Bubbly Lilith – Nightstalkers – 1/6 resin figure – G-area

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Introduction

Scale
1/8
Sculptor
近藤 貴之
Maker
G Dome
Completed
01/14/07
Parts
11
Retail
Inquire

If there’s anyone who can make a cute Lilith, it’d be Kondo-san 🙂 This adorable character is from the Capcom game Darkstalkers/Vampire Savior, I’ll again leave wikipedia to describe her in more details in case you’re interested. :)

This kit took a long while of procrastination to finish since I’ve wanted to experiment a few new things with her. Her pose suggested the sculptor wanted to have her beckoning the viewer or something, and blowing a kiss seems logical. But her mouth wasn’t sculpted to support that. So after a bit of struggle I decided to resculpt her mouth in a blowing pose. The next thing is what is she blowing. Originally I wanted to do a Valentine motive where she blow a 3D heart object, and she’ll be surrounded by flowers. Then I was planning another kit of mermaid swimming, and wanted to do bubbles for that kit… wait, I can have Lilith blow bubbles too, and wouldn’t it be an interesting scene? So there born the concept of the scene.

Before that whole story though, I wanted to try work out some real stockings for some kit, and Lilith has a surface that doesn’t look too hard to experiment with, so I went ahead. The procedure was documented here. It was a huge hassle and I’m not sure if it’s noticeable enough to justify the time spent. Ah well, just something you’ve gotta try at least once 🙂 The main issue isn’t getting it on the kit, but that the fabrics are somewhat porous, so the glue can soak the fabric a bit. Then you’ll end up getting dust/small pieces of gunk on the surface. I think the trick is if you manage to get the fabric on, seal it immediately with a clear coat, that should prevent this from happening. Some in-progress pics from one of my previous blog posts:
IMG_3037.jpgIMG_3038.jpgIMG_3036.jpg

Anyway back to the bubbles. They were acrylic spheres and domes from a local Tap Plastics store. They’re really cheap when they’re small, but I think the cost is probably a function of volume (amount of acrylics) and surface (amount to polish), so the cost sky-rockets as you get to bigger spheres. The biggest question is, of course, how you’d get them on. Fortunately, it seems even the thinnest brass wires can hold the largest spheres I want on her, so it’s kind of solved. The pinning is actually quite tedious as you can imagine, and the fact that I’m using very thin 0.02 brass wire means that I need to be super-careful about the tiny drill bits. After experimenting a bit I found a way to use the tiny drill bit with my Dremel. First, you’ll need an adaptor chuck that’d take the tiny drill bits. Next, there are three things that’ll break the bit – heat, jamming and twisted axle. To prevent heat from building up, I used the good’ol 5000 RPM mini-mite. I started out with the 10000 setting and it broke the bit after some time. Next, to prevent jamming, I remove all the debris left in the drill bits after each drilling, and apply vaseline to grease up the bit. Finally, the twisted axle problem is a lot of adjustments to your Dremel and chucks. Align them so that when you turn it on, you don’t see the drill bit kind of flapping around in different directions. With all that, I managed to finish the drilling breaking only one bit (when I used too high RPMs). But you sure do want to buy a case of these bits since they’re really quite fragile. Anyway, besides the work of inserting the pins, the placement was also a brain teaser. I’m not sure if I’ve done my best job on it, but at least it didn’t look too uniform, or wayyyyyy too many bubbles (although I may have overdone it somewhat). I’m also happy about how some of the pieces had occupied positions where it looks as if the bubble was floating. Yeeha.

I’ve originally wanted to make her into a Christmas mascot… with that feathery outfit that’s colored in red, she can do the job just fine. Ah well I’m only 20 days late :mrgreen: The feathery white fluff was done with a Santa hat lining materials. Hint: buy them a couple of days after X’mas and you’ll get them for dirt cheap… I’ve done that twice now 😛 I originally wanted to do something like Angel‘s wings, but it didn’t quite work out after a messy failure. The fluffy santa lining is an extremely attractive alternative: although the fluff may be not totally in line with the character’s line art, the soft look of it makes her even cuter. Moreover it’s easier to work with, because all the fibers are already threaded on to a backing cloth, so there’s no need to create support for them. After some cutting and trimming, I sprayed some hair fixer on them to solidify the fiber threads. Otherwise, not only are they impossible to get into any sort of shape, but they seem to come off quite easily.

Alright, there you have all the gut details, I hope you’ll enjoy Lilith in her cozy bubble bath 😀 I wish I’ve made a full in-progress report, but I was having a hard time finishing her as it is 😛

 


28 comments

  1. 😯 Just WOW !! You truely did a great job on this piece. Thanks for the details on the fabric. I always wanted to give that a try on a kit but was afraid of the way it would look. Could you tell us what type of fabric you used (or what you recommend for doing a similar kit)?

    -Mezz

  2. Thanks all! 🙂

    Masa: That meant a lot to me! I really appreciate it.:grin:

    Mezz: I didn’t really check out the name of the fabric, but apparently it’s quite common as I’ve seen it at a couple of places around here (including Walmart). It’s a plain translucent piece that comes in many different colors, and are much more tightly woven than fishnets. You can see your hands through it.

  3. 😯

    Wow. Just wow!!! I wish I could elaborate but I’m just amazed. This so amazingly cool and that’s why I (and many others, I’m sure) look up to you and your model kit building-skills!

    😯

  4. Great work!

    For the fine drill work, do you think using a drill press rig for the Dremel might make it easier to avoid twisting and jamming?

    Thanks!

  5. Thanks Sophie :mrgreen:

    Brad: I think the drill press may help with aligning the drill bit, but jamming is more due to the clogging of the drill itself, especially when working on acrylics which clog like mad. Whereas resin turns to dust and can easily be separated from the bit, acrylics melt a little and adheres to it.

  6. This is the most amazing thing i’ve ever seen !!! 😯

    Can you please let me post your work on my french website and giving you credit of course ?

  7. Another fantastic piece, the addition of the bubbles is truly inspired! This project is one of my favorites – and for the record I definitely think the stockings are worth the effort. I looked at the original on e2046.com, and your work blows their’s away. Thanks a million Cody, your skills still set the standard.

  8. where did you get the transparent sphere?

    I tried your link, but it didn’t work.

    Thanks again, and great work.

    Ed

  9. Above you say that you’re not sure if the stocking detail is noticeable enough to justify the time spent. Well, let me say that it was the first detail I noticed and it looks absolutely impeccable. If you get an end result that looks that damn good, it’s well worth any amount of time.

  10. Well, i’m not a personal fan of this stuff, but, I have to admit, this is very very good. I don’t know a lot of this, but wondering if this piece would be for sale?

  11. This is an excellent piece of work! It is also one of the best Lilith sculpts I have ever seen, not to mention your spot on paint job as well.
    Your bubble placement is fantastic, and NO! You did not use too many bubbles at all. They only enhance the Lilith kit, not detract from her at all.
    Keep up the great work!

  12. OMG:shock::shock::shock:…. this is so beautiful. I haven’t been to your site for ages and you just keep on improving so much to the point I wasn’t sure that those bubbles are actual spheres pinned to the models (so natural looking as if you CG it in). Superb! Congrats on her!

  13. Holey moley that’s awesome, the bubbles are so well placed, you forget they’re attached to the figure, no matter what angle viewed.

    The attention to detail is also superb, after staring at this for quite a while I noticed even the tights change color density behind the knee and the … “back”

  14. Hello !

    I am in love with this figure, but I don’t know how to find her. Can you help me?
    thank you !

  15. Woah, wait, back up.

    Explain to me what I’m missing here.

    I saw this figure, this exact one, at Otakon just now, at the table of the guy whose name I have unfortunately forgotton, who was participating in Super Art Fight Thursday night.

    When I saw it, I thought “Wow, I remember this! I forgot about this kit, I should look it up”, forgetting you made the bubbles yourself.

    So what’s up with this? Are you the same guy who was at art fight, were you sharing a table, what? I’m horrible with names. I’m the guy who was playing the role of Jamie Baldwin’s manager, until I got fired because she lost.

  16. i lieke the bubbels XD looks really cool ^^ nice work. Really really nice work. I wish I had the money to buy such a figure my own and build it, maybe later ^^ Hope to see more models from you.

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