custom mighty mugg: ryan frye

Created for a friend who's face needs to be on everything, the handsome devil.

start with a good sketch

Knowing ahead of time that I was going more detailed with this paint job, I made sure to sketch in every facial variation I wanted to paint in. This makes painting on a 3D surface much simpler in a paint-by-numbers sort of way. The pencil outlines are easy to erase and redo if you step back and notice facial distortions. Paint is more difficult to adjust.

Painting the figure

Blank Mighty Muggs provide a whole lot of space to paint in all the details necessary to really capture a face.

Acrylic paints were applied over a Krylon base coat. I wound up regretting the Krylon base coat. One challenge with the Mighty Muggs is that water based paints tend to bead if you paint directly onto the rubber. While Krylon solved that problem, it created a new (and arguably more disastrous) problem of sticking to my fingers and creating unsightly "potholes" if I handled the fig.

Boxed and ready to go

After the figure and custom accessories were complete, a custom box was created using a digital painting of the figure and a photoshop template, and once printed, folded, and fitted with a clear window, the Ryan figure was inserted and complete.