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  • A Custom A Day.... 2015 365 days of custom figures
  • Arthur Adams’ Art
  • Pop Up Paint Night Parties
  • Murals
  • The Artwork
  • The Toy Collection
  • Contact
  • Colorin'
  • A Custom A Day.... 2015 365 days of custom figures
  • Arthur Adams’ Art

A CUSTOM A DAY.... 365 Days of custom figures

A Custom A Day.... 365 days of custom figures Day 335 - DC Universe Classics Geo-Force by 4:F

11/30/2015

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ideally I would have used a DC Direct Geo-Force to create this green costume variant but since I had a Renegade Nightwing laying around I decided to use him as the base since i don't know the character or why he changed his costume to display the figure in my collection. The green Geo-Force is significantly smaller in height and overall size but I think he turned out well.
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A Custom A Day.... 365 days of custom figures Day 334 - Toy Biz 5 inch Marina by 4:F

11/30/2015

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Marina rounds out the main team from the Byrne era of the book. She uses a Marvel Superheroes line Invisible Woman figure as her base.
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A Custom A Day.... 365 days of custom figures Day 333 - Toy Biz 5 inch Shaman by 4:F

11/30/2015

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shaman suffers from the same problem that Excalibur's Meggan does, patchy skin. I mixed his reddish skin tone using cheap paint so it has become blotchy over the last couple of decades. He uses a Hulk Doc Sampson figure as his base.
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A Custom A Day.... 365 days of custom figures Day 332 - Marvel Legends Neal Adams Beast by 4:F

11/28/2015

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The Toys R Us exclusive Marvel Legends All-New X-Men box set Beast is great fodder for most of Hank's looks through the years. First up is the Neal Adams version. I liked the way Cyclops turned out with the lighter blue highlights so I replicated the technique on this version of Beast. It matches the look of the comics they represent.
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A Custom A Day.... 365 days of custom figures Day 331 - DC Universe Classics Lashina

11/27/2015

 
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lashina uses a DC Universe Classics Cheetah and Wonder Woman hands. Her whips are made of metal. I purchased her on eBay. She's a nice start to the Female Furies. I haven't had them made yet because I think DC Collectibles will get to Granny Goodness eventually. DC knows how high up she was in terms of fan demand. I'm certain she'll pop up in the DC Icons line sooner than later. I was going to wait on the Furies until then but this one was well executed for the price.

A Custom A Day.... 365 days of custom figures Day 330 - Marvel Universe Wolverine Movie Series Weapon X

11/26/2015

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im not a fan of Barry Windsor Smith's Art but this is a defining moment in Wolverine's history. Hasbro tried to sell as many Wolverine's as they could in association with the X-Men Origins film. This isn't a custom as much as it is a replacement figure in the playset but it completes the look.
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A Custom A Day.... 365 days of custom figures Day 329 - Marvel Legends Cyclops by 4:F

11/25/2015

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Cyclops wore this costume from the 60's through the 80's so I needed to represent him twice in my collection to cover both the Neal Adams era and the John Byrne/Paul Smith years. I decided to altered one of them to add some variety. I really liked the paint scheme Hasbro used on the Dark Phoenix two pack version of Cyclops so I replicated it in the Marvel Legends scale. I started with evening out his yellow bits to get rid of that terrible, dirty looking wash, then I gave his blue areas a black wash and finished his lighter blue highlights with a blue paint marker.
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A Custom A Day.... 365 days of custom figures Day 328 - Toy Biz 5 inch Nighthawk by 4:F

11/24/2015

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I hope to one day own a complete 70's Defenders roster in plastic for in at least one scale. Minimates have attempted, Toy Biz tried with their 5 inch line and Marvel Universe finally made this guy but it one toyline has released all of the members of the Defenders in one scale. Hellcat being released for the first tom as an official figure in the Marvel Legends line has me leaning towards completing them in the 6 inch scale but long before this I only had the Toy Biz line. I made a haphazard Moondragon, a decent Hellcat and this Nighthawk. He is made from an Ultra Force Prome cape and a Iron Man Whiplash figure.
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A Custom A Day.... 365 days of custom figures Day 327 - Toy Biz 5 inch Invisible Woman by 4:F

11/23/2015

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Toy Biz proposed a beautiful rendition of this figure in the form of a fully painted two up on the back of their packaging as part of the second wave of their Fantastic Four line. When she was released she was cast in clear plastic losing all of the details shown in the fully painted version. She underwent a change because she was released as a repaint in the first wave. The line was supported by the Marvel Action Hour cartoon and retailers wanted the full Four members of the team in the first wave. Sue and Johnny were planned for the second wave and only Mr. Fantastic and The Thing were released in the first assortment.

Toy Biz repainted an Iron Man Julia Carpenter Spider Woman as Sue and a Silver Surfer as Human Torch to quickly get the full team on store shelves. The fact that Spider Woman doesn't have a sculpted eye socket because of her mask the eye floats on her face and looks odd.

I had access to an airbrush at the time I did this custom so I was able to prime her in a mist of white paint giving her a pretty effective transition from solid to invisible.

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A Custom A Day.... 365 days of custom figures Day 326 - Marvel Legends Ariel by Bluebery Customs

11/22/2015

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Ariel, Kitty Pryde. The missing link. She is one of the most integral X-Men from the 80's and she has yet to be represented in the Marvel Legends line unless you count her Giant Man series figure which is more her Astonishing X-Men look than anything for the 80's.

Kitty and Rogue have had the most costume changes in the 80's. Marvel struggled to come up with an iconic look or name for poor Kitty. I enjoyed her as Sprite but with her being an X-Man and not a New Mutant, she needed her own look.

I'm glad that Bluebery Customs took this custom on for me. His sculpt work is phenomenal. He nails the most obscure looks. It's not easy to translate a 2D image into a 3D figure yet he nails it every time. I'm glad to begin my Kitty Pryde collection with this familiar yet short lived costume. I've only ever seen her rendered in this costume as a figure one other time. I appreciate this one for its accuracy. The height, the colors and the sculpt all scream Sprite or Ariel. She ties in seamlessly with my collection of Paul Smith era X-Men.

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    A Custom A Day....

    Since I began toy collecting as a hobby back in 1990 I have always had a need for custom figures. Toy companies begin action figure lines, begin to release individual characters to create teams and, more often than not leave them incomplete. Many collectors find that custom figures pollute their collection's authenticity by not being mass produced creations from the toy companies that created the preexisting toy lines. I disagree. I feel a quality custom action figure enhances a collection and help create a complete picture.

    When characters are chosen for a toy line several factors come in to play. The character's current media relevance (if any), their most iconic look (they may have had multiple costumes through their sometimes vast histories) and gender. Female action figures tend to not sell to parents of the boys who are playing with them so a great many of the female characters are never rendered in plastic in the way the male characters are leaving holes in the collections.

    I am a fan of the female heroes primarily so I have purchased and made quite a few "customs" throughout my years as a collector. I find it challenging (ok impossible) to get a smooth, quality finish to my sculpt work, downgrading the quality of my figure's appearance that I create so my custom work tend to be of a Frankenstein type nature where I use different parts such as a torso and arms from one figure attached to the hips and legs of another, and a different head with a full cost of paint to create my pieces. I also struggle with painting facial details on figures. The small areas, the eyes in particular give me the biggest issues. I prefer to reuse another head from a different character that will allow me to not have to paint the facial details since I am heavy handed and tend to paint in clumps rather than smooth, factory produced finishes that many of the customizers I work with can achieve.

    Most of the figures that I have in my collection that have intricate sculpting and paint details have been created by other artists from around the world. The UK, The Philippines, Australia, Hong Kong, Canada and from several states throughout the US through personal communication or via eBay, which can be an outstanding resource for quality custom work. I've had the pleasure of meeting some incredibly talented artists through websites & social media. Over the past two years seeking out quality custom figures has become the main focus of my collection. Which is at over 5,000 loose pieces. As you will see over the course of this year this does not just affect super hero toy lines. I collect different toy lines spanning the 1960's through today covering cartoons, movies and television in addition to comic books. Some of the custom pieces I have had done wouldn't have been made as toys because of lack of consumer interest or based on licensing issues simply cannot be made in to toys. I haven't let that stop me from using several different toy lines to amass a complete plastic collection of all of the media I have enjoyed throughout my life.

    I have decided to begin a project called A Custom A Day.... to showcase my custom pieces one a day, every day throughout 2015. If you follow me on social media or on this site you may have seen many of them before but with this project I will give a little background of each figure and its relevance to my collection. So check back daily!!!

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