How to Make Resin Statues, Why It So Expensive

How are resin statues made? you must be curious to know the answer, resin statues are wonderful and attract attention, but many people do not know how to make resin statues, because the resin statues sold on the market are usually produced only in toy factories.

What is Resin Statue

In the art toys industry, a resin statue is a kind of high-precision, small-sized handicraft made from anime, movie, and game characters, its excellent details, and perfect colors make the characters behave realistically, which can richly express character features. The resin statue is a high-end collector’s figurine loved by art toy fans and artists.

What are Resin Statues Made of

Resin statues are mainly made of two types of resin materials, Polyurethane(PU) and Polystone, both of which have advantages and disadvantages.

polyurethane is the primary material for making GK models today. The “HEI-CAST resin” is PU resin, and it needs the same weight ratio between agents A and B. PU resin is malleable, has a strong ability to express details, and has a good hand feeling. It is available in white, beige, ivory, and transparent colors, and can also be made in unique colors.

Polystone is a kind of artificial stone made of resin mixed with stone powder, usually used in statues, and has become popular in recent years.

Advantages: 1. Heat-resistant, hardness. 2. Does not get oily from sunlight, and it feels good to apply by hand. 3. Long life, not easy to decolorize, and deformation.
Disadvantages: 1. Heavy-weight. 2. Brittle, not easy to process cutting, very easy to fracture.

Why are Resin Statues So Expensive

In fact, the cost of resin material is not a high percentage of the total cost of resin statues, it has other costs, such as the designer’s idea, 3D prototyping, mold making, labor production, packaging, and shipping all cost money, as well as the brand promotion fee and profit, these are not cheap costs.

More importantly, the life of silicone molds is very limited, use a dozen times can not be reused, so you can only make small batches of resin statues, can not be easy like the production of 500 vinyl figures.

If you want to produce 500 pieces of resin statues,  you need to make a lot of silicone molds, which requires more money spent on the mold. In addition, silicone molds turned into semi-finished statues in the shape and surface there are large differences, can only rely on workers hand polishing, painting, the production cycle is long, so labor costs are also high. This is why resin statues are more expensive than other types of toys.

How to Make Resin Statues

The main production process of custom resin statues is the following

Resin Mold Making

Resin statue molds are made of silicone, so they are also called silicone molds. The structure of a complete resin statue is complex, so we need to split it out and make several silicone molds. It is easier to make silicone molds, we only need to make a clay or wax sample, then duplicate the front and back of the mold, but the silicone molds can’t be used 30 times, so if produce hundreds of resin statues, we need to make multiple silicone molds.

Blank Resin Statues Making

We will pour the liquid resin into the silicone mold without heating, then fix the silicone mold, the resin will slowly solidify into shape, wait for 20 minutes, then you can disassemble the mold and take out the white or uncolored resin statue accessories.

Resin Statues Polishing

The surface of the produced blank resin statue is usually rough, so we need to use a grinder or sandpaper to polish it until the surface of the resin statue is smooth.

Resin Statues Coloring

Coloring generally uses such as paint, acrylic, etc., and tools such as brushes, airbrushes, various brushes, etc. Because of the complex shape of resin statues, different colors, and high requirements for color details, the maker needs to have high hand-painting skills and some professional skills in flat paint, halo, dry erase, illumination, and airbrush spray, etc.

Resin Statues Assembly

We assemble the resin statues that are made, polished, and painted. When assembling, we need to be gentle with the resin statue parts, and with a little force, some slender resin statue parts may break, then everything will have to start over, which is not cost-effective.

Finally, we pack it into a beautiful box, and the whole resin statue making is finished, waiting to be shipped from the factory and sold out.