Are you a fan of G.I. Joe custom figures? Do you like making customs or just looking at them? Regardless of your thoughts on the customizing community and the wonderful product they turn out on a regular basis, you need to hit up JoeCustoms.com and check out their seventh annual Custom Celebration!
Customizer interviews, custom showcases, and nominations for the JCA awards are all hitting the site throughout this week.
Don’t feel left out, go hit up JoeCustoms.com to join in the Custom Celebration!
As folks who have been paying attention probably know, I’ve been actively working on my next Dio-Story for several months at this p0int. I even documented some of the set building process in my “Behind the Curtain” series for this Dio-Story. I was feeling really good about how things were coming along and anticipated having much of the filming done at this point and ready to hopefully launch the dio-story by the end of the year.
Then the house move came about… and I haven’t mentioned this to too many folks yet, but in the process of moving, the load in the U Haul truck shifted, and almost all of my constructed dio sets were destroyed. My Cobra Temple awesomely constructed by Eric “Capolan” Vaughn? Crushed. The Cobra Commander throne room so crucial to the climax of the story? Done.
It was pretty depressing.
But I’m determined to continue moving forward on this, and as part of that, I’m reconstructing the interior to the Cobra Temple, going in a slightly different direction. Capolan’s Temple set was fantastic. I absolutely loved it, and it served me great, but as the story of Darkness Falls has evolved in my head, I needed a little bit more size and scope, so I started from scratch to rebuild the internal lobby of the temple. Yes, this means there will likely be some design differences and inconsistencies throughout the scope of the story, but I’m hoping some suspension of disbelief will allow folks to overlook that and just appreciate the story.
To give folks a bit of a taste of this new Cobra Interior, I documented the process, which will hopefully give people something to hold them over until Darkness Falls launches. Though that launch probably won’t happen until next year at this point. Click the “Read the Rest of the Story” link below to check out the process of constructing this new Cobra Temple interior.
I don’t think the pictures even do this thing justice…. I talked about Assembly Required from the Codename: Iowa guys last week, and one of the showcases of that even was, without a doubt, the diorama by customizer/genius AVAC. He’s famous for his HISS Tank themed and construction vehicle themed customs, but this diorama set totally goes above and beyond. It’s simply spectacular.
These images were featured on HissTank.com, and the video was shared by the Codename: Iowa Facebook page that really shows the size, scale, and scope of this amazing diorama.
All I can say is I wanna play with this thing! Just imagine the dio-story potential here… wow.
Check out the images and the embedded video below. I think this qualifies as a Kick Ass Custom, to be sure.
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Don’t forget you can also hit up the Codename: Iowa Goodsmiths store and pick up some of the great exclusive pieces they had for sale at the show.
Poor Gary has been trying for over 90 episodes (including Special Editions) to try and track down Marauder John and get him on the show, and he finally made it happen. Marauder “Gun Runners” is one of those companies that has been around for a long time in Internet years, and it’s hard to remember a time before they existed, but we talk to John about what got him started down this path and some of his collecting origins.
It was a fascinating discussion with a guy who has had a huge influence on the hobby through his weapons store, and even though I’ve talked to him a number of times over the past many years, it was great to “get together” with him again and talk. Any Joe fan will gain a wealth of knowledge from him, and on your next order mention that you heard him on the Podcast! He’ll throw in a free weapon for ya! And of course we want to encourage everyone to visit the Marauder “Gun Runners” Kickstarter as well to help fund the next series of weapons. It’s an awesome project with some awesome potential results, and worth contributing to for sure. Click here to contribute.
But that’s not all…the entire show was chock full of Joe news and discussion as it always is, and I had to leave early, so you even miss the GeneralsJoes corporate influence. Click on the embedded players below and Show Notes are after the jump.
Judging from all of the comments and requests I get, it seems like G.I. Joe fans are still very big fans of the dio-story concept. While my own time is too short at the moment still to produce one of these bad boys, that hasn’t stopped friend of GeneralsJoes Nas from doing his own thing.
Over on Gigamach Productions, Nas has produced a new Dio-Story that is showing some serious promise. He was kind enough to send me a printed copy he made up for ComicCon, but he’s got it all hosted online as well, and it’s definitely worth checking out.
Click on over to Gigamach Productions and take a peek. I can’t wait to see more.
Flash over at the TS118 site let me know about this a few days ago, but I was a bit lax in getting the “heads up” posted, but the awesome guys from TS118 are showcasing their incredible diorama and customizing skills at the 11th Philippine ToyCon! The below info was a heads up from Flash about this event:
“Back in October 2007, TS118 celebrated the 25th anniversary of the GI Joe 3.75 line in Robinson’s Galleria in Manila, Philippines. 5 years after, the group is back STRONG-er than ever with a display area sponsored by Solar UIP (local movie outfit who will show GI Joe Retaliation in the Philippines). Despite the Joe movie being pushed back to next year, the spirits of the true GI Joe fans from TS118 are not dampened, and instead, we are SPEARHEADING the celebration of the 30th anniversary of the 3.75 GI Joe line by participating and displaying a large collection of GI Joe memorabilia in the 11th Philippine Toy Convention in SM Megamall Megatrade Hall (5th level).
As part of the display, the group will showcase figures from all 3.75” scale versions (ARAH, 25A/30A, Valor Vs Venom, DTC, Spytroops, etc), Sigma 6, the original 12” line (1964-onwards), Sideshow Collectibles, 5 mini-dioramas, and for the centerpiece, the largest playset ever created in 3.75” scale and considered by many as the Holy Grail of GI Joe collectors, the vintage USS Flagg (never been in public display in the Philippines for the last 20-plus years).
The event will be during the weekend of June 15-17, 2012, and TS118 will be there in full force, wearing our latest TS118 blue t-shirts as homage to the GI Joe navy.”
