Ban Luca: Attaching the Cape

 I continued on Ban Luca today, getting her cape prepped and in place. This involved shaping the cap by trimming the top edge a bit, then adjusting the shape of the whole thing by putting it in hot water for a few seconds, then bending it into the shape I wanted. Once I had a fit I was happy with, I primed the cloak and painted the inside dark blue. Then I glued it in place and puttied the gaps. Next time, I can paint it.

I didn't shade the areas under the cloak at all before I attached it. They're not going to be visible anyway, so I'm not too concerned about it.

Ban Luca: Boots, armor

 I got a base coat on Ban-Luca's boots and armor today.

It took a while because the base coat for the armor took four coats - two of the green undercoat, and two of the bronze.

Probably the next step will be to try to reshape her skirt thing and decide if I'm going to use it or not. It'll make a big difference on how/if I shade the back.

Ban-Luca: Leggings, Tunic

 I got in a little work on Ban-Luca today. I did her leggings, and base coated her tunic. Was hoping to get a little farther, but this was it.

Ban-Luca, skin, hair. Tower.

Today I switched to Ban-Luca. I finished her skin and face, and did her hair as well. Then I remembered that I needed to prep the bits that need to be pinned on, so I did that.

I also started work on my second clock tower. I cut bricks last weekend. Today I put together the inner support and started gluing the bricks on.

I am making the bottom section of the tower a little larger. I also used my new tabletop hot wire cutter to make the bricks, which gave me more consistently sized bricks. Put together, they are both a good and bad thing. The more consistent sizing is nice, but between that and the different tower size, getting the bricks to line up right is more of a challenge. With the last tower, I had a wide variety of brick lengths to use to line up correctly. It was just a matter of finding the right set of bricks for each row. With the more consistently sized bricks, there aren't as many options. With the larger tower, the bricks aren't quite the right lengths to get around the base without adding in some small chunks, as you can see in the picture. Even with that, I've got some vertical seams that are too close together. So, this stage is turning out to be a little more fiddly than the last one. I didn't do anything specific to get the bricks sized to line up on the last tower; I just got lucky.

Jack: Jacket, Shirt

 I was busy with other things for much of the day today, but I did get in a little work on Jack. I changed his jacket and lapels to the same very, very dark blue (it's blue, I promise). When I bring in highlights, it'll read more blue and more saturated, don't worry. I also started base coating his shirt and ruffle. Took a couple tries to get a color I liked. I'm overall happier with his direction now, though I still have doubts. But he looks less like he's going to be a circus ringleader of some kind. :p

Jack: Jacket

 I started laying in base colors on Jack's jacket today, and immediately entered 'doubt your creative choices' phase with this figure.

I dunno, I think I want to go darker with the blue. I'm not sure what to do with the border on the collar (the skull buttons will be silver). 

Jack: Freckles, Hair

 I gave Jack his freckles, which I think has helped with giving him some depth. I also got shading and highlighting on his hair. I think it still needs some work, probably. I was being pretty fast and loose with the highlights, and also overdid the shadows. I started them with brown, which was fine, decided I wanted to get a cool tone in there, so went over them with a heavy glaze of dark purple, which was...too dark. I knocked it back with another heavy glaze of the base color, but I think it might still be too much. It's hard to tell; I might be getting to a point where I need to start roughing in other colors to see how it will all go together.