Custom accessories and figures

Michael Crawford

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The creation of new accessories for figures is something that's huge in WOS land, and I'm not at all suprised that it will get popular with Muppets. As a matter of fact, I'm betting that quite a few of the generalized WOS accessories (phones, picture frames, food) could work quite well with the playsets. I'll have to try a few out. Anyone have a good picture of Kermit to shrink down for the frame?

Another area that's huge in most popular lines is customizing figures. There's really three categories - taking existing figures and doing them up as something completely unrelated (Kermit as a Jedi Knight); taking existing figures and doing show related variants (Cop Fozzie); creating new characters that we may or may not ever see produced by Palisades (Pepe).

Of those three categories, I expect well see plenty of the first one, a fair amount of the second one, but very few of the final set. The design of the characters makes it a little tough to create completely new ones, although there are some mighty talented customizers out there who I'm sure will rise to the challenge.

So who's going to do the first Muppet custom?

Michael
MWC
 

FER SURE

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I thought about taking the hair off of a EB Piggy and maiking it a custom. Piggy was going to be Divine from Pink Flamigos. Alas my EB sold out and I don't want to pay postage from their website. Anyone else here love John Waters' films?
 

MrTheFrog

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Hey guys,
I already started making "Manhattan Melodies" Kermit from the tux version, and I also plan to do a Muppet Christmas Carol repaint if I come across another one. i'd just have to make my own scarf.
-Artie
 

uncleduke

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Originally posted by FER SURE
....Anyone else here love John Waters' films?
Not a huge Pink Flanngos fan, but I do like some of his pre-studio stuff. Most notably Female Trouble (Where can I get a Dawn Davenport figure?) and Polyester. I actually still have an Odor-ama card, autograped by John from when the movie first came out.
Not to stray too far off the topic, but I always hoped the WOS would do a John figure for their Celebrity line.
C'mon Ken, your'e in Baltimore! Secure the right to these figures (I think Playsets would be a bit too much, except for Edith Masey's crib from Pink Flamingoes):eek: :wink:
 

beaker

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>>>creating new characters that we may or may not ever see produced by Palisades (Pepe).Of those three categories, I expect well see plenty of the first one, a fair amount of the second one, but very few of the final set. The design of the characters makes it a little tough to create completely new ones, although there are some mighty talented customizers out there who I'm sure will rise to the challenge<<<

Youre looking at one of those talented customizers:wink: Ive been doing custom figures for 5 years(at first potf parodies, toy biz variants, but more recently ive done much more complex from scratch customs) Ive actually already began on plans for making a very authentic to palisades scale Pepe figure prototype(the kind that if i posted a scan of people would go 'when did Ken and his team make this?') As for variants, I was also planning on doing Matrix variants of Beaker and Bunsen soon. *ph33r the 1337ness*

Michael, thanx so much for this post, its great to see other custom enthusiasm out there, as the Lucas gestapo and others have sought to rid the net community of fellow rebel scum customizers^_^

And yes, its that final set, making authentic to line brand new characters thats my specialty:wink: but i also like the variant and spoof ideas as well.

Anybody here also a customizer or plan on making variants/customs of these?
 

GWGumby

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Are there resources for those who may be interested in customizing? I'm potentially interested--especially in creating unique character prototypes. I've seen Simpson variations on e-bay, both characters and playsets, and I'm amazed. I would be interested to know if there's a particular way to go about doing that.

I'm also interested in learning about ways to display figures. I've got quite a growing collection that are getting quite crowded on my shelves. I would like to be able to introduce things like levels to allow characters deeper on the shelf to be seen. I'm open to any other ideas people have of displaying their characters.
 

gags beasley

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I think it would be cool to have custom figures based on the Marty Feldman episode of The Muppet Show! One of my favoritest episodes ever. Can you picture it? The Swedish Chef as the Sultan ("Ali Booboo!") with little sword and a bottle of ketchup, Kermit as Sinbad the Surfer, and Fozzie as "Big Foz". :big_grin:
 

ResidentLilly

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I've been thinking about the Alladin Chef for a long time. Now THAT would be a funny figure...
 

Rufus

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I've got a couple Muppet characters in mind that I'd like to sculpt from scratch to go along with this line... one of which may never see the light of day from Palisades because apparently Henson won't allow it... :wink:

But I've got some other stuff I want to work on first, so it may be a while before I get around to doing another Muppet sculpture.

Super Sculpey is a good way to go for those who want to dabble or are just starting out in customizing/sculpting. It's relatively cheap and easy to get a hold of, and you can bake it in a normal oven to harden it. The downside is it's fragile when hard, like a ceramic. But it can be easily sanded and painted.

If you want to get more involved with it, you can try molding and casting you creation. This will allow you to create your final version in a more durable material like resin (a kind of plastic). It's a lot more complicated and messy and can be a pain in the butt, but you won't have to worry about it shattering.

I don't know if WOS accessories would fit in well with the Muppets, as they're so cartoony, and Muppet props were always just real-life objects. I like the idea of using doll accessories as has been brought up in other threads, and I may have to look into that to fill my Muppet playsets with more junk and props.

- R -
 

Gonzo

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I'm also a customizer--I did over 50 5" scale JLA figures (including Titans, Villains, etc) and I've done some Simpsons, some Star Wars, and I've customized a lot of Star Wars LEGO (a LOT--over 100 of those) and 641 Fisher Price Little People...

So I've been considering some Muppet Customs. The first may be a Princess Leia Piggy with a Dirth Nader Gonzo....of course, that will have to wait several months...

We'll see.

As far as making completely new characters, I would attempt some of the smaller ones, like Bean Bunny or Pepe, but I don't know if my sculpting skills are good enough to try much beyond that.

But I don't know until I try, eh?

Quinnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn
 
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