I've been having a lot of trouble setting aside time to blog lately. I think the main problem is that I want to make sure each article I post delivers a concise, complete thing by the time you're done reading it.
The only problem with that is that usually, by the time I'm done with a project, I move so quickly onto the next thing that I don't pause long enough to write up all of it's various segments. This is why I've only written a handful of the eight or so articles about the recently finished Goddess Thor costume and I never finished writing about the painting and rigging of my Mk3 Ironman costume from a few years back. I'll get back to those later.
My goal for the next two weeks is to post daily. It should be easy. I won't be able to show off a completed project each day, but what I will have is at least a few progress updates on four things I'm working on simultaneously.
First: I'm making the final great strides on finishing my T-60 Power Armor from Fallout 4. Today I was focused on sculpting out the rubber pieces for the knees and elbows. Making the rubber parts starts with figuring out how big they need to be. Here's my assistant Chuck making an outline of the visible opening that the rubber bit will fit into:
The next step was to lay out a rectangle big enough to fit that shape into and then sculpt a ribbed sheet:
Now I just need to make a mold of it.
Second: I'm nearing completion for my Grey Knight Terminator build from Warhammer 40K. For starters, I sculpted the rubber bits for the knees and elbows for that guy too:
It came out okay:
I'll be molding it along with the rubber parts of the T-60.
I had another helper vacform a couple of copies of this fun little detail piece:
I've also made the prototype for the hinge detail piece that'll go all over the armor. Here it is on top of one of the shoulders:
At this point, it's ready to mold along with a couple of new purity seals:
Once I've got nine or ten casts of the hinge part, I'll install them all over the armor and get to painting. For now, here's a skull detail from the right shoulder in its first coat of silver:
On the silly, lesser project front, I'm almost ready to mold the body and lower jaw for the Mouser droid from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles:
The only other thing I'm planning on having done in time for Maker Faire is a few minor improvements to the display booth. More on that in tomorrow's post.
The other day I got the following email:
"We are excited to inform you that your application for Maker Faire... has been accepted. Congratulations. We are delighted to have you participate in Maker Faire Bay Area 2018!"
So yeah. I guess it's time to get cranking on some new stuff. For those of you that didn't make it last year, here's a snapshot of the display filled with the old stuff before we filled the tables with more exhibit items and the crowd flooded in the gates:
This year I'll have even more interesting things on display as well as (hopefully) a bunch of copies of my book. Be sure to stop by and say "hello there."
I'm on the cusp of having all sorts of new finished projects to brag about. But since it's been entirely too long since my last bloggage, the very least I can do is give you dear readers a glimpse into my current collection of UnFinished Objects currently piling up in the workshop.
First off, I'm coming up on the last little bits of work for my Grey Knight Terminator from Warhammer 40,000:
So far the helmet is the only part I've painted, but once the rest of it gets some color, this thing is going to be phenomenal. Here's my shop assistant Chuck trying it on:
She's only about 5'3" tall, so here's a pic that'll give you a good idea of how massive it'll be once the whole thing is rigged together:
Of course, I've still got a lot of Star Wars stuff in progress. First, there's the Boushh costume for my friend Mallory:
She's doing all her own work on that project. So since she's only around one day a week, it's slow going:
Because I'm a person who needs all the distractions I can get, I'm also working on a couple of helmets:
And when my 3D printers aren't doing anything more important, I've got them turning out parts for this little guy:
On a completely different note, my Fallout 4 T-60 Power Armor is starting to come together as mentioned in a previous post. Here it is during a recent test-fitting:
I've also been making slow occasional progress on the War Machine build I'm working on in collaboration with my friend Jon. Most of the time, my contribution just looks like this:
But the other day I decided to put the robots back to work on this beast. Here's Maria the Robot Whittler (Carvewright CNC machine number three of my four) carving out some of the slices of the back armor:
A few days ago she made me the slices of the lower chest plate:
So at this point, all of the grey parts in this render have been carved and/or printed:
Most of those parts have even been molded and cast. So hopefully I'll have a full set of parts ready to paint and rig sometime soonish.The thing that's likely to be finished soonest is the Lady Thor costume I've been working on. I still need to prototype the cape harness, but otherwise, all of the hard parts and most of the soft parts are made:
There are countless other little projects going on right now too. More on those as I dig them out of the usual project avalanche in the workshop:
Stay tuned...
