About Me

My photo
I make toys for kids who don't want to grow up. I'm on the lookout for new projects. If you're interested in commissioning me to build something ridiculous, shoot me an email.

Wednesday, December 13, 2017

Quick and Easy Project: Fallout 4 Fusion Core

Every once in a while, in the midst of a huge project when it's hard to see the light at the end of the tunnel, I'll start to feel run down or overwhelmed.  When that happens, it's helpful to focus on some small thing that I can finish in short order so I can get a glimpse of the feeling of accomplishment that will come at the end of a build.

So when I was starting to feel swamped by the T-60 Power armor build, I was thrilled to come across a high resolution, printable 3D model of a fusion core by Daniel Lilygreen at myminifactory:
Fusion Core Model

You can download it for yourself here: www.myminifactory.com/object/fallout-4-fusion-core-17423

Ignoring the original scale of his model, I resized it so it would fit into the port on the back of my armor:
Scaled Fusion Core Model

Then I went ahead and uploaded the files to my Zortrax M200 3D printers.  A few hours later, I had a thing:
Printed fusion core

After a quick pass with 120-grit, then 150-grit sandpaper, the parts all got sprayed with a couple of healthy coats of primer.  Then, without any additional sanding, I went ahead and sprayed the base colors onto each piece:
Fusion Core Body

Fusion Core Cap

Fusion Core Contacts

Once the paint had dried overnight, final assembly took a few quick minutes:
Fusion Core Painted in Hand

Fusion Core Painted 1

One of these days I'll dirty it up a bit and give it some proper wasteland weathering.  But for now, there it is.  A done thing.

Stay tuned for some more Fallout builds.  There's about to be a lot.

Tuesday, December 12, 2017

Thor, the Goddess of Thunder Part 3: Getting Hammered

Without the hammer, Thor is just a lady in a funny hat and cape.

About the time I started this project, I ordered up a couple of Mjolnir kits from Branfuhr Studios.  You can see their current offerings here: www.etsy.com/shop/BranfuhrStudios

The two kits arrived at about the same time as my fabric swatches:
Fabric swatches

The castings were nice and clean.  Free of surface flaws and with only a tiny bit of cleanup work to do on the sprues and seams.  I ended up getting a bit carried away:
Hammer Heads Sanded and Filled

Here's the parts of the heads glued together with the handles dry-fitted into place:
Spot Putty Drying on Mjolnirs

Once I'd sanded the filler smooth, everything was primed and the metal parts were painted with a gunmetal metallic paint:
mjolnir head base color closeup


mjolnir heads base color

The handle was painted in a tan enamel:
mjolnir handle basecoat

Once that had dried thoroughly, I added a thick coat of darker brown acrylic paint, wrapped the whole thing in plastic cling wrap while the paint was wet, then peeled off the plastic wrap to reveal decent faux leather effect:
Handle Leather Closeup 1


Handle Leather Closeup 2

After that had dried, the next step was to mask off the "leather" parts so I could paint the metal bits:
Handle Masked Prior to Silver Bits

The masking was a bit on the rough side, so there was a bit of leakage around the edges:
Silver Picked Out

Still, it was good enough to continue assembly:
Mjolnir Before Weathering

After a quick blackwash, the dark metallic parts were drybrushed in order to bring the details to life.  Then I added the leather strap to the pommel and it was good to go:
Mjolnir Finished

"But wait," says you, "I thought you said there were two of them."

Good catch, dear reader.  Stay tuned to find out what happens to that one.

Sunday, December 3, 2017

Interview Segment on the New Screen Savers

Yesterday I had the honor of being interviewed on an episode of the New Screen Savers.  I brought along a handful of recent creations from the workshop:

I also dragged along a few characters in costume:



The show was fun to shoot and you can see the whole thing here:


My segment starts at about the 51:50 point.  Check it out and be sure to leave a comment!


Sunday, August 20, 2017

August 2017 UFO Sightings in the Workshop

I'm doing a terrible job on the bloggage front, but in the workshop, stuff is definitely going on.  So just to make sure you don't think I'm slacking, here's this month's round-up of Un-Finished Objects around the shop...

First off, there's the E-22 heavy blaster rifle carried by the Scarif "shoretrooper" stormtroopers in Rogue One.  At this point I've finished prototyping and molding and I've cast a complete rifle.  Here it is in black primer and waiting for a real paintjob:
First Completed E-22 in Black Primer

While I've been tinkering with that, I've also been working on the helmet of the Goddess Thor:

Chrome Helmet Face

The wings are cast separately, so I'm keeping them separate until I'm finished painting them:
Chrome Ears 2

Work also continues on the T-60 Power Armor from Fallout 4:
T-60 With Lewis Front

I still have to prototype the rubber parts and work out the rigging for the hands, but for now I've been stalled for a moment while I experiment with different paint schemes:
Family Portrait 1

The other day I decided to spend a few minutes on some sewing projects.  Among other things, I made a pocket:
Hip Pouch Test Fit

So now I guess I've taken the flametrooper project off of the backburner:
Hip Pouch and Reference

Finally, because I had the 3D printers sitting around with nothing else to do, I cranked out a Covenant Carbine from the Halo video games:
Carbine Test Fit 1

So there's still a steady stream of prototyping, preparation, molding, casting, sewing, design, cleanup, painting, and more going on.  Sooner or later I'll do some proper writing too.

Stay tuned...



Monday, July 31, 2017

Thor, the Goddess of Thunder Part 2: Molding the Helmet

At the end of the last post on this project, I had three shiny helmet parts.  The first one looked like so:


The other two pieces looked like this:
Ear Wings

Tacked together in a hurry, they looked kinda like this:
Thor Helmet Prototype

The problem: the carved and polished prototype helmet is way too thick, way too heavy, and way too pink.  So it was time I turned it into this instead:
Assembled Thor Helmet


For details on how it was done, read on...

Monday, July 10, 2017

Thor, the Goddess of Thunder Part 1: Prototyping the Helmet

My shop robots had some free time lately, so I got them working on something new carved out of some leftover MDF I had sitting around: 
Lady Thor Helmet Parts Carving

After a couple of miscalculations, I finally assembled a helmet with a size that I like:
Lady Thor Helmet Parts assembled

Before the day was over, I soaked it with primer:
Lady Thor Helmet Primed

The next day I got started cleaning up some of the details:
Lady Thor Helmet Detail Cleanup

After a bit of bondo work, it was looking pretty good:
Lady Thor Dome Reshaping

If she be worthy...  #thor #cosplay #ladythor

Lady Thor Helmet Rough Left Side

Here's the wings after a bit more love with a file and some sanding blocks:
Lady Thor Helmet Wings Smoothing

So the new addition to my routing in the shop is to spend the last few minutes tinkering a bit with this helmet and then adding a coat of primer:
Lady Thor Helmet Filler Progress

Here's how it looked last night:
Lady Thor Helmet Dry Fitted

Which means it looked like this this morning:
Lady Thor Helmet Shiny

Lady Thor Helmet Left Side Shiny

Here's the inside face of the wings with the cutouts that register to the sides of the helmet:
Lady Thor Helmet Wings Gloss Coat


Once that dried, I sprayed the outside faces too:
Ear Wings
I'm not sure why, but this is the first time I've sprayed something with my standard high-gloss pink prototype paint and not had it instantly feel wrong*. Once the paint is dry, I'll flip the wings over and give the outside faces a nice, glossy coat of paint.  Then I'll be ready to start molding all three pieces and make them into something wearable.

Now I just need to resist the urge to dive in all the way on this project and make some shiny ARMORED BOOBS!

I'll probably fail though.  This outfit is pretty darned sexy:
Lady Thor Reference

Stay tuned...

*Historically, I use pink gloss paint for my prototypes for no reason other than to aggravate a certain subset of people.  In this case, those are probably the same people that will already be upset by the creation of a female Thor.  So that's an added bonus.

Wednesday, June 14, 2017

June 2017 UFO Sightings in the Workshop

Well, the time has come once again when I can't help but be embarrassed by how little I've been posting in my blog.

While there's been a ton of progress on countless elements of numerous projects in the shop lately, I don't have a shiny, new, huge thing to brag about just yet.  So once again, I'm forced to share a stack of photos of UnFinished Objects currently in the works.  Enjoy.

First up, I've been making slow and steady progress on the E-22 Blaster Rifle wielded by the Shoretroopers on the planet Scarif in Rogue One:
Overall Progress

Just a bit more smoothing and this beauty will be ready to mold.  But even now it looks pretty nifty:
E22 Test Fit

While I'm having fun tinkering with that, there's still the much more massive T-60 power armor project from Fallout 4.  Here's most of the T-60 Parts piling up:
Full Set of Fiberglass Parts

At this point, all of the fiberglass work is done.  There's just the rubber parts left to prototype.  For now though, I'm concentrating on making a presentable copy of the helmet:
Just a few more greeblies and this sexy beast will be ready to paint.   #carvewrightcnc #T60 #fallout4

In addition to the power armor, I've gone a bit off the deep end of building Fallout props.  Whenever I've got down time on the 3D printers, I've been putting them to work on all sorts of little additions to go along with the big suit.  For example, here's the nearly finished AER7 Laser Rifle:
Fallout Laser Rifle Assembly in Primer

Somewhere in the room, I've also printed out the parts for the Fusion Core, Laser Pistol, 10mm Pistol, Plasma Pistol, and a whole host of other little things Fallout.

Since I need a change of focus, I've got my Carvewright CNC machines started on the parts for the next armor build.  Behold, the rough carved helmet of the Doomguy:
Doom Helmet Assembled with Seams Marked

Also, to thank the Lady Shawnon for putting up with all of my insanity projects, I figured I might as well get started making her very own Thor helmet:
Lady Thor Helmet Rough Left Side
This is just the first piece of the whole, sexy, shiny costume.

More to come as I make progress and find a few minutes here and there to actually write up each of these projects.

Stay tuned...