MOC: Younger Balin

 After a four-month break, here's another dwarf. Surprised? Didn't think so.

Balin is my favourite character in Hobbit movies, so I though he deserved another version. This one is the Erebor version from the flashback of the first film, An Unexpected Journey. Balin has the most beautiful coats in these so well-tailored films, and this one began a couple of months ago with fiddling with those cloack details. They came out rather nicely. This is the first time I used those old 1x16 net plates on a MOC (or at least MOC posted online). There were some fences at first, but those were quite perfect, showing the dark orange behind them, enhancing the rich color scheme. I think it is a nice example of wealth and glory of Erebor at its peak.

The torso construction otherwise is quite basic, using most of my dark red slopes again (keep in mind that regular Balin, Dori and Thráin are still in one piece). There are some obligatory SNOT and  offset techniques used but nothing too special.

The arms have quite nice range of motion using minifig legs on elbows and small ball joints on shoulders. I'm especially happy with the upper arm details using those ninja knives, whatever they are called. The gloves ended up being dark bley. I wasn't sure about the color, it could have been dark brown instead, but I wouldn't have had right pieces in that shade. The grey ones look quite good with the beard, though.

I'm happy with the head and the hair (both facial and ordinary). I'm not that happy with the beard and face of my older Balin MOC though, but haven't remade it yet because it's sort of the first thing I build for the whole Hobbit thing, as a bust form in 2012. The tail/robot arm beard is, sort of, the genesis of this thing. But heck, I tried a curved slope design with better nose and man it looks more natural. We will see. This one, though, has a lot winder hair with a bead on back. Well done, that dwarf.

 The boots were the last part to be build, as usual. They are built studs up though, instead of whole SNOT design used in pretty much all other dwarf boots except Ori's. The design is similar to older Balin's boots with curled-up toes. I have a bit similar leather boots I use at winter; My grandfather bought them years ago. Family heritage!

This, along with Thráin, is for another bigger project (but still smaller than the original; Don't expect 15 figures this time). It'll wait until I receive this year's LUGBULK pieces, though. Until then, there might be some other dwarves though. I like these fellows, as you probably already guessed.

- Eero