So today was pretty awesome. I got a call from a friend the other day saying that he was taking his art students at a local community college on a tour of McFarlane Toys (apparently one of the students’ father works there). My friend asked me if I wanted to tag along. Of course I said yes! He gave me the address and contact number in case I needed it.
I was shocked to find that McFarlane Toys is located in the next town over from me! One of my friends works just down the street from them and has never noticed it, I’ve never noticed it either. It was a big surprise. It was an even bigger surprise after seeing everything they did there. I thought “Oh maybe its just a factory.” Maannnn, was I wrong…
I pulled into the parking lot where my girlfriend, one of our friends, and I met up with my friend who organized the tour and some of his students. I couldn’t believe I had driven by this place so many times, lived in the next town over from it for going on three years, and never knew it was there. The place is a bit low-key, but they do have a box-van sitting out front with their logo all over it.
When we walked into the first building I realized they did more than assemble toys…
Apparently, I had it in reverse. This wasn’t the factory, that’s in China… duh! This place was where they do the original sculpts! After seeing the sculpting stations we moved throughout the buildings… four of them if I recall. Each building had a different purpose. There were a lot of cool things and I learned a lot about the process involved in making an action figure. The first sculpt costs them around $25k to make, and that’s the first step in a long line of steps. Step two is another $35k.
In one of the buildings, they have a huge 3D full body scanner. It looks like something out of comic books itself. There are only 13 of them in the world, I think Steve said 7 of which belong to government agencies, and McFarlane Toys owns the only one on the east coast. Another interesting tool they use were two 3D printers. Their like inkjet printers that print in 3D. They lay down layer after layer of material, each is a 600th of an inch thick. It takes almost three hours to print a figure’s head but cuts their production time down by two weeks. The 3D scanners and printers don’t replace the sculptor though. After they are done printing the object, a sculptor will touch it up. The majority of their work seems to be sculpted by hand and they bring the 3D stuff in if they are on a strict deadline or feel that it will better suit that specific toy.
After we saw that stuff, Steve took us to AJ’s Pizza just next door and treated us to a couple slices each. I have tried many of the pizza places in my area, and had yet to try AJ’s, and I have to say it is probably my favorite out of all the others in my area.
After pizza, we toured the final building – the paint room. In the paint room they explained the painting process. In the studio they use vinyl cell paint (same as used on animation cells) to paint the figures. Most of the logos, etc. on the pre production figures are done with decals they make there at the studio. Our tour guide, Steve Hamady, told us that part of the final paint process on the production figures is similar to chrome plating, which I have a pretty good understanding of from growing up around hotrods and classic cars.
Thank you Josh for inviting me on this tour. Steve, thanks for the tour, you were an awesome tour guide, and thanks for the pizza! Todd definitely has the right guy in charge of quality control, I was amazed at how much you knew about the process. I’ll be keeping in touch, for sure.
-Z
