DatterBoy

Still Cranking: :Dat

It's great that CC would offer these heads, but to be honest, at 19$ a pop, it's a bit much especially isnc eit's wholly possible to get a VF-1A 1/60 off ebay these days for about 22$... Was hoping to have my Hikaru 1A converted to a Hikaru 1S, but that would practically have doubled what I piad for it. :Dat

It's 3D, so it'll look liquid forever! HAHAHHAA... I used a gloss material since the flat stuff just got lost in the lighting. But it's not real... though it would be sweet if it was.. :Dat

the attached pic was taken before i finished painting the hands and final touching up on the shoulders/arms... oh, and i don't have a digicam so this was done with a scanner Hey, soulDistortion! Believe it or not I made this custom last night, and lo and behold... twins! :Dat

OK guys, need a few tips on how best to render the "boost" from the feet and fast packs when flying. interested in what the best shape would be as well as how to make that white with blue fringing effect I generally see in these. Thanks! :Dat

Though I love the 1/48 detail... let's face it... 1/48 is way too big for a toy. I still think a 1/60 valk with 1/48 detail and transformation is both doable and realistic. And to have the space to display/store that sized collection would be a valk lover's dream. :Dat

I bought 4 of these guys about a month ago. Real cheap. Costed me 28 bucks to get 4 of em, one of which was the strike. Hated em at first because for the life of me I could not get it to hold real well in any mode. I spent a good 45 minutes just trying to figure out what would make it most stable in each of the modes... and no toy should take that long to set up... Read around on the forums, learned of ways to make them more stable by joint tightening, and now, I have to admit for the price you can get em for, they're pretty cool. Proportions look pretty great in all modes, and you don't have to be all gentle. The Strike pack looks great in detail.. but still somewhat odd design for securing them in place... Now.. the only one thing that still bothers me is that the arm ball socket still is not strong enough. Any ideas on how to get this permanantly fixed? Since the arm is some sort of rubbery plastic, I'm not able to just add some filler to tighten it out since it expends whenever yo uadd stuff. Saw an ultimate banpresto once where the guy just straight replaced the ball socket with another one. Any ideas? :Dat

My intention is that the 1J is the only 1/48 I get so pretty much anything that comes with it, I'll probably drop for. :dat

I suspect because they liscense the rights to game creation to non-fans. Only someone who loves the series as much as a true fan could make it right. :Dat

Brian, that's pretty awesome. Man, This just may be the first VF-0 fan CG we've seen outside of the show. Can't wait to see more. You said your models were polygonal. Any chance you could post the wireframe of your models? I'd love to see them in order to get an idea of how you appraoched your models from a polygonal technique. Especially in the contoured areas. Worked on some more lighting pix, I think I'm starting to get the hang of this and the lighting has really improved the presentation for the valk: :Dat

BRIAN: Still experimenting. Some dark spots appear in the model, but I suspect it has a lot to do with the polygons as opposed to the lighting. Still don't achieve the ffect I am looking for, but I'm getting somewhere. Looks like a good "pearl" look so far... I think I like the first attempt better. The shadows are slightly sharper. This version is waaaay too soft. :Dat

Sounds like a question for Dok and Brian... I too would like to know more about lighting, different types, effects, etc.

You're completely right. I initially tried to model the lines but decided it would be texturing hell so I am having to remove them in newer less detailed models. Any references to actual weathering we can use out there?

SILENTRAGE: Thanks! :Dat

Another one, with a plane to cast shadow, but this time the shadow did not come out with definition, taking away from the realism. DOK: How do you do a fully rendered movie? To date, I can only get preview renders like screen shot movie grabs from the actual program. Could not find the optinon to render out a hi rez movie. :Dat

Damn, I'm such a CG Newb... all this lingo flying back and forth is way outta my league...

Why did you stop using MAYA?

MK16: Yeah, I used the global lighting from a MEL script Brian directed me to. I know I have a lot of experimenting to do with the lighting since I do not yet fully undertsand the concepts and mechanics behind it lal, but even with my limited knowledge I can tell that it;s much better than what I was doing before. I wanted to put a plane beneath it but I wasn't sure how that would play out in the end and figured a box would be better, but I would definitely give that a try. I am going for the "toy" look because that is what I intended originally. The brightness is giving me a hard time. I'll definitely tone that down a bit as well. BRIAN: Still not sure how how to tweak the lighting so I can get it to lok as natural as yours, but you're definitely the mark I'm trying to hit. Not duplicate, but that level of realism you seem to capture in your renders. Beautiful work on the valk. Still one fo the best I've seen. And thanks again for pointing me to the script. :Dat

BRIAN was kind enough to help me out with a bit of lighting on my CG Valk after I asked him about the lighting he uses on his models. He has some of the softest lighting I've seen to date that really brings out a smooth effect for his models and I really wanted to try it for myself. he pointed me to a MEL script for MAYA that I tried on my model and here was the effect: I have to say I am completely astounded by the effect that lighting has on my piece. I was wondering if folks out there had any tips on lighting, effects, how to make a wing tip look "lit" as opposed to not lit, how to obtain certain effects (lasers, light behind the head visor) that they could tip me in on to make my Valk look more realistic. To date,a ll the lighting I have is pretty much ambient light which tends to not effect the space around it and looks pretty flat, although it does stand out in the dark. Thanks :Dat

RODAVAN: I've not seen those before or any better ones, but given those, I'd be tempted to try and make one from that. ALL: Anyone know how to get a smooth look on renders like BRIAN is able to get? I imagine it woul dhave a lot to do with the lighting configurations but all I can do is get sharply lit objects as opposed to smooth ones. DOK: YOu once told me the basics of texturing in the old forum, could you impart me with your knowledge again? Thanks! :Dat

POWERED BY PHO For real. I was wondering where I could get those metal strips. Looked to me like the guy who did it got it off one his desk benches or something but could not tell since I could not read the Japanese (thought it was chinese). That's my biggets isue right now, getting the metal strips. Is that something hobby shops carry in general? EXO: Yeah, the blue heat shiled Is somethign i just guseed at when I made the model since I lent out my DVD's at the time. I do plan to make it like the TV as close as possible unless I percieve something would look way better another way. Put some shot's up. Would be good references. :Dat

Hey there, The pic was created in MAYA. If you want to see more pics, you can see them all here:MAX TV and a bunch of others. Vietnamese folk got skillz! hahhaha :Dat

BRIAN: WHen you build your models, what are your primary refernces?

Was watching the old TV series last night. I'm gonna make this one out of a Yammie 1/60 with perfect transformation. Swing bars as found on that other site, PERFECT TRANSFORMATION 1/60 but am having a hard time finding pieces of metal to act as the swing bars. I'm thinking of getting some durable plastiv and trying to theraform it (hold it over the stove till I can bend it).... Anyone have any better ideas of how I can get this piece or where I should look? It's a weird shape, kinda L shaped to have the right shape. Also going to make it from a VF-1A DYRL Hikaru and make it fast pack compatible. Thanks :Dat

Brian, That must have been really disheartnening. If I ever lost my work.. I sp[ent so much tim eon it all, I seriously think I'd have a major cry right there on the spot. It's a shame you lost you stuff. If the fighter and the gerwalk were any indication, your battroid must have looked pretty sick. Glad you recoved something of your stuff. What model do you regret losing the most? And 300 progress files... that's sick... or is it? :Dat