Jareyes' Journey To Armour Awesomeness

[pooper]

Wow, everything looks great! Looks as if you can pep pieces in a week faster than I can in a month.



And yes, you've pepped rundown's model! I'm going to make my new ODST helmet using his model as well. Thanks for the suggestions about the folds and such... I'm thinking I'm going to fill in the line details with bondo and carve them back in using my dremel.



Also, what pep file did you use to build the Battle Rifle?



Well, keep up the good work!

 

[jareyes]

Wow, everything looks great! Looks as if you can pep pieces in a week faster than I can in a month.



And yes, you've pepped rundown's model! I'm going to make my new ODST helmet using his model as well. Thanks for the suggestions about the folds and such... I'm thinking I'm going to fill in the line details with bondo and carve them back in using my dremel.



Also, what pep file did you use to build the Battle Rifle?



Well, keep up the good work!

Sweet, I don't have to double-post for my update! haha. Thanks for the compliments man, considering you have a completed suit there's nothing to compare =\! The pep pieces I find have been coming together a lot faster lately though for some reason, maybe increased motivation?



Yeah for rundown's model all the ridges are POSSIBLE, and some of them are actually easy. It's just that one part with the rectangular detail cut out that's the problem. Ral Partha's unfold dealt with those tiny mofo's.



annd for the battle rifle, I think I used bevbor's model. I originally downloaded the clown_puncher file off the wiki, looked at it, felt sick and gave up. Then I found bevbor's which honestly wasn't a WHOLE bunch easier but I really wanted a battle rifle. Came out okay, but bends slightly to the left.. must figure out a way to fix that..



Anyhow, time for updates! Or rather, pictures to accompany the update I posted in my last post.



A culmination of everything I've done today so far. You can see most of the ODST pieces pepped, an ODST knee and a Mk. VI bicep ready to go for resin. Weather turned bad halfway through the day today so I had to stop.

Here's the Mk. VI chest I've been working hard on. Just finished rounding off the shape for the spartan boobies. IMO it looks pretty good with all those ridges removed. Can't decide which ridges to remove on the back though.. it looks good with all the ridges there but somewhat unfinished for some reason.. suggestions on what to add to make it look more finished?



Front:

Back:

I also managed to get some bondo on the new ODST. 'tis true, the helmet hardly requires any bondo. Compared to how much bondo I had to put on the WETA ODST, working on this ODST was a breeze.

Started on the top curvature:

And on the curlaround on the back:

Also gave my old ODST bucket a quick primer too (kind of a two-face paint job) since I want to salvage/work on it still. It looks pretty good and I think I might end up doing what trooper did, which is just paint it and play it off as battle damage. The craters caused by the air bubbles in the bondo really look like bullets bounced off of it and stuff.

Anyhow, work continues on the undersuit but I think I'll stop for today. Got work at 8am.. but as soon as I'm done that I'm going right back to work.. sweet!

 

[jareyes]

Apologies for the double post (again) but I didn't want this "update" to be swallowed up in the mess of text and pictures in the above post. Anyway, I finished glassing a few more pieces and I finished pepping almost all of the upper torso parts. Going to redo the torso piece because it doesn't come far down the back enough. Anyway, I'm posting this mainly because I wanted everyone's opinion on one thing: the proportions.



Here's the picture of all the pieces on:

What do you guys think? Do you guys think the proportions are okay? Do you think they're off? If they're off, can you point out what exactly is off (i.e. too small, too big) about it?



My concerns are

- that the chest pieces (or torso packs, whatever) are too small, but the chest piece.. if I made it any bigger than I would lose arm mobility..

- also that the thigh piece doesn't come up high enough? It won't go any higher, too tight. Maybe I have to scale it up? It's the first time I unfolded anything so maybe I should've scaled it bigger or something.. maybe, maybe not. need a second opinion.



And don't worry about the shoulder piece being so high. I haven't trimmed out the inside yet so there's a little edge of the shoulder piece that prevents it from sitting lower.



Anyway, let me know what you guys think about it.

 

[Dagger06]

Is that crackhead's thigh? I'm going to have to unfold it and such soon enough myself. I would say if you have the time increase the size a little bit. It seems like it might be uncomfortable after a while. In most images I see it go up to where the hip plate is at least.



For the chest piece, I sized mine up a bit, and it ended up being a bit larger than it probably should have been. Arm mobility was still decent though. I couldn't touch my other shoulder without difficulty, but I still had a very comfortable range of motion. Definitely more than the master chiefs I was hanging around with. By itself the chest seems fine, but with the stomach pieces, the chest seems dwarfed a bit. Maybe if you shrink down the center stomach piece?



Just my two cents. I also just realized it's 3:14am over here so I may be a little out of it. Probably want a second opinion. =P

 

[jareyes]

Is that crackhead's thigh? I'm going to have to unfold it and such soon enough myself. I would say if you have the time increase the size a little bit. It seems like it might be uncomfortable after a while. In most images I see it go up to where the hip plate is at least.



For the chest piece, I sized mine up a bit, and it ended up being a bit larger than it probably should have been. Arm mobility was still decent though. I couldn't touch my other shoulder without difficulty, but I still had a very comfortable range of motion. Definitely more than the master chiefs I was hanging around with. By itself the chest seems fine, but with the stomach pieces, the chest seems dwarfed a bit. Maybe if you shrink down the center stomach piece?



Just my two cents. I also just realized it's 3:14am over here so I may be a little out of it. Probably want a second opinion. =P

Thanks for the opinion! and confirming my suspicion.. I knew it looked a little small, I was just concerned about the mobility. After a little though, I will scale it up as per your suggestion and cut it into three pieces to maintain maximum mobility.

and YES, it IS crackhead's thigh file! I have to say honestly, it IS low-def like he said it was good but it's so much better. Infinitely better.. you're going to have to unfold it yourself but I'm sure you were aware of that already.. it's really easy to unfold, and easy to put together. Appreciate your input



Also, I guess I can squeeze in a quick update. Here are the fruits of my labour after 14+ hours of work today:



Lookin' a little rough:

and after all the work, sanding and smoothing with another quick coat of primer, it's looking pretty shapely. There are some slipups, remaining craters and dips in the helmet, but I think I might keep most of them.. adds a nice feel to the helmet I think:

and with the rest of the parts:

That's it for now. I figured that perhaps I was spreading myself too thin with so many projects going on in the garage so today, for once I chose to just focus on one thing. More ODST to come in the following weeks!

 

[mc halo3]

wow thats amazing work,BRAVO

 

[Oscar]

Looks awesome... Keep up the good work

 

[KrAZiiMan117]

I hope you don't mind me asking, but where did you find the HD thigh piece for the MC armor? I've looked in MANY threds here on 405th and everywhere in the Pep file index, but still cannot seem to find it. If you can point me in the right direction or give me the link where u found yours I would greatly appreciate that!

 

[jareyes]

The HD Thigh pieces for the MC armour were made by crackhead09. In the original thread for them though, I think the links are down. You can now find the file (and I think the rest of the pieces) at this link here:



Armour Pieces



crackhead also made a better thigh piece more recently, but minus the three scale-looking things on the inside. In some ways better than the one I used, in some ways not as good.. it's all up to opinion really.

 

[KrAZiiMan117]

THANK YOU! I was almost going to give up on the thigh piece



also, does anyone know where to find a high detail BR? The one in the wiki index is good but Jareye's is 100% better no doubt!

 

[Deathcoreknight]

lookin for the h3 odst rookie back pack some one told me u had link but i saw none any advice were to go

 

[jareyes]

Maaaaaan, it has been a LONG time since I updated this thread! This thread is so old, I used emoticons that don't even exist anymore apparently. Gotta admit, life gets in the way pretty good. Chalk it up to university to eat up all your time and homework/readings/assignments/papers to eat up all your friends =(. Either way, I've still been keeping up with the forums lately and I felt like, with the recent loss of Rube, I would put up my own ODST work in commemoration. Makes me really upset to know that he left for whatever the reason may be, the point is that he's gone now. Seeing his work was hugely inspirational and obviously my own is not up to par, but I thought I'd show it nonetheless. This is for you Rube!



Overall Shot:

-> You can see that the shins still need to be glassed and bondo'd/strapped. The gauntlets also still need to be trimmed to fit as they are huge, then glassed and so on. Also need to add the Belt plate, it's resined and stuff.. I don't know why it's not on there actually



Close-up on the "strapping" method:

-> still in its rough stages, but I've pretty much decided that I will mount it the way it's mounted.. just not with electrical tape haha. It'll be with straps, just finished the strap work with the belt and the shoulder pieces. Will replace the cardboard that is currently holding all the stomach pieces with preferably something cordura later haha.. oh cardboard.. I actually didn't want to resort to a full MOLLE or otherwise tactical vest because I felt it would look obtrusive to the overall look.

-> Just kind of wanted to highlight the shoulder straps I used here. Not to toot my own horn (TOOOOT!!) but they are the most comfortable things known to man. I picked them up from a local climbing store for about $42CDN and they are nice, thickly padded things with the single strap already sewn in = win. If you guys have local climbing stores around you and have some extra cash, ditch the backpack straps and get some of these climbing bad boys!

-> and you know me, the last one's just for good measure haha. P.S. no I'm not actually inside of the suit! I also have to fix up the paintjob on the top. stupid stripe



well that's pretty much it for now. I'll slowly try to keep up with the work in school and the work on the suit, I haven't even touched the undersuit of this but I would like to go way further on the undersuit than the plain black one I've got on there right now. I've also excluded the old chest piece (i.e. the piece that goes around the back) because it got too beat up from being on the mannequin too long. Also, I understand nightshade's put out a wonderful new one with better detail, so I'll probably be making that one.



I also can't even resin anymore because Canadian weather has taken a turn for the worst and temperatures have already dropped below good resin temps. Looks like I'll be waiting on that order of Aquaresin . Which brings me to an important question:



Does anyone know of a body filler putty (i.e. like Bondo brand body filler.. maybe even easier to sand would be nice too!) that is non-toxic? Kind of like what Aquaresin is to normal resin? Being that the putty also needs warm temperatures to cure in but is also toxic, I wouldn't be able to bondo during the colder months. Anyone have any non-toxic alternatives? That would be great.



Anyway, as always, you're welcome to leave comments, suggestions and questions!

 

[RELLIK NISSASSA]

Maaaaaan, it has been a LONG time since I updated this thread! This thread is so old, I used emoticons that don't even exist anymore apparently. Gotta admit, life gets in the way pretty good. Chalk it up to university to eat up all your time and homework/readings/assignments/papers to eat up all your friends =(. Either way, I've still been keeping up with the forums lately and I felt like, with the recent loss of Rube, I would put up my own ODST work in commemoration. Makes me really upset to know that he left for whatever the reason may be, the point is that he's gone now. Seeing his work was hugely inspirational and obviously my own is not up to par, but I thought I'd show it nonetheless. This is for you Rube!



Overall Shot:

-> You can see that the shins still need to be glassed and bondo'd/strapped. The gauntlets also still need to be trimmed to fit as they are huge, then glassed and so on. Also need to add the Belt plate, it's resined and stuff.. I don't know why it's not on there actually



Close-up on the "strapping" method:

-> still in its rough stages, but I've pretty much decided that I will mount it the way it's mounted.. just not with electrical tape haha. It'll be with straps, just finished the strap work with the belt and the shoulder pieces. Will replace the cardboard that is currently holding all the stomach pieces with preferably something cordura later haha.. oh cardboard.. I actually didn't want to resort to a full MOLLE or otherwise tactical vest because I felt it would look obtrusive to the overall look.

-> Just kind of wanted to highlight the shoulder straps I used here. Not to toot my own horn (TOOOOT!!) but they are the most comfortable things known to man. I picked them up from a local climbing store for about $42CDN and they are nice, thickly padded things with the single strap already sewn in = win. If you guys have local climbing stores around you and have some extra cash, ditch the backpack straps and get some of these climbing bad boys!

-> and you know me, the last one's just for good measure haha. P.S. no I'm not actually inside of the suit! I also have to fix up the paintjob on the top. stupid stripe



well that's pretty much it for now. I'll slowly try to keep up with the work in school and the work on the suit, I haven't even touched the undersuit of this but I would like to go way further on the undersuit than the plain black one I've got on there right now. I've also excluded the old chest piece (i.e. the piece that goes around the back) because it got too beat up from being on the mannequin too long. Also, I understand nightshade's put out a wonderful new one with better detail, so I'll probably be making that one.



I also can't even resin anymore because Canadian weather has taken a turn for the worst and temperatures have already dropped below good resin temps. Looks like I'll be waiting on that order of Aquaresin . Which brings me to an important question:



Does anyone know of a body filler putty (i.e. like Bondo brand body filler.. maybe even easier to sand would be nice too!) that is non-toxic? Kind of like what Aquaresin is to normal resin? Being that the putty also needs warm temperatures to cure in but is also toxic, I wouldn't be able to bondo during the colder months. Anyone have any non-toxic alternatives? That would be great.



Anyway, as always, you're welcome to leave comments, suggestions and questions!

Great mannequin, Great Suit build, and dude..... that's my Garfield alarm clock.

"Nahhhh don't get up. Stay in bed. Sleep longer."

 

[pooper]

Wow, the suit is looking good jareyes! Glad to see some progress... We can understand that life does come first, but hey, you’re getting the suit done as well. Slowly but surely.



And you mention that with Rube gone, you’d post your recent progress in commemoration. I thought that was cool of ya to do... Rube was and still is an inspiration to as all. Now seeing your work, I’m sure you’ll inspire others.



Keep up the good work bud!

 

[mroreo123]

Does anyone know of a body filler putty (i.e. like Bondo brand body filler.. maybe even easier to sand would be nice too!) that is non-toxic? Kind of like what Aquaresin is to normal resin? Being that the putty also needs warm temperatures to cure in but is also toxic, I wouldn't be able to bondo during the colder months. Anyone have any non-toxic alternatives? That would be great.

Given how much research into non-toxic alternatives I've done, it would be a crime for me not to step in. I haven't tried the following methods personally, but...



Malechei has used spackle on some of his work with good results. He recommends sealing it IMMEDIATELY after you're done working with it so it doesn't crack while drying.



Ben Streeper has used Dap Patching Plaster for his detail work on his ODST, Elite head, and probably others. More info about it here in his molding thread.

 

[darth wombo]

Wow!

very nice work

 

[eggmoe]

omgosh that suit looks super sexy for some reason. Awesome work