Samurai headsculpts!!!

[ILUVSkinner]

We have been getting a lot of nice samurai (and Shinobi) figures lately, from the Ignite/Crazy Owners wonderfully non-armoured, duel-ready figures to the heavily armoured DiD battle-ready samurai daimyos and commanders. But one thing most of the samurai do not have is the classic chonmage topknot, with the bald plate and the folded-over hair. We have the DiD International Samurai, all with long hair (OK for the era, and they are meant to wear helmets anyway), the crew-cut Beat Takeshi samurai, the long-haired Kojiro (coming soon). The only one with the classic, common looking chonmage, not made by Alfrex, is the bear-fur Tokugawa Ieyasu. The CO Mushashi has a ''pine-apple'' chonmage, much like Sonny Chiba when he plays Yagyu Jubei and Hanzo in the sequel films to 'Hanzo The Razor', and the black Ignite samurai has a downward facing chonmage, like Gorobei in 'The Seven Samurai', but most are not like this:

- Nakamura Mondo!

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/6c/Samurais_wearing_Kamishimo.jpg - in Kamishimo

Do you think we'll ever get ''generic'' samurai figures from Crazy Owners? Or maybe some intrepid customisers/sculptors would be up to the challenge of creating heads with chonmage?

 

[iampoch]

I hope DiD does this. I hate Crazy Owners, which is strange because I loved them when they were still Ignite. I feel they've lost their way when they changed names. Their Musashi figure is one of the weakest figures in my collection (both in terms of paint applications and overall quality control) and their upcoming Richard I is a joke as far as historically accuracy goes.

 

[ILUVSkinner]

I almost agree with you, because the second black Ninja (the modern one with the grotesquely long neck) was so rubbish that I didn't even think of purchasing him, but I must admit that I like the Musashi somewhat; he is not perfect as the character - should have been Mifune Toshiro - but he atleast had some nice slippers - though Crazy Owner's are really reusing parts too much. I mean, I really only want them to reuse the kamishimo (the hakama and cape that came in the samurai clothing set), but we need the slighly different cuts of kimono, new accessories and new styles of katana.

If DiD decided to do non-armoured samurai, it would be great, because truth be told I prefer kimonos, hakama, kataginu etc. to armour and helmets. ideally, they could make non-armoured samurai and armoured samurai or armour sets similar to the Alfrex ''samurai power up'' set.

We still have not go any really generic looking samurai (with the chonmage) to go with the kamishimo set which is a major same. They should have released a samurai headset to go with it, like DiD releases the Napoleonic and WWII Japanese headsets.

 

[Lejuan]

yep, would love to see some more cloth and less armour. The DiD armoured figures look superb and the reviews say as much. I'll be picking some of these up in the next few months, but I would love a properly done ninja and a stock-standard samurai.

 

[Jessica]

I have a Japanese looking character that I could see if I could cut the hair off and re-do.

 

[ILUVSkinner]

I have a Japanese looking character that I could see if I could cut the hair off and re-do.

That would be great! I have already modified a Naomasa Ii to have a topknot (not the shaven plate though), and I am thinking of trying to sculpt some chonmage hair onto a few DiD WWII Japanese. Problem, is my sculpting skills are not great at all.

 

[cr`]

here's one samurai you all recognize:

yup, turns out hellboy is a samurai as well.

 

[iampoch]

That would be great! I have already modified a Naomasa Ii to have a topknot (not the shaven plate though), and I am thinking of trying to sculpt some chonmage hair onto a few DiD WWII Japanese. Problem, is my sculpting skills are not great at all.

wow! I'll try to do that to my samurai as well!

 

[Jessica]

I didn't know Hellboy was samurai! That's so cool.

 

[Jessica]

Here's one of the characters I had that I think would pass for samurai.

 

[ILUVSkinner]

Interesting! To upgrade him into a samurai, would you use greenstuff or another material?

I customized a Naomasa using his real hair (sadly I could not give him a bald plate due to the fact that there isn't much of a head under his hair), I think it came out rather well but was hard to use and needs a lot of maintenance.

 

[Jessica]

I would probably shave off his hair with an exacto, and then build up with air dry APoxie, which dries rock hard. If I accidentally cut off the top and punch through, it's still ok because I've done it before with other vinyl headsculpts.

 

[ILUVSkinner]

Ah, I might try that too! Thanks for that! I would like to see how your headsculpt comes along if you do manage to do that.

One of the problems I find is that there is a lack of heads based on Japanese people, I am thinking of purchasing the DiD Japanese WWII headset and sanding down their crewcuts to make some of them more bald and sculpting hair on. I'll probably take pictures of them as I work. I hope I'll manage suit.

It is just so frustrating that we have a beautiful kamishimo set by Ignite and no samurai that really suit them (apart from Nakamura Mondo, I'll upload an image of that figure in the kamishimo soon, he looks far better than the DiD and Ignite figures when he wears the kamishimo!).

 

[Jessica]

tadah!! I went with a more traditional look for the sideburns instead of the movie-style samurai sideburns, which would easy to do as well. Probably easier, but I liked the old photo reference. I ended up using sculpey which I still have to bake in the oven. Not sure how well the plastic knob would survive, the thing that pops the head onto the neck...or I could possibly just make a mold of this and pour some resin to make it permanent. Or try to pop out that plastic piece and bake it to cure? I'll have to see...

 

[siquisiri]

great job!!

 

[LordAzrael]

Awesome stuff - are you going to make casts available ?

Maybe cast the topknot as a second part wtih a plug ?

 

[dragonsleeper]

Bravo Jess Bravo

 

[Jessica]

I can make casts available, but I want to make sure that more people can use them. Should I extend the neck so that the headsculpt will be able to accomodate more different types of bodies, since this current headsculpt is specific to a particular body...so that customizers can just dremel off what they do not need?

Is this guy fit for samurai? I think my samurai will need someone to have combat with.

 

[Jessica]

This is that guy with a samurai makeover:

 

[Jessica]

Here is a cast of my newest samurai. Too bad he's not 1:6 scale.