themodelmaker

This is the personal custom munny I made for my best friend. He is an architect and  tenor. He is working hard and making progress so  he will sing in Metropolitan Opera soon. I decided to make his first action figure, long before Mattel
At the moment you can only hear him at shower but I will push him to record some videos for YouTube
Happy 30th birthday Waldek!

I was asked by Vince from 909Toy to customize his new toy, which will be for sale in few hours. I am waiting for box, it should arrive soon. It is going for sale 23,24,25 July from 9.00-11.00 Honk Kong time and in very limited numbers!!! It is going to be a big hit, so I recommend to go to his website: http://www.909toy.com/store/ and get one while it last. First come first served.

Every day it will be only 30 black and white, 10 black-gold and 3 wood for sale.  I expect it will sell in few minutes, judging by the comments on other blogs. The toy is unusually complicated and composed from 56 parts!!!( I love details, I am going to add another 50 parts in my custom ) The production process took 2 years and it finished with success. Another models will be coming so give them your support for all the hard work and great design!

This beautifull munny was customized by my friend an collegue from my office. Ania is an architect and very tallented designer. This is her first munny and her entry to the munny munth contest. Please vote on her if you like it, she is on this page. She doesn’t have her own website yet so she allowed me to post her work here. She started her deviantart gallery so you can post a comment and encourage her to show more of her works.

UPDATE 15 JULY 2010: Ania’s munny won 3RD place in category: “Best use of accessories”. Congratulations!

It is my first custom munny I made. It was customized before Rocky and Shrek last month. I used mini munny so I couldn’t enter to competition with this one. It is a young  version of Carl from Disney/Pixar movie Up. I sculpted his hat with epoxy putty, added shorts and shoes. Glasses are made of laser cut plywood.  This project started my addiction to toy customization. You can try it yourself!

This is a custom munny I made for kidrobot’s munny competition. I wanted to sculpt a lot with this one. Original toy’s hand reminded me boxing gloves so I started to think about boxing stars. The first thing on my mind was Rocky Balboa, one of the heroes of my childhood I did some research and found this brilliant caricature painted by Sebastian Kruger. I imediatelly saw the Sylwester’s face on munnys head. I needed to extend it verticaly and create huge jaw using munnys ears as a base. It looked like a challenge, so I decided to do it. Here you can see some progress photos.

The body is from 7 inches DIY toy, but the head is taken from  mini munny. All figure measures 25 cm. Its painted with spray paints and airbrushed acrylics.

UPDATE 15 JULY 2010:  This little guy won second place in “best movie event reenactment” category at Munny Munth Contest !!! Thanks for all who voters, supporters and contestants. You chan check other winning entries here

I played a little with munny customization. This is second mini munny I customized. Its 4 inches tall. I used DIY canvas toy from Kidrobot’s mini munny series – Bub. His body looked like shrek  right from the beginning. I just cut his ears and add nose chin and new ears so it looks more like shrek from dreamwork’s animation. Its painted with montana sprays and acrylics.  It was great fun making it. I became addicted to customization and ordered 8 more munnys, so few more toys will follow.

Few photos of my recent weekend project. This is a 33mm tall figurine of Carl Fredricksen from Disney/Pixar animation “Up” made in scale 1:48 to match the dollhouse I made recently. I sculpted it in two parts epoxy putty, you can buy it in every hardware store. I used the one with 5 minutes working time, it means I had to work fast and on small areas, and I could quickly make corrections with sharp knife. Glasses are made of 0.25mm styrene. All is painted with acrylic paints from Valleyo and Games Workshop range of colours and later sprayed with matt varnish. It was fun to make it.

If you are looking to buy a figurine of Carl or Russel, I would recommend collectible vinyl toy from Hot Toys. If you need something cheap for your child, I found good quality little figurines from german producer Bullyland.

I didn’t update this site for a long time. I’ve been very busy on a new project. This is a bigger version of Carl’s house from brilliant Disney/Pixar animation “UP”. I built it in victorian dollhouse scale 1:48 ( 1/4 inch ). The floor plan is 180mm by 180mm wide and it stands 210mm heigh to top of the chimney.

I had already prepared drawings for my previous project in scale 1:160. Bigger model gave me the oportunity to create more realistic and detailed windows, so I had to modify my drawings to suit new scale. I was also able to sculpt railing to the porch and create interiors. Living room can be accessed by openable side wall. It allows to fully appreciate Carl’s living room with his fireplace and have a view to the staircase with his collection of photographs on the wall. There is an option to look into the hallway through front door and window. In the movie there was some difference in size between interiors and exterior of the house. I couldn’t fit kitchen at the end of corridor, but I indicated it with closed door and created little green room under the stairs which can be viewed through rear window. A great help with that were sketches and pictures found on donshank.com blog.

Like previously I started with laser cut rigid 1.5mm plywood as my main construction with another 0.8mm layer containing some of the window details. I was able to see fast progress at this stage. It all slowed later when I had to trim with the knife panels for elevations, and stick them one by one. Repeat this process with shingles for the roof. The tricky part with them was warping after I put glue on it. Its because wood grain goes in shorter direction, the stripe with shingles absorbs moisture and bends before glue sets. I had to lay two stripes and clamp it for 15 minutes until glue dryes. When all parts were in place, I spraypainted them with base colours. I couldn’t buy exact colours in cans so I refined them with selection of acrylic paints from valleyo and games workshop to get the right tint. I used various techniques like drybrushing and washes, I also painted wood grains with very fine brush in some places. It took me more time than I expected, but I was pleased with the effect. After that I sprayed everything with two protective coats of matt varnish and then added transparent windows at the end. I didn’t forget about tiny mailbox this time

Carl’s house is now ready, and waiting for some more furnitures in the living room. I enjoyed building it and I hope you will like it.

Here you have few pictures of my finished scale model of Carl’s little flying victorian house from new Disney Pixar animation Up.

Here you have few pictures of my finished scale model of Carl’s little flying victorian house from new Disney Pixar animation Up.

Here you have few pictures of my finished scale model of Carl’s little flying victorian house from new Disney Pixar animation Up.

Here you have the most recent addition to my model collection. This is N-scale scratchbuilt model of flying house from the new  Pixar movie “Up”. I haven’t seen the movie yet (still not open in cinemas in Ireland) but I loved the trailer and this colorful piece of architecture.  I needed to have it in real 3d…  The design was simple, I based on pictures, movies from youtube and cut out toy from official Disney Pixar website. I started last Friday, all parts were ready on Saturday. It was going to be weekend project. So far its two weekends project and I am not yet satisfied with my paint job. I will post more photos from different angles later.

I was asked by people from forum pixarplanet.com how was it made and blueprints. Here are my drawings with all of my parts to give you better idea what was involved in process of creating it.

First drawing is prepared to be cut on 1.5mm cardboard. The blue lines are cut to 0.5 mm,  yellow is the engraving of panels on the door. I glued the parts together, I prepared little holes and joints, so all walls are at right angles and in exact positions and its quite rigid construction.

Second page is cut on 0.5 paper. Its another layer to cover joints and create window frames. I engraved the boards on the walls, but later decided that I want better 3d effect, so I covered it with overlapping stripes of paper.

Last page is with 3 types of shingles and boards for wall and is cut out of 0.3mm paper.  If you have any questions, feel free to ask on my email or post a comment.

Here you have the most recent addition to my model collection. This is N-scale scratchbuilt model of flying house from the new  Pixar movie “Up”. I haven’t seen the movie yet (still not open in cinemas in Ireland) but I loved the trailer and this colorful piece of architecture.  I needed to have it in real 3d…  The design was simple, I based on pictures, movies from youtube and cut out toy from official Disney Pixar website. I started last Friday, all parts were ready on Saturday. It was going to be weekend project. So far its two weekends project and I am not yet satisfied with my paint job. I will post more photos from different angles later.

I was asked by people from forum pixarplanet.com how was it made and blueprints. Here are my drawings with all of my parts to give you better idea what was involved in process of creating it.

First drawing is prepared to be cut on 1.5mm cardboard. The blue lines are cut to 0.5 mm,  yellow is the engraving of panels on the door. I glued the parts together, I prepared little holes and joints, so all walls are at right angles and in exact positions and its quite rigid construction.

Second page is cut on 0.5 paper. Its another layer to cover joints and create window frames. I engraved the boards on the walls, but later decided that I want better 3d effect, so I covered it with overlapping stripes of paper.

Last page is with 3 types of shingles and boards for wall and is cut out of 0.3mm paper.  If you have any questions, feel free to ask on my email or post a comment.

Here you have the most recent addition to my model collection. This is N-scale scratchbuilt model of flying house from the new  Pixar movie “Up”. I haven’t seen the movie yet (still not open in cinemas in Ireland) but I loved the trailer and this colorful piece of architecture.  I needed to have it in real 3d…  The design was simple, I based on pictures, movies from youtube and cut out toy from official Disney Pixar website. I started last Friday, all parts were ready on Saturday. It was going to be weekend project. So far its two weekends project and I am not yet satisfied with my paint job. I will post more photos from different angles later.

I was asked by people from forum pixarplanet.com how was it made and blueprints. Here are my drawings with all of my parts to give you better idea what was involved in process of creating it.

First drawing is prepared to be cut on 1.5mm cardboard. The blue lines are cut to 0.5 mm,  yellow is the engraving of panels on the door. I glued the parts together, I prepared little holes and joints, so all walls are at right angles and in exact positions and its quite rigid construction.

Second page is cut on 0.5 paper. Its another layer to cover joints and create window frames. I engraved the boards on the walls, but later decided that I want better 3d effect, so I covered it with overlapping stripes of paper.

Last page is with 3 types of shingles and boards for wall and is cut out of 0.3mm paper.  If you have any questions, feel free to ask on my email or post a comment.