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When I got hooked into 40k, one of the things that hooked me was the ease of conversions. A head swap here, and arm swap there, and oooo you made that little space marine sit on a toilet! neat! I desperately wanted to try my hand at interesting conversions, and i thought "hey! what better way than by learning to sculpt.

I went and got some greenstuff.

Things didn't go well for me at first. I felt like a 5 year old at kindergarten. there i was trying to make things smooth and hide the join line, and all I was getting was FAT sausages and FINGERPRINTS! well, back to the drawing board. if at first you don't succeed, ask google. There was some help there. nothing i could really work with though. Mostly it was people selling how-to vids or pics of finished products or wips.

I should'a just asked google for sculpting tools... but the ones that i already had weren't doing what i thought they should, and so i got frustrated and stopped.

If that's where it ended i wouldn't be here and you wouldn't be reading this.

The other day I was browsing Les's how to paint vids (thanks BTW Les, you have a fantastic radio voice) and i was surfing off them on youtube. I chanced upon a video of this guy sculpting a fantasy giant, like converting it. He was working so fast, and you could see the green stuff wasn't giving him any problems what-so-ever. It was like the tool was an extension of his mind, making the green stuff fluid and yet pose able. I knew I had found the key right away! In my haste to tell someone about my discovery, I lost the video.

But i remembered the tool.

I hope you enjoy

transcription in case the picts no work: so i went and bought me these babys. I got 5 for $40 can @ opus. these are paint shapers. this is the tip that i use most. $40 is too expensive and why waste it on a try when you could make it for cheap! get you a pencil with an eraser, or as in this case: just an eraser. cut you off a piece of that eraser in the shown manner then make another cut that will make your eraser into a workable point. here we see the tool beginning to take some shape. a little trim off the edges and woila! instant sculpting tool. try it out for yourself! the soft rubber eraser isn't so great for sculpting but a hard rubber eraser would be GREAT!

Cheap, and easy.

Not bad at all.

Excellent idea
will be good for jobs like you have illustrated but could be tricky getting to awkward places on a model

Know I am wondering if I can convert some of my knacked out old brushes to hold the eraser well enough to be able to apply some pressure.

Shaving an eraser to make an improvised clay shaper--neat!

you can get those clay shapers in black tips too, i think the black ones have a firmer tip.

those little green stuff monsters are hilarious, i love them!!

My paint shapers are identical to yours and I'm sure the set of 5 were under $25... here we go, from Dick Blick:

http://www.dickblick.com/products/colour-shapers-tools/

They now have a set of extra-firm. I can attest the frim tips are good, but I've always wished they were a little stiffer. New stocking stuffer for the man of the house...?

Yes, those paint shapers are wonderful. Over here, the set sells for less than 6 euros (10$) as I recall.
Stiffer ones? I'll have to check that out. And the eraser idea also looks interesting.

That one brand shown in the first post has three colors: white (color shaper soft), gray (medium) and black (clay shaper stiff).

Cool. Thanks for the tip.

Some times i forget that we live in a global economy. Thanks for the tips on the firmer shapers guys! I too feel that they may be a little soft. As far as price is concerned sometimes i forget to ask google if i can get a better price. 10 euros beats 40 dollars anyday.

i must repeat my mantra: if you don't know, ask google!

good tips I'll look into those clayshapers further. Thanks guys!!

This is awesome. I've got 0 GS tools and like 4 white erasers that are getting too dirty to use. Time for some tool-making. Thanks a bunch.

Cool, '' honey where is my eraser!!!''

Excellent idea, I'm going to try this out.