Anyone here ever tried to custom paint Mcfarlane figures?

Allen

Anyone ever done this? How hard is it? Any advice? I saw an artivle on it in Beckett or something but I forgot which issue.

helionaut

I've done a Starting Lineup, but not a McFarlane, I assume it's the same, though. It turned out OK for a first try, and considering I hadn't painted anything in years. I used acrylic for the most part as that's what I happen to have, but other paints might be better if you can get them thin enough without streaking. I don't have an airbrush, but I'd recommend using one for real subtle shading. I ended up using finepoint magic markers for details like eyes and getting into folds of clothes. I'd recommend priming the figure, or at least going over it in a white basecoat, before doing the real painting. And get as many photo references as you can (like cards).

As to the difficulty, it all depends on your skill and experience and what you're trying to do. I tried to do a Bake McBride with a Phillies home uni, which was a mistake because of the pinstripes and I got one leg done before realizing it was harder than it looked, so I switched to a 70s-80s style powder blue road uni. That still left the difficulty of the numbers and the logo. There might also be smaller details like outlines around numbers and names that you have to get in there with a 000 brush to do (or cheat with a marker). I'd recommend getting a few cheapo SLUs or other action figures and just trying it out. There are some websites of toy customizers on the Net (one was posted here last year for a guy doing custom 12" McFarlanes, IIRC) so you can get more info there on the real experts methods.

Fabfrank

Allen- Try this website http://www.customsbyjomo.com/

Not only do people show off their handiwork, but the site also teaches you how to customize figures step-by-step, with pictures.
If you don't want to make your own and you have the coin, you can even pay them to make you a figure.

BigKidAtHeart

THIS is the same group that you read about in Beckett