First things first gathering reference material. "Kingdom Come" and "Superman: Peace On Earth" of course were my main reference. I had at this point become a good friend with Alex, so he sent me some turnaround sketches he had done (from a proposed video game I think). He also sent photos of a friend of his, Frank Casey. Frank is the live model for Alex’s Superman character. So I had quite a lot of reference, which is a huge plus.

Next I began work on sculpting the head. This is crucial part, being a huge fan of Alex’s concept; I had to get this exact. I’m sure I don’t need to explain you guys but the face had to look heroic, majestic, sincere, stern (but not in an aggressive way), handsome, otherworldly BUT…He had to also look like he could fit in as a regular human being. This took up to 4 weeks till I was happy. Then the head was molded in silicone rubber. Molten wax is pored into mold and allowed to cool. Next day the mold is opened and out pops a wax replica of my sculpture. Next acrylic eyes are created and fitted, perfectly matched to Alex's artwork, a pale, gray blue, very striking but still in the realm of plausibility. Next is the time consuming process of inserting the hairs (black mixed with dark brown with occasional lighter specks to break up the uniform color)...1000s of them, one at a time!!

Once the hair finished…weeks later…I start on his skin color, giving him a healthy complexion, but subtly littered with veining, broken veins, an occasional freckle. Finally the eyes lashes are meticulously fixed in to place. For the body, I welded a steel armature and applied water based clay to begin fleshing out the muscles etc. Although I knew he had to look Super, I tried to get away from the ripped body-builder look and more like a lumber jack or someone with that natural "working man" type of large build. My reasoning for this being, Mr. mild-mannered Kent would look a bit out of place with a Mr. Olympia type ripped body. Just my opinion of course. I sculpted the Torso/arms separate from the legs (split at the waist) because my Superman statue was to be 6’4 tall whereas I am only 5’10 so reaching up there would have been a pain!!! I then reproduced the legs and torso in a plastic fiberglass material.

Now I needed hands, I looked at all my friends etc., to see who had large, Superman type hands …then whilst at my local pub, I saw them. Superman’s hands. They belong to my friend Mike, a local DJ. I molded Mike hands the following week (he was very flattered!) I added some sculpting here and there to get them right and voila… Superman had hands of steel!

The costume was made from spandex. Alex provided the exact colors.

I had made other superhero costumes in the past so this was trouble free ordeal. I just had to make sure it screamed Superhero!! I never liked Dean Cain’s costume it looked kind of cheap to me. Christopher Reeve was great but what I liked about Alex's Superman was that the S-crest was very large and imposing. I tried to make the costume very crisp and clean. I particularly liked how Alex had the cape draped at the back of the neck based, I believe, on the Fleischer animated serial.

The final steps were to style his hair and dress him. It was really surreal as soon as that costume was on, this piece of wax and resin became the Last Son of Krypton!