Wargamers WIP

[wargamer43210]

Hi Everyone!

I've missed having a running WIP thread. I had posted one for Fluffscale Space Wolves and a big old Dreadnought but I work on such an eclectic mix of projects that I always found myself having new stuff to post but rarely was it related to the Wolves... Half the time it isn't even GW product! So now I'm going to go the sensible route and put everything in a general WIP thread.

At the moment I've been having a lot of fun tinkering with the new Robotech RPG tactics miniatures from Palladium and Ninja Division. For anyone interested late 2014 provided some love for us 80s kids in the form of a long, long overdue kickstarter for Robotech! I missed the KS, probably to my own good fortune considering the drama surrounding it, but I did get the first wave models for Christmas. A lot of people have posted lamentations regarding these models online so I won't go into too much detail but I will list the following issues you will encounter if you delve into this game universe.

1. The models are very detailed. This is a 6mm game like Adeptus Titanicus (Epic 40k) and the designers managed to cram a lot of fine detail onto the models... although there is a price to pay.


2. The Sprues are too tight. Often there is not enough room to get clippers in between the model and Sprue so be prepared to use a super sharp Exacto knife and a tremendous amount of care removing parts.


3. The parts are NOT identified. Even veteran modelers have been exasperated by the failure to ID parts on the sprue especially since there are alternative parts and certain parts that were designed to go together. A little extra care with removing parts and dry fitting is required for best results.


4. Some parts are stupid small. No kidding... some of these parts are fractions of mm in size so you need to be careful removing them, handling them and in not accidently pitching the sprue while these tiny detail pieces are still hanging out on it! Some kits are far worse than others.


5. There are lots of long seams. I do NOT recommend super glue for this product. I used both GW and Testors Model Masters Plastic Glue (both with the long metal needle like applicators) to coat the seams and partially melt the plastic before pressing the pieces tightly together to create a slight ridge along the seams that can be sanded down.


So all of that being said do I still recommend the models? Absolutely. Once you get past the assembly they are true to the original anime. I'm very excited to paint them up over the next few weeks and actually play some games! Hopefully I can get all of these done before wave 2 lands!

And the best part about having questionable assembly instructions is it encourages you to just throw them out and go to town with the posing.

For me the Battloids are the most iconic Mecha from the anime so that is where I have spent the majority of time on conversions. The legs are simply too static so I decided to take advantage of the 2 part design and cut the feet away before gluing things together. By cutting the feet away and then cutting the knee joint you can pretty much do anything with a few pins, some green stuff and a little patience. Here is a full set of the 4 legs off the sprue next to the same legs cut into their main parts.

And here is the first Battloid pose I cobbled together next to the core frame of the standard pose.

Getting a little more extreme and stealing the hand from a GW Farseer I was able to put this pose together.

Next I decided to try a kneeling pose. This one proved to be pretty tough given the proportions of the legs and it ended up being more of a "in the process of kneeling" pose.

I also modified one of the core pieces to allow me to do an open wing pose. This was another tough to get the arms right pose as I had to leave room to add some missiles when I paint.

At this point I started running short on ideas for poses but got the good advice to just grab some frames from the anime for inspiration which has proven to be a gold mine! These poses came from the Max and Mirya holo-game sequence.

here's a front view of the one mech that is kicking back to the side.

and a front view of the mech that is kicking off and back away from their opponent.

Going to split this here to keep it from getting too long!

 

[wargamer43210]

Battloids Part 2!

After you get the swing of assembling these 1:285 scale models you can really go crazy. The kneeling pose didn't accomplish all that I wanted so I decided to have another go at it! this time I am much happier with the look and feel of it. There's still some GS work to do before this one gets painted!

 

[moetle]

Ahh man, I loves me some Robotech! I too have fond memories of coming home from school and watching Rick Hunter blow stuff up. Your conversions are fantastic! I can't wait to see more.

 

[wargamer43210]

Thanks mate! I was a Macross junkie as a kid and getting to actually play around with models from the game is pretty awesome. With only 1 TV channel I used to binge watch sci-fi and anime on VHS... I'd hate to say how many times I've seen the Macross saga from start to finish!

Here's a quick how to for changing your VF-1S head lasers on the Battloid. Actually it's pretty easy but since the pieces are so small it gets fiddly!

To start with grab the VF-1S head from the Battloid kit and a pair of the VF-1S side lasers from either the guardian or fighter kits.

Now comes the fiddly part! Carefully cut the lasers off of the Battloid head. I did this very very carefully with a sharp Xacto knife and then used the edge of the blade to scrape the surface flat. Then drill a tiny pilot hole with your hobby drill... this puppy is a fraction of a mm in diameter so it's pretty small!

That's it... You're ready to slap the parts together. Make sure and face the flat side of the head lasers down and away to minimize their visual impact. After it sets up you can alos use a little ApoxiSculpt or Green stuff to round out the flat spot.

 

[wargamer43210]

Here's a pose modeled directly from the following screenshot of Max fighting Mirya during their first encounter in the US Macross saga.

 

[wargamer43210]

I used the screen capture below with the not fighter/not gerwalk pose for inspiration. It was a Max sequence... big surprise as a lot of the dogfight animation revolved around Max. This was from the movie "Macross: Do You Remember Love".

and here's a mock up.

This isn't that hard of a conversion to throw together as you can use most of the pieces directly from the Fighter and Gerwalk kits. The only tedious part is that you need to add a small leg extension before you pin the Gerwalk legs to the fighter body.

The one on the bottom is for a leg close to the body while the top one is to extend the legs length down and away a little. The indenture on the bottom leg is where the Gerwalk leg will 'slot' into it. After things cured I also added a metal pin through the green stuff into the fighter cavity being careful to not drill all the way through the fighter.

This shot ended up being out of focus but I wanted to give everyone an idea of how long the foot pins are that I am using. Since the legs are hollow I prefer a long pin that spans the leg cavity and touches the top wall of the plastic. I also prefer to fill the leg that will be pinned with greenstuff to add some structural integrity to it as well.

And while it looks like the weekend progress was light I spent a little time fixing a second Scout Pod. (I really don't know how you guys are getting the double antenna and the paper thin sensor off the sprue intact! Here's a WIP of my replacement antenna for Scout pod #2.

And here's a sneak peek at a piece of another weekend project I started to play around with!

At the moment there are a lot of things at various stages of completion that I hope to finish up for pics soon. Cheers!

 

[wargamer43210]

I'm taking a little Battloid break and starting to play around with the Gerwalk and Fighter kits. It's going to take a lot more effort to be very creative with these two as they are missing the 'human like mecha' element. Here I've blended a Fighter with some Gerwalk parts to capture a mid-change vibe. The worst part of this assembly was getting the folded tail fins to lay across each other and still look ok. I actually had to use a needle file and sand a portion of the fin down to an almost paper thinness. (Honestly I would probably leave them up if I did this again as the model comes across as a bit 'flat' with them folded down.)

 

[wargamer43210]

Hello everyone!

Usually I picture things near or at completion... well I thought I'd go a different way with this project. While I was waiting rather impatiently for green stuff (GS) to cure it hit me that I needed a distraction. For no good reason whatsoever, I decided it would be cool to do a vignette. (You really have to give it to the French for providing cool words to describe things.)



First up is the rough base layout. Nothing is attached and it's possible that a bigger or smaller base may be used for the final piece.

Second thing today is what will ultimately be a mecha hand. It's going to take 4 separate sessions to finish it cause I'm really into layering GS!

Session 1 was the biggest. I mixed up some GS, made a sausage and wrapped it completely around the barrel. Next I used a flat tool to shape it into a continuous 'ring' of GS and cut away any extra from the ring to leave it roughly the right size for the hand. It was set aside for ~15-20 minutes to let the GS really stick to the plastic and start to firm up. The rest of step 1 was shaping the fingers with the business end of an Xacto knife. It's easiest for me to get the fingers roughly the same size by very gently making a line that splits the entire hand in half and then splitting these halves in half again to get 4 fingers ~ the same size. This is slow and tedious work. The GS in the thumb area was cut away as I wanted to add the thumb later.



Session 2 was short and sweet. After everything cured for a few hours, a tiny bit of GS was added to the back of the hand area and shaped to make the armour. Sorry I missed that angle in the pics, I'll add it next time.



Session 3 added the thumb. A more experienced sculptor could have done the hand/thumb in one go but I've found that if I work on all sides of a piece, more often than not I manage to ruin some of the detail with my chubby fingers. In the long run it's just easier for me to let things cure and do some extra steps.



Session 4 (tonight) will add some fine details to the back of the hand. There again this could have most likely been done earlier but layering works best for me and as a rule of thumb, unless you're trying something new... go with what you know!



A few notes on GS...



> When you're working with it you have to get a feel for the sweet spot. If the GS is too soft it's easy to deform so you have to set it aside and let it firm up more... however, if it firms up too much then you can't get it to stick or hold the shape you want! It's one of those things that comes with practice and time.



> GS is only really sticky for a short time after it's mixed so if you need it added on to something then you need to get it pressed against it pretty quick.



> GS does not stick to plastic well... at all. After it fully cures it can pop off pretty easy. I usually head this off at the pass by doing the GS work I need to do, letting it cure and then carefully popping it off myself so that I can reattach it with a tiny amount of Superglue.



If you're a hobby nut like me, the best thing you can do is surf the net for articles and then dig in. You can learn a lot through trail and error.





Next up we have the second hand. I just started this last night so it is still pretty raw.

At the moment this is just the fingers part of the hand. Next I will add the armoured back and thumb. With the way this hand is shaped I'll be doing these in one step... I hope!



When finished I want this hand to be open with the fingers curled just a little. For me it's always easier to sculpt against a firm surface so I grabbed some Sprue out of the trash and used it for a work area. Since GS doesn't stick well to plastic it will be easy enough to pop this baby off when I'm ready! I thought about doing the hand over a wire armature by roughing out the shape and then layering the detail onto it but thought going the sprue route might be easier... we'll see how it turns out!



Last up is a WIP pair of legs. Earlier I posted a pic of these in various pieces. After figuring out the final shape/position of these I pinned them and filled any gaps with GS.

Sigh... these things take so long and I get so excited to see the final piece that it's almost torture waiting on parts to dry and for work days to pass. Tonight I hope to make some progress with the hands and maybe get the legs attached to the waist. I can promise that there will be a lot more to come as this project rolls toward completion! Cheers!

 

[wargamer43210]

This shows the small vent added to the back of hand #1

and cut the spure down to an angle and added the thumb/back hand armour for hand #2

The only thing left to do with the hands is to use a needle file to clean up the shape and to add a vent to the back of hand#2!

Also got the legs pinned in place for a dry run but had to break one of the feet off and redo the GS work to get a different angle on the final piece.

Finally... carefully cut the head laser mount away from the back of the head and glued it back in place to get the final laser position.

 

[wargamer43210]

Finally able to dry fit some pieces and see how they are taking shape. Although there is still a long way to go!

As for the missing arm... It's waiting on the hand to cure after the last detail was added.

 

[moetle]

Nice dio start. When will you start painting these bad boyS? BTW I'm living my dream of buying this box through what you post. no pressure.

 

[wargamer43210]

Nice dio start. When will you start painting these bad boyS? BTW I'm living my dream of buying this box through what you post. no pressure.

Thanks mate! Always glad to provide a service! I plan to start painting soon as I have quite a few of the UEDF force assembled.

I took a cue from the Ancient Greek aphorism "know thyself" and redirected the scope and scale of the Spartan Vignette. (I wanted to finish it up before my short attention span moves off to other things)

The whole project was inspired by the amazing artwork of Dan Dussault that was used in the Robotech RPG Tactics rulebook. The complete picture here is from his Deviant Art page where you can find some truly inspirational work!

And here is the latest WIP.

I should have kept the source material closer as I managed to blow the angles on the hands and head lasers! Yikes! I may have another go at the hands before it's all done but we'll see.

The left hand looks really fuzzy from where I have to alter it heavily after it came off the sprue. I managed to get the fingers too long and the shape was way off from what I wanted.

And some additional angles.

Spartan #2 is less dramatic as it's cobbled together from test pieces. I decided to upgrade the hands by modeling one to be pointing while the other is balled into a fist. (There is still a little detail work to do on the fist so it has an unnatural looking gap at the attachment in some photos.)

After a little detail work these one should be ready to walk off the assembly line and head over to paint!



And here are both of them next to one out of the box for comparison.

Happy Monday everyone!