figumate series.

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The detail on the facial detail is SUPERB, it’s beyond “good”. The paint for the details of the face are sharp and accurate, no splotches or runs, it’s basically… perfect. It’s not just this particular series of Mecha Musume Figumates either, I have two Negima Figumates and they also exhibit this level of quality.

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In the box you get ten (10) pieces, or rather, Figumates. As with most other trading figures, these smaller boxes are all random, and sets usually have rare/special figures as well. So, the Mecha Musume Figumates have 8 in the set, 3 of which are considered rare items. The specific figures corresponds to the first volume of the Mecha Musume Trading Figures, which include the “British Tank, Infantry, Mk III, Valentine”, “German Sturmgeschütz III Ausf.G”, “Soviet P-60″ and others.

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Oh… one of the figures didn’t come with that ball joint for the head…

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If you’re a fan of World War II war machines, and an avid lover of cute lil not-so-innocent girls, then Mecha Musume might very well be up your alley. Some people are so engrossed in Mecha Musume that they even weather the figures as if they were actual scale model kits of war machines. Like me… so here’s a few pics of two of my works:
(sorry about the craptastic lighting)

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First up is the British Tank, Infantry, Mk III, Valentine. Coming from the Mecha Musume Vol.1 trading figures, she’s one of the first. I picked her up in Japan, at one of those second hand stores where people put their items into glass cabinets for sale. They were sold out everywhere in Akihabara so that was the only way I could of gotten it. With this figure I decided to give the run down dusty look, since Valentines were also deployed in the African theatre.

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And second is the German Sturmgeschütz III Ausf.A. She’s from Mecha Musume Vol.2, which I also bought from the same store I got the Valentine. The Sturmgeschütz III, or StuG III is the most mass produced armoured fighting vehicle of Nazi Germany in World War II. I decided to give it a generic urban weathering since the first deployment of Ausf.A (Type A) was at the Battle of France, and only 30 of this type were produced.

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Anyway, there’s my lil article on the new Mecha Musume Figumates and also some of my work with the original Mecha Musume series.
Tell me if you want to see more of them, or even tutorials on how I did it ^^;

Details – Figures

Name
Mecha Musume Figutemate Vol.1
Series
Mecha Musume
Maker
Konami
Release date
May 2007
Place of purchase
HLJ
Retail price
450 yen per piece
Bought it for
$42.50 AU Est. for a box of 10
Availability – HLJ (at time of writing)
Backordered :(
Links
Official Konami Mecha Musume Figumate Website JP
Official Konami Mecha Musume Vol.1 Website JP
Official Konami Asia Mecha Musume Vol.1 Website ENG

P.S. I use the actual wartime naming conventions of the Mecha Musume instead of the ones listed, however for fictional ones I just used the shorthand version.

P.S.S. 6th June 1944, go google it.