Writeup TBC

2016-07-24

Finally managed to get to a point I'm happy to call "finished" with this build. It took a lot of work to get the wiring sorted out and there still a lot of cracks and scratches from being handled that need repairing, but for now I think it's looking pretty good.

As with almost everything on this site this was 3D printed in ABS at 0.1mm resolution, but had to be heavily modified in order to make it wearable. In-particular I had to hollow out space for peoples ears since the round hub bits on the side are otherwise completely solid. I can only assume the original STL files for this were never intended to be wearable. That or they were designed by lizard men.

The motorised faceplate mechanism was created using this guide by James Burton over at xrobots.co.uk. Basically it uses a 180 degree servo motor attached to a PIC chip to pull an arm attached to the inside-left of both the helmet, and the faceplate to pull it upwards. The end result is a mechanism that opens and closes the faceplate with a fairly smooth motion, although it doesn't actuate the faceplate quite as far back as I would like. That's something else i'll probobly improve as I continue working on it.

STL files available here.

2016-11-30

This was made as part of my 2016 Christmas Blitz for a very special friend. I tried out a new smoothing technique on this one that basically consists of covering the parts in epoxy resin, the end result is alright, but once the resin hardens it's MUCH harder to sand than the underlying ABS, so unless you can get it to dry perfectly smoothly it's a trade-off that in my opinion isn't really worthwhile.

Wiring was tricky thanks to the differences in the electrical characteristics between the blue and orange LED's. The end result being that the orange LEDs could be wired in an array of 2 parallel sets of 4, but the blue had to be in 4 parallel sets of 2, which made the wiring a complete mess.

Finished off with plenty of gloss and a little dry-brushing to make it look just a little worn i'm pretty happy with the end result of this one. Merry Christmas Hannah.

2016-07-06

This was made as my submission for Desert Bus for Hope 2016. It's a fairly straightforward 3D printed ABS build, held together with Acetone Weld. Given that this is likely the first thing i've ever made that will get anything close to widespread attention, I paid particularly close attention to filling and hiding all the seam lines, thankfully most of them are practically invisible on the finished model.

I used a triangular file to add scratch marks all around the edges of the model to try and really make it look wild and primal. I also used some gravel of various densities to try and give the "inner" areas of the gun a more rough texture again to try and give the thing some depth and drama to its appearance.

The paint is a simple silver base coat with a patchy grey topcoat to try and create a mottled texture, with some silver highlights and a black wash added on top to pick out the details and add more depth to the scratch marks. Finally finished with a satin clear-coat to make it durable, with the exception of the green "jewel" at the front which instead has a gloss coat as I felt it needed to stand out from the surrounding rough texture.

The box is made from European oak and sealed with 3 coats of Teak oil. The Destiny symbol was stained into the top with 2 coats of a dark walnut stain and sanded back slightly to try and give a "burned" or "branded" effect.

STL files available here.

Technically this is a re-paint of my Paladin Pistol, but I really wanted to see if I could improve on that original with almost a full year of additional practice and experience. The surface preparation is much better, the 3D printing lines are far less visible and the overall look is much smoother. Unfortunately that has the side effect of making the remaining rough parts much more visible, I still need to work on getting crisp, clean, factory-looking angles on my props.

Special Thanks to Rob at wessextransfers.com for the lettering on this one. Turns out printing white lettering is MUCH harder than you'd think and requires some specialist equipment that I wasn't able to acquire myself.

Overall, an improvement over the previous, but still shows many areas that need work.

2016-01-20

This was the first prop I'd made that required extensive use of shading. it took many attempts but eventually arrived at a point I'm happy with. the handle areas at the bottom of the model were sprayed with a textured spraypaint before being given a topcoat in order to create a grip texture. The lettering and markings on the gun were printed onto decal transfer paper and applied on top of a gloss coat.

STL files available here.

Another Christmas 2016 project, this was made for a friend who's a big fan of original series Star Trek. The top section detaches thanks to a small magnet, and the blue "emitter" section at the front was cast in resin with a blue LED embedded in it to make it light up when the trigger is pulled.

the silver trim is a bit shaky as I didn't have the time to finish it to the usual standard I would be happy with, but overall it's alright. Happy Christmas Colette.

2016-04-12

These were a fairly quick build for a friend based on the goggles her D&D character wears. They use some basic camera colour filters for lenses and are probably the only thing on this entire website that's not held together with glue! The bolts around the side aren't just decorative, they actually hold all three parts of each lens together. the strap is just a piece of fake leather cut from the bottom of an old purse.

STL files available here.

Another part of my Christmas 2015 projects for a friend who's a fan of woodwork and FFVII, so this was a natural fit. Originally I was going to leave the logo in black and let the back-lighting create a nice silhouette effect, however the 5 shades of turquoise that the logo is made up of proved fairly simple to mix up and airbrush on. the result is a piece that looks just as good when unlit as it does lit up.

the wooden backing has a small recess routed into it that fits a small battery pack so it can be wall mounted without worrying about visible wires. a simple yet (hopefully) effective piece. Merry Christmas Cayden.

A friend bought me this with the request that i re-paint it and report back to him on how it went before attempting the same himself

Well here's the result, I went with a fairly standard Gunmetal/Metallic Black/Bronze colour scheme and gave it an all-over black wash for shading. Lastly I added some dry-brushing for some minor weathering effects and a clear coat for durability. the result looks pretty good in my opinion and still functions perfectly. I might try doing this to some larger Nerf guns in the future.

I've made 3 of these in total now, refining the design each time. The latest one being a special version made for Desert Bus for Hope 2016.

This version has the 4 logos of the events various "shifts" painted, one on each side. each one was masked off and then primed to help the paint sit on-top of the wood rather than sinking into it. The end result helps the paint retain bright, vibrant colours despite being on a porous surface. Sadly it does somewhat give the impression that they're just stickers slapped onto it rather than hand-painted logos, but oh well.

Each of these are made from 0.7cm thick European oak and sealed with 1-2 coats of teak oil. The peg layouts have changed a lot between the three versions to try and minimise the chance of dice getting stuck inside the tower. The latest version is the best yet in this regard but sadly the chance is still not zero. I guess this is just the price to pay for dice towers that use pegs rather than simply a series of wooden baffles, but I think this style is much more visually interesting.

2016-05-06

My first real electronics project, this was a birthday present for a friend and a good lesson in just how much time large-scale things like this take, and how important pre-planning is. this project took well over 2 months and a large amount of that could have been avoided if I'd realised how little space was included in the default model to house the LED's

Internally the inner-ring of the gate is attached to a turn handle at the back of the base that, in theory, allows it to rotate freely. However the fit of the parts was so tight that the pressure alone makes rotating it very difficult, another issue that could have been addressed with better planning

This was painted using a silver base coat and a patchy grey top coat to try and create a stone-like texture. It's lit by 27 orange SMD LED's mounted onto strips of variboard.

Overall I'm very proud of the end result, even if it's plagued with issues that I think I could correct if I ever make another.

STL files available here.

2016-01-06

Another 3D printed model this is probably the best example of "The devil is in the details" that I can think of. The shading has to be just right on these to create the impression of areas of metal that have been worked smooth through handling, and darker areas that give an impression of age. I still don't think i've managed to get it quite right yet but I'm happy enough with these for now.

STL files available here and here.

2015-12-09

Basically my first ever large scale prop this was a secret Christmas present for a friend. Personally I'm not much into Destiny myself but I can't deny that the games art direction is gorgeous, and this gun in particular is fantastically beautiful.

The painting is about as straightforward as it looks, black base coat with gold trim. The only difficult part was masking off the trim at the front. That took a lot of time, patience, and a sharp knife.

The base is cut from 3mm clear acrylic, with the edges smoothed using a solvent swab. The destiny logo was etched into the plastic using 30 micron lapping film.

STL files available here.

2016-06-15

Not particularly unique or impressive but none the less owning one of these has always been something of a childhood fantasy of mine, and I love it.

Paint is pretty much as you see it, a base coat of gunmetal grey with black accents and hand painted detailing.

STL files available here.

2016-04-01

This was probably my first ever attempt at painting a 3D printed model. it's far from my best work but it holds a special place in my heart.

Painted with a light grey base coat and brick-red trim underneath a dark-grey wash to pick out the panel lines and some dry-brushing to add a weathered look.

STL files available here.