2.27.2015

Swirling Influences

The above pics are of Test Shot Number Five, which sealed the deal after repeatedly striking out on four earlier versions of the Skeleden armor.

The major changes that occurred to the sculpt for Number Five focused mainly on the following:

-Revised size and shape of the torso armor, with newly added sculpting around the front and back edges to achieve a tighter grip on the base body. I tried to hide a bunch of strange visual elements across the back area, with some Lovecraftian inspired creepiness in the form of a little Cthulhu half face hanging onto Skeleden's upper left side. The "back" area is patterned after old school gladiator armor design concepts, fused with a little Bio-Boosted punch.

-Revised size and shape of both leg armors. Skeleden's right leg armor was extended downwards and the skeletal creature on the knee area was tweaked, as well as some redefining of the "ribbing" that curves around to the back. The left leg armor was also extended downwards and given some extra detail and a tighter fit.

-Revised interface of the two part head connection. After George completed his killer master sculpt of Skeleden's noggin, I sent a copy to our team in China to create the first tooling pattern. They then sent back the tooling pattern with our requested 2 part separation, which not only allowed for more interchangeability, but eliminated the need for glue that would have compromised production runs with clear PVC. Since the head was originally sculpted as one part, I went in and added details to the areas that previously would have remained unseen. If you flip Skeleden's head upside down and reverse it, then replug the skullcap on, you can create a "Skeledrone" head configuration, to do Skeleden's dirty work.

When the fifth test shot finally hit the mark (and completely passed my "shake" test) I had to scream for a little bit.

The good kind of scream.

Some pics of the "Battle Skeleden" configuration are on deck for tomorrow!


4 comments:

  1. What a great figure. We are lucky to have such passionate toy makers like all of you involved in this figure. you can tell so much craft and care was put into this dude. P.S. this final test shot is a great colorway. would love to see it reach production some time

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  2. Love all the great behind the scenes info.
    Matt, any chance of a realease of this #5 color way to honor the trail and error of this fig?

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  3. That green is beautiful. So somebody is running something in that color huh?

    Thanks for sharing Matt.

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  4. I was wondering if ten parts meant that Skeleden has a two part head.

    Now I'm wondering what a "Skeledrone" head looks like and if I we can create heads with the horns on the front side.

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