Garage Kit Zombie Web Log

More Phantom Progress

Thad Rhodes — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 06:50:44 GMT

The more time I spend with this, the more I appreciate the sculpt. The folds and wrinkles of the skin are really great, but my only wish was that the head was separate. Makes a few areas tough to get at, but it's not a huge deal.

Had to spend some more time on the skin, I wasn't entirely happy with it before:

Then working from the inside out, I guess, painted the shirt white and then started outlining the areas in black with watercolors.

Can't wait to paint those crazy eyes in, but these always look creepy with that blank stare.

Phantom Progress

Thad Rhodes — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 21:27:57 GMT

Here's a totally not exciting pic of some airbrush work on the face and hands.

And some oils...

Couldn't tell if I liked it yet or not (I thought it actually looked cool at this point, but I still couldn't tell if I thought he was too dark or too light, so I blocked in some of the hair and tried more of a neutral background. But I think gray would have worked better. Will have to hit the fabric store this weekend. Or pull out one of my gray t-shirts.

There are some greens and blues in there that are getting washed out. I'll probably use some pastels around the eyes, they still need darkened quite a bit and that will help with his over-all pasty sicklyness.

This reminds me, of what I wanted to post before I went to Wonderfest, and that was for anyone attending that chipped in on the fundraiser to make sure to introduce yourself and say hi. Many did, and it was great to talk with them. Just can't thank everyone enough. I'm so terrible with names, so as a rule people either need to have a name-tag or tell me who they are. With all the handles online and changing from board to board, I have a hard time keeping it all straight. I'll blame the paint fumes. Except I paint with acrylics and other water solubles...

Back to Work

Thad Rhodes — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 23:02:04 GMT

Well dudes, I've been totally slacking on updates. By now (a week later) I should have all kinds of pictures from the show set up and all that. I'll perhaps put some up, maybe on my crappy and out of date website, but in the meantime I'll share just a couple highlights from Wonderfest.

A new friend and fiend Moses Jaen entered this in the contest. I got to see it up close, and the thing is amazing. It's an original sculpt for our Mutual friend Mike, who is one lucky bastard to own this. What you can't see in the picture is the mutilated remains of a Toho-Kong. Genius. See more at http://mochiindesigns.com/

The new issue of Amazing Figure Modeler debuted at the show, and I got to see the layout David did for my "Kiss the Cook" article. That guy sure knows how to make you look good. Combine that with a terrific sculpt by Karl Libecap and you can't go wrong. Everyone I work with and my friends are probably sick of it by now, but here are some pics. But you should go buy the magazine

And speaking of, this is another one of the treats from the show. Karl's newest, which should be ready soon. I can't wait to get my bloody hands on this one!

You should go buy a bunch of this guy's stuff too. At: Monster Dork Studio

But the best part of the show, was seeing my friends and making new ones. In this photo with me are Jason Walker, and Julia Ambrose. She's an incredible sculptor, new to the modeling scene I believe, but should make a name for herself very quickly if she decides to offer us some of her talent. Check out her website at: toolmarkstudio.com

Other than that, been prepping up the Man Who Laughs and the Phantom Bust. The latter is ready for paint, so I'll work on that while I'm getting the MWL ready for the same. I'll get some pictures up soon, and get back to keeping this thing updated. As long as GoDaddy fixes their buggy interface. Grrrrrr......

Wonderfest Bound

Thad Rhodes — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 07:15:48 GMT

No, it's not turned into a bondage festival. Although sometimes you feel a little beat up and spent afterwards
I will be back Monday evening, hopefully with some cool pictures and news of the garage kit world.
I imagine anyone reading this is likely going as well, but if you cannot attend, this is from another board:

[url=http://wonderfest08.paulystuff.com] WonderFest on the Web 2008 has gone live. Coverage of the festivities starts Friday, the 18th, and updates will occur throughout the weekend. Links to past WoW are live, if you want to whet your appetite with stuff from the past couple of years...

Check it out, and if you're not going, enjoy your weekend. Be it watching the new Batman flick, enjoying the weather, bowling, lazer tag, or throwing washers in a hole in the ground

Phantom of the Opera (Mark VanTine)

Thad Rhodes — Sun, 13 Jul 2008 20:34:08 GMT

Thought I'd share what David sent for me to paint, the winner of the drawing.

It's been an entire week of goodies showing up on my doorstep. Including my own copy of a kit of The Man Who Laughs and something else that demanded my attention.
I was going to spend the day Saturday painting up the Vampira statue I stripped previously to bring to Wonderfest, but I decided to work on this instead.
Since it's the only other thing I'm taking with me (and my recent AFM kit) I'll just leave with this picture.

(I love this guy!)

Lizards

Thad Rhodes — Sun, 13 Jul 2008 13:15:17 GMT

Two kits of The Lizard done for some gentlemen in Ireland. Hope they like them!

This one's a little dark, I guess.

I've got a couple things I've painted up in a rush for Wonderfest. So prepare for some crappy 4 hour long paint jobs, haha!

And The Winner Is....

Thad Rhodes — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 23:01:47 GMT

David Morrison!

Right on, you deserve it! I'll send you my address.

Congratulations!
I'm curious to see what you send me. I guess now I'll be the one in suspense I'll post more about the winner later. In the meantime, I want to thank everyone who chipped in, it's much appreciated. We were able to raise $583, which is pretty great! That will totally be worth me painting something for, (well we'll see, hahaha) and people will continue to be able to replace all the things they need. I hope everyone is enjoying their weekend!

It's The Fourth Of July

Thad Rhodes — Fri, 04 Jul 2008 11:01:38 GMT

But not quite Independence Day.

Only A Few Days Left

Thad Rhodes — Sun, 29 Jun 2008 21:05:45 GMT

As of now, we've raised $470. That far exceeds my initial expectations, however I'd like now to see it go over $500. We're close as it is, and I'm sure we'll make at least that. Some people have jumped in with some suprisignly generous amounts, and after what I saw the other day... man people can really use this money.
I didn't want to take pictures myself and appear as as a gawker, but I snagged this one elsewhere online.

Just blocks and block of that, everything that was in all these houses thrown out. Actually most of what I saw was piled much higher than that. I think by now they're tearing out the walls and appliances, windows... Such as in the house I was in. Everything ruined, even the floors I'm afraid. And the smell is quite incredibly bad. Like if you've ever torn a shower out, and gotten a whiff of that damp nastyness under there, it's like that but wrap it in an armpit and top it with a turd.

These fellows should hopefully be done by the end of the week as well. I'm actually not looking forward to cutting out hundreds of little pieces of paper with names on them. Should have thought of another way!
There's got to be a simple program for it, but that would take all the fun out of it.

$1 To Paint Any Figure Kit Or Bust, and to Help Iowa Flood Victims

Thad Rhodes — Sat, 21 Jun 2008 21:31:19 GMT

If you're here on the blog, you know that 24,000 of my fellow citizens have been rendered homeless as they're homes were flooded last week. As they now return, those who are lucky enough to have their homes considered safe to re-enter, find incredible loss. Many have lost nearly everything they have.

All around me there are cool fund-raisers and people coming together to help out. At work all of our managers will be bald by the end of next week!

I thought I'd have my hand at it, and see if I could raise some money myself. If these pictures aren't guilt-tripping you into donating some cash (hey, it's tough times for everyone) I'll give you another reason.

For Every Dollar you donate, you will get an entry in a drawing, and that winner can send me any figure kit or bust and I'll build and paint it. (You can always strip it later )

All I ask is you pay for shipping! Hey, I'm taking a chance here someone is going to send me a full size Predator or something ridiculous, hahaha. And since I'm asking you to pay for shipping, I'm not putting any regional restrictions, this is open to anyone who wants to participate.

All of this money will go directly to the flood victims. I have any number of resources available to me through work, and otherwise to make this donation. I will even possibly video the drawing to make sure it's entirely random, if I had a web-cam I would do it live But I think my reputation is such that you can trust me. And I did exclude myself from entering...

But keep in mind, if you use paypal (which I'm assuming the majority of you will) they take a chunk out, but I think it's still cheaper than a stamp, so make it $1.25 or something. 8)

If you wish to throw a few bucks in an envelope, email me and I can send you my postal address.

I'll keep posting in this entry to let you know how much we're making, and if it exceeds my expectations I might consider some other ways to cheaply sell myself, who knows! Maybe I'll even let you know if someone's making a large donation too, so if you want to even things out.... But I won't tell you who it is! >8)

Ok, I guess it's time for the details.

Paypal donations can be made to:
zombi@mchsi.com

Make sure you enter flood, or flood money, so I can keep it sorted, and include your name. Or you can shoot me an email at either that same address, or info@garagekitzombie.com

I will keep accepting donations until July 4th at midnight (the 5th). By 12:00 Noon Central Time on the 5th, I will post the winner.

To those of you that frequent other boards, pass this around! I've got a post on The Clubhouse, and I'll be posting on the Amazing Figure Modeler Board, but other than that I can't think of other places to post. The Statue Forum would be great, but I don't think they allow solicitors. So if you can't donate monetarily, mess up the odds for those who are by spreading this as far as you can think of! >8)

Thanks for all the interest already, before I even made it official. I hope that this is successful, and I can't wait to see what I get to paint!

Keep watching this space!