Aliens, Guns and Pirates

I have come to realise that I don't use this blog as much as I used to when I first made it, which makes me sad, but I just don't seem to get time to write stuff like I used to or check out other blogs, so for that I apologise! On that note, I finally decided to post some stuff, so it's quite a long blog...

Lets start off with some Grekwood Minis stuff!
I haven't released anything which I have sculpted since the Fancy Dress Zombies last year. Lately I've been working on some guys/sci fi aliens to make the Bioblyte range more complete. They look different to the current Bioblytes on the website, but that's intentional. They are meant to be different as they have different purposes! The Bioblytes on the website are more "support" weapons with heavier guns. (It's not the best photo...sorry!)

The armoured guys are the regular infantry, whereas the claw guys are more expendable and are there to cause disruption amongst the enemy. I'm not sure whether they would be clones or not yet, but then i guess that's not for me to decide!

Project Zeke Miniatures
I started discussing things with Simon a few months ago, but wasn't in a position to buy in new stuff. So a few months later, I have some extra cash and started to stock some of PZM's figures! I thought they were pretty cool, and sell for an extremely good price, so why not!

I'm sure most on here have already seen them, but here they are on the right!

I believe they are most perfect for post apocalyptic games, or even during a virus outbreak! I really do like the SWAT/Security team!

Now for non-Grekwood Minis stuff ...but still rather cool...

My first Pistol Prop!

I recently started making props for cosplayers or general collecting. I decided I wanted to start off with something easy-ish. So I created a gun known as the "Paladin Pistol". It can also be used as a "Carnifex Pistol" since they are the same body, just painted up differently, and houses a different coloured LED. Furthermore, with the addition of a suppressor on the upper barrel, (and again painted differently with a different colour LED), it becomes a gun called the "Suppressor Pistol". So it's kinda 3 guns in one!


Once built, I used grey primer to show up any flaws, sanded it down, resprayed etc etc.

I decided it wasn't good enough as it is, so I decided that I was going to introduce electrics to it! Towards the front (on the sides) there's a groove where a light should be, so I will wire up some LED's and add a switch so they can be turned on or off :)

I plan to make a resin mould of this, so I can make more than one if needed ;)





Captain Hook:
I also made a cosplay costume based on a TV show called Once Upon A Time, and a character named Killian Jones/Captain Hook! I think I have posted the costume before, but just in case you haven't seen it, here's some photos (click to enlarge).

I realised a couple of days ago that I was missing the necklace which he wears, so I sculpted that too, and I think it turned out pretty well:

Well that's all for now. If anyone would like to see regular updates, go check on my "Sutherwood Photography and Cosplay" page on Facebook. It's a combination of Rovanite Cosplay and my "Carl Sutherwood Photography".

Thanks for reading everyone!

It's been a while...

So it has come to my attention that I haven't written a blog post since December when the "Zombie & Survivors" rules went online (which are still free by the way!). So I thought it was about time to write a blog and do a little update on me, the business, and aliens....ok, less of the aliens!

Business Stuff:

On January (25th) we (my dad and I) went to Crusade Wargames Show/Convention! We originally bought a 12' table, but the guy next to use didn't turn up, so the guys who run the show gave us a free table! We now had 18' of table space. We already had out display almost set up (it was about 30 minutes before opening time), so we had to re-juggle everything to make it work.

Anyway, the whole day was a success! We had a turnover which was almost 3 times that of our first year (last year) and we had double the amount of orders. We were able to meet new customers, and existing ones (which is always good!), so overall it was a great day.

Future:
Currently I'm looking at bringing some more minis to the UK from outside of Europe. There are roughly 100 figures all from one company. The minis I am going to stock have been around for a long time (some not so long but the majority a long time), but I like some of them, and my dad likes some of them, so why not stock them and have a set for ourselves! I'm mainly hoping that some people are unaware of them. But even if everyone has them, there will always be new customers and our website gets to grow even further. I plan to sell them cheaper too...that's always good...right?

Personal Stuff:
Nothing much is going on with me really (I'm boring!). I have started making a long leather coat (it's not real leather). It's meant to be like the one "Killian Jones aka Hook" wears in "Once Upon A Time" TV show. It's cool, so I thought I would try and make one. Maybe even sell them if I find it easy enough. Below (left) is the WIP so far (with a dodgy photo of me pulling a face for no real reason).

Also the Mass Effect armour is coming along nicely, but I lost my "mojo" with it a bit, so I need to get back to finishing it off... But here's how it looks at the moment (right):

Apart from that nothing is really happening with me. Just plodding along doing this and that, and shouting at the xbox when I get shot on Battlefield 3... Good times...

Anywho, cheers for reading, and I apologise for not getting around the blogs much at all. I do most of my online stuff through Facebook!

New Zombies, Painted Zombies, Armour, and a Manikin.

Hi everyone,

I've been a bit quiet around here so here's a large-ish blog for you :)

Miniature Stuff
The "Costume" zombies are now available on the website!! Yay! I was excited when sculpting these as they were kind of fun. I'm currently in the process of painting some up for the website, and here is a WIP photo of what I have done today :)

I have also been painting up all of the WGF zombies over the past few weeks (I haven't touched them in about a week or so), which were also fun to make up. Below are images of the male horde and then the zombie vixens. The male horde come with tiny bases, so they have been based on 30mm to in-keep with our zombies.

A nice colourful bunch I think you would agree!

Personal Stuff:
I have been building some Mass Effect Armour for fun using a combination of EVA foam tiles and "funky foam" sheets.

I found some templates, so I resized them, and cut them out. I then carved out some areas and covered them over with bits of funky foam (dark black parts) to give more detail.



Once everything was cut out, I used a soldering iron to burn lines into the abs area and chest pieces (the dark lines).

I then used a heat gun (purchased for £15 from Tesco), to heat the foam. It becomes "soft", so I was then able to press it against my body until it cooled down a little. It cools after about a minute.









Finally... Kate (my wife) helped wrap me up in duct tape. That is me in the photo, but I covered my head up with that of Commander Shepard from the Mass Effect games...as my face looked weird. However, I chose an equally weird face to cover mine up with (it's been comically morphed...not by me..).

This isn't some weird fetish, I am making an Mannequin/Manikin of my body so I can easily fit the armour onto it.

It's a simple process:
You wear old clothes, you wrap yourself (or get someone else to wrap you up) in duct tape. That person then cuts your clothes off and you struggle/slide out of the "duct tape skin".

You can see in the image that we cut from the ankle to the knee. and from the wrist to the elbow. We also cut along the spine down to the "tail bone" area.


Now I have to build a "skeleton" so that it can "stand up". Once that's done I can pack it full of stuff (newspaper, old clothes, whatever you want), until it is all "tough". I will make a blog of the next steps :P

Once this is done I can continue with the rest of the armour.

Alrighty then, that's all for now!

Cheers for reading as always :)