Building your MARINES - CORRECTLY

[Mudshark]

Ah, another Japanophile, and a translator, no less! I suppose most people here don't read Japanese and could probably care less, which makes us a minority, but anyway... you know, and I know that this is the only character it could possibly be. It's what I painted on my Hicks, in any case.

Btw, James Remar was originally cast as Hicks and he must have been the one who put it on there. Michael Biehn got the armour like that when he was signed to play Hicks after Remar left. It seemed to me that the Ai kanji and "LIFER" on the back, plus the USCM tat on his arm was probably meant to emphasize his love of the Corps, which goes with his laid-back, frosty, seasoned combat veteran image. At least that was my take on why the kanji was there. Besides that, it just adds interest to his armour. Mata, yoroshiku.

 

[Stendec]

I am going all out in terms of accuracy so I was very grateful when Mudshark first identified this character.

I made a graphic of this character and printed it off as a decal to put on the back of the torso armor. Since the decal paper isn't opace (and the body armor is fairly dark) the decal doesn't show up too well but I intent to paint over it with red paint and a super fine brush so this will serve as a perfect stencil and guide. Thanks again Mudshark.

The pic sucks but its the best one I have for now.

If its any use to anyone this is the graphic I made, printed at 100%.

 

[icruise]

The guy from this site finally got back to me about the Hudson head sculpt, so I ordered one. It was $12.25 shipped, which is very reasonable if you ask me. I think it's quite a good looking sculpt as well. I think I will use this head for my Hudson, repaint the Hudson head as Hicks (since it looks like Michael Biehn) and use my Hicks head for a Terminator 1 Kyle Reese custom.

 

[JediMike71]

That site you linked in your last post icruise is the site ran by the guy I told you about in my post that I got the Hicks padlock and clasp armor from. His name is Chris Chulamanis. He's a great guy! I also got that Hudson head, and painted it. I had it on my Hudson body for a while...not superglued onto the neck post. Here's some pictures of how mine turned out after I painted it. I made the paint look a little lumpy on his forehead to simulate sweat, and worry around his eyebrows and on his forehead.

But...as good as that head is...I got a much better head from "figuremasterles" Les Walker on this board. His Hudson head shows a different expression than Chris's head does. At least in my opinion. It is the permanent head on my Hudson now. I've superglued it to the neck post. I'll get some pictures of my Hudson with Les's head on it sometime later tonight for you to see it. I think some other members have that Hudson head from Les too as their permanent head on their Hudsons.

 

[Mudshark]

Brother STEN! It's nice to see someone found that post useful! That looks great, by the way. Looks like you nailed the size and location too. I think I ought to mention that the one I used was from dictionary text, so the brush strokes for the character should probably look a little more hand-painted, if you see what I mean. JediMike's has that nice "organic" look to it, but I think he copied it from the photo of a replica of Hicks' armour (you know the one I mean). Unfortunately, the brush strokes on that replica piece aren't quite right, so it's sort of misspelled, if that makes sense. (This is by no means a criticism of JediMike's work, he did a very nice job recreating it.)

I'll do my best to post another example in a hand-painted style in the near future, like the one on my Hicks, in case anyone else is interested.

I am going all out in terms of accuracy so I was very grateful when Mudshark first identified this character.

I made a graphic of this character and printed it off as a decal to put on the back of the torso armor. Since the decal paper isn't opace (and the body armor is fairly dark) the decal doesn't show up too well but I intent to paint over it with red paint and a super fine brush so this will serve as a perfect stencil and guide. Thanks again Mudshark.

The pic sucks but its the best one I have for now.

If its any use to anyone this is the graphic I made, printed at 100%.

 

[metaphorge]

I am going all out in terms of accuracy so I was very grateful when Mudshark first identified this character.

I made a graphic of this character and printed it off as a decal to put on the back of the torso armor. Since the decal paper isn't opace (and the body armor is fairly dark) the decal doesn't show up too well but I intent to paint over it with red paint and a super fine brush so this will serve as a perfect stencil and guide. Thanks again Mudshark.

The pic sucks but its the best one I have for now.

If its any use to anyone this is the graphic I made, printed at 100%.

You rule, Stendec.

 

[Stendec]

Thanks guys, appreciate it.

Yeah Mudshark, my graphic does look abit clinical, but as a guide it should work pretty well and Im hoping the character will look more organic once I hand paint over the decal. I'd love to see how yours turned out, its cool to know that others are adding this detail to their figures too

Im not sure how I'l tackle the "LIFER" motif yet since I cant print white onto decal sheets and painting it free hand woul d be a disaster with my shaky hands lol There are vinyl cut alphabet labels that you can buy which come in some pretty tiny fonts so I'l just wait till I source those. Im going to place it below the two lower brackets of his armor though, not inbetween as it was in the movie. The space on the HT armor is just too narrow for my liking.

 

[icruise]

JediMike -- I'd like to see pictures of your new Hudson head. I'm guessing it's the same one that was on ebay recently, since the listing mentioned that it was from Frontline. It looks like a nice head as well, but I figured for $12 I could try the other one out and see how it worked for me.

 

[MaulFan]

Thanks guys, appreciate it.

Yeah Mudshark, my graphic does look abit clinical, but as a guide it should work pretty well and Im hoping the character will look more organic once I hand paint over the decal. I'd love to see how yours turned out, its cool to know that others are adding this detail to their figures too

Im not sure how I'l tackle the "LIFER" motif yet since I cant print white onto decal sheets and painting it free hand woul d be a disaster with my shaky hands lol There are vinyl cut alphabet labels that you can buy which come in some pretty tiny fonts so I'l just wait till I source those. Im going to place it below the two lower brackets of his armor though, not inbetween as it was in the movie. The space on the HT armor is just too narrow for my liking.

Unless your hands are super shaky, I say paint it by hand, the lifer part that is, it looks more authentic to be a bit sloppy like it was slapped on there.

 

[JediMike71]

Hi icruise. I'll be posting pictures of my "Chronohead" Hudson (as Les calls it) custom head here soon for you. I have a decent Kodak Easyshare digital camera, but it sometimes has trouble taking pictures up close for some reason. Pics are coming soon...

 

[Wor-Gar]

Well, there's so much excitement about the Pred 1 Dutch crew, I was wondering...

Is that the end for the Aliens Marines?

Other than a possible Queen, which may or may not happen, do you think that HT will abandon the Aliens line in favor of Pred 1?

 

[MaulFan]

I could see it happening only because beyond the CORE fans of ALIENS, there aren't many people that would buy up the remaining characters at the price HT figures cost, Bishop maybe, but Gorman, Crowe, Wierzbowski, Burke, I can't see enough interest to justify the production.

 

[JediMike71]

Well, I for one would buy them all! Crowe, Weirzbowski, Spunkmeyer, Dietrich, Lt. Gorman, Frost and even "slimeball bad guy" Carter Burke. Let's not forget little Rebecca Jorden aka "Newt"! I've already made her and she's almost done. I'll post pictures in this thread soon. I have made Cpl. Dietrich and just have a few things to do for her before she's complete. I made my own custom Bishop like some other people on this board have, from an existing Sideshow X-Files/Millennium Frank Black. I plan on working on Pvt. Frost next. I will use the original Hot Toys Hudson head for my custom Pvt. Wierzbowski, and a blonde haired Dragon head for a custom Pvt. Crowe. So, I'll eventually get around to making them all on my own. But, I would definitely buy all of the marines if Hot Toys made them!

I'm in the number of one of those CORE ALIENS fans who wouldn't mind paying the money for the rest of the ALIENS marines and Newt if Hot Toys did get around to making them.

 

[Mudshark]

As much as I'd like to see them make the rest of the characters from Aliens, it does seem a bit unlikely at this point. And yet, I wouldn't put it past them, they've been just full of surprises lately.

There are plenty of completists around the globe who would pick them up just to have the whole gang, and if they kept edition numbers low, I don't think they'd have too much trouble selling them all. That said, if we really want the other characters it looks like we're probably just going to have to make them ourselves, guys.

 

[Stendec]

It would be great to see HT release a third wave of marines, though Id really only be interested in a Bishop figure. Then again, I have seen some fantastic custom Bishops here so I can always bash my own version.

 

[El Roranous]

I would love a Bishop from Hot Toys. I also wouldn't mind them re-releasing some of the Marines again.

 

[Reinhardt]

yes, i'd only be interested in a bishop figure. there are just far too many others to get!

 

[voncougar]

I think a great third wave of "marines" would be Burke, Newt and Bishop. Personally, I would love/buy all of the marines, even right down to Ferro! But I think Frost, Wierzbowski, Gorman...all of them...would be the best way to go. Even at the cost of all that plastic, metal and fabric

 

[JediMike71]

Well, guys I'm making my own. If Hot Toys gets around to putting out a 3rd wave of characters from ALIENS, I'd still buy them, even if I've already made them. But I think it is highly doubtful they'll do any other ALIENS characters except the queen alien that they're supposedly working on now. I'd love to see her come with a Bishop with "tear-apart" torso. I guess we'll see....

 

[icruise]

Does anyone have a specific source for a Bishop-style jumpsuit? I noticed some discussion about it a while back in the thread, but I'm not sure where to get the one people were talking about.