For this concept art Insider, I’ll be discussing the development process on the new MiniCrate model Mrs. Walls, the bonus seventh model you receive with a VIP subscription.

The idea with this was to create a female version of Mr. Walls, the Quartermaster, in full pirate-themed regalia, so with that in mind, Andrea Uderzo got to work.

In his first batch of sketches, I liked the following elements:

– Corset from #1/2

– Pants from #2/3 (with the buckles shoes)

– Coat #1/3 

In addition to those choices I had additional notes:

• Pistols are going to need to get a lot bigger, and I’d change the holstered pistols area to a single sling holster, having it cross over the chest. Reduce the number of pistols to 4 total, including the ones in her hands. 
• Unless she comes up in size, that monkey is going to be really small, and his details won’t read well. How can we make that work?
• Remove the crossed straps on the chest area. Hooks and strings on corset are too small.
• We’ll need to increase the size of the buttons on the cuffs in miniature by double. 

Will Shick liked all the elements from number four, and Matt liked my choices as well, with the caveats that he also liked the long coat and pose from number four. He also suggested that since I was cutting down the number of pistols, we should give the monkey a gun.

Well, we all know how that turns out in other pop culture places, but it was a great idea just the same, so we ran with it. I sent Andrea the compiled notes and some additional suggestions on the pose to make it a little more powerful. I liked the barrel idea quite a bit, but from a material cost and part-count angle, it just wouldn’t work, and the other proposed poses weren’t working for me. We hadn’t firmly decided on a final when Andrea sent me the following sketch:

This was solid. The one note I had here was that I would like her wrists/hands positioned so she has positive control of the pistols, as she looked like someone that doesn’t know how to handle a firearm. So, with that in mind, Andrea sent me back a proposed final:

Now this was much more like what I had in mind! She looks as if she would mess you up and clear a deck all by herself…with the aid of her armed monkey, of course.

After talking with production, we adjusted several elements to make the model more miniature-friendly. I made adjustments on my end and sent them to Andrea. He then polished the changes up and this lead us to the final line art.

The only thing left to do now was to copy Mr. Walls paint scheme and the concept was complete!

I hope you’ve enjoyed this glimpse behind the concept art process for Mrs. Walls. In order to get this model, you’ll need to be a VIP subscriber to MiniCrate, so if you aren’t already a subscriber, now’s the time to rectify that! Head on over to www.mini-crate.com to sign up and then post photos of your paint schemes online for Mrs. Walls or any of the MiniCrate exclusives!