Bram Stoker's Lucy

 This bust is from Francis Ford Coppola's Dracula film from 1992. The likeness is that of Sadie Frost who played Lucy Westerna, Dracula's victim in London. The pose shows Lucy has already been killed by Dracula and Van Helsing and the others confront her as she returns to her crypt. In the film she was just about to be married, so when she died she was buried in her wedding dress - hence all the frills...

 The model comes in 9 parts - 4 headdress frills, her head, arm, collar, body and base. It was a white resin casting and only 1 or 2 seam lines remained. 

As usual I started with paint the portrait. Since she's dead, she's very pale, but high rez images show blush was applied to her cheeks. So I had to remember that but not make it too obvious. she also looked to have gray eyes, but this round I picked paint that was too light.

Putting that aside to dry I tackled the next most obvious part, the frilly collar. Naturally the part is one solid piece of resin, but again looking at detailed pics, the real thing was mostly open lace where you could see thru it. How to do that?

What I did was give the whole part a wash of gray, and then came back with a makeup brush doubling as a dry brush and carefully brought back the highlights. Then I added some pearlizing paint to give it a shine. The pearls around her neck were also pearlized to give them a similar shine. The ornament was painted a chrome.

Since everything was overwhelmingly white, I decided to add some purple to the shadows of the ruffled headdress and her gown. The actual cap she wore showed up as a different white color, so that was painted Ivory. Similar was done for her arm.

I painted the base a simple black and then drybrushed some white to brig out the texture in the stone. At the end I added some "blood" drips and I was done. 

 

 

Dracula A.D. 1972

 In 1972 London - a century after his final battle with Professor Van Helsing - One hundred years later, the colorful 1972, Johnny, the great-grandson of the servant joins up with a "group" containing Jessica, the grand-daughter of the present vampire hunter, Abraham van Helsing and with their unknowing help resurrect Dracula in the 20th Century who is determined to destroy the house of Van Helsing, but who can believe that The king of the Vampires really exists and is alive - in 20th Century London? 

The image below is what I think the sculptor got his idea from. 

The kit is in 2 parts, where one part, the Victim, Caroline Munro, sits inside the base which is also the Dracula (Christopher Lee) figure. The kit was once again very clean.  As with most kits there is only a slight parting line across the hair. 

As is my new usual, the skin starts off with a coat of pinkle and red - 

After the pinkle was dry I applied the skin tones. I didn't want them both identical so Dracula got a light coat of Medium Flesh, and the victim for the Game Air Flesh. After that was some dotting from Reikland Fleshshade wash.

Drac's hair is almost Black, while the Victim is done with the German Black Brown. They both are wearing black so I have Drac highlighted with a blue shine, and the Victims dress is just strictly gloss black.  Her cheeks and chest were done with a very thin Transparent red, and her eye shadow is simply black pastel. Drac's 5 o'clock shadow was done with a dark blue pastel.   Once dry it all was sealed in Vallejo Matte ending the project.  

The only downside IMHO to this kit is Dracula's expression. If he was about to bite, you think you would see the teeth bared and the eyes squinting preparing for the attack. Post bite, I would think his eye would again be squinting, and his mouth relaxing still with the teeth bared. This expression makes me think he's creeping on Caroline.  Thanks for looking. 

 

TKS The Birth of Dracula Finale.

 I took a break from all the painting and started in on the base. I had these 4X4' blocks hanging around and decided to use that. The base supplied was just one layer but it had 2 or three layers that couldn't be seen to make it a little taller.  I thought would be enough, but the base was smaller than the block, I cut out similar sized blocks out of foam to add around the base. 

I then had the idea that I would used Green Stuff World's Crackle Paint to make cracks and I planed on painting the cracks yellow and red as if the Devil was making his way up to Vlad.  Long story short the crackle paint didn't really work out. :( 

I always wanted to add a back drop so I just kept cutting foam to make them. I didn't have my cutter and doing them by hand I ended up with a few different sizes. Oh well.  When they were all cut I glued them together with Gorilla Glue .When that dried I cover the whole thing in my Black paint/Mod Podge mix. This will protect the foam from paints and super glues. 

Turning back to Dracula's armor I simply applied Nocturna's Sanctuary Red over everything and then a couple of coats of V's Metallic Gloss.  That's it, I was done. Since the wood base is rather big I will get a little name plate for it.  Thanks for looking.  

 

TKS Birth of Dracula

 This is another terrific kit from TKS-  Terrible Kid Stuff from Italy. It's really call Elizabeta: Birth of Dracula. But I like the shorter name better. It's 75mm in gray resin, and  has 7 parts.

Seeing the red armor in the Coppolla movie, my plan was to paint his armor chrome and then add V's Transparent Red over the top.

 While the Chrome was drying I knew I was going to add a background, so I just mixed some red and black and painted the cape with that. The fur collar started dark brown and then a few dry brush highlights. Elizabeta was painted all Beige Red. I remember, again from the movie that she lept into the moat or river...  and I was going to paint the gown sheer in parts.

Adding the transparent Red to the chrome just turn the armor pink. Many layers later and it still wasn't what I was thinking. I needed to do something else.  As I painted his face I had to keep checking with the arm since it wasn't attached to see how much would and wouldn't show.

Elizabeta was painted in V's Azure Blue. Darker where the material looked thicker, leaving the Beige Red where it didn't. I also painted the skin with a mix of Pale Skin and Light Gray as she was supposed to be dead and wanted to to contrast from Vlad's skin tone.

That's it for this time. Check back for the finale. Thanks for looking.

Christopher Lee Dracula

This is one of the newest offering's from John Dennett's MoonDevil Studio. It's a two piece kit - the bust and base, in a bubble free resin. There is only the faintest remnant of a seam line across the top of his head and it too no time to make invisible. 

While I always picture vampires to be these pasty pale people.  Lee was none of that. The most I saw was, in a few pics, was they used (IMHO) too much powder to mask his 5 o'clock shadow. This was the pics I used -

I started off with my usual Beige Red for the skin base - 

From there it was a simple matter of filling in all the base colors I wanted - 

I was going to go out and get that Rustoleum Stone paint for the base. It's a type of paint that's basically some sort of gray, but somehow it spits out whit, black, and sometimes beige to form what looks like a rock. But- hehe -I was too lazy (maybe next time) and used used a dark gray base, with light gray highlights. I then used Vallejo's grime effects to make the green schmutz, and also Citadel's Mephiston Red to create some blood splatter.

The face was done as I usually do, in that I did simple highlights gradations, and then tried out some pastels to make shadows, and before I knew it I was done. Thanks for looking. 

Christopher Lee Dracula

As you may have seen in the promo, with Chris Lee's face already base coated, this is where I started. 
MoonDevil's kit is, as usual, very clean - no bubbles and the faintest remnant of a seam line in the hair. It took just minutes to fade that seam line into near invisibility.  It came in two parts - the bust and the base.  John also autographed the bottom of the base for me - 

 

This model is going to go fairly quickly. Of course I go back and forth with the skin tone. Stuck in my head Dracula should be this pasty white character, but Hammer Films had Christopher Lee as a fairly buff figure. 

So I end up doing the highlights and then backtrack because I made it too light. Anyway, here we are at the half way point with the skin, and the rest base coasted. Thanks for looking.

The Next Contestants

I'm still not ready for another vehicle yet, so the next volunteers from the stash are Vincent Price caricature bust, Christopher Lee bust, and a Hannibal (of Carthage fame) bust. 
I've had Vincent Price for a *long* time and really forget who it's by. I *think* it's from Rebel Resin. The Chris Lee is from the one and only John Dennett and MoonDevil Studio, and Hannibal is on the mini side and is from Black Heart Models.   Check back. Thanks for lookin'.

Black Heart's Vlad Finished

With the base coat finished and dried, I picked up with the shadowing and highlighting. Here can be seen that I also started on what I took to be pearl's around the cap. With the black base coat, I simply added a white pearlizing paint  - 

The pearls didn't take as long as I imagined, so it was on to some pigments for the dark 5 o'clock shadow and I was done with the bust. 
It was here that I decided I wanted something a little more unique for the base. I'll think of something. Thanks for looking.

 

Black Heart's Vlad

Black Heart Models, know for their 1:1 scale busts, have started a "micro" series of figures. Some of them are even historical in nature. I recently picked up Hannibal and Vlad the Impaler. Today, I'm starting Vlad. Besides what you see in the image it also comes with a pedestal type base  -

First thing was to look for an idea of color. Most of the images I'm familiar with are the woodcut or illustrations based on the woodcut.  Also a lot of the newer images had either a blood red vest or cape. To me that was a little too cliche. I settled on this pic -

As always I start by blackening the eyes and then start base coating -

Base painting well under way -

I did use red for the hat but will be darkening it down with some washes. The vest is Cavalry Brown, which has sort of on the red end of brown. The edge of the cap was smartly done. It looks like the sculptor used beads on a thread, and wrapped it around the band. Cool idea!

Thats it for today. Thanks for looking.

On to PART 2

New

With my creativity level low this month, I have been lurking around the Net finding some new subjects to spark my mood. 

My first offering is from CGS Military Figures out of the UK and it's the companion to my recent Doc Holiday bust. It's Wyatt Earp. The kit is 200mm and comes in 10 parts: body, head, 2 arms, gun w/ hands, 2 hats, 2 flintlocks, and a pedestal.  The likeness to Kurt Russell is not as good as the likeness of Doc was to Val Kilmer. But I guess with the low slung hat and the giant mustache, there's not a lot of room for facial recognition points.

Next is from my friend John Dennett at MoonDevil Studios. It's an aquatic monster John calls The Deep One. It's part of a series he has in relation to JP Lovecraft. This is a 6 part kit in a bubble free, nearly seam free resin. The parts fit together very nicely and only a minimum amount of putty will be needed to make the seams completely disappear.

The third one was a kit I was able to see in the making at the modeling/sculpting forum The Clubhouse. "Pat Morea" created The Rock show WIP on this forum as he went along. It looks to be 1/5 or more likely 1/4 full figure. The likeness is very good. but it looks like the mold slipped, and separated a bit below the waste. A bit of work will be needed to correct this.

My final offering for this installment is a kit from a miniatures Co., called Terrible Kids Stuff  (TKS). The kit is a 75mm (1:24) kit called The Birth of Dracula. The scene depicts Vlad holding the lifeless body of Elisabeta, with his free hand up to his face in grief. I found it a very powerful scene. 
The kit is a limited edition of 75 castings. On the site they guesstimated that it would be sold out in Aug., but when I ordered in October, and the kit came it had a certificate of authenticity numbered 70 of 75. So there is a small chance to get one. 
It comes in 7 parts - Vlad's head/body/legs, Elisabeta's head/body, Vlad's upraised arm, his cape, Elisabeta's 2 dangling arms and a block base. The base also has a "base" in that extra material was used to lift the block floor off the ground. Nice touch.  The model is exquisitely sculpted and cast; no bubbles and no apparent seam lines. The resin is the type you some time run across in Europe and SE Asia where there is a pretty strong petroleum smell, especially when one cuts or sands the resin. That aside, this is going to be a pleasure to build.

Thanks for looking.