How do companies such as Hot Toys produce such amazing head sculpts?

[Gully Foyle]

A combination of masking and stenciling techniques with airbrushes over a plastic mold whose base color most closely matches the figure's skin tone.

Then hair follicles, stippling for age spots, scars, etc. appear to be done by hand brush in batch sets.

Finally a clearcoat to seal the entire piece for handling and display and...


Okay . . . it's elves.

 

[Mr. EcKo]

Yup little Asian elves. That's how they do it

 

[Penn]

The very fine skin painted skin blemish effect I believe is done using airbrushes - air flow reduced and the nozzle aperture increased so the paint comes out in very fine 'flecks'. It looks like they use maybe more than one color as well to build up a subtle patina.

 

[Uncanny Web-Slinger]

Since most of these companies head sculpts have been consistantly excellent for quite some time, a better question would be how do they screw up the occassional one?

 

[robbiethepainter]

Casting the heads in flesh color really helps. Also they are technique painters. Meaning master painter figures out the process of what goes on when and how. That's why so many customizers keep their process quite.

 

[CloudN]

I've been part of the 1/6 community strictly as a consumer, and it always amazes me how lifelike these headsculpts can turn out. A large portion of that revolves around the sculpt itself which I understand to be painstakingly handcrafted from clay before getting used to create a mold for mass production. It's the other part of the creation process that leaves me clueless. How are they able to create such consistently detailed paint applications for mass production? I understand great custom creators like Rainman probably do everything by hand. But how is the process done by companies such as Hot Toys where productions can easily now number in the thousands? Are these still painted in by hand? For Hot Toys at least, all of their products seem to have their paint credited to JC Hong. Obviously this guy isn't forced to hand paint everything, so how is it done?

From what I was told Hot Toys does use some machinery to apply paints for their figures. That's why some of their early figures look really plain.
The modern process is basically training workers to do different tasks. JY Hong is the paint director I believe that's what his title is called. Basically he is responsible for painting the head sculpt in a way that the process can be broken down into simple steps for different workers to apply. This is called providing a Paint Master, which is a sample of what the final results should be.
I also heard stories of Enterbay not using the step by step process and ask the same working to compete the entire paint application process which is not really effective for quality control.

I heard these things from experience collectors and some people who are really into toys.

 

[subzro]

From what I was told Hot Toys does use some machinery to apply paints for their figures. That's why some of their early figures look really plain.
The modern process is basically training workers to do different tasks. JY Hong is the paint director I believe that's what his title is called. Basically he is responsible for painting the head sculpt in a way that the process can be broken down into simple steps for different workers to apply. This is called providing a Paint Master, which is a sample of what the final results should be.
I also heard stories of Enterbay not using the step by step process and ask the same working to compete the entire paint application process which is not really effective for quality control.

I heard these things from experience collectors and some people who are really into toys.

That would explain the difference between how amazing some like Lt Gordon for example looks vs how plain some like for example The Rescue Captain America looks.

The Rescue Cap looks ok but it looks like something they would have made 3 years ago

They are most likely using the latest and greatest techniques on some higher priority figures and using the older techniques on lower priority figures.....IMO

 

[jstep13]

I have nothing to add other than, great thread topic! Very interesting!