Desert Fox 6 W.D.

This is another commission vehicle. The customer asked for the vehicle to be "battle-weathered". He was extremely generous in providing advance payment, which exceeded what I thought the job was worth - so I plan to exceed his expectations, as well!

To begin with, I broke the whole vehicle down and removed the decals. The decal residue was cleaned off using Goo Gone and then all of the parts were washed with dish detergent and a toothbrush. While the parts were drying, I hopped online and sent an e-mail off to Ruben Jiminez, my normal source, asking him to ship me a set of Desert Fox decals.

Once everything was dry, I used an X-acto knife to trim down the foot pegs on the gun mount. They no longer look quite as tidy as the original mold did, but they now accommodate the foot holes for the modern era figures, so the customer will be able to pose those figures on it.

The next step was priming and painting the missiles, machine gun and gun mount. The missiles were done with flat OD green and were given details in yellow (these are the colors commonly used on High Explosive ordnance in the US military). The gun was done with a metallic "gunmetal" finish and the gun mount was done with OD green with a drybrushing of gunmetal to show wear on the paint.

While the spray-painted parts were drying, the entire vehicle was given the metaliic drybrush treatment. High-traffic areas where troops would be climbing in and out were also "scuffed up" to show where dirt, grime, sweat and other stuff adhered to the vehicle's paint. The pic to the right shows the vehicle as it was at this point.

TigerFish Conversion

This post documents the step-by-step process I used to convert a regular G.I. Joe DevilFish into a TigerFish. The vehicle was commissioned by a fellow HissTank member for his son and I hope the running post will allow him to share the process with his son. Here is a shot of all the various pieces, before work began:

And here is everything after the spray-painting was completed:

The next step will be painting all of the sculpted details on the upper and lower hull pieces!

















The buyer asked that I paint the torpedoes red to match the missiles, so I'll take care of that and the detailing of the twin cannons tomorrow. After these little things, I just have to wait on the stickers to arrive.













So the stickers finally arrived and I've got them all applied. I realized that I still haven't painted the torpedoes red, so I'll have to do that before I can apply the sealant.

Oktober Guard

My very first issue of the classic G.I. Joe comic was #6, which introduced the Oktober Guard. To this day, that is one of my all-time favorite Joe stories and the Oktober Guard have a special place in my heart. The recipes for these figures were blatantly stolen from the exquisite work of several different HissTank customizers - all I really did was assemble the parts and paint them.

Colonel Brekhov (Team Commander)

















Daina (Sniper)

















Horror Show (Anti-Armor)

















Stormavik (Naval Infantry)

















Dragonsky (Flame Weapons Specialist)

















Schrage (Machinegunner)


























The first time I saw the PoC VAMP, the color and aesthetic reminded me of something the Oktober Guard would have driven. When I started work on these guys, I set about obtaining a VAMP for them. The Oktober Guard logos are decals from CobraStickers.

Quarrel (Covert Operative)

Until recently, I never even knew that Action Force existed. While I still have no overwhelming love for them, I do seem to like new characters. This is a variation on the figure that will be offered by the G.I. Joe Collector's Club - same Scarlett figure repainted in Quarrel's colors, but I decided that I have enough Scarlett heads in my collection so I looked for something different. I thought that the Mrs Coulter head sculpt from the Golden Compass toy line looked sufficiently sophisticated to be a British covert operative.

Tomax & Xamot (Crimson Guard Commanders)

Today seems to have been a day of headswaps and minor repaints...

I did not have a modern era version of either of these guys and I never cared for the whole circus acrobat look they sported in the 80's, so I decided to make them a little more "tactical". This is just Tomax and Xamot's heads on a couple of Shock Trooper bodies. I painted the kneepads and belts with the colors from their original outfits to keep a little of the vintage look about them...

Kickstart (G.I. Joe Vehicle Specialist)

Kickstart was released during 2010 with the G.I. Joe Steel Marauder Mech. I have never liked mechs in my G.I. Joe world, but I always like new characters, so I simply re-designated Kickstart as a standard Motor Transport guy. The paint apps on the original figure sucked, so I touched them up a bit. Nothing too drastic, but there's really no reason to NOT paint the skin when it's quite obvious that it should have been.

Gnawgahyde (Dreadnok)

Gnawgahyde was never my favorite Dreadnok, but I had to get around to making him eventually. I decided to abandon the yellow vest and go with something a bit more practical. I think he looks a bit more realistic now...

Parts: Head (SDS), Hat & Rifle (PoC Recondo), Body & Vest (PoC Zartan), Bow & Quiver (PoC Shadow Tracker), Boars (Unknown).

Kay-Strike (G.I. Joe Demolitions Specialist)

This is my entry for the Mission Prospect Custom Contest Part II at Custom Figure Wars. Her name is Kay-Strike. She blows things up. She loves popsicles and cookies. Her vehicle is called "The Pinkinator".

Kwik Blast (G.I. Joe Urban Warfare Specialist)

This is my entry for the Mission Prospect Custom Contest Part II at Custom Figure Wars. His name is Kwik Blast and he is an urban warfare specialist. That means he is good at fighting in the city. His vehicle is called the Devastator.