LPB complaint, again

[nachoman]

I am stuck in a hotel room, snowstorm outside. Luckily, i bought some atlas unpainted figures and some craft paints as something to do if I got bored. Sure, I paid only 3.50 or so for a box of 26 unpainted figures, but I still have complaints! I like the unpainted ones because I can paint them however I like. And they are cheaper. And it is an excellent activity when stuck on the road. But...

in this box of 26 there are many duplicates. I have about 5 of this same standing woman who looks like she is hitchiking.

There is what looks like a nurse. Who is going to build and detail the inside of a hospital? How about some more realistic poses? There is also a guy holding binoculars...He may look good on the rear platform of a tourist train...

And people's proportions seem unrealistically thin. And sure, one can change the skin and hair colors, but even with paint few would make a convincing african american or hispanic.

In the end, I am going to have about half a dozen useable figures from the box of 26. I guess I will paint the rest of them because I am bored and then give them away or sell them on ebay.

kevin

 

[ezdays]

I am stuck in a hotel room, snowstorm outside. Luckily, i bought some atlas unpainted figures and some craft paints as something to do if I got bored. Sure, I paid only 3.50 or so for a box of 26 unpainted figures, but I still have complaints! I like the unpainted ones because I can paint them however I like. And they are cheaper. And it is an excellent activity when stuck on the road. But...

in this box of 26 there are many duplicates. I have about 5 of this same standing woman who looks like she is hitchiking.

There is what looks like a nurse. Who is going to build and detail the inside of a hospital? How about some more realistic poses? There is also a guy holding binoculars...He may look good on the rear platform of a tourist train...

And people's proportions seem unrealistically thin. And sure, one can change the skin and hair colors, but even with paint few would make a convincing african american or hispanic.

In the end, I am going to have about half a dozen useable figures from the box of 26. I guess I will paint the rest of them because I am bored and then give them away or sell them on ebay.

kevin

Try painting these in N scale. I got a bunch, can't remember how many but probably close to 100. One problem is that they came unassembled. There was a bunch of heads, torsos and legs. The heads were just a blob with no molded detail. I put them in a drawer figuring I'd never use them, then came the Atlas Kitbash Challange. I took a sitting torso with the arms outstretched and put it on a set of standing legs. I took the straight torso and put it on the sitting legs. I had probably 25 of each style in male and female, so I mixed them all up. I mixed up one shade of green and created what is now know as the army of LGM.

I know this, I'll never buy unpainted N scale figures again.wall1

 

[sumpter250]

With a little careful "plastic surgery", you can change the poses on most of those figures.
Your blade needs to be sharp (you should hear them complain when you use a dull blade), and you'll need a good liquid cement to reattach the things you cut off.
Some "body" putty, and you can add/change hair, clothing, backpacks, etc. A small container of Acetone is the punishment for the most stubborn LPBs, keep it close, they'll behave.
balloon6

 

[jim currie]

sumpter's right i guess its because i have a bad case of tinkerites i redo a lot of my LPB's looks like the texas chain saw massacre on my bench when working on them (heads, legs and arms every where ) i use my goop(plastic scraps desolved in laquer thinner) to reshape them.

 

[Jac's Lines]

I hear you on those Atlas figures -- they're cheap but really bad in almost every respect. And they don't clean up much when painted. I also found that they're made of a much stronger plastic than the Preiser figures, so it's almost impossible to frankenstein them without losing one of your own extremities.

 

[MilesWestern]

Build a scale Guillotine to chop off extremities!

 

[zedob]

Yes, but then you have to set up a net to catch the flying apendage(s).

 

[nachoman]

i love how the subject "lpb" solicits many humorous responses

i still enjoy painting them, though. Has anyone tried the model power unpainted figures?

kevin

 

[zedob]

I don't travel much for business, but I do have to attend the occasional training seminar every once in awhile, which are out of state and I never have brought any MRRing stuff with me except a book or mag. The idea of packing a small armitorium of LPB ER OP instruments is a good idea. Set it up specifically for hacking up and doctoring LPBs.

Have a set of loupes or a gooseneck type magnifiying lens (a decent portable light would be handy too), an array of razor blades, putty, lighter/torch, paints and whatever else that is deemed necessary to inflict punishment to the wee ones.:thumb:

Of course, I think about doing all of this...the night before.

 

[eightyeightfan1]

I have done the Preiser unpainted. There were a bunch of duplicates in there too.

 

[shaygetz]

i love how the subject "lpb" solicits many humorous responses

i still enjoy painting them, though. Has anyone tried the model power unpainted figures?

kevin

I use all brands including Model Power, which are reissues of the old Plasticville dies. Like a demented Frankenstein, all my LPBs are merely an assortment of appendages, torsos and noggins to rearrange at my whim. I make up a putty out of the sprues leftover by dissolving them into small bottles of Testors liquid styrene cement, making sure that I keep the diiferent plastics for the various brands separate and use them only for the brand they come from.

This is an example of my work on LPBs---I enjoy classic oil paintings and so thought of this female form as a good challenge. She was cut off at the waist from a Plasticville brakeman. Her torso came from the farmer shown then glued to the legs as though she were bent over. After carving off everything that didn't look like a girl, I then built up her figure and hair with blobs of the styrene putty, let it set, then carved it to shape. Once hard set---about a week---I painted her with a coat of styrene cement to soften the rough edges of the carving. It seems to help harden it some as well. Some well placed paint, a Prieser dog (repainted, of course) and a kitbashed pier completed this mini scene. Once I thought of them as parts of a whole, my citizenry started growing by leaps and bounds. More often than not, I simply relocate an arm or leg, this one took two figures to do, I've used as many as five.