I'm sorry about making this a pricing question, but I have no clue how to go about this one. A friend of mine originally had wanted a Wall-E cake for her son, but decided it would probably be beyond her budget to make the whole thing shaped like Wall-E. She's going to make a regular cake herself, but wanted me to make him a small personal cake (maybe a 6in stacked square? That's bigger than a "personal" cake, but big enough to decorate ... Smaller?) in the shape of Wall-E. I really want to do this, but we are very careful about keeping personal things personal and business business, and it will not be my gift to him. I was planning on making something covered with fondant and gumpaste and such (look at some of the cakes I've posted to get an idea of what I usually do for character cakes), and while I don't want to underprice myself, I want to be able to offer her something small enough to fit her budget, but still worth my time to do (i.e. no making a single cupcake for him). The fact that it's for this weekend is not something I'm going to hold against her for now .

Please help with any ideas!

Here's a square cake from frostingbyheather. You could make the neck post from a column, the eyes could be cookies? The treads could be 1 layer cut into the 2 shapes. If so, your pricing shouldn't be too hard to figure out...
http://frostingbyheather.com/yahoo_site_admin/assets/images/Wall_E_Cake_1.201111255_std.jpg

I love this cake, but even if it's a 6in, that might still be a little out of her price range with the extra stuff I'm putting on it ... that specific cake would probably be about 14 servings, plus the the extra work on the head and treads, right? Argh! Not sure what to do ...

Oops! Double post! Thanks for your feedback ...

This is wall-e when he's scared or asleep. He collapses down into a cube. Might be closer to her budget.
http://www.geeky-toys.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/08/wall-e_construct_a_bot.jpg
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3218/2780389048_f8cb9c141c_b.jpg
Link is larger.

I'm sorry to sound negative because i know that you want to help your friend, but in a cake like "Wall-e "size doesn't matter that much. You'll be makint the same intrincate shapes/decorations, just smaller! even worse!
If you are trying to make Wall-e 3D even if its a personal cake that is a lot of work! Support the head, make the neck tall, all the little buttons, triangular wheels, thread marks, arms etc....
Maybe you can make the little boy a tiny round cake, and make a gumpaste wall-e to put on top.

I'm sorry to sound negative because i know that you want to help your friend, but in a cake like "Wall-e "size doesn't matter that much. You'll be makint the same intrincate shapes/decorations, just smaller! even worse!
If you are trying to make Wall-e 3D even if its a personal cake that is a lot of work! Support the head, make the neck tall, all the little buttons, triangular wheels, thread marks, arms etc....
Maybe you can make the little boy a tiny round cake, and make a gumpaste wall-e to put on top.

Here's a buttercream one. It has some good ideas...i.e., licorice for the tracks, Reeses for the wheel details. I would just make the head inedible. Seriously you could use some PVC pipe (even put in an angle joint if you want) for the neck, attach two toilet paper rolls (wrapped both in fondant) for the head. I'd do the eyes flat in fondant, let dry, and attached to the fondant covered toilet paper rolls with RI, paint on the yellow and used black fondant, or piped black for the eyes. Just make the body buttercream and pipe on some basic details.....still if her budget is really small, it would probably be best to just decline.

http://www.cakecentral.com/modules.php?name=gallery&file=displayimage&pid=1232288

Thank you so much for all of your ideas, and for taking so much time to post links! I'm thinking I might just end up giving it as a gift after all (though it's kind of lame to give that as a gift to a kiddo, who mostly just wants toys, I think! ) ... either way, I'll need all the inspiration I can get . Thanks again!