I started sculpting the clay on the legs, boiled it, but then the clay started cracking right off the legs. I think this was one of the many bad "casts" I had. (Cast=I made legs using liquid plastic material. I pour this into a mold I also made using the original legs. The ratio of the plastic mixture was off so it makes the plastic greasy and it also makes the sculpting very difficult because the clay won't stick to it.)
Then I decided to find new parts to use. The action figure (head) I used to make Sierra, I used that body. The only problem was the legs were not right. Here is a picture of the figure I was thinking about using.
I ended up cutting off the legs and the breasts since they were too big for what I wanted. I then used the legs from the Chandra figure and super glued them onto this torso. I cut off Chandra's feet and glued on feet from a Tara figure. I then cut away the hair from the Buffy head. I had to drill a hole in the the head as well as the top of the body. I then used a stick to join the two pieces. I guess I should have made the head sit taller. This was one complaints/comments people said to me on the BTVS Figs forum. At this point in the making of this figure the neck looked fine.
I then sculpted clay over the torso just covering the rough spots and smoothing it out some. I used some wedding tulle for Buffy's stockings. (I had to paint it black before I put it on her because I knew it would be impossible to paint with it on her). I did test a sample of this in boiling water to make sure it wouldn't warp after I had attached it to her leg. I'm not good spatially so it was very hard figuring out how to attach this piece of tulle to her leg, and make it look like stockings. One side looks great, the other side I ran a little short of material but I had already super glued it so I just left it. (I'm not sure you'll be able to see the "oops" in one of the pictures). I then sculpted on Buffy's boots and clothing and chest.
Finally I attached the arms. I used deluxe Buffy action figure arms and I used the hands from a Jean Gray action figure. The positioning of the arms is a bit wrong. I guess I didn't realize until it was too late that when your hands are rested on your hips, your elbows stick straight out from your body. My elbows were slightly bent back. Most people would not recognize this but it's one of those details only the artist sees...
The hair and the upper collar on her suit was the most difficult. I tried to get that messy hair look down. Ever time I kept separating the clay to make the wisps of hair, it would rip the whole thing apart and I had to start over. I didn't want the clay to be sticking out too much or one slight bump would break the hair. What I ended up with is not what I envisioned. It looks too curly for my liking. So, I just decided I was not going to change it considering how much I struggled with it.
Here are completed pictures:
I know when you click on the picture it shows a huge blown up version. When these pictures are magnified you see many flaws. In real life you don't see the flaws, or not as easily. I like showing close ups of the face because these are 6 inch figures and painting faces is extremely hard--and getting it to look like the character is even harder! Using this head was probably a mistake. It really didn't look like Sara Michelle Geller, but I think I did a pretty good job at getting the likeness down and making her look youthful like the picture.
Here are a few of my favorite pictures. You can really see the details in the arms and clothing:
I decided to go with a very simple background. I thought about many different things but the magazine cover was simple and I kept it simple. It also looks like Sara is wearing some sort of a cape. I had no idea what it looked like (since you only see what is on the cover) I tried to reproduce this using that wedding tulle. Here is what I came up with. I have to do more tweaking to it if I'm going to use it--for now I'm not going to use it with my figure (unless I can get it to look better).
I contimplated redoing the head of this figure and using a larger Buffy head, one that is more accurate to her face, and fixing the neck, but I like how it looks and I decided to leave it alone. There are so many other great things with this figure--the arms/shoulder/armpit area, the clothing and shoe lace part. The boots.
There is one other RollingStone cover with Buffy I want to do but I'm trying to get a model car that is in scale with the figure (1:12) and that is so hard to find! If I have any luck you'll see it posted.
