Chronocidal
-
Posts
10761 -
Joined
-
Last visited
Content Type
Profiles
Forums
Events
Gallery
Everything posted by Chronocidal
-
So, I'll be completely honest, I haven't even given half a thought to how to paint or decal any of the 262 kits. I've actually been more concerned with working out the weak points in the plastic to reinforce. The transformation of the kit is just so much more intuitive and simple than the DX, I find myself going back and forth between battroid and fighter fairly regularly with the kits, while the DX sits in permanent fighter display. Doing that has definitely caused a few stress marks to pop up though, as I mentioned in a previous post. What I'd really love to do is find a way to stash a set of smaller hands in the kit's fighter mode, and rework the legs to lock together without the removable bracket, to make it an actual perfect transformation. As far as the shield closing, I think there's a bit more play in the hinges than you might think. If you get the stickers flat enough, you might be perfectly fine using them. It'd be easy to test without using the actual stickers though, just cut out a section of the unused space on the sticker sheet, and apply a patch to both tails, and see if they close. One of these days I might actually just start slapping the stickers on one, and see how it goes. The joy I get out of these is really just from the building process, and figuring out the mechanisms, so even if they turn out terrible, I don't imagine it'll be hard to get more to build.
-
So, I believe the VF-0 pitot tubes are cast in POM, same as the VT-1's pack probe, and the old Yamato YF-19's canards. It's just a notoriously paint-resistant material. It may have been much easier to just wrap something like pinstriping tape around the pitot for the stripes.
-
At first glance, I'd assumed that new cockpit glass was re-using the angled section from the Saturn V, but no, it's actually two studs larger in diameter at both top and bottom, tapering from a 6x6 to a 10x10 area. I think as they see more and more creative uses for all the curved panels we're starting to see, they're also realizing the limitations of needing to use them for so many curved shapes, and starting to think more about larger diameter curved sections. I'm seriously eagerly awaiting the day when we can finally get a UCS X-Wing with properly scaled engines. The 4-stud diameter ones always looked ridiculously undersized.
-
I'd have to guess that it's just because the Spartan doesn't share any parts with any of the other destroids. I think the rest of them are all the same from the waist down.
-
And there goes $800 of my paycheck this fall. Good thing the premium SDF-1 isn't until next spring. I'm really liking how the Saturn V set seems to have set a new standard for how to make big round sections, because the whole cockpit on this one looks amazing. Also, glad to see they went with the best of both trilogies, making it an optional ESB/TFA version, and having an actual interior for the ship this time. Makes me think it might actually be somewhat swooshable, and not so much a stationary model.
-
The initial demand will probably be through the roof, but for comparison? I got my original UCS Falcon on clearance, at like $100 off from the LEGO main online shop. The Ideas sets are more limited, but this will be a fairly long term general release by comparison, and should be available for a while, through multiple retailers.
-
Hah.. looks like the ESB version instead of ANH then? Yeah, I'm going to have to order this if it exists. Just the variety of parts is something I can't pass up getting, even if I never actually build the base set.
-
So, they're screwing themselves over by using an orthographic projection on those renders. It's going to look incredibly wrong from every angle except side/top/front that way, because it's not done in a proper perspective. That being said.. yeah, I'm not quite feeling the proportions.
-
I don't understand why they can't use actual aircraft anniversary schemes for inspiration.. some of those are actually.. you know.. attractive.
-
I think the base issue is that they really didn't do anything to reinforce those wing pivots, or to lock the whole wing panel into the leg. The 1/72 kits all had ratcheted hinges in the wings, but the DX uses a sliding hidden pivot. I'm also guessing that the DX is incapable of sitting on the gear with the drones mounted, because they didn't include the "over-fold" that the 1/72 can do, tilting the wings inward past vertical so the drones clear the ground.
-
So, if you have an airbrush ready and waiting, I can't recommend hand painting the red like I did. It was an exercise in frustration, because at the time, I was using some old Citadel paints meant for 40k miniatures, because I got them on sale. They're not bad, but they tend to turn into rubbery goop as they age. The process of getting smooth red stripes on the tails far longer than it should have, and would have been much faster if I'd been able to just airbrush it. It really was a matter of flooding the paint with so much water that it made a shallow puddle, and then letting it evaporate down into a smooth coat. Also, was heavily dependent on my dry climate, since I live in the desert. On the flip side, that dry climate may also be why normal brushing on some other paints is so painful. They dry so quickly, that by the time you dip the brush a second time, the paint has already dried enough that the second stroke pulls up the paint you just put on. Adding copious amounts of water to the brush was the only thing that kept the paint blend-able.
-
Have we seen any Master File schemes done on any Arcadia or Yamato valks in the past? I suppose the anniversary scheme might count, but that design was such clearance fodder, I hope the licensing for the scheme wasn't too expensive. Licensing aside though, I get the feeling that the bigger issue would be playing mix-and-match with the production lines. Depending on how the molds for each design are broken down, it's entirely possible that the only way to make a 0B or 0C run profitable would be to do both at once, so they have enough matching sets of the correct parts.
-
Definitely reminds me of the process I used when I did my VF-25F years back. I didn't want to deal with stickers or decals, so I hand-painted the entire thing, only masking some select bits, since most of the paint was along existing panel lines. The red stripes were just an absolute nightmare to get smooth, but the process that eventually yielded an almost stroke-free coat was to pretty much soak my brush in water, and then let the paint "float" in the water as it evaporated, leaving a smooth coating. It just took quite a few coats that way. I also laid a full base coat of black under all of the red so I wouldn't have to put white under the red on the tails, and it wound up giving me a really nice deep crimson color. Far as the Ba kit goes though.. ugh. Yeah, that gunpod was one of the worst offenses. There was no reason whatsoever for them not to mold that in color after the entire gun was done that way on the Hs. I actually prefer the silver to the gold anyway... though I'm actually not sure which is shown in the show? I almost want to say the gunpods on the Ba model should be silver, but I can't find a screenshot to back that up at the moment.
-
For the most part, they've drawn the line at fantasy/science fiction war machines, but lately they're sneaking some more realistic jets under the radar, under the guise of being aerobatics aircraft, or racers, or whatever. One of the recent Creator sets is basically an F-35 in civilian markings, and one of the Technics sets lets you build a motorized VTOL jet based on the JSF too. On the other hand though, there is a precedent for making official sets of historic fighter aircraft. We've had both the Sopwith Camel and Fokker Dr.I, and one of the Indiana Jones sets basically let you build a minifig-scale BF-109. One of the current Ideas designs up for review is a Red Arrows BAE Hawk, so I'm anxious to see if that one makes the cut. If so, I can see a slew of stuff like Thunderbirds F-16s and Blue Angels F-18s getting submitted. As sad as it is to say though, I think the Saturn V has kind of inflated expectations of the Ideas process.. yeah, it's nice to have the Saturn V, but now people are submitting ideas left and right for similarly scaled rockets of all types, launch platforms, crawlers, etc... and people are setting themselves up for disappointment. Their stated guidelines about submissions really don't allow for people to make entire series of sets that go together, and as nice as it would be to get the Saturn V launch pad, I think the chances are almost nil that LEGO will ever approve something like that.
-
So the Ideas Shuttle hit 10k last night apparently. Time to wait and see if LEGO decides it's worth making official. Personally, I'd be up to buying 6, one for each orbiter.
-
See, I like everything about the new X-Wings except the non-McQuarrie aspects. The offset split wing just bugs me enough that it ruined the entire vehicle for me. And it's not that it couldn't work physically, or mechanically or whatever.. I just think that the symmetry of the original design is one of the most striking and beautiful aspects of the ship, and they went and pissed all over it for the sake of looking "new" and "different." I'm not going to question anyone liking the design, it still looks great to me as long as the wings stay closed. I guess it just feels odd to me that even with how bad the prequels were, they still managed to introduce a heap of memorable and unique designs that I felt a decent need to go out and buy merchandise of. They really haven't managed to sell that on this new trilogy. Most of the designs have been either minor tweaks of old things, or new designs that languish on store shelves because they're completely forgettable, or just downright ugly. They definitely made a comment in ESB about it. Luke's line is "That armor's too strong for blasters." I think in-universe, you can kind of make the analogy that the difference between blasters and the cannons found on X-wings is something like the difference between machine guns and cannons on WWII aircraft. I always thought it was a bit of a silly contrivance, especially given the relatively huge size of the cannons on the snowspeeders,, but if you consider the likely difference in power output between speeder repulsorlifts and the ion fusion engines used on starfighters, it's very likely the speeders just couldn't put out enough juice to run heavier weaponry. -
See.. I don't believe that they don't have the same experience mimicking real world stuff. That Wonder Woman statue is insanely detailed, and very finely crafted. I think it's all down to source material, and what their basis is. If they're going with the Bandai-ish "It's a robot that happens to turn into a jet" mindset, yeah, it's going to look like a gundam. If they actually tried to make it look like a real aircraft with the parts jumbled around into a robot shape, yeah, I'm sure they could make it look that way too.
-
Mmm, fair, though the idea of that design being the "standard" is its own worry. If you want a real fun thing, go look up the debate on the true size of the original ESB SSD Executor. I worked on X-Wing vs TIE Fighter and X-Wing Alliance mods for years, and the debates over "canon" sizes for that thing were relegated to "thou shalt not discuss" status, just to keep the peace. Far as actual scale goes though.. Star Wars has always been really lax about it. I don't think any of the filming miniatures were built in a specific scale to begin with, so everything was kind of just eyeballed, and a lot of scaling data was just made up. It's funny seeing the dirty laundry get aired now that companies are actually producing kits designed to be in a particular scale.
-
Might be overly nitpicky, but you'd think, being group so renowned for their attention to detail, they'd use actual source material instead of making up their own panel lines...
-
I might go cancel the Messer VF-1s I did order.. I was thinking they'd be good for customs, but then I keep forgetting that I never get around to making those. Come on VT-1!
-
Calling it now, they made it flat so it can pass for a building until it takes off. Also, they can't count. That's five times the size of a normal star destroyer. Is there like.. some kind of viral infection spreading through JJ's productions that renders people completely incapable of understanding scale?
-
Yeah, I noticed this getting my Regult set from NY the other day... their site is currently using a direct conversion from yen to dollars (literally 1 yen -> 1 cent), which is way out of whack with reality. Yen is currently around 105 to the dollar.
-
Or you know. Use wheels, or treads. Or even better, they could just flat out hover like every other freakin' civilian vehicle in the franchise. Getting rid of legs altogether would completely eliminate the possibility of them failing a mission because they fell over.
-
At this point, I've just written off the idea that we're going to get any designs that I give a crap about from this new trilogy. The only passable designs have been hack-jobs or copies of OT designs, and the new designs have been just so ugly that I have to question whether they're even conscious of the concept of marketability. Like.. sure, you can make stuff completely utilitarian in design, and just slap engines on bricks, and pray that someone buys your toys. Meanwhile, they're making it a lot easier for me, since it's one less franchise for me to spend money on. Also makes it slightly easier to justify getting the Bandai PG Millennium Falcon, since I can focus my Star Wars budget on OT stuff.
-
Looks like half-finished construction honestly. I'm curious about the... well.. I'm trying not to make NSFW jokes in my head about it, but the cannon(?) dangling from the bottom looks pretty dumb. It kinda looks like they had the city/superstructure section from an SSD just detach and float away. I mean, it's perfectly fitting with everything from the new trilogy so far. They just seem to be going with a "I'm going to take a random geometric shape, and then throw a repeating generic mechanical paneling texture over it" feel.