did you ever wish to make your own toy soldiers? (1 Viewer)

[Aleš]

Did you ever think that it will be great that maybe you start with your own toy soldier busines?
If that is so,what you need?
What kind of materials,machines,.....?
I am not thinking of making toy soldiers like WBritain,or First Legion quality,...but still toy soldiers as the best it could make.
So how it is start?
Did anyone try?

 

[blaster]

Yes I did. I set aside a little bit of money, sculpted my own masters, was able to do reproductions of my pieces and went off to pursue my passion.

Rgds Victor

 

[Aleš]

Yes I did. I set aside a little bit of money, sculpted my own masters, was able to do reproductions of my pieces and went off to pursue my passion.

Rgds Victor

sound interesting.can you tell us more about the sculpting,how you start,which material you use,how is the procedure,...?

 

[blaster]

Sculpting is easy after you have experimented on a few thousand prototypes....

I use wire armatures and sculpt entirely in epoxy putty to obtain a master figure. This can be moulded in RTV rubber moulds and small amounts of castings can be obtained this way. For larger runs, I send off my masters to other companies to make production slab moulds.

The process for this can be followed on another thread on casting under the "How To" Section started by Sunyi.

 

[PJDeluhery]

Sculpting is easy after you have experimented on a few thousand prototypes....

I use wire armatures and sculpt entirely in epoxy putty to obtain a master figure. This can be moulded in RTV rubber moulds and small amounts of castings can be obtained this way. For larger runs, I send off my masters to other companies to make production slab moulds.

The process for this can be followed on another thread on casting under the "How To" Section started by Sunyi.

Don't be so modest, sir. You're an artist!

I've tried scratch sculpting for years and could never make anything resembling a human being. For those of us with more modest talents there are some basic body figure kits (Elastolin makes one - there are others) available that help you get a head start on the figure so that you can "convert" it to the figure you want.

 

[Grognard]

I am leaving the sculpting to professionals...When I retire I am planning to give painting TS's a try though!

 

[Spitfrnd]

To answer the question; of course, who wouldn't like to direct the way their preferred figures were modeled and finished. Is that realistic, not for most of us but we can chip away at it a bit with a modification done by those with the right talent here and there.

 

[blaster]

Did you ever think that it will be great that maybe you start with your own toy soldier busines?
If that is so,what you need?
What kind of materials,machines,.....?
I am not thinking of making toy soldiers like WBritain,or First Legion quality,...but still toy soldiers as the best it could make.
So how it is start?
Did anyone try?

Hi Ales,

It would appear that sculpting itself seems to be the bottleneck, especially if you had wanted to start your own business. However, I think that there are businesses which produce reproductions, for eg, of plastic figures based on contractual arrangements.
There are compact mold-making and centrifugal casting machinery that allows one to start up modest operations besides rtv rubber molds. These are mainly used by hobbyists, including in the jewellery casting section. See this website:
http://www.metalcastingzone.com/

I hope this answers your query.

rgds Victor