M.CHRISTIAN'S 3D THINGIVERSE 2

Thanks so much, Woodsy and HUGE thanks to all the great folks who enjoyed my Cosmos Corps Build-A-Rocket Kit pics - 

so here’s a bunch more, including how everything fits together, and even a couple of fun ephemera like a movie poster and magazine cover (all hail Hero Forge!)

Got a 3D printer? 

 Join in the fun by downloading my parts files over at Thingiverse!

M. Christian

CHRIS'S 3D ROCKET BASE

Fellow toy enthusiast here, and a huge, huge, HUGE fan of your site - and REALLY wish had as many cool boot sales in my neck of the woods!

Anyway, thought you might like to see my current hobby project: an old-school, retro sci-fi 3D printable build-your-own rocket toy - with plenty of accessories and ephemera as well!

http://www.mchristian.com/cosmos-corps

Keep up the great work and have FUN!

Chris

www.mchristian.com

amazon.com/author/mchristian

TERRANOVA47'S 3D PRINTED BATTLESHIPS

Last week when you posted Wotan's LEM you asked :

You could get anything 3D printed I imagine these days!

Have you got anything readers?

Well, yes.

Long ago I sold off my Tri-ang Minic Ships Waterline Models, as they were not of any great interest to me but then on eBay I saw a 1/1200 HMS Rodney, 3D printed.

To me that class of battleship defined the look and power of a battleship and in the listing it mentioned the company that designed the software for printing it, Ghukek's Miniatures.

I contacted the designer, paid $10 per design, sent them scale drawings of Royal Eagle and Crested Eagle.

I then arranged with the company that printed the models to provide them 1/1200 and 1/600 scales after getting the software from the designer.

Here they are. On the larger scale ones I replaced the masts with plastic to be thinner.

One shot has a Tribal Class Destroyer and a Flower Class Corvette as escorts.

Terranova47

USA

ORANGE AND WHITE: LEMS THE RIGHT COLOURS!

Remember the beautiful Tri-ang SpaceX LEM we've featured in the past? 

A wonderful old plastic toy in detachable white and orange parts. Along with its companion Apollo capsule Its one of the larger SpaceX toys. My friend Paul Vreede covers it beautifully on his Triang SpaceX website

https://www.triangspacextoys.info/SpGAtoys/Apl8/SpLTApl8.html

BILL BULLOCH

Well look at Etsy's 3DStuffUK's Elon Musk's SpaceX Falcon 9 crew dragon capsule, a 3D printed model rocket. They could be from the same SpaceX! This model is 22cm tall assembled and it looks great!

3DstuffUK also make a Dyna-Soar! For the Project SWORD fan on a tight budget!

You could get anything 3D printed I imagine these days!

Have you got anything readers?

Looey's Fabulous Fugurines

Things Are getting creative down under in Oz Base. Here's a couple of Looey's amazing creations ....

For SOFUBI Dollars More Part 1

Hello Moonbasers! 

Recently, Scott Kellogg deftly defined the meaning of SOFUBI, which Woodsy thought might be an acronym!

If it was, it would be Suffering Overconfident Failures Utterly Beyond Imagination!

Like fellow Moonbaser Richard Dixon, I have a self created comic story I want to build as models and bring into the real world! I wanted to make Japanese style Soft (B)Vinyl figures and my main character seemed to be a perfect subject...

Meet Peregrine Besset, a time-travelling Ancient Egyptian Astronaut! Inspired by an actual alabaster statue of a dwarf Steerswoman found in Tutankhamun's tomb. I wrote a series of self published comics about her adventures in the late 1990's and she is still forever in my thoughts!

...and yes, she actually IS a real trademark, for online comics, and animated films.

So I wanted to make Garage style vinyl toys. How difficult could that be? It turned out there wasn't a lot of hard information out there to guide me. The Japanese tend to keep their secrets closely and even the name "Sofubi" is the equivalent of French Champagne, no bloke making sparkling wine in Pontefract can use that name! The basic porcess is to have a hollow metal mould that you fill with liquid PVC and cook in an oil bath until a thin skin forms against the inside of the mould. Then you empty out the unset PVC, cook it again to set the skin completely and pop it out of the mould with a theatrical flourish.

You can see clips of a Japanese Master who has spent his entire life making these these toys here...

Japanese soft vinyl (sofubi) toy factory

Eventually I worked out all the talk about "Iron" moulds was a smokescreen. The moulds may have looked like rusty old iron, but in fact they were ELECTROFORMED COPPER!!! I knew this was possible to do in your garage, so I spent several hundred dollars buying a home electroplating outfit!

Now it was time to turn my character into a toy. It took a very long time to get just the right level of stylisation on what is essentially an imaginary person! I did try sculpting a fully realistic face several times but ultimately I was happier with a Thunderbirds style than a Captain Scarlet type character!

Hold that thought about me being happy, I was about to enter a world of pain beyond anything I had attempted before! ...

To be continued

CHRISTMAS POD

Hey there! Just an update on the Space Pod for my next project...

It's tough work using CGI, but I think it's mostly done now so I can look at printing it out and finishing it in the real world...

Cheers, 

Looey

Oz Base

Sherlock Holmes Book Nook Diorama

Book nooks are small dioramas, which will fit on a book shelf. They are very narrow, but fairly deep. Apart from making your own, there are now kits available. Wood seems to be the main material.

In this series of You Tube videos Brad hair looks at a kit called Library Prague. He turns it in to a crime scene for Sherlock Holmes and Doctor John Watson to investigate. The figures used are 3D printed.

I had not seen these kits before, but had a look around the shops recently, and found some. Not the same as the one featured in this video, but similar. They include lighting.

Fairly expensive, but they look like fun.

Part 1

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ag86Fhcmev8

Part 2

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1JKYuPNoMvE

Part 3

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JQJru61ZdIM

Part 4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mgEvu-U1LiU

Part 5 - all finished. A highlight of this episode is a guest appearance by his cat.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qLpd3E1AstY

Paul Adams from New Zealand

BODY DOUBLE

Its amazing what's on the 3d printing site Shapeways.

Here's a gorgeous little Lifting Body Space Glider a la Project SWORD and Triang SpaceX.

I wonder what else is on there!

THE HORNET AND THE SCOUT

Whenever I see a yellow plastic plane I'm reminded of my Scout 2.

Here's such a plastic plane on the 3D printing platform  Thingiverse https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:4783409

The R/C Delta Hornet Owl by OwlPlane.

I've stitched together two of the pictures to make it easy to see; what a sleek neat craft!

By comparison here's my beloved Project SWORD Scout 2, which I adored as a kid.

Any similarity ends there though if any at all! 

The Scout 2, being one of the three smallest SWORD toys, could fit on your palm, whereas the 

Hornet Owl is huge! Have a look at the assembly video on the maker's page. How cool is that!

There's a design video and test flight video too, both on the Thingiverse link at the top.

Have you anything like this?

LOOEY'S DARK SUN REAPER DOODS!

Hi Woodsie, as always a mad rush, but me and my my latest 3D printed Art Toys made it to Melbourne for the opening of a new toy store.

These are my Dark Sun Reaper Doods* (it's Dutch for dead!) A love letter to all those 60's skeletons in space helmets! I took a lot of effort to get that transparent pill bottle yellow colour to match the old Major Matt Mason space visors.

And they glow in the dark!

How many references can you spot, Moonbasers?

Cheers, 

Looey

OZ

Tampo Printing

This is a technique for printing on to either flat or irregular surfaces.

Using stencils, ink is applied to rubber or silicone pads, which are then used to print on to an object, such as a die-cast model.

It can follow curves, and other complex shapes. In the case of die-casts, it is used mainly on the metal parts, but is also suitable for use on plastic, and other materials.

Early diecasts either had markings, such as lettering, cast-in to the surface of the model; or used paper labels, stickers, decals, or even masked and painted markings.

A few had tinplate parts, which could be printed on to while the tinplate was flat, that were then bent or folded to shape, and applied to the model.

I am not sure when tampo or pad printing was first used on die-casts, but some time around the 1970s or 1980s. Initially, only one or two colours were used, and the markings were fairly basic.

Today, several colours can be used, and the markings can be very complex. Sometimes colours are printed on top of each other.

Even the cheapest Matchbox or Hot Wheels models now use tampo printing for chrome trim (using metallic inks), number plates, headlights, indicator lights, and other markings.

This page on tampo printing includes a very brief video showing the printing process.

What is Tampo – Also Known As Pad - Printing? (oberk.com)

Paul Adam NZ

LOOEY'S 3D MAGIC: LIFTING THE LID ON MIKE HAZARD'S HAT

As you've seen, with my new kit, I made my own Mike Hazard hat!

I'm using my childhood toy memories to inspire my art toys and I'd already sculpted a spy hat for my own planned Bess Hazmaat Civil Servant figure. I'd managed to make a metal mould of the hat and cast it in soft vinyl, but the complexities of the actual figure had stumped me.

So I decided to 3D scan this hat, shrink it down and 3D print it out for Mike H!

It took a couple of attempts and two different sizes, but I finally got something I'm happy with. This new technology now allows me to recreate and restore old toys to an acceptable level.

Next up (sometime in the future) will be the scanning of the missing landing leg of my Dinky UFO Interceptor, so i can finally have the toy I never had as a kid, in proper WHITE livery!

Cheers,

Lewis

OZ

LEWIS'S 3D PRINTED MARX MIKE HAZARD HAT AND FRIENDS

Re. Superthunderstingcar, look at these Aussie attempts too...

https://www.google.com/search?q=d-generation+thunderbirds+sketch&oq=D+generation+Thunderbirds&aqs=chrome.1.69i57j0i15i22i30.12177j0j7&client=ms-android-samsung-gj-rev1&sourceid=chrome-mobile&ie=UTF-8

Also possibly blogworthy, I've finally finished my Spy Hat Adventures. Here are Mike Hazard and Jane Apollo in their final display box fully accessorized with a childhood tin toy vehicle beneath them!

The blue cabinet is a personal reference to Fantasia Toy Shop in Richmond where I first saw Mike Hazard in the window! Now he's behind glass again, but he's also mine all mine!

Very difficult to take pictures through closed glass!

Big container from Blighty to Oz!

Lewis

OZ

Looey's Have Shogun will Travel Part 3

The spaceship docked into the top of Mazinger's head is a definite highlight and when your toy is 24 inches tall, how can it not be a separate piece for added play value? 

Well, if it's a Second or Third Release when due to cost cutting, it's just a plug permanently attached! Luckily I have the originals, so this was a good excuse to try out my new 3D scanner!

The detail on my scan was a bit soft and as with all the scans on this project, looked as if had been cast in porridge! Still, I was able to add some details in 3D Builder and the resulting prints looked fine when painted up and installed. 

I had a junker Mazinger sitting as parts in a box, so I decided to restore it at the same time. Here are the two restorations alongside an original and really, they look fine to the casual eye!

One of the things I loved about the original Mattel releases was they still had their Japanese names on their waists in cool Katakana typefaces! I used gold foil  Origami paper to laser print some replacements. Raydeen had some very small kanji characters and it took a super close up photo and lots of time in the vector program to reconstruct it.

As I've mentioned before, Shogun Warriors are mostly blow moulded polythene which is a pain to restore. I had to hand smooth all the scuffing with wet and dry abrasive paper using turps as a lubricant. 

Then I had to smooth it further with 5000 grade steel wool before spraying with a Satin Clear acrylic paint (graffiti type, not automotive grade!)

The missing missiles were 3D modelled and printed in two parts so I could paint them separately then push them together (can you guess which is the original and the replacement in this photo?) The missing fist was scanned and printed too.

 Mazingers original blow moulded polythene swords were still present, but broken and held together with old slimy, green electrical tape. 

After cleaning with turps, I discovered they'd originally been mended with 5 minute epoxy, which was a good idea, but they'd really needed a piece of wire inside to strengthen them, hence the second mending attempt with tape! 

I filled the hollow sword handles with clear co-polymer sealer (a sort of non silicone adhesive that paints nicely) cut some lengths of coat hanger wire and pushed them in through the original moulding holes! 

Unfortunately the sword plastic was a bit Translucent, so you could see the shadowy wire inside (I should have used clear Perspex rod!) I solved the problem by lightly steel woolling the polythene, rubbing in some ESP surface prep spray and lightly spraying red enamel paint over the joins. 

This is completely ignoring the rule book for polythene, but the prep spray made the paint stick. 

(Did I mention working with polythene is a pain?) .......

Lewis

OZ