Tuesday, April 29, 2008

The Workshop

Sometimes called the kitchen. In a studio apartment, you do what you can. Which sometimes means a big mess to be cleaned up when you're not exhausted from doing all the creating + the stuff you do to survive to create another day. The second cloud cast is in the front of the ranks (The Lady got the first one, cause she's The Lady). The purple thing is the mold, with a curing cloud inside (super hot that stuff, don't touch!). The paper cups are for the mixing/pouring, and the two plastic jugs are the two parts of the plastic mixture.


The thing that I think is just amazing is that for the longest time as a kid, I had wanted to make my own toys. I was always making paper action figures and lamenting their lameness. I got a knife and tried to carve action figures out of wood, and gave up because they would never EVER be as cool as the stuff you could buy. But years later, and even though I'm not necessarily going to be able to make jointed toys that have great articulation (maybe, but not with my current skill set) I'm still able to come up with a concept and put out something that's pretty darn cool, in a durable plastic that I can pour in my own kitchen. That's something that just blows me away.

I think once I get a few more clouds cast (which means buying some more casting material) I'll post the process of making a mold. I'm going to make a large mold with six or eight clouds in it, so that I can do a larger batch all at once. The other reason, besides just the larger quantity, is that this first mold was flawed because the original was flawed in a couple ways that I didn't see (and one that I did). The original had some space under the sides where the silicone crept in during the moldmaking process. So the mold ends up making some crazy looking bases for the toys. A little sanding on all of these castings, and then a new mold will get rid of that, and make the next generation a bit more easy to finish once I pop them out. With these I'll really have to do some heavy sanding to make them look nice.

Also not sure about the black eyes and mouth. Thinking I might do them in powder blue instead. The Lady was saying I might consider molding faces for them on top. That's definitely a possibility. I think though, that I want these to be customizable, if one wants to do that, so I may do some customizations like that on my own, and encourage others to buy blanks to do such a thing, but that the mass produced ones that I'm putting out (or as mass as I can do in my kitchen) should be smooth. That would allow for if you wanted to do a custom job of your own and not be married to one of my molded faces. I like the Munny for that reason, and that's definitely the reason Munny works so well for customizing.

If you're into toy customizing, let me know what you think of these. I'd love to get some feedback from people who do this stuff too.

No comments: