This commission required me to pull out all the stops. Lately, I have been starting a lot of recent projects asking myself how in the world will I pull this off. Dad is usually a great resource for ideas and coming up with a strategy. He made a few suggestions that were a great starting point.
We started off by using a McFarlane "Halo" Brute Minor action figure as a base figure to sculpt onto for this one. Dad had set aside one of these figures in our fodder to make a Grumgar from "The Force Awakens". Since the Ninth Sister was the same type of alien as Grumgar it was a great suggestion. Normally we try to use all Star Wars parts for our builds but due to the size of the character we had to get creative.
We found a few different kits that were available for the character but when we discussed using them with our client it was decided that utilizing self-made original parts was the best direction for this build making this one a 100% "Customs for the Kid" piece.
The Ninth Sister's head, helmet, shoulder pads and lightsabers were all designed by me in Blender and then printed here at home. I then molded some of those prints and made red-dyed, clear casts of her visor and lightsaber blades.
The details of her body, hands and feet were all hand-sculpted the traditional way using both ProCreate and Aves Fixit. I was really happy how the hand sculpted and 3-D designed elements blended so well together once she was completely assembled.
The soft goods kama was hand tailored then painted both red and black by hand.
All the Imperial symbols were hand painted as well. I strongly considered designing my own water slide decals but when I saw how difficult it is to print white decals, I just busted out my paint brush and did what needed to be done with detailed precision.
This project was great 3-D modeling practice for me. With every new sculpt I get more and more confident making a new part on my laptop. From hand and digital sculpting, soft goods fabrication and detailed paint application, utilizing all the many skills I have obtained over the years really brought this project to life. I was really happy with the final results!
