Creature Feature:
Sadly, on February 21st of 2008, Ben Chapman, the man inside the most famous American rubber suit of all time--The Creature from the Black Lagoon--passed on. I had the pleasure of meeting Ben several times and he was a quite charming fellow, always eager to tell a story and very quick to give fans of his famous portrayal tremendous credit for making his life so wonderful. This week, we pay tribute to him in the CreatureScape Kit Pit by building a great bust from Resin Realities. So, with no further ado, grab your snorkels and let's dive into the Black Lagoon.
In the monster model kit world, there are some undisputed heavy weights, and the Creature from the Black Lagoon is among the true giants. This one comes from Resin Realities and was sculpted by Wayne Hansen, who has produced a few cool Creatures for this time tested company. They are carefully sculpted and rewarding to work on.
The kit is simple. With only four pieces to assemble, including the base, it occurred to me that this would be a perfect subject for a 24 hour build up. So, after work on Friday, March 3, I started tackling on this great kit.
To the right, you can see the parts. The body of the Creature fits into the indention that you see in the base and the arms are designed to be completely posable. Note how the shoulders are sort of winged out (like the monster suit) and the arms are rounded at the connection points allowing for various positions. The body will only fit in the base one way, but the arms could be in any number of menacing poses.
Like any resin kit, the first thing to do is wash it in soap and water to remove any resin dust or release agents left on the kit. Next, I go over the kit with an razor knife and fine sand paper to remove any lines I can see. Along the way, you will want to fill in any holes or gaps with putty. I use two part putty (Wonder Putty) and a little of the Testor's tube putty. The claws needed a little reshaping and there are a few places that need filling, but it took only about 30 minutes total. Then, I put a coat of sandable auto primer (light gray) on the whole kit.
Notice that there are two long screws drilled into the top of the arms. This allows me to hold them without touching the paint as it dries and these will stay in until the last phases of the build.
In the picture above, you'll also notice that the Creature is already set in the base. This is a judgment call. I could have drilled a hole in the bottom and held it to a board like I normally do, but I thought that there was enough room to use an airbrush (even though the angle of the monster is facing forward a bit). It might have been easier to paint separately, but in the end, you need a bit of putty around the edges, and that might have been a bear to paint in convincingly.
Well, the first steps of painting are pretty easy. I used a Badger Anthem 155 at about 15 psi passing through the air line. The base coat is Badger's Forest Green. In the areas beneath the body plates, right along the lines, I spray in a thin line of Freak Flex Gangrene and then a second line of Createx Tinting Black (essentially, a transparent black). The same is done for the arms as well and they allowed to dry. This pattern is consistent with the Creature as he appears in many daylight shots, with the dark lines below the plates.
Next, I turn my attention to the face and belly of the beast, so to speak. This part of the Creature is a little bit lighter than the Forest Green base and I didn't have a color at hand to coat it the way I liked. So, I went to a local craft store and picked out a few acrylic candidates, but when I got home, none of them looked quite right either. Hmmm . . . what to do?
Well, it is time to just start mixing. I took Folk Art's Citron Green and Hauser Green and mixed them with a little Forest Green, gradually getting a color I could live with. You also have to thin down those Folk Art craft paints, so my final mix was about 1 parts paint to 3 parts water. Honestly, it is one of those things that you have to judge on a per mix basis, but that gives you a ballpark figure.
A little paint tinkering was necessary at this point. I lightly misted Forrest Green over the head and belly (a little more on the head) to tone down these areas. Some touch up was necessary here and there too. That was enough for one evening, so I sealed the kit with Dulcote, turned off the light and went off to dreamland. (Well, actually, I had a beer first.)
The next afternoon I loaded up my airbrush and went to work. The next step was to add some depth to the kit, so I began by working on lightening the center of each body plate. Using the citron green in the airbrush, I sprayed a line of very thinly applied light color, and over that I applied a line of Createx's Orange Yellow Transparent. You can see how it brings out the color, but keeps it from being too bright.
Now, I needed to start raising some of the details of the kit. Using a technique called dry brushing, I applied a layer of very light Sea Foam green to the body and arms. To dry brush, apply a small amount of light colored paint to the tips of a flat brush. Pull the paint off with a rag with repeated tugs on the bristles until the paint seems to be totally gone. (It isn't!) Then, in short strokes pull the brush lightly over the surface of the kit. This will have the effect of raising the details up and begin the process of showing three dimensions in your painting.
At that point the kit must be sealed with Dulcote to protect the work so far.
When that dried, I hit the parts with a Raw Umber oil wash. Using about a dab of oil paint about the size of a quarter, I mixed it in a ratio of about 20 parts thinner to one part Raw Umber. This is applied with a brush to the whole kit and seeps in, allowing the dark tones to settle in the recesses. It takes a while for this to dry, but that's fine.
In the photo to the right, you can see how the combination of the oil wash and dry brushing bring dimension to the kit. You can also see that I have begun to work on some of the details.
First, using Americana Antique Ivory, I have painted the claws and eyes. I will paint the eyes Antique Gold with large black, fishy pupils in the next step, but I want a light base to paint on.
Also, using blue painter's masking tape, I have covered the belly so that I can apply Badger's Brunswick Green--a dark blackish green--to the kit without damaging the paint on the kit. He's not splashing a lot so I thought maybe we could keep the Black Lagoon more or less black.
At this point, the last stages take very little time. As mentioned above, I apply a coat of Antique Gold from Anita's to the eye and while that dries, I use the airbrush one last time to coat the Creature with a misting of Amber Oxide from Lifetone's Hydromist line. It gives it a yellow-green hue overall. I also decided to lightly apply Createx's Transparent Deep Red to the back and arm frills that line the Creature. The bottom of the base is painted a flat black and the water is drybrushed with a light gray and then misted again with Brunswick Green. A couple of black pupils for the eyes and an application of Dulcote and the Creature walks among us. Or wades among us, I suppose.
At this point, it was time for dinner and I was pretty happy with a kit that I was able to do in less than 24 hours. I might go back and darken the claws a little or work on the water effects some, but my main goal of getting this Creature assembled and painted in a day was behind me.
Let me encourage people to consider this kit for a future weekend build. It is not particularly complicated, but it does require some modeling skill and won't bore you. It also makes a perfect first "serious" kit for modelers. Check out our official review, and contact Resin Realities to make your order.
Enjoy.
The Rules:
- Actually PRACTICE your hobby. Just do it because it makes you happy and don't worry about it. Geeze . . .
- But DON'T BUY RECASTS. Artists need support to keep doing it and recasts are typically crappy anyway.
- If you want to use some of our images, cool by me . . . just credit the source as www.creaturescape.com
- If you want to link to us, knock yourself out. Use our banner if you like and contact us so we can return the favor.
- If you find an error, problem, bad link or foolish statement, let us know, but don't be a butthead.
- Support our sponsors because that is how we stay afloat.
- Support horror hosts at www.horrorhosts.com by buying their products
- Support rockabilly radio at www.rockabillyradio.net by giving them money
- Fight the power, wash behind your ears and for heaven sake, if you are surfing the web right now, take a minute to think about how cool monster models are and go immediately to our sale page and buy a kit!
© 2007 CreatureScape, All Rights Reserved Callahan