Calling all model kit fans - she's finally done

[captain nemo1701]

Bit of a derailment, but I really miss practical effects shots. I don't want to go so far as to say that CGI has ruined everything but when you read how ILM did seemingly simple stuff like e.g the Enterprise D stretching as it goes to warp, it's really ingenious, ground-breaking stuff that requires in-depth knowledge of how light and cameras work, not to mention the manual compositing and editing processes.

Being able to do stuff like that semi-trivially in software means that special effects are no longer special.

I do miss the 'disco tunnel' warp speed FX of ST The Motion Picture, done by the slit-scan technique which i believe Doug Trumbull invented for 2001. That's still the best 'models & string' FX movie in my book. No CGI, practical FX that blows the minds of today's generation who can't understand how a 50 year old movie did it without computing power approaching NASA!. Genius idea, build a giant mouse wheel.....

Having said that though, the warp-drive wormhole bit in ST TMP was early CGI. It was apparently a real pain to film with multiple takes in 70mm. They had to repeat scenes to get the ' light flares' off people & the set. I think it took nearly 3 weeks to shoot for a 2- minute sequence!.

 

[voyager]

It boldly goes where ........... oh forget it you wouldn't understand.

correction it boldly goes NOWHERE , it's a model ,

unless it has a couple of ducted fan units and an invisible set of wings

I'll grab my coat and go model flying..

regards Emma

 

[rogerzilla]

Not a sci-fi film, but the best pre-CGI effect must be the Illinois Nazis' orange station wagon going off the end of the unfinished freeway in "The Blues Brothers". The filmmakers actually took it several thousand feet up with a helicopter and dropped it into Lake Michigan. They had to satisfy the FAA that it would drop straight and wouldn't fly sideways!

 

[Edwardoka]

Not a sci-fi film, but the best pre-CGI effect must be the Illinois Nazis' orange station wagon going off the end of the unfinished freeway in "The Blues Brothers". The filmmakers actually took it several thousand feet up with a helicopter and dropped it into Lake Michigan. They had to satisfy the FAA that it would drop straight and wouldn't fly sideways!

Good tracking on those two angles. Not like they'd have many chances for retakes.

 

[captain nemo1701]

Not a sci-fi film, but the best pre-CGI effect must be the Illinois Nazis' orange station wagon going off the end of the unfinished freeway in "The Blues Brothers". The filmmakers actually took it several thousand feet up with a helicopter and dropped it into Lake Michigan. They had to satisfy the FAA that it would drop straight and wouldn't fly sideways!

In the Bond movie The Spy Who Loved Me, the famous ski-jump stunt almost never got caught on camera. They apparently had four cameras on it, one failed, one missed completely, one got it partly but one managed to track him all the way down.

 

[rogerzilla]

Yes, the ski bouncing off the top of the parachute was not meant to happen!

 

[captain nemo1701]

Yes, the ski bouncing off the top of the parachute was not meant to happen!

It wasn't until I saw it on VHS that I noticed that!. There's a whole series of documentaries on the Bond movies on YT (someone uploaded their DVD extras) and he mentions it in conversation. He was also the stuntman who did the 'cliff fall' in For Your Eyes Only Where Bond falls off the high cliff when climbing up to the monastery. The sudden stop would have killed him, so they rigged a fall-arrest system with wires, pulleys and large weights sliding along a trough!.

The Bond documentaries are fascinating to watch, the stuff they did was mental. For example, in FYEO, the stunt skier was actually tied by wire to the Bobsleigh so he went at the same speed. Tied to a bob at 60mph???.

 

[stephec]

A bit of progress, it's beginning to look more like a Hurricane now.

 

[Andy in Germany]

Oooo. Looking very nice...

 

[CharlesF]

Quality work

 

[Andy in Germany]

Am I the only one her who collects oddments like old bottles, guitar strings, and staples to make details for models?

And does anyone else who does this find they lose these items or throw them away the day before they need them?

 

[voyager]

We used mouth wash bottles for cockpit canopies on home built foamies .

 

[Andy in Germany]

I'm gradually building stuff again after a long break. One project that has been running for longer than I care to remember was this railcar, so I finally got myself into gear the final details, or if I’m honest, distractions to stop people noticing too many of my mistakes.

First of these was the transfers I printed a while back after a considerable amount of dithering. This was a mixed success. Unlike the transfers on the touring bike project I couldn’t get the colours to match exactly so I had to paint as closely as I could to the numbers themselves, and unfortunately this shows.

The weathering is aiming for a “well used” appearance. This is appropriate as the railcar is supposed to have been built in the late nineteen seventies or early eighties, but long suffering readers will notice a pattern here, as I’ve found that weathering is rather useful for hiding my mistakes, and I have plenty to hide. Most of what you see is made using artists pastels, I keep trying different ways to apply a dark wash, and attempted one on the roof. As usual it didn’t work.

After covering this minor disaster with black pastel I dry brushed the rest with light grey, a tiny bit of white and an even tinier bit of silver, then toned down the lot with more chalk pastel (black and brown, for those taking notes) then decided “what the heck?”, added black pastel to the side vents and dusted the lower body with light brown.

So much progress at once. I'll work on something more relaxed now...

 

[voyager]

Finished the diorama , now to start making the interesting parts and making a second one of an interior of a garage , maybe with ramp , engine hoist and large toolbox .

It's a novel way of displaying a not so perfect model (1:18 scale )

Seriously we would rather be out triking, but we will do that in the other 3 seasons of the year

regards emma .

 

[Joey Shabadoo]

Saw this and thought some might find it interesting.