Dr. Doom Sculpt

So I have been wanting a Doctor Doom costume for quite sometime and finally began the sculpt the other days. I began just blocking in the forms to get a good idea of how I wanted it to look as Doom has gone through several changes over the lifespan of the Marvel Character. I chose to go with the look based upon the Legendary Doom statue that really has him in some ornately crafted armor.

Here is the look I am basing it upon with certain changes to suit my own tastes.

So once again starting with the basic Plastelina clay easily accessible from Hobby Lobby thanks to their 40% off coupons!

As you can see its quite hideous at this point and looking more like five year old playing with clay than anything worthy of Doom. In the beginning its important to just get the rough shapes in because if you try and just carve out fine details and move on you will end up removing them as you have to constantly adjust something for scale or perspective. 

Once I had the Doom mask shapes in place it was time to start attempting some proportioning and symmetry for the mask. I haven't had more than a few hours to play off and on with the sculpt but its starting to look a little more recognizable as Doom. 

I plan on molding the face plate as one piece and the head seperate making a full head mask that the face can easily attach rare Earth magnets. I think the Dr. Doom mask and helm is a good fit for vacuum forming as its pretty smooth with little to no undercuts. Also making it from plastic will make it extremely lightweight and reproducible should anyone show interest in wanting one of their very own. As you can see from previous projects that the vacuum table is the direction I want to go with most if not all of my costuming choices. Thermoforming just really is fun and I look forward to seeing what I can pull from this.

Now I will really have to focus more on the key details getting the shape of the eyes correct and all the other little details. I believe any rivets will be added to the mask after casting to insure nice solid shapes to form over. If they don't get picked up well in testing I will then have to add them to the plastic mask as Doom requires rivets. Its always been a big part of his look.

So I got some more work done upon the mask and cowl. I finished the sculpt and coated it in Polygel 35 which is good stuff to use when you plan on pouring ultracal-30 casts, which I am. 

So here is a closer to finished pic of the sculpt. I forgot to take an end pic prior to molding but I coated it with Polygel 35 and then made a fiberglass support jacket for it. While this was curing I moved on to the cowl. In the pics above this looks less like metal and more of a leather or synthetic material.

I plan on making this from something like a flexible urethane rubber from Smooth On as I will want to move more comfortably since it is very close and molded to my head. 

DOOM!!!!

We have a Doom face plate! Or the makings of a potentially good one. I mixed up a batch of Ultracal-30 last night and poured it in to the mold and before long it hardened to in a very stout casting. The fiberglass mold jacket was a bear to remove so in hindsight you always want to make your silicone or in my case Polygel mold is as smooth as possible with no undercuts or areas it could potentially lock once the plaster expands while hardening. The mold and casting was successful and once I get to some touch up work with the Dremel smoothing out the planes and cleaning it up it will be a good base mask to add rivets and a solid paint job. I plan on carefully drilling through the eyes and mouth to increase suction for pulling the mask on the vacuum table.

Well I finally got some plastic and tested out the forms and table. I began with .04 ABS to test out the greaves and tried a .09 Styrene for the mask and pauldrons.

For test runs I think they came out pretty well. The plastic was a bit thick for the mask as I lost some detail but for pauldrons it was excellent. After some late night painting and sanding I think the first test run of the table was a success just in time for Free Comic Book Day.

So after the initial rush to get something created for Free Comic Book Day I have been doing the tedious work of sanding and working on the symmetry of the mask. Sand, sand, sand and make sure both sides match. The initial sculpt had several issues from the forehead half moon being far wider on the right side to the chin being lower on the left. I have been slowly fixing these issues to get a better looking mask. I also sanded the back evenly so it was no longer sitting at an angle when laying flat.

Also did several passes on the legs and arms to smooth them out as well.

Now off to make some elbows and knees.