Romulan Attack Ship

If you thought I was a nerd before, check this shit out. The RPF (an intertnet forum I spend entirely too much time on) hosted a contest to build a TOS Star Trek ship out of two Polar Lights NCC 1701 kits. Totally bitchin', I know. I read somewhere that In the original draft of Search for Spock the Bird of prey was supposed to be of Romulan origin, and I liked the idea of bridging the TOS Romulan Bird of prey with the Klingon. I tried to keep it looking TOS era with a hint at the direction the design would go. Here are parts laid out in the basic body plan.

This kit is great because you get a ton of spare bits with it. I used that pile of different versions of the warp inter-cooler intakes to the left (thank you Haynes manual) to make the vanes of cooling rods on the back of the ship. I hemmed and hawed about changing the bridge shape, but eventually I just sanded the top flat and called it good.

Version one of the ventral hull. It seemed boring just mirroring the top, but I didn't want the distinctive curve of the enterprise sensor dome on a Romulan ship. I end up completely redoing this later.



The nacelle pylons were by far the jankiest part of this build. I entertained the notion of just using the connection between the primary and secondary hull from the kit (is there a name for that?) but it was not to be. The nacelle pylons were made from the Starfleet logo bases filled in with bits of scrap. I figured out that if I sanded it before the glue was dry it made a much better seam.



Here is the rebuild of the ventral hull. I used the nubbins from the Bussard covers as pointless detail to hide the fact that I was fast running out of parts.



Here is the impulse engines coming together. I'd like to have been able to spend more time on this bit, but I went on a trip to Iceland in the middle of the month and it was pretty great so I can live with it. Initially I had a curve on the end of the dorsal fin, but it felt to cartoony, so I sanded it flat.



The pylons were ugly no matter how much I sanded them, so I hid the seams with the "feathers". I wanted to bring in some of the Trans-Am aesthetic of the original BOP, to still have it look tough, you know? I was pretty stoked about the way the vanes on the back came out.



All primed up. Honestly, I wish it was still this color, but rules are there for a reason. We could only use 4 predetermined colors of paint, and scandalous primer was not among them.



The shuttle-bay door were the easiest panel scribing I have ever done. I didn't screw up even one time. You can see the illicit non kit parts base that I built in the shape of the TOS Romulan Star Empire logo. Way cooler Swiss brutalist design than the buttrock screamin' eagle from TNG.



GREEN!!! It is honestly not this green in person. Really. Look up the color swatch for lawn green on the Montana Gold website. Anyway it is a lot less Christmassy than it could have been.



I had a hard time stopping myself from using more of the red on the ventral side, but I am glad I did.



The copper really breaks up the holly-jolliness of the paint scheme. I love the styling of the TOS ships, so it was good times building this. Thanks for looking.

Insect Systems

Here is some more old stuff. I really need to get a scanner so I can put up something recent. I did these couple sketches for homework in an entomology course. Sadly they have stopped offering entomology at the University of Washington from lack of interest. It was the schools longest running course, and I loved it.

Elytra Infantry

I found this little guy I kit-bashed together years ago when I was packing to move. His body is a tank turret, and there are some Gundam joints in there. The paint job makes me cringe now, but I like the overall design.

Ghetto Blasters

Another quick project I did the day before Burningman. We didn't have any flashlights so I made these so we could see in the porta-potties at night. Mine broke the second night, so I had lots of thrilling adventures.

I knocked this Klingon communicator out in a couple days for a contest on the RPF. Didn't get first place, but I did get a sweet Spock beer stein out of it. The bit on the back is a rare-earth magnet to hold it on clothing.

1£ Store lightsaber

The RPF hosted it's second annual dollar store lightsaber building contest this November. As I have still to find a job this was a great opportunity to stave off cabin fever and keep the modeling skills sharp. The 20£ cutoff insured I could afford it. I used the following parts, minus the ones that are crossed out. Mind you I've just moved to the U.K. so I had to do the whole thing with a Dremel.



Concept sketches



I dremeled out the crystal chamber window from the wee little flashlight, as well as the "vent holes" on the side. This flashlight was great, as I could use it's two screw off ends to attach it to the other internal segments. The crystal itself was cut from the invaluable ice-scraper's acrylic blade. For the internal mechanics of the crystal chamber I cut apart the accessories from the "Funtastic Police Play Set" which had a lot of great textures.


For the emitter I used the top screen from the microphone, but hollowed out the middle, then cut lenses from the pen and closet light to color and diffuse the LED's from the flashlight. I then glued these to the hollowed top of the flashlight.

Here it is all together. The wire is stripped from the microphone cord. I was hoping the mic

would have some cool electronic guts, but it was totally empty inside. Thanks Poundland.

For the shroud I used the Aquafresh tube. They were polyethylene, and if I had to choose a least favorite plastic it would be polyethylene. Nothing sticks to it, it gets all hairy when you cut it, and sanding it is a ghastly nightmare. But the tube fit nicely, so there you are.


For the pommel I wanted something that had interest and spoke to the rest of the saber. I used two sections of Aquafresh cap, the reflector cup from the flashlight, and some of the EVA foam.


To light the crystal I needed a seperate light source from the emitter, as it's battery supply wouldn't cover enough LED's to light both. I used the blue LED rig from the ice scraper (why do you need a light up ice-scraper?) and cut it down to fit in the base of the crystal chamber. I then used some of the microphone wire to run the switch to the handle.

Next the unthinkable happened and I dropped up my DSLR taking photos during the build. So, the contest ended up being a lot more expensive than 20£. I am such a dumbass.

I finally figured out I could focus by getting it in range physically and manually shooting. I'm still out a spendy lens, but here it is. I used the decorative mirror the landlord put up to make my tiny flat seem bigger for the backdrop. For the paint scheme I was inspired by McQuarrie's original sketches of the stormtroopers holding sabers. The sabers they were holding in the concept sketch looked suspiciously like Obi-Wan's, so I pushed the design to look more sinister and mass produced. Initially I wanted to do a more elaborate paint job using some blue details, but ran out of time.

I think my favorite bit is the crystal chamber. The only part I ended up using from the bike pumps was the bit holding the crystal and the power switch. The blade adjustment knob is a screw cap from the corkscrew sanded flat. I was really impressed with how sturdy the switches from dollar store crap were.

The grips are cut from two layers of the EVA foam sheet. I couldn't believe they sold that stuff at Poundland. That was the biggest score of the whole build. The charge port is the tip of the pen used for the emitter lens.

Thanks!!

Ralph McQuarrie Concept Viper Scratchbuild Part 2

Rather than try to build the "ear" sections I vac formed them. I didn't want to use expensive mold material for such a simple shape, so I used silicone caulk and it worked pretty well. I just had to make sure that the first layer had no bubbles.

Here are the plaster positives in the vac former.

And here they are on either side of the top fin. I think I made them too tall compared to the drawing, but I like they way it looks, so meh.


A closer look. Tons of Bondo, I know. Most of it was sanded off.

Rear view with the upper wings attached.

And finally time to prime it. After spending a few minutes trying to scribe panel lines with the back of an Exacto blade I ordered a scribe tool from Japan. I wish I had that thing in school, it's awesome. Initially I was going to build this with landing gears down, but I liked the way it looked flying so I skipped it.

I added these pinstripe details that may be in the drawing, it's really hard to tell what is going on back there. I thought it had a cool vintage look like a lot of RMQ stuff.

I added some kit parts from a hind for the undercarriage.

I added some more pipes and venting in the part of the drawing you can't see.

White! It looked so bright when I started the body color. White stuff is really hard to take good photos of, no contrast.

The factory showroom paint job. It looked ok, but really needed some weathering to tone it down. I had a really difficult time finding the right yellow in a spray acrylic, so I got as close as I could, but it's not a match.

The empty cockpit and some pastel weathering.

For the little Sculpey pilot I used the razor style uniform for a model, I'm not a huge fan of the old suede uniforms and king tut helmets. I went for the airbus style joystick just to do something different.

The dash lights on. I wish I had taken a better picture of this where it didn't look so bright, but the canopy is on now.

Building the canopy was the hardest part. I did three tries and I am still not satisfied with the result but I am really, really tired of making little canopies.

I tried to take this shot from the same angle as the drawing. The proportions are a little off, but I am pretty happy with it.

It is dark in space, you would need headlights.

The underside after weathering. I thought I went overboard, but in the photos it still looks pretty clean. I didn't do any paint chipping because it's a concept, but it really needed a little dirt in the nooks and crannies.

The engines turned on. I think the way the inside of the thrusters turned out was may favorite part. It's also the part that I could take the most creative license with, so it was a lot of fun.


I hid the battery cover between the thrusters. Its a really tight fit, but looking at it on you can't really tell it is a separate piece. I'll probably do some more detailing and spruce up the base eventually, but this thing has already eaten a big chunk of time and I think we need some time apart.