Blink ! They're Gone !!

I'm a bit behind on posting this here, but if you checked out Max Toy web site you would have seen them.. and know that they quickly sold out to Max Toy Club members and this morning to everyone else. There was such a rush to order them that the web store had a hiccup ... and not in a good way ;-( While a few of you I had to email and tell you your order did not go through, mostly I was able to cover the overage. Ah, it's not easy being a sofubi maker ;-P
Next up is Japan's Winter Wonderfest and I will post pics soon of our offerings, followed by a new colorway of Kaiju Negora in February. More soon ! MEOW !!!
Max Toy x Konatsu, Kaiju Negora ! Negora was designed by artist Konatsu who herself is a Cat lover .. and sculpted by Yoshihiko Makino of TTToys, Japan.

and of course the US debut of Lady Darkness !!! Cover the kids eyes ... ;-P




Lady Darkness stands 4 inches tall and so far the Face version seems more popular ... interesting.

Mecha Kaiju Dualos by artist Todd Robertson

Photos are great ... but there is still no substitute for seeing a piece of art in person or even holding it in your hand. That said the first time I laid eyes and hands on a Todd Robertson customized Kaiju I got that excited feeling inside that of late has been missing ... to back track a bit, I'm a long time collector of Japanese toys ... over 20 years now .. and lets just say it takes a lot to make me stand up and notice a new toy or artist. I get this feeling from Todd's work and his 2 newest creations .. while I don't have them in hand just yet ( but will in a matter of days will) ... I'm already getting excited about !!!

So the challenge this time was to customize two Max Toy Kaiju Dualos figures ..these were cast in clear vinyl with Mega Glitter. I've painted a few and the denseness of the glitter really makes it tough to paint .. plus you have to decide if you want to use opaque paint and cover the glitter ... on top of that I wondered what choices Todd would make in placing his mecha parts ... as you can see from the following photos Todd hit a home run on both !


This first one retains the Dualos look from the front. I like the color combinations he's using here, if you look closely there's a mix of opaque and transparent paints he's using ... but you can also see a hint of whats happening in the back...

.. as a tube and hose peek out ...

oh wow ! The mecha parts are laid out to perfection.. look at how the coils lead your eye to the tubes and hoses ...
In this example, Todd doesn't just pile on the mecha parts .. but carefully weaves a mechanical tapestry ... following the original arms and legs ....

but not so much as to totally lose the original sculpts. This is the key to Todd's technique and his talent.
Todd uses Monster Kolor paints .. and I know your sick of me saying this, but you really have to see stuff painted with Monster Kolor paint in person .. the glitter and color change effects are amazing... and the depth to the colors just don't come thru in photos.



Both of these one of a kind customs will be for sale via the Max Toy web store in a few days for $450.00 each. I can say without any doubt that both will be sold out very quickly. I'll tweet a brief heads up before they go live ( @maxtoyco )

Whoever buys these will be adding true works of art to their collections ! Todd's represented by Lot F Gallery in Boston, be sure and check out his additional work as well as his paintings too !

and last but not least .. this fantastic video showing a time lapse of Todd creating these art works !

Mecha Dualos Project - Todd Robertson from Lot F Gallery on Vimeo.

all pictures / video courtesy of Lot F Gallery / Todd Robertson
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Todd Robertson web site : http://www.mechavirus.com/
Lot F Gallery : www.lotFgallery.com

Upcoming Gallery Shows Mark Nagata / Max Toy

Somehow I've managed to break my New Years resolution of pulling back on work and saying "No" ... haha ! In my defense I do say "No" .. but i guess not enough to make me feel like I'm taking it easy .. as i am not. Oh well, it's all good and besides the challenge that each show or collab brings to the table .. i'm still having "Fun" and the Kaiju Train keeps moving along.

While most of the info in this blog has been posted via my Twitter feed ( @maxtoyco ) or on the Max Toy web site ( www.maxtoyco.com ) I thought I'd include two recent projects and some in process shots to go along with them.

First up we have Gara-Eyezon !!! This is for the upcoming show at FOE Gallery & store called Garamaniacal. A show as a homage to the classic Japanese monster character, Garamon.

I'm fond of taking my character Kaiju Eyezon and turning him into something else ... so this was a no brainer if you will. Once I got an invite to be in the show.. the image of Gara-Eyezon was in my mind and I knew what to do ;-P

I hallmark of Garamon are his many spikes .. while I could have gone crazy and made tons of them I decided for my sanity that less is more. I knew just sculpting them and gluing them onto the soft vinyl was not a good long term solution .. much too fragile ..
so i cut slots into the figure and inserted the cardboard spikes ...and epoxy glued them into place. Meanwhile, using Aves Apoxie Sculpt I begin roughing in the spikes over the cardboard.below, comparing my spikes to a far more masterful version .. ah well.. i try my best ...
To break up the sameness of the surface textures I dabbed on some acrylic sand texture onto the spikes.
I had sculpted a tail but after inserting it .. somehow was too small ... so i decided to re-sculpt it.below the newer version ..haha, bigger in this case is better, I think. Also longer toenails were sculpted too.
The biggest challange for me was to come up with a color scheme that did not over power my figure but still would move the eye around it and of course keep the Garamon red colors.
Using Monster Kolor paint I base coated the figure with red, gold and yellow.more spraying of black, white for eyes, and gold for the horns ... and a coating of Color Change coating ...
Finally, a nice coating of Glossy Clear Coat .. this is where the magic happens ! ;-P
I had to hold myself back from adding too many colors and such .. but over all i think a good color spray to compliment the added spikes and such .. while keeping the Garamon feeling.Next up, is this custom Kaiju Drazoran with kit bashed vinyl wings. The show is the Year of the Dragon show at Giant Robot 2 in Los Angeles. The theme is Dragons ( really ? ) .. and much like the Gara-Eyezon I instantly knew what I was going to do. Now to paint the Drazoran was easy but I thought he'd look more Dragon like with wings ..and after having sculpted wings from scratch for any Eyezon for Toy Karma 3, I decided best to look for wings somewhere .. and right by my foot was a beat up CCP Ghidorah figure .. with wings perfect for the job ;-P
Starting with black cast vinyl Drazoran ....

I carved out round holes in the vinyl to fit the wings .. a small amount of gap was left but not too bad ...I epoxied the wings and used Apoxie Sculpt once again to blend the areas around the wing base plus added some fins to the back.
above, base coated the figure with Monster Kolor black and carbon for a slight subtle change in darks..you can't see it in the pics .. but gives it a bit more depth ...

I laid in sliver over the whole figure and glazed in various c-thru colors, red, pink, orange, yellow, light blue ...
next few shots you can see how the piece is beginning to "Pop" .. as the various c-thru colors are layered in ...
Once the colors are done, i take the critter inside and hand paint the eyes, teeth and sign the foot. A coating of color change and ...It's subtle but if you look at the head I've added extra horns. Just a small touch to bring your eyes upward and plus adding to the custom nature of the piece.

The final step the Clear Coat .. and the figure is done ! My Dragon.. kinda a merge of Japanese monster Dragon and Western style ...!
So there you have my most recent gallery pieces ... you can contact the galleries for more info. I'm also in the middle of customizing many Kaiju Negora for my two person show with artist Konatsu in Tokyo March 31-April 1st, 2012. I'll report more as we get closer to that fun event and others in the works ;-P

Yes... i mean "NO" haha... I'm still working like a Kaiju madman !

Kaiju Negora Plush by Mariangela Tan

photo by angel tan

One of the benefits of producing toys is I get to work with far more talented artists than myself. Case in point, artist Mariangela ( Angel ) Tan who contacted me about Konatsu's Kaiju Negora figure. After checking out her work .. i had to ask if she would be willing to make a plush version of Negora for myself.

As you can see she said yes and the result is awesome !

I like the braided / camo patterns up the back are very cool touch ...
And how did she manage to get the teeth and paw pad details in there ?

While remaining faithful to the original Negora figure, there's just enough of Angel's design to make it unique. Sorry to say this was a one off and is mine ;-)
Will there be more ? I hope so, but have to clear it with Ms Konatsu, of course. Needless to say I'd love to do a Kaiju in this format too.
Check out more of Angel's work via her Flickr page here ! Many more amazing pieces ... really opened my eyes to the possibilities for all things plush !