Justiciar

What's that you say? Use some product that I've never heard of?! Get over yourself. Dude. If you don't like the curt response then don't be an apeface by telling someone to read the farting manual.

That's the guy. I was getting a little lazy and didn't feel like looking it up. Did Miyatki work on Macross II? Because if he drew it... I'm just saying.

I may go ahead and make the model anyway, but won't include the stats. The original color version of that pic has a signature under it that looks the same as on all the original line art. I don't know if it was drawn by SK or his friend (name starts with an M, the character designer guy) or someone else.

The setting won't be limited specifically to SWI, so I'll probably go ahead and include VF-0 (and therefore SV-51 for opposition forces), Cheyenne and VF-4 (noted on the "G"), all of which will have player deployment limitations. Granted, this is a pretty small sample to work from, I just want a little tacit approval and not risk getting completely flayed. I guess I'll leave the Maverick out. Too bad, I rather like it. Thanks again for your input.

Where does the LDR-04 Maverick destroid fit into Macross canon? It's listed at the Macross Compendium, but it's under the Mardook. Does that mean it's part of Macross II? Would you consider the VF-4G Lightning III to be part of the Space War I time frame? Granted, we only see a protoype in the series (I think...when Hikaru is in the hospital...?) and in action on-screen it's limited to the very end of FB2012... Is the Cheyenne done for by the time of SWI? Excluding the "common" destroids and the Valkyrie, is there any other mecha that you would consider to be apart of the SWI timeframe? Frex, the VF-0 and SV-51, or do you consider that a completely separate era and ne'er the two shall meet? I'm making a table-top game and want to be complete and reasonably accurate. Thanks in advance

Well, I don't read, write or speak Japanese so I have no idea what that link says, and there's not a readily apparent name to the kit so searches are kind of hard. Thanks for the head's up everyone.

Hi all, I'm looking for this stylized Valkyrie and was hoping someone could point me in the right direction. Hobbyfan has a re-cast of it but 1) I'd rather not get a re-cast if I can help it and 2) they're out of stock in any event. I'm especially interested in the hands and all three head variants. If someone has the kit perhaps you'd be willing to take some pictures for me? Thanks in advance. David

Telling someone to RTFM is generally considered bad form. It was rather amusing here because following your directions leads one to this very thread, which doesn't answer my question (which is why I asked here, but thanks). I still haven't figured out how to view the new file on my PC. On the plus side, I finally got a stack of dual layer discs and successfully burned one on the first try. I used Verbatim DVD+R DL Printable media. I thought I had a new question, but turns out it'll be a point of advice. I'm watching on a wide screen TV, but we'd recently switched to a different table-top DVD player and didn't bother checking the settings. When I first put in my shiny new copy of DYRL, all the sub-titles we're appearing in the black letterbox portion above and below the picture itself, rather than being superimposed over the movie proper. Turns out the DVD player was set to have the TV at 4:3 instead of 16:9. A simple change there and now the sub-titles are where they're supposed to be and all is great. Now I just have to figure out what to do with the other 19 blank discs. Mucho thanks to Hurin.

I have a friend in Japan that it got through Amazon Japan for me. I did the whole procedure again, nothing running in the background, double-checked to make sure everything was set-up appropriately, etc. and I get the same result. DVD-Lab tells me that it's done it and dumps a bunch of files into the destination folder. I can watch them individually (on the PC), but not as one continuous movie and I'm still not getting any sub-titles. And burning the whole thing to disc doesn't seem to be an option (XP does not list that as an option in any menu and yes, I do have a DVD-burner).

I'm a little slow on the up-take here... I got the Bandai R2 DVD, I followed the instructions to a T and went with the default destination of c:\macross-dyrl-r2\Final DVD Image\. It took ~45 minutes to do the compile and I got the "Done" message. But where the heck is the image? That destination has two folders in it: AUDIO_TS (which is empty) and VIDEO_TS, which has 13 files files in it (2x BUP, 2x IFO and 9x VOB). The VOB files can be played, but there's no audio or sub-titling with them. So what am I doing wrong?

As you noted, the Q-Rau's differences are negligible. Painting schemes are utterly irrelevant to how the model is built. Not sure why you'd be concerned about that, since they're obviously not going to be pre-painted. I'd like to see your conversion, because I think you'd have to try real hard to make it look like Gundam. If I were to do just one, it'd probably be the Series version because the DYRL version is a shapeless blob (an exaggeration, of course, but it has very poorly defined lines).

The Destroids for my 1/285 scale project are just about done (files at the 3D printers) and I thought I would do Zentradi next. The Series and DYRL versions of the Q-Rau are pretty much the same. As near as I can tell the only real difference is in coloring. The N-Ger, OTOH, is pretty different from Series to DYRL. So my question to you is about how I should proceed with the N-Ger. 1) Hybrid, best features of each 2) One or the other, but accurate 3) Model each one accurately That's pretty much my preference. I don't really want to do both simply because I doubt there's enough interest to warrant the extra cost. But I thought I would put the question to you guys. Size-wise, these figs in 1/285 would be ~59mm tall (~2 3/8 inches).

Hi all, I would very much like to get one of Valk009's wonderful new 1/72 Lightnings, but I am a truly horrid painter and modeler and don't wish to destroy the kit. I know there are some very talented modelers in this community; are any of you available for commission? David

So, is there a list here of people who take commissions? (and pics of previous work would be nice) I'd like to get this kit, but I'm not willing to spend that kind of scratch only to butcher it with my imitation of painting.

I'll try not to make this too confusing. 6mm is 1/285 - 1/300 scale (depends which side of the Atlantic you're on) and is very common for micro-armor (WW2 tanks). It's also the "official" scale for CBT. 7mm is 1/240 and is really not a scale "officially" used. The problem is that over the last several years, many manufacturers have been cheating upwards on scale, meaning they'll label something as 25mm, but it's really 28mm or even 30mm (Games Workshop is notorious for this). Iron Wind Metals, the company that makes all the miniatures for Classic Battletech, started doing this as well a couple years back. All the new models are larger than their originals. On the one hand it's nice because you can put in extra detail. OTOH it totally torques the scale. Believe me, that 1mm in scale difference, when talking about things like giant robots, makes a huge difference. What really causes it to be an issue here is that the sizes of mecha in Macross do not necessarily translate the same into CBT. Formatting is a pita, so please bear with me. We'll compare Macross to CBT using some commonly seen designs. Note that the problem is even worse when jumping to 7mm, which would be necessary to keep the models "in the same scale" as the Iron Wind stuff. And since that is where the majority of interest for these kits comes from... Macross name ...... 6mm model height ...... 7mm model height 1. VF-1 ...................... 45mm ......................... 53mm 2. VF-1 w/ FAST ......... 45mm ......................... 53mm 3. VF-1 w/ GBP .......... 45mm ......................... 53mm (50mm and 59mm to top of booster) 4. Tomahawk ............. 40mm ......................... 47mm (45mm and 53mm to top of 6-pack) 5. Defender................ 38mm ......................... 45mm 6. Phalanx.................. 40mm ......................... 47mm 7. Spartan.................. 40mm ......................... 47mm 8. Glaug .................... 51mm ......................... 62mm (59mm and 70mm to top of gun) All heights are to top of head. Now the same mechs, in the same order, but with their CBT names (also to top of head): CBT name ............ 6mm model height ..... 7mm model height 1. Wasp....................... 30mm ......................... 35mm 2. Phoenix Hawk .......... 35mm ......................... 41mm 3. Crusader ................. 40mm ......................... 47mm 4. Warhammer ............. 45mm ......................... 53mm 5. Rifleman .................. 39mm ......................... 45mm 6. Longbow .................. 48mm ......................... 56mm 7. Archer ..................... 45mm ......................... 53mm 8. Marauder ................. 45mm ......................... 53mm Here's relative to each other in both 6mm and 7mm in true/Macross-scale: Here's how they look relative to each other in CBT-scale: It's a bit crude, but hopefully these pics help a bit. Download them and pull out your trusty metric ruler and re-size them on your screen and you'll get a good idea of how big these models would be in real life in both 6mm and 7mm scale. The Tomahawk looks great in 7mm (holding prototype in hand), but the Valkyrie and Glaug are just too big. Basically, the Valkyrie and Glaug cause the biggest problems, though the Phalanx and Defender do as well. It's all because in Macross these guys are basically the same size (except for the Glaug), but in CBT they're all over the map. It's worse when you throw in the Monster, which should be 79mm in 6mm scale. It jumps up to 94mm in 7mm. By comparison, the tallest 'Mech in CBT is 56mm and is supposed to be substantially larger than the Glaug. At the moment, what I'm planning is Tomahawk (and the other non-Monster Destroids) in 7mm. That'll give them some bulk on the table-top and look nice. The Valkyrie and Glaug (and by extension, Regults) I'll do in 6mm. They'll still be large enough to have nice detail, but will be more-or-less usable for both CBT and Macross (not that I know of any Macross wargames... other than Palladium's Robotech and the new fan version of Macross Mekton <sorry, forgot author's name>). Call this the Hasbro-scale, where the goal is to have all the toys more-or-less the same size. @MechTech -- I have a special arrangement and pay substantially less than I should be for prototyping these. Cost depends on process used (not all RP processes are the same), material used, height of model (which effects time to build) and the house doing the job (some really try to gouge people). Breaking the kits down into many smaller pieces actually decreased the build time, which further reduced the cost. You basically need to shop around, and be willing to show them your model, to get quotes. I started a Macross Minis Yahoo! Group specifically for these kits. There's a poll about scale. Sorry, but Yahoo! insists that only Group members be allowed to vote. So you could join, vote, and leave in about 2 minutes.

Final (hopefully) revision Tomahawk, Defender and Phalanx are going to the printers on Friday and should be ready within the next couple of weeks. The only differences are fixing the fits of some of the components and setting some minimum heights and depths on features to ensure they come out on the models. Hope no one minds, but I'm tweaking the scale. Simply put, there are more people interested in these models for Battletech than there are for Macross, which means scaling them "properly" for Macross would jack them up to no end for CBT. End result is that some models will be in 6mm scale, some will be in 7mm scale. Last chance to tell me how wrong I am. Speak now or forever hold your peace.

When you post pics, can you post some pure side shots? I'm not real up on the variances in the VF-4G kits, but it appears (to me, anyway) that some have a bit of a flattened S curve in the fuselage, while in others it's straighter. It could be an optical illusion. Sorry if I'm a PITA.

I've always wanted a VF-9 model. Very cool. Thanks.

Out of all the models and all the toys and in all the scales, who makes the best VF-1S head?

I'd like to be interested. I'm a bit leery of "changes to protect the feelings of LE owners." If it's a difference in materials, that's ok. If it's the same detail or better, that's ok. If it's more difficult to assemble or has lacking detail, I'm less interested. Just trying to be honest up front so there's no WTF reaction down the line. Hope I didn't offend.

I don't have any experience with .obj, so I couldn't tell you for sure. It's not so much the file format that matters (though that can be a factor), it's more how the model is constructed. 99.5% of the models out there are done as a polygon mesh. That's because these models are done by artists and are just meant as glory shots, or are done for movies or video games. That's all those venues need. Not so for a physical model. There's no geometric data in such a model and it can not be used to make a physical model. The model needs to be built specifically as a solid or with a solid surface. So if I had to guess, I'd say stuff like that is useless, except for providing a template to work from for re-building it as a solid.

About 120 million Celsius (ITER.org). A pressurize water (fission) reactor, by comparison, is about 650 degrees C.

Yes, I'm planning on having some available for sale, along with the rest of the Destroids. The kits are either going to be urethane, resin or plastic. Still working that bit out. Price will be comparable to metal miniatures of the same size/scale.

Sort of. The model has to be constructed as a 3D solid object, which is not the same as building a polygon mesh. From there, it needs to be saved as a certain file type, depending on the 3D printer. Some like STL, some like IGES, or DXF, or... I'd be more than happy to discuss other projects with you. I'm considering starting my own RP company and am looking at printers this week, so new business would be nice. Just be warned that it's not a cheap process to go from CAD to real world. I'll pretty much guarantee that I'll do it cheaper than anyone else, but a model like the Tomahawk, in 1/285, is still going to be somewhere between $200-300. The price goes down if you wanted a large number of whatever.

I don't know how else to say it other than please be patient. There's been little enough feedback that I'm just not sure it's worth the effort. I say effort, because while it looks nice on the outside, it needs to be completely re-built on the inside. That's a need, not a desire, because of the process of going from CAD to physical. And if only one person wants it, it's just not worth it (as in I would lose several thousand dollars to make one person happy). Sorry if that sounds gruff.