Hairstyling a Lead Miniature

 I want to begin with the hobby of modifying lead miniatures, so I decided to change the hairstyle of a soldier that I had lying on my drawer.

This is my first attempt on this wonderful subject but I am pretty satisfied with the result.

Pictures were taken with a Pentax K10D with a Tamron 90 mm macro.

You just need a soldier with a hairstyle that you do not like and some epoxy resin.

Usually it is used a resin called ``Materia Verde'' (green stuff) here in Italy. It is a green epoxy resin, but it is very expensive so I decided to use a cheaper alternative.
This resin that I used is a resin that repairs metal objects.

The lead miniature is a Samurai Hero (Tatsu) from the old game Warzone, that is setted in the Mutant Chronicles universe.

The tools are really simple.

- A hobby knife.
- Some toothpicks.
- Latex gloves.
- Small Files.

You need to make room for the new hairstyle, so ``cut'' its hair. 

I used a hobby knife to cut the main part and a file to finish it.

Put you gloves on! It will stick to you fingers otherwise.

Cut a small slice from the stick of resin. If it is the first time you use it throw away the firs slice.
I did not do it and I had many small pieces of resin that did not mixed well.

Quickly mix the resin so it will have an even colour.
The kind that I brought gives you 5 minutes to shape it before hardening.
So remember: be quick!

A slice was too much for my purpose so I had to throw away a piece about 1 cm wide.
Next time I will cut the slice in smaller slices. Be careful, though, to cut it keeping the right proportions of the two components. I suggest to cut it like a pizza, with triangle slices.

I did not take pictures of this step because I had 5 minutes to finish the work, I am sorry.

Firstly I made a small ball and I pressed it on the top of the head.
The resin is sticky so I had some problems in doing that.
When it was attached on the lead, I smoothed the surface with the side of a toothpick.
To sculpt the hair I used the blade of the hobby knife.

Then I prepared a small cylinder to make a pony tail.
The resin was already hardening so I had to press it hard on the miniautre to stick it.
Then with the point of the toothpick I sculpted the hair.

 Now Tatsu has longer hair!
Being my first try it looks pretty good.

Now I have to paint it.

Unfortunately you can see the bits of unmixed resin that are still kind of soft.