FINAL FANTASY IV
IRONMAN PROJECT #618 CREATED: JANUARY 2019 Unlike some superheroes who call themselves Iron Man, the Ironman of Final Fantasy IV fame was a metallic monster constructed entirely of ferrous alloys. It patrolled the lower chambers of the Tower of Bab-il, awaiting unsuspecting explorers to tumble through the pitfall to the lower level. It was sometimes accompanied by a BladeMan, who no doubt replied on the relative safety of the metal golem. The Ironman was extremely strong and could endure tremendous physical punishment—and, unlike the Staleman, did not share its cousin's weakness to cold temperatures. When struck at the proper angle, a shard of the Ironman could break off and could be fashioned into a makeshift Silver knife, which could be equipped as a weapon or sold off for a tidy profit. (In the Game Boy Advance remake of Final Fantasy IV, the Ironman was renamed Mythril Golem.) I built the Ironman (as well as his brothers, the Stoneman and Staleman) out of a Stone Biter action figure from the 2003 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles toy line. The biggest changes I was required to make were to sculpt new fingers and toes for him, as well as fashion a more humanoid head that was faceted as if it had been carved from stone. Sculpitng the head was not an easy task. I went through a number of rejected prototypes until I settled on something I was truly happy with. For his paint job, I went with a cel-shaded look to try to make him look as metallic and shiny as possible. The designers for the 16-bit version of the game actually used grey to represent shadows on the otherwise greenish-blue colored monster. I actually tried that on my three-dimensional project, but it didn't look right to my eyes at all. I went with a dark green color instead, despite not being quite as authentic to the original game sprite. |
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