She stands on my paint table taunting me... finish me... finish me...

Back in the '80s... Yes, the 80s was when I started on this figure. I adjusted the figure's left wrist so the rifle would be held straight up by cutting into it from below and bending the hand upward. I filled the gap with epoxy putty.

On into the '90s... I detached the sword hilts from the scabbard so I could make the sword removable. This meant scratchbuilding a blade from sheet styrene.

I replaced the poorly formed rifle chamber handle with an epoxy ball and short piece of styrene rod.

I'm sculpting a fox squirrel (Teto) figure which will stand on Nausicaa's shoulder.

2/26/07 - Added triangular metal loops to the rifle for the strap it will eventually have. The rifle's paintjob is hand-brushed Metallizer gunmetal and steel, and Model Master leather for the grip.

4/25/2010 - There's been some progress - painted in her eyes' irises and pupils, finally. And, it sure would've been nice if I'd kept notes - or could find the notes - on the shades of blue I used to paint her.  and more - now she has eyelashes.

5/2/2010 - Did a bit more work on the short sword and Teto sculpt. I painted brass and steel metallizer on the sword hilts and superglued in pieces of red styrene taillight for the cabochon in the hilt. Teto is an epoxy putty sculpt. The basic shape is roughed out so far. And I started work on the base she'll be standing on.

9/26/2010 - Shading... blue, brown, black, and white chalk

10/1/2010 - More base work. I glued some thin balsa shims to this block of wood so the figure stands up straight. I slathered a coat of Liquitex Gesso over the wood and then sifted on a coat of dry Durham water putty. When that dried I brushed away the excess and mixed a batch of thick putty to coat the base. I stood the figure (with plastic wrap booties) in the wet putty to make impressions for her feet and rifle butt.

10/2-3/2010 - I finished up the weapons by adding thin leather straps for the rifle, sword sheath, and belt pouch. The pouch loop will also hold the sword. Small nailheads or red styrene tail lights became the rivets for the sheat and rifle straps. I secured everything with 5-minute epoxy. But, I ended up needing something more flexible for the pouch, so that's adhered to the loop with E-6000 contact adhesive.

And I realized I hadn't attached the "dog ear" flaps on her hood. I flattened some aluminum tubing to use as a tab for the flaps and bored some holes in the sides of the hood. I epoxied the flaps in place and puttied around them with Apoxie sculpt.

The rest of the work was paint touchup and then the final mount up on the water putty base.