Amped

OMG!!! For once I AGREE with Keith!!!

Wow, nice Minmay. I'm generally not into anime figure models, but he did a nice job... tarted her up just so. Lookin' at his other stuff, I'm amazed at the likenesses he achieved at such a small scale... I mean the Carrie Ann Moss & Natilie Portman likenesses are neat-o... but kinda freaky-deaky in their accuracy. It's like: 'I shall call you 'mini-Natalie'...

Well, that sounds nice & all, but face it: there's money to be had. It's more like 'devotion to his pocketbook'. Are Harlequin romance novels good? Probably not very. Do they sell? Yes they do, and how!!! The same reasoning applies to the Star Wars franchise.

Man, what a fun business this must be! Some of the designs are actually pretty nice... http://www.adangio.com/

What, was he like the Racer X of the team? Dude, there's obscure and then there's obscure, but that is just plain esoteric. I tip my hat to you, sir. Holy f*ck. I think I remember that comic back when I was camping as a kid! Esoteric doesn't begin to describe how obscure that reference was...

Gads... all this crap is really making me anticipate the arrival of my Alpha with more than a little dread!!! I think the main problem with Toyanmi is that they either rush things (because they set themselves up with unrealistic timelines, thereby risking fanboy wrath if delayed) or they can't spec materials to save their lives & have sh*t for quality control (therby risking fanboy wrath for producing a product of inferior quality). As a professional designer, I know how important spec'ing the right materials are toward making a well engineered & easily manufactured product that 'WOW's the customer. In my current capacity as a quality control auditor at my facility, I know how sh*t quality can instantly destroy any custmor goodwill you may have spent years trying to build up. Sounds like Toynami needs somebody that takes quality control seriously.

Niiiiiice. For when a .50 cal just won't hack it... The XM-109 25mm (!!!) Sniper Rifle http://www.strategypage.com/gallery/articl...s_200481522.asp I especially like the fact that they note recoil is a problem. No sh*t.

Da-ymn she looks good with markings!!!

Sorry man, I too forget that text can't deliver the nuances of delivery very well! I guess I'm just shocked that folks have had such polarized (& rather harsh) views of this film & that we've all yapped so much about it. It must truly be a slow time in geekdom... Honestly, I felt it could've been far worse. Maybe I had set my expectations too low. Whatever. I just didn't think it was good enough... or bad enough.. to merit this much discussion. Go figure. So anyhow sorry if it seemed if my hackles were raised, I must just have nothing better to do at the moment.

Damn you Jenius!!!!

OK... custom stickers'd be alright... but what I wanna know is this: Is someone gonna make custom waterslide decals?!?

Truly... rabid fan-boys have the ability to say the dumbest sh*t. Only in the realm of Geekdom would someone find it acceptable to equate a completely forgettable summer movie shclock with a devastating disease like AIDS. 'WAAAAAA... Paul WS Anderson raped my geek-behind. WAAAAAA... Now I feel like a warm dork-eclair!!! WAAAAA!!!' I can't believe this film has generated this much discussion!!! I can hardly remember it & I only saw it last Saturday!!!

Well, I'm awaiting my Alpha... it should arrive from Kevin next Wednsday. I have to say I'm a tad nervous as to the quality, but I'm willing to suspend judgement until I inspect mine. Mind you... I will be the biggest b*stard screamin' for Toynami's downfall if it's suck-o. Toynami hasn't impressed me with there mostly cheap-o goods so far, so they have some impressin' to do! Well, I thought the Macross MPCs were fugly & overpiced, so I avoided those like the plague... even heavily discounted. The Alpha is definitly overpriced, IMO (by at least 20 - 30 bucks), but I have to admit I was beguiled by it's appearance and the positive appraisals from MW Con. I never did convince my mom to get me a Gakken back in the day... and haven't been willing to pay top dollar for one now.. so I figure this is my best chance to snag a decent rendition of the Alpha (without having to build any of my kits, that is). So I'll be waiting with my fingers crossed! The only thing I have to add to the quality discussions is that Yamato never impressed me with their quality control either. My Mac Plus valks were pretty toit, but my Hikaru 1/60 was absolute sh*t when it came to paint quality; there was fuzz and bleed everywhere. That cheap-a** white plastic didn't do much to impress me either... and my Low Viz, while the best rendition of the VF-1 I've ever seen, had some crap paint quality too: the weathering was goofy & spotty... and I was not impressed by the big ol' fingerprint on the tail I discovered... dunno if the person that assembled it figured that he/she'd impress their 'mark' on it or what but I thought that was pretty crap-ola quality control for such a pricey figure. Basically, I think high-quality anything is hard to come by outta Chinese factories. Made in Japan they aint!!!

WOOOAH!!! FLASHBACK!!! I totally forgot about the old War of the Worlds TV series!!! It was actually pretty cool, IIRC... Crazy lil' three-fingered muthas that'd melt into goo...

A relatively simple way to re-make rivits is to use just a tiny dollop of of viscous (or 'thick', as opposed to runny) glue or epoxy where you need a rivit... try squirting some out... then using a tooth pick... get some on the tip... then make your dot/ rivit. Let it dry and... TA-DA: insta-rivit! It requires a steady hand, but it's simple & effective. Actually Elmer's White Glue is pretty damn effective & has just the right consistancy. Likewise, you could take a piece of glass (not plastic or acrylic/ plexi-glass, real glass... like a broken mirror or the like) and make a series of glue/ epoxy dots. This allows you some leway to practice making a series of 'rivits' to get just the right size you need. When they cure, you should be able to pop 'em off the glass pretty easily & cleanly with a razor blade. Then you have a series of rivits to glue on individually (use only a very, very small amount of adhesive, as you don't want leakage of glue to get outta hand). Tweezers help in handling. Pretty simple & effective... especially for larger scale models. As always, practice makes perfect! Now, if ya wanna make 'inny' style rivit markings as opposed to 'bumps'... a simple pointed scribing tool/ awl or small drill bit (again, practice on another piece & make sure you are working in the correct scale) is pretty effective. IMO, professional dental tools and scrapers are the absolute best for re-scribing fine details such as panel lines. Check out medical supply catalogs or ask your dentist where he gets his supply... you may even luck out & get a free sample tool!

Good Lord Cap'n!!! That is some bad-a** detailin' you've got goin' on with that booster!!! Great work!!! Hmmm, wild... That screen cap really surprised me... I had no recollection that the boosters where white. I always envisioned them in that Soviet-era green, for some reason...

That article pretty much summed up my earlier point: AvP was made for (casual) fans of the game. Let's hope the (probable) sequal is a whole lot better & more intense. BTW, I wouldn't be at all surprised if the DVD comes out in an optional R or Unrated version with extras. While I wouldn't purchase a DVD of the theatrical version (one viewing was enuff... like any high-calorie morsel, too much'd make ya sick!) I might even consider a version w/ extra footage & goodies if it's well done enuff. Take that Max!!!

What's the world comin' to when mods lose it?!? I thought you were made of better moderator-stuff, but... maaaaaaaan, you talkin' crazy!

I cannot believe you spent that much time venting about how crappy AvP was yet you shrug off the criticisms of fanboys in the Star Wars threads!!! Have you even seen Alien 3 or 4??? Total & unadultrated SH*T!!! Unbelievable!!! And they let you mod these boards?!?

Interesting blip on Popular Science's site: http://www.popsci.com/popsci/science/artic...76853%2C00.html Should make for some interesting design possibilities in a number of fields! YF-21, here we come!!!

OK, first let me say: I am a hyper-critial beeee-atch of a movie reviewer & a huge fan of the first 2 Alien flix & the 1st Predator movie (2nd one, not so much... but without it, we wouldn't have had the starting point - the Alien trophy head - for the whole AvP mythos, so it deserves credit for that much at least). Also, I would rather pluck out my eyes & place them on a plate than watch the absolute sh*t that was Aliens 3 & 4. Start the f'in film by killin' Hicks & Newt my assssss.... Alien 4 was just plain ol' frenchy filmmaker pappy-crap: all style, no substance. Yes, the director did City of Lost Children.... SO WHAT. As a person who earns my keep as a professional designer I am always offended by filmakers & fans alike who equate interesting production design with a'great' film. No. Visually interesting maybe. But still narrative pappy-crap... Soooo... having said all that... AvP was pretty entertaining. Really. Definitly suffered somewhat from the PG-13 rating, but by no means was it a total (or even partial) crap-fest! That title is reserved for crap-tacular drek like Troll 2... WATCH OUT- SOME SPOILERS AHEAD!!! There are definitly things to quibble about, namely: - It is too damn rushed. They tried to fit WAY too much exposition into too limited a time frame. Oddly enough tho, it is slow to get going. I know that seems like a contradiction, but it's true! - Super-sized everything! Jee-zus!!! I thought XTREME everything had finally been fading out as a marketing gimmick. Aparantly the filmakers of AvP were not given that memo. Steriod-enhanced predators... shoulder-mounted plasma howitzers... a T-rex-sized mama queen... way too fast & inconsistent chestburster incubation (sometimes it happens within what appears to be minutes... in other cases at least an hour or more). - OK, somebody mentioned 'Corky the special-Ed Predator'. I agree! WTF?!? Why did they haveta mess with the facial proprtions??? Change for change sake? I'll tell ya why the Preds get wasted so fast! 'cause they appear to be 'tards!!!! - Predator & human sittin' in a tree... Ick, how awkward & weird can you get? OK, if that doesn't prove my standing as a card carrying supa-critical hyper-dork... well I dunno what will! Having lambasted parts of AvP, however... there are notably good parts: - The acting is pretty decent, given the rather flimsy script they had to work with. - SFX were very tight! Nice job on all the technical aspects... good costumes, CGI, etc. It's just soem of the aesthetic choices taht I took issue with, not so much their execution. - C'mon...a Predator chest-burster... how cool is that!!! - Set up for a sequel! (duh) Really, if anything I think AvP was more for fans of the game than of either specific franchise or of the comics. If you had ever played the game, you would've noticed how many scenes seemed to be directly from the game scenarios. Especially every time you saw an Alien lurking overhead or scurrying down or along a wall! Like I said in a previous post... I hope this does well enough to spawn a BETTER sequel. As it is, this was good popcorn fare. Now bring on the MARINES!!!!

Hmmmm, I want to see this movie... yet I am one of those hyper-critical fanboys who believes in only 2 Aliens movies (the others being heretical abominations of which I do not speak)... yet... for some reason, I don't know if I'd be as harsh toward AvP as I was to those seq....er, films... whose names I dare not speak. I may catch a cheap day-time showing (hell no, I ain't gonna pay full price!). Basically, I look at this flick like the Alien/ Predator version of Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla... my expectation are low: I just expect some monster bashing. My hope is that this film will be successful enough to produce a SUPERIOR sequel.

Ick! The cyan on the first wave's intakes looks nasty!!! Sounds to me like some one F'd up the quality control on the paint specs so they decided to make that a 'special' feature of the first wave. Man I hope I don't end up with one of those!

Well, now that AvsP is out they can get crackin' on the movie I really wanna see: Aliens vs Predator vs Terminator... where we all learn that Dutch was actually the template for the Terminators... Yes... I'm joking.