ODDWORLD - GREETER

This was made a long time ago (2013), but it came together really quickly - mostly through luck. I've been mostly reluctant to post this as there is still ONE MORE THING I want to do to it, but I can just update when I get around to it!

THE BODY

All of my figures are scaled from a reference image, but overall size is just me pointing at a spot on a ruler... it's as scientific as that.

I searched around the town for a cylindrical object in the size that I wanted I actually found a waste paper bin in EXACTLY the size I wanted. It needed to be wider at the stop than the bottom by just the right amount... and it was - behold the bin of plenty...

The bin itself was 20mm too short though, but this was solved with an additional strip of styrene glued along the bottom.



To give that welded beading look, millput was added around the edge with sculpted detail added.

The smile was drawn on in pencil and holes were drilled to mount the lips. The big red lips are made from a length of red vacuum hose. It is secured on with threaded rod and a nut which pulls the hose towards the body.

a bit extreme?

The whole thing was then painted in some brown textured paint from Rustoleum. It's great stuff, has a good sandy texture to it and is really durable!

Gouges were added with a dremel tool into the surface. This combined with the textured paint created the good old water tank look that I needed!

THE LID

For the top of the greeter (which again was a lucky find) I used a saucepan lid which fit perfectly onto the top of my waste paper bin.

The handle was removed and the resulting hole filled. This was also painted with textured paint. To get those little raised elements you see there I beaded some super glue over the surface and let it dry. The lid was made of glass, so there was no way I was going to be carving into that with a dremel!

(Super secret radish fact - the handle from this lid later became the rear of the jet engine used in my Earthworm Jim build - check it out here!)

THE BOTTOM BIT

The bottom section of the greeter has 8 lights in it. This section was made with styrene wrapped around a plastic lid from something. Brass pieces (I forget what they are) where used to make sure the holes were circular.

Red LED's were mounted and soldered together, powered by a single 9V battery hidden inside the vast cavern that is the body. To stop the light shining through where I didn't want it to a ring of black styrene was added to the inside.

THE BACK

The pipework on the back was made from copper pipe. This was also given a light dash of textured paint.

THE WHEEL

The wheel is a plastic lawnmower wheel. Its design kind of matched the reference. The bits that hold it together were made from various pieces. The large curved section was made from styrene and filled with Milliput.

The wheel was then painted, with just a smattering of the textured paint. The whole thing is held together through a central threaded rod which everything screws onto. Washers and nuts hold the pieces in place.

THE SMILE

Cheeky...

I used this  reference material by AVEcotone to photoshop a smile which I could wrap around the body. The scale was worked out by laying paper over the body and tracing the shape I needed on to it. I then scanned the resulting shape and used it as a template to fit the smile in to.

Initially I had planned to apply this as a water-slide decal - but its size made it far too weak to position correctly or stay in place without bubbling or ripping. In the end I used a sheet of card stock which I coated in gloss sealer.

FINISHED!

Greeter is 20 inches tall, and around 9 inches at his widest point. He always has something to smile about.

Thanks for reading.