I had this Batman figure from the 2003 Mattel line lying around, and while it was not as crazily coloured or decorated as some other figures in the line, some things seemed out of place. I was toying with making a figure based on Batman's new look from the Batman Incorporated comics, but ultimately decided to go with my own design. I had previously sketched a Batsuit redesign (which you can see below) and this figure is partially based off that.

First I cut off the...things that were attached to his belt. Always thought those looked odd. Then I repainted the main body grey, leaving the Bat-symbol unchanged, and the cowl, gauntlets and boots got repainted black. I sculpted individual pouches for his utility belt out of DAS air-drying clay and then glued them to the pared-down belt. I'm quite nervous about how the pouches look, since they are completely from scratch.

I then added his armour, which was sheets of clay imprinted with a pattern. I was looking around the house for something to make a cross-hatch kind of pattern, and found a metal pencil holder that did the trick. There are sections of armour plating for his shoulders, abdomen, ribs, codpiece and hands. I also created some piping down the front of his boots with the clay. The main problem with this custom are the thighs. I had wanted to cover them with the imprinted clay armour similar to the other sections, but it ended up looking way too bulky. I couldn't totally remove the clay because it was stuck on with superglue, so I was left with an uneven residue. I smoothed that out best as I could and painted it black too.

It may look bad, but I'm quite happy with this one as I got the concept to work. Kind of.