Step By Step Sculpt Part 06!

Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5,

Before I cook the clay for the second time I have decided that I want to do some work on the feet.

The first thing to do is bulk them out to get a reasonable idea of size. It is very easy to sculpt hands and feet out of scale, put in a lot of work and then realise that they are too large or too small, and have to scrap them. When working on 28mm wargames miniatures there is a bit more tolerance on this as many wargames figures have developed their own style which has led to heads, hand and feet being oversized quite a bit. When working on this larger scale miniature though it is very important that the whole figure is in proportion.

I plan to work on the soles of the boots later on (after baking), so I have just roughly built them.
Initially I started work on the left boot. Getting it basically boot shaped and building up the cuff around the ankle.

I was building the ankle part into quite an open style, however I wasn't very happy with that, so I will change it later.

Overall I am happy that it looks like a left boot, and is the correct scale for the figure.

I tightened up the cuff and brought it in around the ankle, then started work on the front detailing.

The clients drawing shows detail down the front of the boot that looks like a similar plate design to that on the figures left side and right shoulder. However, with the positioning and the small scale of the detail I am concerned that it looks like he has lace up boots. I don't feel that this is very in keeping with the high-tech design, so I may add a strap across the ankle later on. Also, I felt that the boot needed more of a definite division between it, and the trousers, so I am trying a rib around the top of the boot.

I didn't want to get to far ahead with the left boot without doing the right one. So I have started to build that one up too. I have found that while I add clay to the right foot I have caught the left foot once or twice with the sculpting tool. It is annoying to damage finished areas while working on other pieces close by, so I can see i am going to have to bake it soon...