Warlock664's DC Direct 13" Customs

[warlock664]

After many years of inactivity, I recently started customizing superhero action figures again (I had previously done over 25 Famous Covers customs in the late 90's/early 00s). My first goal was to do a DC Direct 13"-style Captain America using parts from the ToyBiz Marvel Icons Cap figure. After he was completed, I decided to do Bucky (using an extra DCD Robin), and then figured I might as well complete the Invaders. After the Invaders, I stuck with the Golden Age theme and did the entire Liberty Legion as well. Here are some (lousy) pics of my completed figures:


Cap and Bucky:

Cap unmasked:

The original 5 Invaders (Human Torch, Toro, Captain America, Bucky, Sub-Mariner):

The Invaders with the British Siblings (Union Jack and Spitfire):

The Liberty Legion (Jack Frost, Red Raven, Thin Man, Patriot, Blue Diamond, Miss America, Whizzer):

 

[warlock664]

After finishing up the Invaders and the Liberty Legion, I turned my attention to Fawcett/DC 's Marvel Family; below are a few pics of my completed Captain Marvel Jr and Mary Marvel DC Direct-style 1/6 figures.
I was able to snag a DCD Robin base figure for $20 recently (a complete figure runs well over $100!), which I converted into Captain Marvel Jr. The boots, wrist bands and belt were taken from an extra DCD Shazam/Captain Marvel, the cape was made by removing the gold trim from a Captain Marvel cape and re-sewing it to a hand-made red cape.

Mary was made from a DCD Supergirl with a re-painted head. The costume is entirely hand-made (with some trim added from another excess Captain Marvel cape), the boots are re-painted Black Canary boots, and the cape is from a DCD Captain Marvel.

Finally, here's a shot of the Marvel Family (no Uncle Dudley or Lieutenant Marvels, though!). The Captain Marvel figure is, of course, DCD's original release.

May have to make a Black Adam now!

 

[dadvader]

Great work! Love the Marvel family. How did you do the Captain America mask?

 

[warlock664]

Great work! Love the Marvel family. How did you do the Captain America mask?

Thanks! Cap's two heads are from ToyBiz's Icons figures; I just remove the masked head and replace it with the Steve Rogers head.

 

[warlock664]

Completed The Spectre tonight. Bizarro body with Dr Manhattan head (both re-painted), Robin shoes, Aquaman hands/gloves, and hand-made trunks, cape and cowl:

 

[dadvader]

Looks great! Awesome work.

 

[warlock664]

Thanks! A couple more shots:

 

[luthor1940]

Beautiful Work all around. I love them all.

 

[warlock664]

Dr Fate

Here's my latest attempt at adding to my 13" DC Direct JSA team: DR FATE.
I'm not entirely satisfied with the results, and plan to do some more tweaking. The base figure is a DCD 13" Aquaman, the boots are re-painted Nightwing boots (with the cuffs removed), the hands are re-painted Aquaman hands, and the entire costume (including the cape) was hand made. The amulet is a pair of buttons glued together and painted gold, with gold cord added.
The helmet was the biggest challenge, as I insisted on making it removable. I first took some wire mesh (found at a craft store) and shaped it over Aquaman's head. Then I added Super Sculpy over the mesh and sculpted it into the Doc's helmet as best I could. After baking it, I painted it yellow (with just a touch of gold added in). It's a bit on the large side, but the DCD 13" heads are a bit smallish normally, so it works ok I think. Remove the helmet and you get Kent Nelson (or Arthur Curry, I guess!). I need to buff it up a bit to make it smoother and then re-paint; should I stick with the yellow, or maybe try gold?
Excuse the poor photography; the yellow cloth on the cape and shorts is actually much richer than it appears in the pics, which are a bit washed-out. They are actually the same shade as the boots and gloves.

2 more JSA members to add to DCD's GA Flash & Green Lantern:

 

[warlock664]

It's been a while since my last post, I've been working on filling out my JSA roster.
After completing the Spectre and Dr Fate, I went to work on the Earth-2 Robin. Since my first exposure to the JSA came in JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #91, it became my goal to complete them as they appeared in that issue, so I first worked on the Batman-influenced costume Robin wore:

Not satisfied with just one Robin, I then decided to customize him in the costume he wore in ALL-STAR COMICS #58-up:

After Robin, I focused on Starman. (Like several of my JSA customs, I used a DCD Captain Marvel/Shazam as the base, so many of the faces will show similarities):

Dr Mid-Nite was next (still looking for an in-scale Owl to accessorize him with: any suggestions?):

One of DCD's biggest gaps in the 13" line was Hawkman; it is my goal to customize both the Earth-1 and Earth-2 versions, up first is the E2 Carter Hall:

Hourman was a bit of a challenge; I wasn't sure how I'd do the cowl. In the comics, the part covering his upper face is shown in shadow, so I used black under a yellow hood (and yes, that's another Shazam figure as the base!):

Most recently, I completed the Golden Age Sandman. A bit of a challenge rounding up the necessary parts. I purchased a 1/6-scale gas mask from a military line and modded it, used a Larry Talbot/Wolfman hat from the 12" Sideshow figure, a shirt from the Clark Kent suit that came with DCD's first Superman figure, Clark's shoes (painted brown), and a tie from Dr Manhattan. The suit gave me fits; I tried unsuccessfully to de-colorize and dye both a Dr Manhattan and Clark Kent suit, but neither would take the dye.
So I finally just bit the bullet and made my own suit, using a Dr Manhattan suit that I took apart for a pattern. The results were less than perfect, but I'm more or less satisfied:

Finally, here's a group shot of my customized JSA figures completed to date (with the two Robins book-ending the lineup):

 

[JBElliott]

GREAT WORK!

 

[warlock664]

Huntress & GA Atom

The last couple of months have been pretty busy, but I managed to add to my DC Direct 13" custom JSA roster with the Earth-2 Huntress and Atom.
I used a DCD Zatanna as the base for Helena Wayne, the costume was hand-made, including the cape, gloves and boots, and I used a shortened Batgirl belt for her belt - not entirely accurate, though her buckle did have a (smaller) bat insignia in the comics. I added a 1/6 crossbow that I purchased off of ebay. I had some trouble matching the purple paint for her mask and hands with the darker purple of the costume, so I'll probably keep trying to improve that.
The Golden Age Atom was a challenge from a body standpoint; I wanted him to be noticeably shorter than the others, but still have the physique/musculature of an adult male. The DCD teen body was too skinny in my opinion, so what I ended up doing was modifying a DCD 13" body: I shortened the abdomen by removing a piece, and shortened the legs both above and below the knee. The result was a muscled adult body about 1.5" shorter than the standard DCD hero body. The head was from a Hot Toys truetype figure, the fin on his head was from a DCD Aquaman, his belt from Superman, his boots were re-worked Superman boots, and the rest was hand-made.

Helena with the E2 Robin:

Here's an updated shot of my custom JSA roster to date (only one of the two Robins is in the shot):

I still need to complete Wildcat; I've stopped work on him a couple of times, as I can't get the mask right to suit me. I also need to get out my DCD GA Flash, Green Lantern, and Power Girl to fill out the roster. Mr Terrific is probably next up, though I haven't given it much thought yet. And I plan to modify a Superman and Batman to match their Earth-2 looks eventually.

 

[TonyMeis]

very creative, you have made a good use of the 13" body. Turn out great!

 

[dadvader]

Love the work. I've been wanting to create a Huntress for the longest time, but can't decide what look I want. Yours is awesome, Zatanna head was perfect for her.

 

[jedijim3002]

These are all great customs. I especially like the use of the dc bodies for marvel characters.

 

[dragonsleeper]

Can you make Black Adam?

 

[warlock664]

Can you make Black Adam?

I plan to get to him eventually, I have most of the materials I need.

Here are my latest DC Direct 13"-scale customs. These 3 were produced using the "teen" body: Kid Flash was made from a DCD Robin (expensive!), while Speedy and Star-Spangled Kid used the Spirit body (much more affordable !).
For Kid Flash, I wanted to use a Robin head due to the hair wave, I also swiped a pair of SA Flash boots and head wings. The rest, including the emblem, was hand-made:

For Speedy I used the Spirit body with a re-painted Hot Toys True-Type head (I intended to sculpt additional hair for him but decided he looked ok with a buzz cut). The mask is a trimmed and re-painted Black Canary mask, the hat, bow, and arrows are from a DCD Green Arrow, and the arrow pack/quiver is a heavily modified and re-painted green Arrow quiver. Boots are from Sinestro.

Finally, Star-Spangled Kid was made from a DCD movie Spirit. The boots are modified Martian Manhunter boots, the belt is a modified MM belt, and the rest, including cosmic rod, was hand-made. The stars were from a sheet of stickers I found at the craft store, painted white. Over time I think they'll peel, so eventually I may need to reinforce the adherence with some fabric glue.

 

[warlock664]

Next I completed figures of Wonder Girl and Aqualad to round out my classic Teen Titans roster (DCD of course had already released a Robin).
Wonder Girl was formerly a Zatanna figure, I used the body, head and modified boots, the costume is hand made, the belt is a modified Aquaman belt, the lasso and bracelets (repainted) are from a Wonder Woman. She's a tad bit tall, I considered shortening her legs, but decided against it.

Aqualad uses a movie Spirit body, the head was from my box of parts with new hair sculpted on (meh), the belt is a modified Aquaman belt, the boots are modified Martian Manhunter boots, the trident is also from an Aquaman.

Finally, a group shot:

 

[warlock664]

I've been working on another DC Super-Team for the past several weeks. Originally created in the Golden Age and published individually in various magazines by Quality Comics, in 1973 DC Comics banded them together as the Freedom Fighters and featured them in JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #107 & 108 before giving them their own short-lived 15 issue series from 1976-1978. I finished the final member today (though I may tweak a few things here and there), so here they are:

BLACK CONDOR
He was the first figure I completed (though not the first I started), and was fairly simple. The base figure and boots are from a DCD Nightwing, the rest of the costume is handmade (the cape is lined with a thin wire to make is posable). My biggest decision was whether to do the costume in blue (as it's usually depicted in comics, since an all-black costume blends in with the ink lines) or black. I figured since his name was the Black Condor, I'd go with black :

PHANTOM LADY
She was the second figure completed. I used a Black Canary base figure and belt and painted the hair black, modified a pair of Zatanna boots, the rest of the costume including the blackout bracelet was handmade:

THE RAY
I used a base Flash figure with a handmade costume (while it isn't easy to tell from the pic I used a slightly lighter shade of yellow fabric for the mask and overlay than I did for the rest of the costume); the fin was modified from an Aquaman leg fin:

 

[warlock664]

DOLL MAN
I knew I wanted to use a Marvel Universe figure as the base in order to make it somewhat in scale, but I couldn't decide which one. Then one morning I spotted a Commander Steve Rogers MU figure at Walmart and inspiration hit. I repainted the hair and body, switched out the boots with an MU Secret Wars Captain America, swapped hands with an MU Captain Marvel, used a rubber strap from a DCD Comedian for the belt, and sewed a costume and cape (sewing a costume for that size figure was a real challenge!):

UNCLE SAM
Uncle Sam was actually the first figure I began, but I kept hitting the wall with him, so I'd set it aside and work on something else until I'd figured out how to approach certain costuming aspects. I had originally purchased a cheap 12" Uncle Sam figure with a cloth costume that I intended to tweak, but when I received it I realized there wasn't much from that figure that was usable. I ended up using only the red bow tie and the hat (which I had to cut off the head and completely repaint). I used the head from a DCD Green Arrow with the mustache carved off and the goatee reworked. I used a DCD Sinestro body since I wanted Sam to be a bit leaner and taller than the others. The shirt, belt and shoes are from a DCD Dr Manhattan, the rest of the costume - pants, vest, jacket - are handmade (I did transfer the "buttons" from the el-cheapo US figure's jacket over to my handmade one):

THE HUMAN BOMB
Just finished him today; some challenges with the helmet. I used a DCD Shazam as the base, used the hands and gloves from a Nightwing (repainted), the boots are modified DCD Comedian boots, and the rest, including the helmet, was handmade. For the helmet I used a section of wrapping paper tube, I cut it to fit the slope of the figure's shoulders, cut out the viewport, cut the dome off of one of those vending machine prize bubbles for the top, and cut a piece of vinyl for the shoulder overlay. I applied a thin layer of Super Sculpy to the entire assemblage and added some detailing around the edges , baked it, then painted it. I added a piece of clear plastic on the interior for the viewport. While it is removable, I probably won't mess with it much for fear of it cracking.

I took some liberties with my costume interpretation, but overall I'm satisfied. Here's a group shot: