Making a robot...

[Lovejoy]

I'm slowly in the process of starting a range of 28mm scifi figures. I've got a bunch of power armoured infantry made, and a couple of small robots. I figured that was all I needed, and I was ready to go. Then I suddenly decided I wanted a big robot as well...

Problem is while I've been a sculptor for a long time, I've not done anything like this before, so it was a bit of a learning process for me.

Anyway, step one was knocking up some sketches to work out what I wanted. I'm not much good at sketching, but then again the finished model never looks much like my sketches anyway, so I guess that's OK!

[Lovejoy]

Step 2: I decided the bulk of the model would be Milliput - I normally sculpt in GreenStuff, but Milliput is ideal for hard edged, mechanical type models. I also dug out my Big Bag of Balls (tm) - I tend to roll left over bits of putty into balls and save them for projects! I also got a sheet of acetate; you can buy it from art shops, but this piece came from the packaging of a shirt I'd bought.

[Lovejoy]

Step 3: I figured out all the bits I'd need, based on my sketch, and made them very roughly in Milliput. You can make very neat parts from Milliput, but I find it a nightmare to work with, so rough is the best way for me...

I put the Milliput parts on the acetate sheet to dry - otherwise they can stick solidly to your workbench.

[Lovejoy]

Step 4: starting to turn those rough Milliput blobs into a robot....

I gathered the parts which I'd made for the legs; two foot baseplates, two feet, two lower legs, two kneepads, and one upper leg.  Yes, just one upper leg. Somehow I'd forgotten to make the other one...  Thankfully it was long enough that I could cut it in two, so it worked out OK.

[Lovejoy]

Step 5: still working on those legs...  

The thing with legs is, they need to match. If I had a computer with a good graphics setup, a decent 3D design program, and new what I was doing, I could make one leg, then copy it and mirror image it. But I don't.  If I had mad skills and awesome hand to eye coordination, I could just make a leg, look at it, and then make another to match by hand. Sadly I don't. So I had to come up with another way.

What I did is, I sanded a flat surface on one side of each part. Then I glued then together with PVA, left foot to right foot, left lower leg to right lower leg, etc.

That meant that I could sand them as if they were one single part rather than two, and would make sure they were the same size and shape. Then when I'd finished I could simply pull then apart - so don't use any glue stronger than PVA!

[Lovejoy]

And here's the leg bits with most of the sanding done:

There's a couple of arm pieces in there too - they rolled into shot while I was taking the pic!

[Lovejoy]

Step 6: sanding, sanding, and more sanding....

Once the leg parts were sanded, I sanded the arm pieces, the torso, the head etc.  I also cut up some pieces of brass and aluminium rod, to use for joints.

I was left with a big pile of bits....

[Lovejoy]

Step 7: construction begins...

I filed some dents into the upper leg pieces with a rounded file, then stuck the brass/ally tube parts to them. I drilled through the leg, and into the rod, so I could pin them for strength.

[Lovejoy]

Step 8: I did the same with the lower legs and feet, drilling, pinning and adding ally tube bits. Pretty soon the basic legs were done... (actually it took ages - brass tube is a PITA to drill through!)

[Lovejoy]

Step 9: basically, the same process for the arms, but with a couple of Milliput balls from the Ball Bag added as elbow joints...

[Lovejoy]

Step 10: the body and head are stuck together... and four Milliput balls are added as limb attachment points. these are drilled and pinned for strength.

[Lovejoy]

Step 11: test fitting...

All the parts are built, so it's time to grab some whitetack and try sticking it all together. And the result is a basic robot!  

[Dr Mathias]

Looks pretty sweet so far!
It looks somewhat lovable right now, maybe due to the round edges, but a hardcore paintjob would cross it right over into brutal

[Lovejoy]

Thanks Dr Mathias!

Step 12: pimping my warbot.

Problem is, the basic robot looks pretty plain... so it's time to bring out the GreenStuff!  I'm much happier doing this bit - it's much more familiar for me. Nothing really fancy, just a few tubes, made with a Masq-mini tube tool, the odd circle pressed in with a brass tube, and a lot of smoothing with a chisel point colour shaper.

[Steve F]

Fascinating thread. Thanks, Lovejoy.