As with my custom Black Falcons torsos, I wanted to update and create new torso designs for the Forestmen (I am calling my version The Forest Guard for my upcoming build).
I started by looking at the existing Forestmen torsos, and there are officially eight versions available, the four original torsos from 1987 (two designs, one with three different colourways), the three Dark Forest versions from 1996 and a revised version from Collectable Minifig Series 1 (2010).
The two original 1987 torso designs are pretty iconic, and for me looking at them takes me straight back to my first – not to mention THE first – Forestmen set 6066 Camouflaged Outpost. I have fond memories of building and playing with this set as a seven or eight year old on the floor laying on the carpet in the lounge room at my Grandma’s place. I have to say that I am not at all familiar with the Dark Forest Forestmen torsos, as I was 17 when they came out and well and truly into my dark ages, I do however remember the 2010 collectable minifig series one version however looking at him critically I reckon he looks more like a 1938 Hollywood Robin Hood than a medieval warrior.
I decided to (the same as I have with the Black Falcons so far) design three custom torsos for my Forest Guard figures. Unlike with my Black Falcons torsos I am not going to use the torsos for specific units, but rather I will have them all mixed up. My three custom torso designs are inspired by the original Forestmen torsos as well as taking some inspiration from existing castle and fantasy torsos.
Above you can see my three The Forest Guard torso designs, the first one would be printed on a dark green torso, the second one on a dark tan torso and the third on a green torso hopefully giving a lot of flexibility and variation opportunities for the makeup of my units.
So what do you think of my designs? Do you think they suit an updated Forestmen faction?
In my next post I will be showing my Forest Guard shield designs, so make sure you signup to the mailing list if you would like to be notified when it is posted!
These are incredible. I am also starting an updated build of the forest men 6077 River Fortress set I was planning on using the Stag shield from the collector series elf as their new symbol. Your shield and torso set look incredible. Will you be offering them as a sticker sheet or for sale at all? I would love to use them in my build as well.
I hope to in future!
[…] the Forest Guard I aim to present one fighting force with a range of related but slightly different clothing and shields to show that they are more grassroots and organic in their […]
You should contact citizenbrick or another minifig custom shop to offer these designs printed on torsos.
Great idea!