Resin the Barbarian - Part 9

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Ultratumba’s Angry Red Spider

July 10th, 2009

Originally published May 11, 2006, at GJSentinel.com.

Angry Red Spider by Ultratumba Productions

Angry Red Planet“ANGRY RED SPIDER”
• Produced by Ultratumba Productions
• Sculpted by Paul Schiola of Eastlake, Colo.
• Size: 9 inches tall, 19.5 inches wide
• Material: Solid pink resin
• Number of parts: 15, including the base
• Price: $99 plus $18 domestic shipping
• Limited to 150 kits

Ultratumba\'s Angry Red SpiderFirst time I saw a picture of this new Ultratumba Productions kit, I thought, neat! I’ve never seen the movie this beastie comes from, “The Angry Red Planet,”but the model is so interesting and fun that it makes me want to.

That, I think, is a pretty common reaction to garage kits based on movies. People like me see a model kit they like, they buy it, then they go out and rent or purchase the movie that inspired it, not only because they’re curious about the film but also because they an idea of how they want to paint the kit.

But looking at this piece, I also figured I couldn’t afford it. I mean, it’s so big and so detailed, I thought it just had to be expensive. Then I found out the price is in the neighborhood of $100 – pretty cheap for a kit like this – and was even more impressed.

Angry Red PlanetAffordability is an important concern for Paul Schiola of Ultratumba, which means that in addition to being worth considering because they’re neat, they’re also a good option for people on a budget or who are just starting out in the hobby.

I’ve been watching for a chance to get in touch with Paul not only because I like his work, but also because he’s a fellow Coloradan. The introduction of this spider gave me the perfect excuse to e-mail him.

Paul Schiola and Bob Burns

Q&A WITH PAUL SCHIOLA

Resin the Barbarian: What can you tell me about the Angry Red Spider? Are you a fan of the movie “Angry Red Planet” or did you discover the creature another way?

Paul: I was a young boy around the age of 8 when we drove to Chicago to see some relatives. I had already been bitten by the monster bug thanks to my oldest brother, Frank, who found several issues of Famous Monsters under his desk while in his last class on a Friday afternoon. He brought them home with the intention to bring them back to the student he thought left them on Monday morning. So I spent the weekend drooling over these… Read the rest

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Ripley & Power Loader, Part III: Mike Allen

July 10th, 2009

Power Loader base

Originally posted May 4, 2006, at GJSentinel.com.

Some people at The Clubhouse said I ought to make the Forbidden Zone Ripley & Power Loader into a three-part entry by asking Mike Allen to share a little more about the base and decals he made for the kit. Mike was game, so why not?

Mike AllenIn addition to impressing me as the guy behind Forbidden Zone, which is putting out some of the best garage kits around, Mike got on my good side by agreeing to help me launch “Resin the Barbarian” Feb. 1. He answered a few questions about his Young Frankenstein bust without having much of an idea of what I hoped to do with his answers, and helped make it easier for me to approach everyone I’ve written about in the weeks since.

So, what follows is what Mike told me via e-mail about making a base to go along with the Ripley figure by Gabriel Marquez (part I) and the Power Loader by Tom Seiler (part II).

Q&A WITH MIKE ALLEN

Resin the Barbarian: As the person who runs Forbidden Zone, you are basically the guy in charge of the collaborative process that led to the Power Loader kit. Do you ever find it intimidating or uncomfortable giving direction/advice to people like Gabriel Marquez and Tom Seiler, who are so enviably talented?

Mike: No, not really. First of all, Tom and Gabriel are so down to earth and easy to get along with. They are very talented, but they’re open to all kinds of ideas. I mean … the machinery is what it is … Sigorney looked a certain way … it’s committed to film, so you pretty much know what you have to create.

I have to hand it to Tom; he studied screen grabs and photographs to pull all sorts of little details into it. I’ll tell you this much, I have had two individuals e-mail me that are connected to folks who created the full-size and miniature Loader for the film. They thought enough of the work on the kit to contact us and compliment it.

Now, the way I see it, the place where you have some freedom and creativity is the pose and composition of the piece. That’s where I think I can bring something to the table. I get to work with these talented guys and collectively create something we can all be proud of.

It sounds cheesy, but it’s true. I can talk to Gabriel and say something like “I want her arm as high as she can… Read the rest

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Ripley & Power Loader, Part II: Tom Seiler

July 10th, 2009

Originally published May 4, 2006, at GJSentinel.com.

Power Loader

This week’s subject is a big model kit, so it’s appropriate that it would require a little extra space. In the last Resin the Barbarian entry, I talked about the specifics of Forbidden Zone’s upcoming Power Loader garage kit and spoke with Gabriel Marquez, sculptor of the Ripley figure on the kit.

Tom SeilerTom Seiler is the man behind the machine on the Power Loader. Like Gabriel, Tom lives in the Houston area, about an hour away from Gabriel’s home.

“I don’t call what I do ‘sculpting,’” Tom wrote in an e-mail. “Don’t put me in the same category as someone like Gabriel, as I’m not worthy! I will answer to ‘fabricator’ or ‘scratchbuilder,’ though, as I assemble bits of sheet styrene, plastic tubing, plumber’s epoxy and lots of putty and primer into master parts.

“I break a project into subassemblies and then make a model of each bit. The closest I come to sculpting is creating a transition or fillet here and there. I like to break objects down to their basic shapes, like the Loader foot is a rectangular solid with a half-cylinder on top of it.”

Read on for more of Tom’s description of assembling the Loader.

TOM SEILER ON MAKING THE POWER LOADER

Resin the Barbarian: Would you like to say anything about creating the Power Loader? I know that project was quite some time from conception to completion, so I’m sure you spent many hours working on it and I can’t imagine how much you focused on details.

Power LoaderTom: I did spend many an hour on it, many a month, many a year. We were really lucky to get some great help from folks with invaluable Loader reference photos. Frame grabs from the DVD were helpful, too.

I’m also very lucky to live in Houston because of the great scratchbuilding resource we have here. G&G Model Shop near Rice University keeps nearly the entire Plastruct and Evergreen plastic inventory in stock for the models built by students of engineering and architecture. There is nothing like being able to pop into their shop and pick up anything you need in sheet, strip, rod, domed, tube or textured plastic!

For my starting point, I used the Halcyon kit, since the folks that made it had good references, at least as far as the scaling and proportions. I took one of their parts, laid it in my scanner, blew it up 150 percent, and PC-drafted plans of that, adding details Halcyon omitted, and correcting much of it.… Read the rest

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Ripley & Power Loader, Part I: Gabriel Marquez

July 10th, 2009

Originally published May 4, 2006, at GJSentinel.com.

Ripley and Power Loader

• “RIPLEY & POWER LOADER”
• Produced by Forbidden Zone
Ripley and Power Loader• Created by Tom Seiler (machinery), Gabriel Marquez (Ellen Ripley) and Mike Allen (base, decals and instructions).
• Casting by Mark Brokaw of Earthbound Studios.
• Scale: 1/8, roughly 16 inches tall.
• Material: Mostly resin, but it will include rubber tubing for the hydraulic hoses, metal mesh for the roll cage over the figure’s head, styrene rod for some details on the Loader. It will also have a clear, vacu-formed dome for the emergency beacon on the top.
• Number of parts: “I think it’s around 30,” Mike says, “but that may change once it’s molded.”
• Price: TBD, probably in the $250-$275 range.
• Date of availability: TBD, sometime in 2007. Contact Mike Allen through the Forbidden Zone Web site if you’re interested in an update.

“Get away from her, you bitch!”

Man, that’s one of the best uses of a naughty word in a movie and I wish I could let it rip here, in text, even half as effectively as Sigourney Weaver delivered it before the climactic battle in Jim Cameron’s 1986 movie “Aliens.” You’ve seen the movie, haven’t you? You know about the big fight between Ripley in the Power Loader and the nasty Alien Queen, right?

If you’re one of the few who managed to miss that one, it’s time to put it on your “must-see” list. Heck, you could probably pick up a cheap secondhand VHS copy on eBay for less than the price of a rental.

Forbidden Zone’s Mike Allen of Halfmoon, N.Y., is plainly a fan of the movie, and sometime back he helped set in motion a project that’s got model-kit lovers interested: a remarkably detailed kit of Ripley in the Power Loader, created by some extremely talented people.

Ripley and Power LoaderOne of the fun things about doing these weekly GK entries is that I don’t have to be ashamed of getting in touch with some of these talented people and ask all kinds of stupid fanboy questions. Gabriel Marquez has been impressing hobbyists for about a decade, and he’s the person who generously let me pester him this week with a Q&A (below).

Lifelong Houston resident Gabriel is a sculptor, 37 years old, married to Terri. He started off working semi-professionally as a sculptor 10 years ago and earned enough respect for his work that he was able to become a full-time professional in 1998. In his Web-site biography, he says his interest in art stems from an early love for fantasy and… Read the rest

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Mole Man Big Head by Mike Falcigno

July 10th, 2009

Originally published April 27, 2006, at GJSentinel.com.

Earthbound\'s Mole Man Big Head

• “MOLE MAN BIG HEAD”
• Produced by Earthbound Studios.
• Designed and sculpted by Mike Falcigno.
• Scale according to Mike: Technically the Big Head line is 2/3 scale, basically very close to 1/1 scale but people sometimes think they are 1/1 because if you take a 7-foot monster’s head and make it 2/3 scale it is still the size of an average human head, hence the confusion.
• Material: Resin.
• Price: $150 plus shipping.
• Kit pictured painted by Steve Parke.

Earthbound Mole Man Big HeadOccasionally, some garage-kit fan will visit one of the various Internet forums available and ask the assorted members: What’s the appeal of a bust? This question inevitably leads to a bunch of sophomoric jokes about women and bosoms; I don’t have the stats to prove it, but I suspect at least 75 percent of the people who build these kinds of kits are male, and like most guys we’ll take any opportunity to discuss female anatomy with a level of sophistication that rivals Beavis and Butt-Head.

Then genuine explanations get thrown around. Busts are distinct from the full-figure kits and have their own unique appeal. Since busts generally don’t go much beyond head and shoulders, the scale is larger and the facial expressions more interesting. Busts are more “artsy”. They use up less space on the shelf. The smaller ones don’t take long to complete. And so on.

However, I think most of us get the appeal of the Big Head busts from Earthbound Studios. First, the sculptures are simply fantastic. Second, they’re big, and that’s important to guys. You don’t appreciate just how big until you actually see one right in front of you. Third, the subject matter (most of them are B-movie monsters). Fourth, they’re offered by Mark Brokaw’s Earthbound Studios, which means you’ll get a first-rate kit for a fair price. The sculptor of this week’s Mole Man, Mike Falcigno (pronounced “fal-cig-no”), said $150 for the Big Head busts is an “incredible value” for their size and quality, and he’s right.

I traded e-mails with Mike recently to find out a little more about him and his work. He’s a 31-year-old resident of Milford, Conn., produces garage kits under the name TerrorForm Design, and has been with his girlfriend, Erin, for five years. Mike is talented enough to make his living as a full-time 3D/2D artist and he writes a weekly home video column called“Digital Creep” for the Fairfield County Weekly.

Fiend Without a FaceIn addition to the… Read the rest

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Cliff Green’s T-rex

July 10th, 2009

Originally published April 20, 2006, at GJSentinel.com.

Cliff Green

TYRANNOSAURUS “CENTENNIAL” REX
Produced by Cliff Green Studio of Price, Utah
Sculpted by Cliff Green, who also does his own painting
6 inches tall, 12 inches long. It’s 1/35 scale, representing a 38-foot-long dinosaur with a 5-foot-long skull
$50 for an unpainted kit (two parts, dino and base), $140 for a painted resin statue, $1,000 for a bronze statue

My interest in model kits was sparked somewhere around age 7; my interest in dinosaurs predates that by at least a couple of years. These two fascinations have risen and fallen with me over the years, but neither has ever faded completely away. So, when I found out recently about Cliff Green, a sculptor whose works include small dinosaur sculptures he sells as kits, working practically in the neighborhood, I had to get in touch to find out more.

Cliff loves prehistoric animals and for the last seven years has made a living as a professional sculptor specializing in prehistoric fauna. He recently worked on a full-sized Dilophosaurus wetherilli bronze monument for the St. George Dinosaur Discovery Site at Johnson Farm and hopes to start a full-sized Brontotherium hatcheri bronze monument for Badlands National Park in South Dakota soon.

For “self-therapy”, Cliff also sculpts, casts and sells 1/35th scale prehistoric animals, including the T-rex pictured above. I was glad Cliff suggested focusing on this in my blog, because the T-rex has long been the dino that most fascinated me (probably because I thought he was the toughest). Cliff describes this sculpture as being rendered under the direction of some of the top Tyrannosaur experts of the 21st century, during the June 2005“100 years of T-Rex Symposium” in Hill City, S.D. The anatomy, pose and skin are based on the experts’ critiques.

Cliff works out of the garage and front room at his home but hopes to buy a studio when the Brontotherium commission in South Dakota comes in, “hopefully very soon.” In the meantime, he says people are welcome to visit him at his address but need to call at least a day ahead of time “so I can hide the bodies.” If you’re interested, give him a ring at (435) 636-0887 or send him an e-mail at dinonaut@emerytelcom.net; I’ll leave it to him to share the actual address. He can also send you a price list if you contact him through e-mail.

For fellow garage-kit enthusiasts, it’s also worth mentioning that Cliff’s brother, John, ran John Green Models for 25 years. That operation closed up shop… Read the rest

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Ultimate Soldier by Alterton

July 10th, 2009

Originally published April 13, 2006, at GJSentinel.com.

Alterton\'s Ultimate Soldier

“THE ULTIMATE SOLDIER”
Produced by Mad Dog Resin
Sculpted by Alterton
1/6 scale, resin kit, comes in 10 unassembled, unpainted pieces
$135 plus shipping
Kit in pictures painted by Norm “Kitman” Piatt
Ultimate Soldier by AltertonIt’s amazing the people around the world a hobby can put you in contact with, thanks largely to the Internet. Before getting re-interested in model kits in late 2001, it would never have occurred to me that one day I would encounter Alterton, a former dentist who now works as a freelance sculptor. And if these facts alone don’t strike you as at least slightly off the beaten path, consider how Alterton describes his home to this geographically unsophisticated fellow:

“I am in a small city called Trelew in Chubut province, to the south in Argentina in a beautiful region called Patagonia. I was born here and turned back at the end of 2005 with my lady after 11 years living in Buenos Aires.”

This fellow from Argentina is a comic book fan, and he’s the creative force behind the sculpture of the red, white and blue hero in the pictures. A few weeks ago, I spoke with Norm Piatt of Paradoxx Resin and John Allred about an Alterton piece called “Aldrhiel The Forgotten One”; this week, I’m pleased to say Alterton fought past the flu and a bad Net connection to tell me a little more through e-mail about himself, “The Ultimate Soldier” and his work in general.

Me: How did a person from your part of the world get involved in sculpting a character who is so distinctly United States-oriented?

Alterton: Thing is, I have always loved fantasy-related stories. My grandfather and then my father were fans of an Argentinean editorial called Columba, with great fantasy characters and stories, those were the days Argentina had a great production of fantasy comics with magazines like Nippur de Lagash, El Tony, D’Artagnan, Scorpio, etc etc etc.

Ultimate Soldier by AltertonWe had great storytellers and 2D artists working for national publications and international comics, especially from Europe (France, Italy, Spain, Germany). As for the American comics; Mexican, Spanish and Argentinean editorials (VID, Abril, Novaro, etc) were reproducing Marvel and DC characters.

By the time I was a child and living at the a** of the world (yeah, Trelew is 932 miles south from Buenos Aires), it was really difficult to get those American publications, so I had to wait until summer holidays to go to Buenos Aires to spend Christmas with the rest of my… Read the rest

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