Giant robots blowing each other up, that's cool! Only back then, they were called Titans. I became a Titan princeps (that's posh for pilot) and it was really cool! The thing was, with that particular game, the height of a man was about 5mm. That companies flagship game had the height of a man at around 28mm, and you couldn't get Titans in that scale. Well, you could, but they were made of resin and you had to rob a bank to be able to buy the smallest of them.
And the small ones had a face like an Alsatian having it's temperature taken... even so I dreamed of making one of my own. Just never got around to it.
Fast forward 25 years, and now I'm a pilot in Mecha Galaxy... with giant robots that blow each other up. That's cool! And they made some that looked like dinosaurs, double cool! About the only way they could make them any more cool was if they had them wearing a bow tie and a fez, because bow ties and fezzes are cool!
Hang on, wrong franchise...
No, Wait... A Giant, Dinosaur Robot model that wouldn't like out of place next to 28mm toy soldiers... now THAT'S cool!
And the really cool thing is that in the intervening 25 years, I've picked up a lot more skill at model making. This is how I did it. Oh, and a quick caveat... this is an overview. Model makers will know the terms used, and non model makers who maybe want to have a go with their kids (if that's the excuse they want to use) you can google the terms.
First thing with any scratch built model is to decide on a design. In this case we were looking for a dinosaur derivative and thanks to movies like Jurassic Park you really can't get much nastier than a velociraptor. With that basic shape in mind, now to choose the parts.
I remember my art teacher at high school saying that the basis of art was appreciating the beauty in any object. That being true, the basis of scratch building models is seeing the form of any object being able to be transformed into something else. In my case the main chassis would be made from an empty roll-on deodorant container. That was the easy part, but the discovery of imported robot kits from the dollar store gave a lot of stuff that could be donated for limbs, especially in terms of easy to use joints, connectors and armour plates. The leg armour and gun pod housing would be taken from medicinal inhaler housingings.
The robot skeleton was the first thing to be hacked apart as it was going to be donating a lot of connectors that would become integral to other pieces. Four of them needed to be pinned and glued onto the hull using epoxy resin to accommodate the limbs. It also had some disguise work added using plastic spoons and card.The head/neck assembly started as a small toy laser pistol with the grip cut off and the hole disguised with card. The rubberised neck covering was a cut down nerf gun dart and part of the squeezy bulb from a joke water squirting flower.
Cheap toy soldiers are a good source of weaponry. Those inhaler cartridges are starting to become the gun pod housing and have already had their connector joint attached.
Its always a good idea to split a larger model into sub assemblies, both for ease of handling and painting. Even though the actual modelling is complete, with detail or disguise work added and any identifying logos removed, this stage can seem as if its a let down... you know what each piece is and you can still see it for what it is; a pile of junk or rubbish glued together.
It's not until the first paint stage that it starts transforming (no pun intended since we are talking about giant robots..) into something else. Black undercoat is always a safe start on machines as it will blend all colours together without the underneath colours bleeding through, and it is far easier to turn it into a dirty metal colour through dry-brushing. It also gives a flatter top colour when dealing with a military model.
And just because I could (and because it fits in better with our dinosaur theme), the external armoured areas get a coat of British Racing Green. Appropriate I think since raptors are fast wee beasties.
Painting techniques such as dry-brushing, highlighting and stippling give a more realistic and worn effect to areas of the model. Its all great when they first come off the production line but we know that no machine stays clean for long, and a machines life in Mecha galaxy is harder than most.
Final assembly and 25 years wait has been worth it. Parts for the model would have cost maybe US$5 all up; in fact the paint was more expensive than the cost of the model. The only thing left is to see if it can be brought to life with some careful posing in its photo shoot.
Believe it or not, these photos were all taken in the back yard against the backdrop if our willow tree. The model was perched on an old refrigerator so I could get a low angle as if looking up at it to get a sense of scale, with anything contemporary having been left out of frame to keep the illusion.
And of course we can't forget that computers are cool, and can apply cool manipulation to photos. Filter to give it an otherworldly
light, and of course night cam views that take a model and hint at something far better.
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Hope you've enjoyed.
Submitted by David McCallum #701548