Another Day Another Head Swop

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Ever since Jon sent me the first samples of the remastered New Israelis, I felt compelled to turn the the superb squad leader miniature in pack SG15-Z7 into a character along the lines of Sergeant Major Avery Johnson from HALO or Sgt. A. Apone from Aliens.

Another Glorious Day in the Corps

This mini took about half an hour. I used clippers to take the helmeted head off then carefully paired down the remaining metal - think of Paulie preparing the garlic in Goodfellas.

The character head I chose was from the original sprue of character heads Jon sent me. Too late, I found that the spigot attached to this head under the chin and not the neck. I'd already removed it from the sprue by this time and because the head is too small to hold and safely cut the remaining spigot away, I had to use a rat-tail file to trim it back sufficiently.

The head still sat too proud of the neckline - a common error in this type of conversion, so I used a semi-round rat-tail file to create a dip that would allow the head to sit more realistically. The finished figure will have a suitable collar round his neck created from Greenstuff, to tidy up the join and provide additional strength to the head.

Hope you like it. I'm seriously chuffed with how 'Sgt Major Johnson' has turned out and think it makes a very powerful miniature that will add character to the whole unit. Next New Israeli figure I fancy converting in this manner is the advancing Sniper from pack SG15-Z10. I think he'd look really mean with the separate head wearing vision enhancing goggles.

Cheers
Mark
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