Sculpting 1/24th scale figures

[Ray Dunakin]

Hi! I have a 1/24th scale outdoor model railroad, and everything but the track and rolling stock is scratchbuilt. Recently I've been sculpting scale figures based on friends and family members.

My newest one is of my brother Mark. I wanted to try a more interesting and natural pose this time, and I think it turned out pretty well. Here's one of the reference photos:




Here's the sculpture of Mark:




You can see all my figures at:

http://www.raydunakin.com/Site/IRR_Figures.html

[Jerry Barnes]

Amazing work Ray. I was an art teacher for 32 years and taught sculpture, but I have a heck of a time with these small figures. You have inspired me to try again!  JErry

[John McGuyer]

You really nailed him. Good job!

John

[lab-dad]

Very impressive!
I wish you had done this a year ago!
-Marty

[michael mott]

Wow Ray! that is a great representation. I wish I was able to to do that. That has a real sense of a real person sitting there, and not just a figure plonked down on the landscape.

regards Michael

[Ray Dunakin]

Thanks! After I shot those pics I decided the profile of the forehead wasn't quite right. Fortunately it was a simple matter to add a tiny bit of clay to correct the shape. That's what I love about this material, it's so easy to make alterations and do "fine tuning".

I recently bought a new loco, and am in the process of replacing the "coal" load with a scratch built oil bunker. When that's done I need to sculpt an engineer and fireman for it.

[Sean]

Ray your giving cjwalas some real compitition in the figure dept!

[Ken Hamilton]

Fantastic work, Ray.  Mediocore figures can ruin a perfectly good diorama.
Your scupting is fantastic and the colors are perfect.

How about a short "How-To"? 

[Ray Dunakin]

I wrote up a four part how-to for Garden Railways magazine a couple months ago. I've been told that the first part will appear in the December issue.

In the meantime, you could check out Chris Walas' figure making "classes" which are posted on myLargescale.com. That's what I learned from, and he goes into more depth. As far as technique goes, I only did a few small things differently.

I might put together something to post online. However it will have to wait until I get caught up on some other stuff, including recovering from a severe hard drive crash that wiped out a lot of my files.