1905Adventure | 26 Sep 2014 7:14 a.m. PST |
I decided to finally give scratch building space ships a try and decided to go with some 1/7000 ships for Federation Commander. I used buttons, a bingo chip, spaghetti, plastic from an old gift card and a bread tag and some sprue from a zvezda 1/100 tank.
For painting I primed them with black liquitex gesso, base coated them, gloss varnish, oil wash, clean up and then picked out details-- my standard speed painting approach.
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Dances With Words | 26 Sep 2014 7:20 a.m. PST |
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TheBeast | 26 Sep 2014 7:21 a.m. PST |
I'm impressed. Have you plenty of similar buttons and the like? Fleets-of definitely quiet the 'purists'. ;->= You KNOW someone will pipe in with, 'well, the Gorn nacelles should taper, and the fed….' Doug |
1905Adventure | 26 Sep 2014 7:33 a.m. PST |
I thought long and hard about trying to get nacelles and hulls to taper. In the end I decided that ease of build was more important than accuracy. Even more so for the Gorn because those ship designs were never on screen. For the cruiser, I wanted to just get the main visual features that clue people into what the ship is. I found some really good model schematics for people who are building them for shooting fan productions, so while I did have the data needed to make it accurate (the plans had all the angles in degrees and bisections showing diameter and whatnot) I decided I value my sanity more than accuracy and just went with my gut. I got a bag of buttons at the dollar store a while back to replace some buttons on some clothing and never used them again. I have enough buttons to make maybe 10 more ships. I'll need to get more bingo chips though. I don't know where I got the one that I had in my drawer of random stuff. |
TheBeast | 26 Sep 2014 7:37 a.m. PST |
…I decided that ease of build was more important than accuracy. You are SO 'preaching to the choir!' Never forget my first words: I'm impressed. ;->= Doug Edit: Of course, the taper should move from a positive ogive curve to a flat or negative one… *lol* |
1905Adventure | 26 Sep 2014 7:56 a.m. PST |
I'm sure I'll get faster as I build more ships and be able to meet your exacting standards *lol* This art was my inspiration for the gorn cruiser. There's more wrong about my model than right, but I also wanted the simple flat old school aesthetic of the the starline miniatures
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Andrew Walters | 26 Sep 2014 8:15 a.m. PST |
Brilliant! And an ISBN from 1971, to boot! But fantastic models, post again when the whole fleet is done! |
1905Adventure | 26 Sep 2014 8:19 a.m. PST |
I got an enormous amount of miniature related printed material from an estate sale. Lots of stuff from the 60s and 70s. That book is "The Modern Soldier Manual" and is a pretty rudimentary painting guide. It's usually floating around like a coffee table book, so I grabbed it to reflect the lamp light back at the miniatures. |
Privateer4hire | 26 Sep 2014 8:24 a.m. PST |
Very cool. Also, here's the Amazon link in case you want to track down the book in the background. link |
1905Adventure | 26 Sep 2014 9:00 a.m. PST |
If someone does start wanting to collect early publications related to miniature gaming, I'm not sure the book will be all that of a special way to start. It's a curiosity but it's unspectacular. |
optional field | 26 Sep 2014 9:28 a.m. PST |
Nice work, and in a scale no one else produces them in. Should you consider casting these I'm sure you'd have buyers… (provided they do not infringe ADB copyright) |
TheBeast | 26 Sep 2014 9:54 a.m. PST |
Different, not wrong. ;->= No fear; I didn't need to be told 'Gorn'. Doug |
1905Adventure | 26 Sep 2014 9:55 a.m. PST |
If you search 1/7000 on Shapeways you'll find better designs at reasonable prices. If I wasn't interested in the actual scratch building process at a hobby, I'd order from there. |
Coyotepunc and Hatshepsuut | 26 Sep 2014 10:01 a.m. PST |
Well, the Gorn nacelles should taper, and the federation struts are at the wrong angle… No, seriously, those are brilliant. I have been trying to scratch a Star Trek itch for a while now, this might be something I try to copy. |
1905Adventure | 26 Sep 2014 10:02 a.m. PST |
Gorn to the rescue. Keeping those Federation colonists out of their territory since 2267. |
1905Adventure | 26 Sep 2014 10:07 a.m. PST |
The federation nacelles should taper as well, just not as much. And they don't have the antimatter vents that actually warp space. :D I was actually trying to figure out a way to do a grooved cylinder for the nacelles, but in the end, I just went with a solid tube. I also found out in the building of this that higher quality plastic cement like Ambroid ProWeld and Plastruct Solvent Cement work on acrylic. So I'm getting a bunch of acrylic beads of different sizes and shapes off of eBay for super cheap. The funny thing is going to be asking friends and family to save me their bread bag tags. They're a great source of thin plastic. I'm probably going to call a food services company and see how much a bag of them is. It'll probably be way, way cheaper than buying hobby plasticard. |
justBill | 26 Sep 2014 10:15 a.m. PST |
Its the use of spaghetti that clinches it for me. Lol! Fabulous! |
Tankrider | 26 Sep 2014 4:21 p.m. PST |
Lizard has a very sporty necktie. |
TheBeast | 26 Sep 2014 8:26 p.m. PST |
Actually, a cravat. Styling! I've saved up a few of those 'tags', but they have been going to Aeronef. Cut in half, they look like arcane guidance fins. Doug |
MacrossMartin | 27 Sep 2014 5:29 a.m. PST |
These are excellent, Nathaniel, damn well done indeed!! I love scratchbuilt Trek ships. Far too many hours in my teenagehood were spent designing and sculpting ships out of whatever I had laying around. 10/10! |
1905Adventure | 27 Sep 2014 7:30 a.m. PST |
I ended up going with 54mm for my VSF, so one day I will scratch build an platoon transport Aeronef for my soldiers, but it's going to be enormous! The Gorn is committing a fashion faux pax though. He's got his cravat, but no shoes.
Next up with be a Klingon D7. It'll involve more of the plastic gift card and bread tag plastic and less use of beads and buttons, so it'll probably take me longer to finish than these ships. |
TheBeast | 27 Sep 2014 9:16 a.m. PST |
Bit of a dust up at the shoe store; all the stylish models were alligator-skin. Do PLEASE put piccies of your transport, when done, on the LAF Aeronef sticky! Do look at the odd bit of plastic cutlery; may well find some of those weird angles of the D-7. Doug |
1905Adventure | 27 Sep 2014 9:32 a.m. PST |
For sure I will. I'll probably go for a pretty classic style for the 'Nef. Something like this but flying in style:
I will start looking at cutlery. I really don't want to build the curved pointed oval part of the D7 hull from flat plastic. Thanks for the idea! |
1905Adventure | 28 Sep 2014 11:24 a.m. PST |
Another picture that shows the sides of the ships better.
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ShadowWeaver2010 | 28 Sep 2014 6:30 p.m. PST |
Those look great reminds me of when Iwas a kid and I did similar stuff to have toys that you just couldn't find. My big thing back then was making manila folder starwars star destroyers using scotch tape sissors bottle caps and one of mom's necklaces that had beads to make the radar domes :) Again great job and thanks for the memory trip back to my childhood. Shadow |
Parzival | 29 Sep 2014 9:46 a.m. PST |
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1905Adventure | 02 Oct 2014 7:58 p.m. PST |
So I was at my monthly club meeting and found a bingo chip exactly like the one I had used before on the floor. And another on another table. Some work in progress shots on the next batch:
The bingo chips with the buttons glued on. And then four of the round buttons I used for the gorn pods glued into two more pods, one for another cruiser and one for a smaller craft like a destroyer. Oh, and a completed Gorn light cruiser that just needs a base made for it before it can be painted. A size comparison with my first Gorn medium cruiser.
The Federation destroyer and frigate will have a button in place of the bingo chips and I'm out of the flat topped hole-less buttons (the pack of misc buttons I bought at the dollar store only contained three) so they'll get round ones.
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1905Adventure | 05 Oct 2014 10:53 p.m. PST |
The new light cruiser is almost done. Just needs some putty to make the nacelle caps and I need to slice a bit of plastic sprue for the bridge.
1905Adventure | 08 Oct 2014 4:29 p.m. PST |
Finished painting the two new cruisers. I ran out of the thinner sprue so their base pegs are thicker. Next up is plasma torpedo and drone markers. I think I might do the super glue cotton swab pull method to make the trail.
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1905Adventure | 08 Oct 2014 11:43 p.m. PST |
Made some plasma torpedo markers. I had some clear plastic crystals from the dollar store and I brushed them with matte varnish mixed with ink. I know there's no blue ones on TV, but I wanted the different colours to differentiate them for Federation Commander which has different torpedo types.
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MacrossMartin | 09 Oct 2014 6:11 a.m. PST |
Cutest starship miniatures ever. Official. |
1905Adventure | 16 Oct 2014 8:12 a.m. PST |
In the interest of cuteness I made two smaller ships. A Gorn destroyer and a Federation frigate. The frigate next to the heavy cruiser. I decided that the windows look better at table viewing distance when they're bigger and have sharper edges and are less impressionistic. I don't know if I'm going to go back and paint over the ones on the other two ships, but I think I'll be doing them more like the frigate going forward.
A comparison shot of the three fed ships:
And the three Gorn ships:
The Gorn destroyer firing some plasma at the Federation frigate:
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