Jobe's mkV build. Perth Supanova in a few days <more detailing, new thighs>

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Jobe Devian

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So heres a little back story:

I vaguely remember when a friend showed me this site many many years ago (I think the membership was invite only or limited open periods at the time). It all looked like magic and way outside my skill/budget. Then a couple of years ago I got excited and started a mkV build with the old low res. files, got the waist upwards pepped, resined and mostly glassed (using cloth, cant remember the weight). I got lazy, lost motivation etc and put it down...

Sometime last year (2014) my (now) wife introduced me to a whole bunch of costumers and I got motivated again to have my own top notch costume, together we made a goal to have a spartan suit each before the next big con here in Perth. I went back to the pieces I had in the garage but found the heat of summer (Western Australia, brick oven for a garage) had not been kind and some were deformed, particularly the half glassed chest piece which had collapsed on itself. Disheartened I shut the door and forgot about it again.

October 2014 came and went, wedding was out of the way and the better half mentioned that she was going to start looking at pep files and planning for her foam build, I did a small count of the months to go...April 11...holy crap given the time it took for the last one to stop smelling I had to get onto it!

fast forward to today, 2 months worth of every spare moment and I am filling and puttying my armour. I didn't want to do a build thread until I was sure I wasn't going to give it up again... here's my photo journey. 20141121_001152.jpgold helmet next to start of new hemet
20141122_132006.jpgnew helmet nearly done
20141125_135146.jpghelmet at work like a boss
20141129_144825.jpgchest pepped, sized about right
20141129_212811.jpgI short-cutted and slush cast the helmet before resining. resined the outside later while resining the torso, I found it kept its shape best when suspended from the shoulders, hence the steel bar. I didn't get any pictures of it the next morning because I was in a hurry to get somewhere and was too angry, but the resin had not kicked overnight (old resin, old catalyst, cool moist air came in just as I was applying). The result was that the card had been to damp for too long and lost its strength, becoming a wet soggy mess. To make things worse, the bar drooped on the box it was siting on overnight so it was no longer supported.... hence the angry. Later that afternoon I spent a couple of hours with the Heat gun bringing it back to; a) a chest shape and b) at least symmetrical. Every flat panel still horribly warped and wrinkled
20141202_185319.jpgtest fit with the wonky torso
20141206_081006.jpgshoulders resined and awaiting slush casting
20141213_091005.jpglaid out top half
20141213_183826.jpgexcitement when you see those first pieces connect up
20141221_152130.jpgA foot!
received_889154237785458.jpegso many bits made
full layout with my helmet (H4 mkV file as is most of my armour)
20141222_064411.jpgfull layout with wife's helmet (Reach mkV MC version)
20141224_183623.jpghelmet visor made from $3 chip bowl, hot knife and boiled water
20141229_192347.jpgbeginning to fill the poly's on the helmet
20141229_192708.jpgtest run with colouring the visor, I didnt listen to the voice in my head that said clean the plastic before painting, also broke it removing it from the helmet so not too worried that it didn't paint well. I used a technique I read about on here using a light silver coat, buffing then orange clear (mixed with yellow clear)
20141230_171525.jpgbeginning of the 10 tons of filler needed to straighten the panels on the torso
20141230_183001.jpgcod all puttied, was actually particularly happy with how well defined the panels are on the back
20141230_183930.jpghelmet puttied
20150101_152107.jpgback of the torso nearly flat now




errr so i was replacing sideways photos with right way up and cant get rid of the old ones from thumbnails, help?
 

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Re: MKV build thread by long time lurker

20150102_192644.jpgslow progress for the last week. The corners are finally coming back on the chest piece though
20150102_192954.jpgthe current state of my pieces, blue is puttied, small white parts on left are ready for putty, chest is still work in progress, yellow still not filled and smoothed yet
 
Re: MKV build thread by long time lurker

Thanks.

I pretty much had this week off from armour building while going back to work for the new year, I also just couldn't make myself do more sanding. It does make it look so much better having the panels smooth and flat, and the corners sharp, but compared to seeing the pieces come alive out of a pile of paper its less satisfying than building and resining, and more difficult to motivate. Also I found that I can't do it in low light after I get home from work like I can the pepping (inside) and resin. I keep telling myself just a little bit at a time and stop expecting to see tons of progress.




So today I went shoe shopping!
For the costume of course.
Here's what I came up with:
20150110_134525.jpg
I got a pair of elastic side low ankle shoes which cost a little more than I originally planned on spending but the textures on them were ideal. Now I don't need to make any kind of "underboot". Also 4 pairs of thongs (flip flops for you Americans, jandals for the Kiwis) I must have looked very interesting at Kmart pulling the plugs and testing my boot armour over them.
The plan is to have 2 pairs inside the armour plates to bring the shoes to the top, and 2 pairs underneath as the tread of the boots, all up it should give me a little height boost since I'm no-where near Spartan height. Ill be cutting them apart in a couple of places to make the wide enough and long enough to match the outline of the armour.
20150110_134425.jpg
I have heated and reshaped the ankle in this shot since taking it, shrunk a little in the curing
20150110_134412.jpg
idea of how they will look roughly, if the white stitching doesn't work I can always fabric paint them black all over and still have the cool pattern/texture


other than that I've just been doing a little more filling and smoothing, got the Dremel out and refreshed my sharper internal corners etc, the chest is really coming along now. Unfortunately it's not the kind of thing the camera brings out so I haven't gotten more pic of that progress yet. I have added my shin pieces to the 'ready for spray putty' pile however.
 
Re: MKV build thread by long time lurker

20150111_193341 edited.jpg
another dress up with the current state of my pieces, knee caps and boot "tongues" wouldn't stay still so they stayed on the floor. Keep in mind none of it is buckled or padded yet so it sits weird.
 

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Re: MKV build thread by long time lurker

20150205_191019.jpg
Sitting in my torso, testing it's practicality


More paint prep slowly happening. Reheated and curved the sides of my torso narrower so I can let my arms down. Been getting some work done on padding the insides of some pieces for fitting and did part of the shin under-armour for which I've decided to go halfway between the CEA design and the halo4. Using EVA to wrap around the back of the calf and recessing the very back. This will allow my to still get my foot through and have it narrow at my ankle

20150205_193322.jpg
with some example detail
 
Re: MKV build thread by long time lurker

Finally assembled my boots to test fit. They worked!
20150210_214929.jpg
20150210_224225.jpg
IMG_610214399630164.jpeg

The boots (around the ankle) and the thigh armour I found kept curling over time even after heating and reshaping so this time I reinforced them with coat hanger wire. So far so good, I've been holding off the filler on the thighs before u was sure they weren't going to change shape again. Now I can finally do them and I'm almost done sanding and prepping.

Status of the rest is helmet ready for primer and visor, chest ready for spray putty. Arms require more filler, thighs need filler and lower legs spray putty. Happy that it's getting near to painting.
 
Re: mkV build. 7 weeks till deadline !!!!

OK so after weeks of appearing idle I finally have a major progress update....

all of the shaping/sculpting/body filler is done, I am finally happy with my surfaces (80% happy but should suffice and time is running out).
This afternoon I set up and primed all my pieces. Pleased to say that I didn't find flaws everywhere once they were uniformly coloured.

here's the photo-goodies

20150302_170214.jpg

20150302_194354.jpg
20150302_210137.jpg
20150302_210255.jpg
20150302_210202.jpg
20150302_210222.jpg spartan washing line?
20150302_210401.jpg


also had a chance to play with visor painting, there are two different test panels fitted there

20150301_201931.jpg
20150301_202014.jpg
 
Re: mkV build. 7 weeks till deadline !!!!

Hopefully I will get it sanded with the 600 grit throughout this week, and the metallic silver basecoat can go on next weekend. Got the paint ready to go.I'm going with a darkish metallic silver (finest grain metallic I could get in the swatch book) base coat, and then the classic mkV light green on top, should make light weathering nice and effective by having the metal under it.
I'll be spraying it on with a gun rather than cans
 
Re: mkV build. 7 weeks till deadline !!!!

Looks great you are dedicated man . Looks like you will be done really soon.
 
Re: mkV build. 7 weeks till deadline !!!!

OK dilemma. I was starting on sanding my primer down, got the boots smooth with 320 grit. I decided I don't want a fully glossed surface on the armour since I couldn't buy the paint in matt, hence not going all the way to 600.

Next I thought I would try things to remove the dusty over spray but leave the grainy texture of the putty. Using steel wool and even a green kitchen scouring pad proved super effective. Quickly removed all loose material and left the surface intact.

My dilemma is. Do I go for a uniform mostly smooth finish, which will likely have a gloss when painted? Or the less consistent matt/coarse finish?

I intend to weather it and have intentionally left imperfections in certain areas for damage. But I'm worried that it might be a bit too much having the rough texture.
I don't think going halfway will work as I'll just have a smooth top with wierd rough valleys. Also the sanding is the safe option, whereas texture there is a chance the whole thing will be ruined. ..
 
Re: mkV build. 5 weeks till deadline !!!! <metal basecoat on>

I got there by the end of today and finally have it all painted in the basecoat, which is a metallic silver.
Happy to say the paint went on well for someone who has never used a spray gun before, it was significantly more vigorous than my little air brush.
I will get some better photos after it's cured a bit more because I don't want to risk scraping any off this early.
20150308_172027.jpg
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it looks so nice in that silver that the thought crossed my mind to just have a silver spartan rather than masterchief green :p

a couple of tight corners such as the back of the visor area and in the crevasses of the torso and stomach plate will need the air brush because I just couldn't get into them without drowning the panels either side using the big gun

I'm decided now that those thighs (from the H4 mkV) are rubbish and I will be remaking them when I have time, yet to decide between CE thighs or the later generic reach/mk6 style
If I get adventurous I will get a picture all dressed up in silver armour :D
 
Re: mkV build. 5 weeks till deadline !!!! <metal basecoat on>

20150308_205007.jpg
20150308_204524.jpg


I did end up bringing a few pieces inside to look at but this was as far as I got before my better half told me to get them out cause they still smell like paint and thinners :)
 
Re: mkV build. 5 weeks till deadline !!!! <metal basecoat on>

Here's a picture of it all on me loosely, I need to pad and strap most of it still. Also the lower legs are going to have some EVA added to wrap around the back of the calves and make it more like CEA graphics

IMG_117505647745606.jpe

also I worked out I can directly link the photos from my dropbox :rolleyes
excuse the photo quality this one is via the wife's phone, to a facebook post, copied to my phone, uploaded to dropbox.......

I've been padding some more on the arms and they nearly stay up themselves now. hope to get more of that done through till the weekend, and do the airbrush touchups I mentioned either by the weekend or by the end of it. I'm going to deliberately leave the green paint till the next weekend just so I have the chance to go round fixing anything I find before the topcoat and so I don't cut any corners getting to it.

Pretty excited at how it's coming along, apart from that I kind of look like robocop :p

P.S. Wife was sceptical about the platforms in the boots, all dressed for that photo, she commented "wow the height from those platforms really makes a difference"

winning
 

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Re: mkV build. 5 weeks till deadline !!!! <metal basecoat on>

Sorry I never made a weekend update last week, I didn't have any new pictures and got distracted gaming rather than armouring.

This week so far I have touched up internal corners with the airbrush.
Last night I retrofitted some glass cloth to the inside of the chest where I have repaired previously with just resin, I figured if it was going to re-crack the same part then it needed some reinforcing (while cleaning up I promptly remembered why I hate fibreglassing).

I got the topcoat green I will be using, its "British racing green" that an auto store person mixed one of the tints wrong, turns out to be the colour I wanted, I have the exact recipe they used so I can still remix the same colour later if I want.

annnnd last but not least my visors arrived in the mail yesterday
20150319_144227.jpg

This weekend should see the suit painted green with only 3 weeks to go
 
Re: mkV build. 5 weeks till deadline !!!! <metal basecoat on>

Jobe...nice effort man.
OCC Perth isn't far off and your suit is looking pretty specco. I've just started my pep build for my Reach Noble armour that I am planning on having sorted for next years Cons. The 405th is an amazing place for support on the build. What's your advice apart from your opening post warning about time getting away? ;)
 
Re: mkV build. 5 weeks till deadline !!!! <metal basecoat on>

Loving the Build so far man, Keep up the good work
 
Re: mkV build. 5 weeks till deadline !!!! <metal basecoat on>

Thanks I'm getting excited with how its turning out, a few things I wasn't completely happy with but I think will still work out ok.
Really looking forward to wearing it at OCC, can't wait.

Advice? a pepped and resined piece is never flat enough to paint straight over without filler. Also I found that spray primer/putty/paint does not like sticking directly to resin so the filler helps there anyway.

On the weekend I painted it all green and I'm pretty happy with the colour, not as 'military' as the later suits but the CE stuff is a lot more green, also seems to change a LOT depending on the ambient light in the game

I also made my first foam sculpted prop, a knife in sheath for the reach armour build my wife is doing

....I would put up pictures but I'm out of time and arguing with the dropbox link again
 
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