View the complete finished gallery here!

Concept

I have finally done something I’ve wanted to do for a long time: make a custom figure with my own headsculpt! Orobus22 is an amazingly talented sculptor I have followed for a long time on Instagram. I decided to reach out and see if he would be open to a commission for my very own headsculpt. Thankfully he said yes. I was thrilled with the result and can’t recommend him enough. If you have any sculpting needs, send him a message and let him know Rex sent ya!

Once I received the incredible print-ready files from Orobus22, I built out supports and printed different sizes on my Elegoo Mars Pro 2. I decided to use the more 1:12 scale version as my go-to for this project. I sanded, primed and hand-painted the head sculpt and was feeling pretty good about it - but now I had to find a body!

I’m not a tiny man, so a normal action figure body wasn’t really going to cut it. That being said, I wanted something cool looking and imposing, and my first thought was Wrecker from Star Wars: The Bad Batch. He’s a big dude, and a bit more svelte than I, but close enough to an action-hero version of myself.

I did some Photoshop comps of what I might want to do for the figure, but I knew that I’d likely call many audibles once I started working.

Process

I started by completely disassembling my The Black Series Wrecker figure and sanding each piece. Using 400 grit sandpaper I got everything sanded, washed & scrubbed and ready to prime. I then primed every piece individually using Mr. Hobby Black Primer. After letting it dry and cure, I reassembled the figure.

For the two-tone look on the body armor, I did some masking and sprayed a base coat of metallic red and then a clear blue overspray to get a dark metallic purple. The shoulder armor was partially sprayed with silver to give it a gradient look from silver to black.

I used Tamiya masking tape to tape off some designs on the different pieces and sprayed those silver. For the leg I painted over the silver with fluorescent magenta (hot pink) in several layers and for the knee on that leg I did some clear blue overspray. This gave some cool contrasting angles and colors. I did some similar work on the sword sheathe; started silver and brushed-on color to masked off areas.

After all the main colors were painted, I added a bunch of waterslide decals to different parts of the armor and accessories. I had previously created a lot of decals in Photoshop for my Acid Rain figures, and they were general enough to feel at home for the cyberpunk space mercenary I was going for her. I applied them in various areas and let them set and dry.

From there it was time to do the majority of detail painting and weathering. Most of the painting was done via a drybrushing method. I drybrushed metallic teal and metallic purple onto many of the different pieces and sections (including the accessories) to create an iridescent / pearlescent look. I think this actually worked really well! I was surprised I was able to get such organic looking color shifting with drybrushing, and I’m very happy with the result. In addition to the drybrushing, I also painted on a lot of small details like spot colors, scratches, rust, dents, splotches and more. I use torn up foam to stamp on different shades of silver and gunmetal weathering onto different parts of the pieces.

The penultimate step was using the Tamiya Weathering pigments to give some weathering consistency to the entire figure and its accessories. Using foam makeup applicators, I added pigment powder to emulate things like soot, oil stains, rust, oxidizing and more. This was done all over.

Finally, I sprayed the figure with Mr. Hobby matte clear coat. This was done with several thin coats from different angles to maximize coverage. I let it dry/cure, and voila! All done! The final small piece I did was cut some small felt and placed it on the inside of the helmet so it would not scratch any of the headsculpt’s paint off. Most of the time he’ll be holding his helmet, but I wanted to be safe just in case.

Conclusion

And that’s that! My very own REXXER figure. It feels really neat to have such a personalized piece in my collection. And honestly, I can throw this head on a lot of different figures and get a kick out of it. Painting this figure was mainly just an exercise in using a bunch of different techniques and trying something completely unique and getting creative. Sometimes it’s nice not basing work on a specific thing and just going for it! Remember to have fun.

Tools and Materials

Oh, and because people often ask me about the tools and materials I use- I am going to list damn near everything I used on this project in explicit detail. I won’t be covering any of the 3D printing info, as that is a whole different beast.

Please note that while I’ve provided Amazon links, many of these items (especially Vallejo, Tamiya and Mr. Hobby) can be found in hobby or model shops locally for much lower prices. I’m just including Amazon links so you can see them.