The piece arrived at the gallery with a few pieces that had fallen off during shipping, which luckily they were able to repair before the show. The piece sold online to a collector and when it arrived after being shipped again it was in pretty bad shape mainly due to the fact that the pieces simply weren’t reinforced correctly. That combined with the fact that there were a few of my own minor imperfections in the paint the piece was then sent back to me to repair, but by the time it arrived, the entire thing needed to be completed disassembled, repainted, and rebuilt in order to fully restore it.
I really didn’t feel very inspired to recreate the same exact toy again (honestly I don’t know how many of the popular customizers out there do multiple versions of the same toy without going crazy) but luckily the collector was okay with me changing the color scheme and design. After a long while the new and improved version ended up being a lot cooler and more refined then the original.
This incident forced me to start reinforcing nearly every piece on all of my following toys by drilling a hole in both the piece, and the toy, then placing a small metal bar to connect the two. This is a very time consuming process but it has proven to be absolutely necessary. Also this forced me to step up my packaging process using double boxing and other methods to ensure a safe arrival. It actually turned out to be a great learning experience.
Make sure to check out my recent feature on www.geekexchange.com if you’d like to get an inside look at what inspires me artistically, my design process, and my toy collection:
http://www.geekexchange.com/josh-mayhem-makes-awesome-custom-toys-with-old-gundam-kits-108977.html
