Abra Kadabra:  I took a little license with Abra Kadabra here.  I was going for the middle ground between his appearances… I didn’t want the bald version and I definitely wanted him to have his cape.  Alternate the black and white and you really can’t go wrong with Kadabra.  The mustache, goatee, and spit curl are all made from magic sculp as are his magic elf boots.  The cape is my usual fabric with wire in the hem for poseability.  The figure itself is a repaint of Dr Strange from the Animated Spider-man series.

Captain Boomerang:  I had the most difficult time coming up with a recipe that I liked for this guy.  I had done just about all of the other Flash Rogues and not having Captain Boomerang was like having a bunch of Batman villains but no Riddler.  The body came from a Chameleon from the Animated Spider-man series.  The head is from one of the earlier Banshee figures.  The sideburns and hat were sculpted from kneadatite.  The boomerangs and gloves are magic sculpt.  His shin guards and bag were sculpted from plumbers epoxy putty.  The scarf is hand sewn with wire in it for that wind-blown look.  His belt buckle is thin styrene and glued to an elastic belt.  The boomerangs on his torso were created in a CAD program and decoupaged in place.  The boomerangs on the bottom of his shirt were painted with fabric paint and stenciled on through a masking taping stencil.  I love the way this guy turned out.

Captain Cold:  Once I started doing the Flash’s Rogues, I couldn’t stop myself.  I’ve seen animated versions, 6”, 9” and 12” versions done really well… and quite a few Total Justice types too (was never much of a fan of that style), but in all my skimming of custom sites, I didn’t come across too many 5” Toy Biz style customs.  Here is Captain Cold.  The base figure is a highly modified Web Splashers Namor with a goofy grin Morph head.  I added waist articulation and sculpted some loose fitting garments with plumber’s epoxy putty.  The hood and goggles were made from magic sculpt.  His gun and holster were slapped together with sculpey, kneadatite and liquid epoxy.  Cotton balls were used to simulate the fur on his coat.  Elastic was used for his tie.  The shawl part of his coat is just cut fabric that I treated with crazy glue to keep it from shredding.

Doctor Alchemy:  Remind me never to paint stripes again.  I had the hardest time getting the pinstripes on this one… Finally I settled on the technical markers, but this was after much trial and error.  The legs came from a Jack-O-Lantern figure.  I joined these with the torso and arms from a Resident Evil Chris Redfield.  The head is a left over MMW X-Man with the cowl/hood from a Swarm figure.  I sculpted the tie on his hood from magic sculpt.  Elastic was used for the belt and pouch and the bottom of this shirt is sewn to his belt.  The pinstripes on his lower shirt were originally done with needle point, but I scrapped that and redid them with fabric paint.  This figure was probably the biggest pain in the butt figure I’ve produced… but how can you not like the “pull my finger” version of Dr. Alchemy?

Heat Wave:  Couldn’t do a Captain Cold and not do a Heatwave, right?  The irony here is that Heat Wave was made using a Blizzard figure from the Iron Man Series.  The head is from an Astral Professor X.  The goggles and ear covers were made from magic sculpt.  His shoulder pads are plumber’s epoxy putty.  The holster came from a Spider Trap Red Skull and is glued to a piece of elastic that is hidden by his shoulder pad and goes up over his shoulder and is held in place with a snap that I seated into his back.  I inserted a cut paper clip into the barrel of the gun and sculpted the flames around it from magic sculpt.  The belt and pouches are elastic.

Mirror Master:  The arms and torso are from a Michael Keaton Bruce Wayne figure (from the second movie I guess).  I added this to the legs from an Astral Professor X.  The waist is still articulated too.  The head came from an Atom from the Total Justice/Justice League line.  His bracers and neck armor (for lack of a better term) were sculpted from magic sculpt.  His belt is cured acrylic paint glued to elastic.  The holster came from a Punisher figure (he wasn’t using it).  The mirror was created from magic sculpt with some thin silver beading material glued to it.  Does anybody else dislike painting orange hued colors?  Even with a white primer coat I had to have about 7 layers of orange before it started looking right.

Pied Piper:  The Pied Piper was just too goofy not to make… and he just shined his belt buckle too.  The body is from a George Clooney Bruce Wayne.  I added waist articulation… mainly because the base is just too stiff.  The head is the Michael Keaton Bruce Wayne that was left over from my Mirror Master custom.  I disabled the “quick change” mechanism while I was adding the waist articulation and added some epoxy putty for a more shirt look on his torso (I mean really now… who wants a “ripped” Pied Piper?).  His pixie boots and collar were sculpted from magic sculp and his hat is good ole kneadatite.  The circles on his torso were punched out with paper punchers and decoupaged in place.  The bottom part of his shirt is fabric that is sewn to his belt.  His “pipe” was made from kneadatite.

Rainbow Raider:  Remind me never to paint stripes again.  What can I say?  Lame villains really appeal to me as a customizer.  Raider here was made with a Pyro torso and head joined to Sunspot legs.  Some sanding and smoothing was done in certain areas and Magic Sculpt was used to fill other areas.  I wish I had more to say about this custom given the amount of time I spent trying to get all of his rainbows looking presentable, but I don’t.

The Top:  Remind me never to do stripes again.  The Top here is mostly a light-up Gambit.  The arms came from a Jack-O-Lantern with hands from an old Bruce Wayne/Mission Masters.  The head is a Cable that was epoxied to the neck of the Gambit figure.  The neck retains its articulation and I added waist articulation to the Gambit figure.  I painted the entire figure from the neck down yellow and then masked the areas that are now stripes with tape and painted the green over it.  There was still some bleeding, and touching up the stripes took forever.  Sometimes I wish I had done more stripes on this one, but when it was all said and done, I’m glad I didn’t.  I’d probably still be painting him to this day.

Trickster:  GI Joe head on a Gambit torso.  The torso was joined to the legs from a Bishop II figure.  I should have made him a rubber chicken accessory, but I didn’t.  I figured out a way to beat the stripes on this figure.  Two words… electrical tape.  The jacket made the assembly of this one was a little tricky, but I like the way it turned out.

Weather Wizard:  I knew the success or failure of this one was going to come down to his collar.  Better customizers than me have tried to make this type of collar with random results.  I’ve seen index cards used; toothpaste tube, sculpting and all sorts of solutions.  I brainstormed for nearly two weeks and nothing was looking right.  Then I said, “Wait a minute.  I’m minesurfer.  I’m the one who uses goofy fabric on 5” scale bases.”  So I used fabric with wire sewn into it for stability.  The rest of the figure was sticking a Sunspot head on a Morph body.  I puffed the sleeves out with some magic sculpt and de-emphasized some of his original sculpt as well.  You’d think the paint job on this one would be easy, but it turned out to be a chore.  The belt is the usual elastic.

Professor Zoom:  This custom represents one of the reasons I got into customizing in the first place.  One of my very first attempts at customizing was trying to repaint a JL/Total Justice Flash into a Reverse Flash.  Horrible failure that it was… but you learn, you grow, or you give up.  I learned about primer… I learned about epoxy… I learned about white primer before bright colors… but I never gave up.  When it was time to retry making the Reverse Flash the custom came down to doing the figure I wanted versus making it “appearance accurate”.  Given the base (X-Men Classic Set Angel)… the custom really wanted to be an older version of Zoom.  But I wanted something a little more visual on my shelf… and I liked the more modern dark eyed version.  I also wanted his chest emblem to be reversed also.  The ear wings are Magic Sculpt molded around wire.  A lot of filling and sanding of details was involved… the wing mechanism was removed… and Captain America ear wings were epoxied to the boot tops.  I chose this figure, not only because of how it lent itself to the running pose… but also because I happened to have a few laying around and not much else use for them.  I probably could have smoothed some details out on this one… but he was the last to make it into the Con… and I’m taking a break for a couple months or so.  I know, I know… I said earlier that I didn’t want to show customs that I didn’t do my best on, but sometimes a B or B+ is good enough or else mental health starts slipping.  I need some time to rekindle the customizing juices.  Think I’ll read a couple books or so, maybe play some video games.