1/100 Lanzegeist Inner Frame *Official Photos*

Hey All,
   I got my new light box today for doing photoshoots, and I wanted to get the inner frame photographed so I could start putting the armor on the kit.  So without further delay here are the official inner frame box images for the kit.  (At least I think these are going to be the final images.)

I will post the full finished photos of the kit with the armor on as soon as I finish the painting process.  I still have about 5 small parts to paint and then to assemble the Hulkatr Cannon before I can do a final assembly before I take the final images.  This process has been a long time in working,and I'm nearing the finality of the box art paint up.  I will keep you all updated.

Stay tuned mechaholics...

LG Internal Frame Painted

Hey All!
   Today I finished the last of the internal frame parts.  So I thought to take some quick photos and share it with you!

The internals are finished, and I used a few decals here and there to add a hair of detail, but

SD Gundam Tattoo Update..err...again!

Hey all,
   Just a quick update for my tattoo.  I added the shoreline behind the ball unit, and a comet/meteor with it's tail coming out of the yellow street lines.  Simple enough, but necessary as background.  I still need to get the street gray filled in beneath the hover truck, and I may add a hole in the concrete above the hover truck.  Here is the progress so far.

I'm loving how it's turning out.  I still need to plan out which objects will get thicker lines, but I will do that a little farther along when I have a better idea of how it all looks.  I know I'm gonna thicken some of them, probably the ball, and maybe the Zaku 2. 

Here are some more pics of the update.

 

In other news I'm working on another top secret project that I will reveal in time.  It's not another mecha yet, although I'm working on painting my LG.  (I bought fluorescent strip lights for the garage and now I've started painting again.)  This project is for my brother so I can't divulge anymore yet as in the off chance that he reads this it'll spoil the surprise, but I will say that it's gonna be a scratch built, hand sculpted piece that I'm casting and painting for him.  My hope is that he loves it.  Well I will update you all as soon as I can.  

Stay tuned mechaholics...

SD Gundam Tattoo Update

Hey all,
  Just a brief update.  I recently got a touch up on the previous work done and added a hover truck getting hit by a missile to the mix.  This part brings a ton of really beautiful color to it like the vivid orange of the explosion and the seafoam green and purples of the hover truck.  Terry did a great job on the shading and the thick outlines are looking awesome so far.  Not sure if I will thicken the other outlines on my arm already or just keep them different sizes like a weird stylized cartoon.  Either way here is the most recent addition. 

In other news I have started doing an action figure sculpt with the intent to cast it. I'm calling it the "Fleischer Truppe" or what I think is roughly Butcher Squad in German.  I have some preliminary sketches done up and I bought some sculpey and some more tools to get started.  I have the rifle, the helmet, the leg armor, and the chest armor planned, but that's it so far.  I've sculpted most of the right hand so far too.  hehe.  I'm going to make it full articulated and ball jointed where I can. 

I'm still waiting to buy a few strip fluorescent lights for the garage to finish painting my box art for the Lanzegeist which I still have every intention of selling 10.  Sorry for the long delay getting back into modeling friends, I'm just still getting adjusted after moving twice.  It won't be long now.

Stay tuned mechaholics...

SD Gundam Tattoo Part Deux

Current (forgive any distortion in the photo, it's a pain in the ass to take a picture of your own shoulder.)

Hey All,
   This past weekend I had a couple sessions with Terry Peek, the artist who's been working on my SD gundam piece, and he made the progress I was hoping for.  If you recall from my last post my shoulder was lookin a bit rough from the first bit of work, but now that it had healed up nice and he was back in town, we got to work on it and get the piece closer to what I want.  Now keep in mind that he is still going to do more work on it such as refilling the windows in the buildings, and doing touch ups on color fills and black, adding thicker lines here and there, but I must say I'm really happy with how this is turning out.  I still haven't decided if I want to thicken up the outer outline of the Char's Zaku II yet, but I will make up my mind before my next session.  Oh and I also got a new addition to the work, a cute lil Ball!

Ball!

 It's placed right under the crunched up car you see beneath the Char's Zaku II, and it looks all distorted because it's bending around my arm.  Now all of this looks a bit funky as my skin is puffy from the work, and the top photo is shiny from the aquaphor, but after some healing and a few more touch ups this piece will be golden.  Now I gotta start planning the next additions, and how to tie the background together!

Stay tuned mechaholics...

Decal Design

Hey all,
   I think I have the close to finalized versions of what the decal are going to look like.  This is just for the large trace line decals that I drew up in this outline sketch:

I did add some angles and variations to them as the ones in the sketch were just for a rough idea.  This of course doesn't include all the little various warnings and small text decals, it's just for those unique to this kit.  Here is the sheet, the layout of the decals may change to suit a more efficient use of page space, but you'll get the idea.

With the Part Outlines

Without the Part Outlines or Path Strokes

I'm going to work with

Sneeper's Badass 1/48 Nu

Hey All,
   Today's post is on Sneeper1980's badass G-System Evolve Nu Gundam.  We've been waiting for him to finish this bad boy for a while now, (I think over a year) but it was worth the wait.  It looks excellent!  Here before I go any further lets see what it looks like, then discussion.  (with myself hehe.)

First off let's cover his surface smoothness.  The texture is flawless, and I'm not sure but I don't think most resin kits come that way either from pour sprues to any debris in the molds.  (Although from what I hear G-System does an exceptional job)  This means Sneeper was sanding and puttying for months to get this kit looking flawless enough to paint.  A+ on that mate.

Next is the paint and topcoat.  Gorgeous.  Now typically I favor shaded and weathered kits when given the choice, but I have to say I couldn't love this kit any more than I do now.  I don't think shading or weathering would have made this kit look better, and I think his paint job is absolutely perfect.  (Again painting is not my strong suit were I to have one, but I love this work.)  The flat coat on top is just right as well and there is no trace of silvering or hazing.  He did his homework, and took his time.

Next is the decals, decal film opacity, placement, and panel lining.  Again,
this work is top notch.  The decals are straight, well placed, and there is no silvering whatsoever.  I can't imagine how long this must've taken.  The panel lines are all solid and contiguous, which is super hard to do perfectly IMO.  (But again I'm dumb with paint so grain of salt and all that.)  It brings out every little detail of this beautiful kit and makes Sneeper's kit a shelf topping showpiece.

Overall I can't find any flaws in his execution at all.  And I can be a critical dood when I want to be.  I'm trying to pick it apart and I can't, which is why this kit gets a spot in my Wall of Awesome Stuff.

If you want to see the mechalounge forum post for this kit you can check it out here.

If you wanna check out Sneeper1980's youtube channel you can find it here.

If you like the work I suggest you go ahead and let him know you appreciate how great this work is, and as always feel free to join the forum at www.mechalounge.com.  It's where I post my work now and we welcome any and all to join us in the community.  At mechalounge we are all trying to focus on the fun and community aspect of our building, and I enjoy the people there a lot.  Again, great job Sneeper, this looks badass brother, I look forward to your next work!

Stay tuned mechaholics...

Crowned King ..uh...Crown Update!

Hey All,
   As the wife and I are pluggin along at making casts  I decided to fiddle with the head crest a bit more tonight.  And although I wasn't gonna add anymore prongs to it (Gary had said it looked to have enough in that department and I kinda agreed) I did it anyway cuz after the shape being cut down a hair I thought there was too much empty space above the crest.  I also added a long range targeting camera which will have one of my new clear lenses in it.  The crest is gonna be cast in at least four or five pieces so I can even cast it, and hopefully then it will work.  I may add a little more detail and shave down some more, maybe not.  Either way though here is what I did tonight.  Again these parts are just fun optional parts and won't affect the kits if you guys don't wanna put the parts on, they are just extra.  (Except for the crotch/tailfin heavy armor sleeve for the white kits)

I like the new targeting camera a lot.

I added the extra normal camera/eyes also as per my little sketch plan.

I thought it would be cool to have a face within a face.

Forgive the pouring sprues still being attached, I just grabbed a couple of fresh casts for the chest parts.

I'll have a better idea of if this stuff looks cool once it's cast.  Right now the mottling of color throws it off.

LG Crowned King Armor pack and Casting Update

Hey all,
   I recently had an issue with one of the molds where a piece of the mold rubber just broke off.  The part was the crotch/tailfin armor and that mold was a pain to make.  So I had a little soul searching to do to decide how to proceed.  I basically just decided to remake the mold as it was, and the molds for a few other parts where the mold was getting worn out for some reason or another.  This is what I spent the last weekend doing with wifey between other things.  The problem came in on Monday night when I went to separate the molds.  They had sealed together.  It turns out that I had used Mann Ease release 300 mold release instead of 200, and the silicone had basically just cured to itself right through the release, since the 300 isn't made for releasing rubber from rubber.  After I had a major rage spell, I tried to cut the parts out of the molds.  I ended up snapping the prototype for the crotch armor altogether.  I really only needed to still make the casts for the white versions of the kit with this mold, but still now no mold, no parts.  Well I came up with a solution that I liked so I went with it.  The Crowned King Armor pack.  The deal is that the white casts of the kit are going to come with a few extra add ons that have a little bit heavier armor than the gray casts.  This solution allowed me to make a new crotch armor piece with a little bit thicker plating for the armor, and to make a few new neat extra parts that will basically just be a neat difference between the gray and white casts.  Here are the basics parts of the Armor Pack.

-New optional head crest
-New optional bicep armor
-New optional front skirt armor
-New optional Hulkatr Cannon weight block
-New optional lower leg armor
-for the white kits a mandatory different heavy armor tailfin cover

Also here is my casting update photo keeping in mind that I'm two and a half weekend (more casting on weekend days) days behind schedule:

Lanzegeist Casting Update!

Hey all,
   I just wanted to do an update showing my progress with the kit casting.  Here is a photo of the parts that the wife and I have poured so far.

What we are doing is basically pouring the entire quantity that we need for each part to make 10 kits, and then moving on to the next set of parts.  It seems to be the most efficient way.  Like I said I am going to be casting 10 copies of the kit before we move, and so far I have to say 8 of them are reserved.  If you have let me know that you want one I appreciate it, but you may want to do so again so I know for sure.  If the number of kits requested is above 10 I may make a few exceptions up to maybe 12-14, but no promises as I do have time constraints and such.  So again if you want a kit cast, make sure to either comment below or better yet email me at onecoldnight@yahoo.com and use the subject header "lanzegeist kit".  That way I'll know to add you to my list and make sure yours is reserved.

Here is a video update showing basically what you see above, but with the moving pictures of a cinematograph!

Video link in case video is not embedded correctly:  Lanzegeist Casting Update Video!

Good news and bad news

Hey all,
    I guess the blog title sounds a bit more ominous than it really is, but it's been a day of mixed things.  I had planned to print out the drekky instruction manual and finish up the packing for sending out, but that was before our male ferret started having seizures and had to be put down.  It's been a rough year for relatives passing away.  Le sigh.  And the not necessarily comparable but still downer problem I was having with a particular mold today just compounded my already kinda crappy day.  (I have a particular mold where the surface of the mold keeps getting a weird matte surface quality to a part that is usually pretty glossy, the parts are still good but it just makes it look like there is a surface quality flaw and I don't know why it's happening.)  So today I just haven't really felt much in the mood to do anything productive. 

  I did, however decide that it would be a good day to maybe start rounding up the cured lenses and toy with them for a few minutes.

I'm pleased that a good portion of the lenses came out wonderful.  Some were oddly shaped or distorted and gotta be tossed out, but most were good.

I took one of my old kits that I modified a little bit when I was first learning to model (an old crappish kampfer mod I did) and cemented on a little bit oversized pink lens.  I used pink as in the animations usually the mono eyed mobile suits have pink eyes when the suit is on.  I used a slightly oversized eye because it catches the light a little better and shows off the clarity.  The smaller better sized version is harder to photograph well, but I do have plenty of those too.  I think I'm gonna use these for my SMS Kampfer conversion kit I'm gonna build soon.  Anyhow here are some eye lens photos.

DISCLAIMER: The work and paint on this kampfer head is old and I just grabbed it to test out the mono eye lens, it's not my current work.  

These took four hours, but they're pretty!

Hey all,
   I decided to go ahead and make a small mountain of mono eyes, lenses, and random round things tonight.  Not that I just had tons of extra time, but I couldn't wait to test the colors and get some small lenses cured.  I made sure to make tons of the pink ones for zeon mono eyes for any future builds like that sms kampfer conversion I got a little while ago.  I also have a neat idea for the clear lenses that I haven't seen done before that I plan to share soon once I make a test version.  (possible detail up add on part kit accessory)  But anyway here is my bunch of curing colored clear apoxy resin.

I mixed up the clear apoxy resin and since it has a 5 hour pot life (really more like 3.5 with the conditions in this room) I had plenty of time to color tint the various little pallets of apoxy.  I carefully used a bamboo skewer and dabbed it into the liquid and let gravity do the rest when I dabbed it again onto a smooth mold top.  I use the tops of various molds because they are smooth number one, and two because the apoxy won't cure to it.  Now there are some oblong shapes and circles that merged or were made mishapen, but no worries as if even half of them are good its a crapload of good lenses of various sizes and colors, and this in reality only took 65 grams of apoxy.  Yeah and I had a ton leftover because I'm stupid and always mix too much.  hehe.  So it would require even less than I used by half.  But you do need a certain amount of material just to make sure your mix ratio has a little play.

Neon Clear Casting!

Hey All,
    The neon yellow clear beam saber blade finally cured enough to demold and I wanted to show it off. 

I gotta say I like the coloring.  I think it will look sweeter once it's dunked in future floor polish.  I'm gonna try out a pink one next I think. 

The clear stand was cured enough to demold too.  I gotta say I really like it!

It still needs a little bit more cure time to harden all the way as this clear stuff takes FOEVAH!  But it will add to the kit presentation a lot and I think I really may use these for the sellable kits.  I am going to try to have an update on the different color casts of the clear lens parts next.  I may pour those tomorrow night in a variety of colors and sizes.  I also have a friend who is starting up working with aluminum so we all may have the capability of designing and making our own custom aluminum parts soon!  But I'll fill you all in as that happens.  He's working on making the LG thruster vents in aluminum right now, but I'll fill you all in as that happens.

Stay tuned mechaholics...

Video Update!

Hey all,
   I just made a video update showing off various parts of the LG.  Feel free to share this with your friends!  It shows off the humanoid mode, burn mode, and the inner frame some.

BTW I think I said the link to this blog incorrectly in the video.  haha it's my own blog and I don't know the address.  Derp.  :(

 Link in case of video issues: Click Here

1/100 Lanzegeist Fully Transformable Kit With Full Inner Frame

Hey All,
   I have been on the forums little and less the last 6 months, and for that I apologize.  However this was for a good reason, I was working on a project that I wanted to keep secret until I had the first cast completed.  That project is:



Specs:



model number: MASF-OAM-LG-001
magnus arms space fleet orbital assault machine lanzegeist
power generator: immersive fusion reactor
maximum power output: unknown
armor plating: thorexium carbide
pilot accomodation: 1 pilot extended occupancy cabin
with long term life support unit
thrust potential: theoretical top speed 18.2 km/s @ orbital alt.
thrust instrumentation: dual biaxial deflected afterburners
armaments: dual long range missile bays, "gotcha" grapple claw,
dual quad cluster bomb array, Hulkatr long range high density beam cannon
quad chest unidirectional beam condensors, two 360 degree light laser turrets,
two 360 degree medium laser turrets, two plasma beam swords,
optional magnetic deflector shield array self deploying
variable modes: high speed orbital fighter jet and humanoid fighter modes