Phase Zero Dark Trooper Build

[RAIDER[COTG]]

16 hours ago, Blue Hatter said:

Yeah, like I mentioned, the rivets will be hidden by the cover strips, I just don’t have the cover strips on yet. The raised part on the forearms isn’t actually a cover strip, it’s molded onto the armor. The cover strips will go over the top of those and cover the rivets. It’s the same for the calf armor.

Perfect!  Thanks!

[Blackwatch[CMD-DCA]]

I just re-read the topic and looked over the photos. Ignoring the rivets what I see in the IP pics are the thighs, and that may come down to just strapping and padding.  
Way back when when this was going to be a "clone Garrison" I built clones both overlapped and butt jointed. I found it harder to get the clone to look "closed up" with a butt joint.  Ive got a costume that is all sealed up and I have to "swim" into the chest then put the arms on with help. 

Also the back plate seems long, is that supposed to be long, or is it a trimming situation? 

[Blue Hatter]

I’m not sure what you mean by the “butt joint”. If you mean the separation between the back torso piece and the “butt piece” (same in the front) I had to split them apart because the armor want long enough for me. The torso armor was about three inches too short so I had to split them and lower the bottom sections. The separation will be hidden by the belt.

The thigh armor just needs to be pulled up, I should have taped them in place better for the picture. Though I have been having a problem with having the thighs up higher... When I pull them up to about where they should be they cut into the old family jewels, which really hurts. What do people usually do about that?

The back plate is cut to where the maker indicated. It probably just pulled down a bit, it might not have been taped well. My tape did not want to stay stuck to anything. I think that the angle is weird as well, but the back piece is about the same length as the front.

[Blue Hatter]

Snaps are on, cover strips are on, and I think that everything is finally ready to be painted!

Here are a few pictures of the helmet showing the ear greeblies that I modeled and 3D printed and the vent plate greeblies that were added to the forehead, cheeks and the back of the head. Considering that I completely freehanded the vent plates I'm pretty pleased with how they turned out.

[Blue Hatter]

I've got a small update. Things are moving along fairly smoothly, aside from one of the thrusters falling off of my jetpack but I figure that I'll reattach it once I finish painting it. Here's the latest pictures of my progress so far. Keep in mind that I haven't clear coated anything yet so it's all still fairly flat (it'll be hit with a gloss clear coat) and I haven't cleaned up all of the hand-painted parts yet, there's still some painted details that I need to straighten up and clean up. And the helmet is the same color as the rest of the armor, it's just weird lighting... The helmet is actually a truer representation of the color, the other pictures are brighter for some reason.

I have also started to paint the boots (and boy does it make me nervous painting them)!

[IcyTrooper[CMD-DL]]

Nice job on the painting and weathering!

[Blackwatch[CMD-DCA]]

a lot of this reminds me of Zajus and Goufs, especially the blue paint and elongated faceplate.

 

[Blue Hatter]

6 hours ago, IcyTrooper said:

Nice job on the painting and weathering!

Thanks! It's the first time that I've tried the toothpaste weathering method and it's working out pretty well... Aside from the big mess it makes.

[Blue Hatter]

4 hours ago, Blackwatch said:

a lot of this reminds me of Zajus and Goufs, especially the blue paint and elongated faceplate.

 

The MS-06 Zaku II and MS-07B Gouf? As a huge Mobile Suit Gundam nerd I will definitely take that as a compliment. ?

Darn it, now I want to make an alternate version with hoses on the helmet and a curved spike on each shoulder armor. And pink lenses in the eyes.Then whenever someone asks me what I am I can just reply with "this is no Zaku, boy! No Zaku!" ?

[RAIDER[COTG]]

Nice @Blue Hatter!  Persistent progress!!! Yea I'd say (what you said) just tighten up those hand-painted details and make them really sharp.  You would be the model here on this and want you to look top notch.

My only question at this point...are we sure on the color?  It matches our reference material?

Keep up the good work!

[Blue Hatter]

16 hours ago, Raider said:

Nice @Blue Hatter!  Persistent progress!!! Yea I'd say (what you said) just tighten up those hand-painted details and make them really sharp.  You would be the model here on this and want you to look top notch.

My only question at this point...are we sure on the color?  It matches our reference material?

Keep up the good work!

Yeah, I'll definitely be cleaning up the lines and such, I've still got fair bit of cleaning up to do.

The color isn't a 100% match but it's pretty darn close, the closest that I could get and that was with a mix of spray paints to just get the lightest color. It also doesn't help that every reference picture has the armor shown in a slightly different shade, some darker, some lighter, some more blue, some more gray... The color I went with was what seems to be roughly the most consistent throughout the references. And it'll look better yet once it's glossy.

But comparing the helmet color to this image, for example, it's very close in color.

[Blackwatch[CMD-DCA]]

On 8/24/2019 at 3:04 AM, Blue Hatter said:

The MS-06 Zaku II and MS-07B Gouf? As a huge Mobile Suit Gundam nerd I will definitely take that as a compliment. ?

Darn it, now I want to make an alternate version with hoses on the helmet and a curved spike on each shoulder armor. And pink lenses in the eyes.Then whenever someone asks me what I am I can just reply with "this is no Zaku, boy! No Zaku!" ?

Yeah, you could defnitely go Gouf with this. I believe Norris Packard would be proud.  Always loved the Gouf after 8th Team. 

[RAIDER[COTG]]

7 hours ago, Blue Hatter said:

Yeah, I'll definitely be cleaning up the lines and such, I've still got fair bit of cleaning up to do.

The color isn't a 100% match but it's pretty darn close, the closest that I could get and that was with a mix of spray paints to just get the lightest color. It also doesn't help that every reference picture has the armor shown in a slightly different shade, some darker, some lighter, some more blue, some more gray... The color I went with was what seems to be roughly the most consistent throughout the references. And it'll look better yet once it's glossy.

But comparing the helmet color to this image, for example, it's very close in color.

The colors are tough for me to tell.  I will defer to @Blackwatch @IcyTrooper and yourself regarding colors because I can't tell.  Maybe because the shades and colors do change alot in the references is why I'm having an even harder time.  This reference pic you posted is much closer for sure

[Blue Hatter]

6 hours ago, Blackwatch said:

Yeah, you could defnitely go Gouf with this. I believe Norris Packard would be proud.  Always loved the Gouf after 8th Team. 

Though I've always been an Earth Federation guy, the Gouf is definitely a sweet design. The Gouf Custom in the 08th MS Team is also killer (and the Gouf Flight Type). In the PS4 game Mobile Suit Gundam: Battle Operation 2, the Gouf Custom can really kick some butt.

[Blackwatch[CMD-DCA]]

Is there one of those.6 view character guides like Filoni had for the Rebels characters? That would give us a pantone reference. 

[IcyTrooper[CMD-DL]]

3 hours ago, Raider said:

The colors are tough for me to tell.  I will defer to @Blackwatch @IcyTrooper and yourself regarding colors because I can't tell.  Maybe because the shades and colors do change alot in the references is why I'm having an even harder time.  This reference pic you posted is much closer for sure

What @Blackwatch said about possible pantone reference would be helpful for that, or else I'm thinking we'll have to get color codes from the reference and compare that to the one in the pics to see how close they are or where to go next.

[Blackwatch[CMD-DCA]]

I mean, not to use that EXACT color, cause thats gonna cause international issues with paint match availability, but if its close to FS 35237 or FS25237 blue grey, a model shop is going to carry a very similar color. 

 

[Blue Hatter]

5 hours ago, Blackwatch said:

Is there one of those.6 view character guides like Filoni had for the Rebels characters? That would give us a pantone reference. 

No, there isn’t. This is from the old Pandemic Battlefront game from around the early 2000s.

[Blue Hatter]

5 hours ago, IcyTrooper said:

What @Blackwatch said about possible pantone reference would be helpful for that, or else I'm thinking we'll have to get color codes from the reference and compare that to the one in the pics to see how close they are or where to go next.

How would I go about looking up a Pantone reference? I’ve never done that before.

I looked for a good year to find paint colors and I tried everything you could think of, I even tried looking through colors of house paint. I’ve spent hours in paint stores, I’ve looked through every paint manufacturer I could find, and sent dozens of Emails out to different companies. As far as I can tell there is no “perfect” paint color readily available on the market and what I used is the closest I could find anywhere (it’s actually a graffiti spray paint), and even then what you see on the helmet isn’t the straight color, I hit it with a few coats of transparent white spray paint to lighten it up even more.

I did look into getting custom spray paint made but that stuff is around $30-40+ per can and that’s just for one color while the armor actually has four different shades of blue (not to mention the gray belt and various other detail colors). I inquired at an auto body paint store but it would have cost a small fortune to get it all painted with all of the different colors that would each need to be  custom mix. And even then it’s hard to say if the color would have been perfect.

...So I finally found what was as close as I could possibly get on the market and then tweaked it a little to be closer still.

[IcyTrooper[CMD-DL]]

4 minutes ago, Blue Hatter said:

How would I go about looking up a Pantone reference? I’ve never done that before.

I looked for a good year to find paint colors and I tried everything you could think of, I even tried looking through colors of house paint. I’ve spent hours in paint stores, I’ve looked through every paint manufacturer I could find, and sent dozens of Emails out to different companies. As far as I can tell there is no “perfect” paint color readily available on the market and what I used is the closest I could find anywhere (it’s actually a graffiti spray paint), and even then what you see on the helmet isn’t the straight color, I hit it with a few coats of transparent white spray paint to lighten it up even more.

I did look into getting custom spray paint made but that stuff is around $30-40+ per can and that’s just for one color while the armor actually has four different shades of blue (not to mention the gray belt and various other detail colors). I inquired at an auto body paint store but it would have cost a small fortune to get it all painted with all of the different colors that would each need to be  custom mix. And even then it’s hard to say if the color would have been perfect.

...So I finally found what was as close as I could possibly get on the market and then tweaked it a little to be closer still.

Totally understand there! I'd say get some clears on it and we'll see where it is at, I personally think it looks good. Let me know the paint brands/names when you get a chance (you may have already done so) at least for reference for others for a CRL. 

[Blue Hatter]

3 hours ago, IcyTrooper said:

Totally understand there! I'd say get some clears on it and we'll see where it is at, I personally think it looks good. Let me know the paint brands/names when you get a chance (you may have already done so) at least for reference for others for a CRL. 

Sure thing, I can do that. I still have the cans. Heh, one of them I used the brand's entire line of matching blue spray paint on the armor. I have to wonder if they ever wondered who and why someone was buying so many cans of blue-gray graffiti spray paint of different shades?

[Blue Hatter]

I forgot to post a picture of this one. My ARC caster is almost finished, just a bit more to do on it!

Since my last round of pictures I have modified the dark blue on the arm armor and the chest/back armor a little so it looks, I think, a bit more accurate in color. I have applied a gray wash over the dark blue on the arm armor (upper arm and forearm) so that it's a bit darker and a little more gray. I applied a white wash over the dark blue on the chest/back armor to make it a little bit more pale. No pictures yet, though.

[Blue Hatter]

Well, I badly need some opinions before I go any farther. I was trying to darken the dark blue parts of the thigh and arm armor and to also give it more of a gray hue so I mixed up some transparent graphite gray paint... I was hoping that if I was really careful that I could just brush the paint on and not have to go through setting up my air brush and spraying tent, but the paint didn't come out as smooth as I was hoping. I do think that the color looks quite a bit better now but... does the paint look too streaky? Should I repaint it and try again (using an air brush this time)? Or does it look okay? Granted I haven't weathered it yet, so I might be able to just kind of blend the streaky look with the rest of the armor via weathering, maybe making it look like some dirt drips on the lighter blue color, or something.

I'd rather not have to repaint it but I will if I have to, and thankfully I only did one thigh piece. I just can't make up my mind whether it looks okay as-is with the streaks or if I should repaint the dark blue... What do you all think?

[Blue Hatter]

The more that I think about it the more I think I should just paint it over and try again. It’ll be a pain taping it all off again but it would look better in the long run. And the streaking bugs me.

[Blue Hatter]

So I've got another question for everyone. Before I finish painting the helmet I need some opinions (which, by the way, I've altered the color of the armor a bit to make it all a bit more gray, which I think looks much better. I'll get pictures later)... On the back of the helmet for the Battlefront video game model there's a thick black line going under the vents, which I'm fairly certain is supposed to represent the ridge that's usually there on a stormtrooper helmet-- the stormtrooper models in the game have that same black line. My helmet has the ridge like on a stormtrooper helmet. Should I add the black line like the in-game model or just leave it with the "bare" ridge?

I can't decide what to do. On one hand it I thought that it might look kind of neat with that extra bit of detail back there, but on the other stormtrooper helmets don't usually have that black stripe, and as I said, I'm pretty sure that the game model has it only to represent that ridge without having it actually modeled. What do you all think? Should I add the black stripe or not?