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Post by WaffleM on Sept 29, 2009 17:17:58 GMT -9
I've begun some sketching for the Battle Mecha Troops. With the One Monk Terra Force, Slick's NCC Troops, and the space crew from Spacejacker, I've got a lot of great figures to look to for inspiration. What do you think? I'm thinking of removing the hip pockets, but in real life they come in handy...
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Post by jabbro on Sept 30, 2009 4:13:25 GMT -9
He looks good. He is a nice and simple design. Looks like you kept him easily modular. Toss in a backpack, flamethrower or other projectile in his arms and you got it made! Oh, maybe some color, too.
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Post by anitangel on Sept 30, 2009 6:40:01 GMT -9
I'd keep the pockets too. They add nice detail to a simple figure, and you need some place to keep your ammo.
Anita
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Post by old squirmydad on Sept 30, 2009 7:27:25 GMT -9
Ditto on pockets, they say "military working pants". Have you perhaps considered making them in 30mm and then just resizing them for 15mm?
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Post by WaffleM on Sept 30, 2009 8:25:14 GMT -9
Ditto on pockets, they say "military working pants". Have you perhaps considered making them in 30mm and then just resizing them for 15mm? Designing in 30mm and then reducing is the general plan. It takes more test prints, or I end up with too much detail and things look muddy. I always draw much bigger and then reduce the size after the sketch is scanned. For me drawing big helps keep things loose. When I had my own sculpture studio, I did all my sketching on a roll of 48" wide craft paper that I mounted to the wall. It's been hard to switch to a 9"x12" sketch pad, but it does fit easier on the scanner! I'm going to keep sketching troop parts until I have enough to make three or four unique poses: two machine gunners, one trooping manning the crew served weapon, and one squad leader barking orders. I think I'm going to keep the pockets too. Long live cargo pants!!!
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Post by anitangel on Sept 30, 2009 10:46:14 GMT -9
I'm glad you've decided on keeping those pockets. Now you just need to find some nice textures and colors to go with them and time.
Anita
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Post by Dagger on Oct 3, 2009 17:51:03 GMT -9
That guy looks great... I like the clean simple design. Lends itself well to different color and camo patterns.... and definitely keep the cargo pockets... (grin)
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Post by WaffleM on Oct 13, 2009 17:47:20 GMT -9
Just a progress image of the troops. It would go faster if I let Corel do the tracing, but I'm too fussy... The shading and line weights aren't set yet, but things are finally moving fairly quickly. I'm really liking the component design process. It's really nice to swap out arms, legs, and heads, and end up with a large group of miniatures from a small number of parts.
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Post by Dagger on Oct 13, 2009 19:03:24 GMT -9
Friggin' awesome... the level of detail you have there is perfect for 15mm... no too much, not too little...
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Post by WaffleM on Oct 16, 2009 17:00:11 GMT -9
Some more trooper progress:
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Post by Dagger on Oct 16, 2009 18:05:17 GMT -9
They look great... I love the facial expressions, and the weapons look awesome... I'm not sure about the knees though, I think I like the outlined version better...
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Post by WaffleM on Oct 16, 2009 18:17:55 GMT -9
The knees will get fixed once the I tweak the coloring. Right now everything has a gradient from white to black. The knees (and a few other areas) will have a less drastic gradient.
I was trying to work in a bad pun using "tweak in the knees" but I'm too pooped and my brain isn't firing on all cylinders anymore. Off to bed for me...
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Post by Dagger on Oct 17, 2009 5:20:51 GMT -9
lol... your troops are "weak in the knees"...(grin) Maybe some kneepads would look cool... all the cool armies are required to wear them nowadays, I've been issued three different styles already...
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Post by WaffleM on Oct 19, 2009 10:51:07 GMT -9
Here is the basic squad. I still have to tweak the arms on the squad leader, but then I'm onto the back views. What do you think?
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Post by Parduz on Oct 19, 2009 11:23:50 GMT -9
They are great, but there's something that "does'nt go round"....
i'm staring at the upper armor on the torso... for some reason i can't get, the "V" shape formed under the chin is somewhat "misaligned" with the head and the pose. It may be the curve of the "background" pectoral, i dunno.... but it make me look at it more than 5 times. My eyes are catching something i can't explain.
Also, the man on the knee have the left feet in the wrong perspective.
Retouch them, and they'll become great.
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Post by Dagger on Oct 19, 2009 17:43:17 GMT -9
The squad leader's arm does look a little long... but other than that, they look great.
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Post by Sirrob01 on Oct 19, 2009 22:23:23 GMT -9
Look like they are coming along nicely, can't wait till it's all wrapped up
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Post by WaffleM on Oct 20, 2009 4:24:20 GMT -9
They are great, but there's something that "does'nt go round".... i'm staring at the upper armor on the torso... for some reason i can't get, the "V" shape formed under the chin is somewhat "misaligned" with the head and the pose. It may be the curve of the "background" pectoral, i dunno.... but it make me look at it more than 5 times. My eyes are catching something i can't explain. Also, the man on the knee have the left feet in the wrong perspective. Retouch them, and they'll become great. Thanks for the tips. I've altered the curve of the color and changed the "back" foot of the kneeling troop. I've shortened the arm of the squad leader, but I still have to work on the anatomy... Freakishly long arms is just one thing that happens when I work only on the computer and not sketches! When will I learn?!?!?
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Post by jabbro on Oct 20, 2009 4:33:59 GMT -9
Don't sweat it. Even with long arms, these guerrilla troops are looking great. Just enough detail for 15mm.
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Post by squirmydad on Nov 7, 2009 15:39:08 GMT -9
Wow! these look great. I have been distracted, but I see them now!
These will look perfect at 15mm scale. I look forward to seeing the colors. I would recommend to keep a thick black line between colors to keep the detail easy to see on the table. JIM
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Post by WaffleM on Nov 24, 2009 7:30:37 GMT -9
This is the early progress on the Heavy Infantry. Working with the existing Light Infantry poses has really helped expedite the process.
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Post by Dagger on Nov 24, 2009 9:35:34 GMT -9
Those look great... I really like the armor, especially the screw head on the shoulders... nice touch. The holographic display on the wrist computer is especially nice too...
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Post by anitangel on Nov 29, 2009 18:10:51 GMT -9
I too like the details, speaking of which are their helmet supposed to look the same? Because a 5 pointed shape is missing from one of them.
Good job!
Anita
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Post by WaffleM on Nov 29, 2009 18:23:02 GMT -9
I too like the details, speaking of which are their helmet supposed to look the same? Because a 5 pointed shape is missing from one of them. Good job! Anita Good eye! That irregular pentagon is actually there as a sort of officer's insignia. I need to place another on the arm or chest and I need to make a print test to see if the insignia shows up at all at 15mm.
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Post by WaffleM on Dec 2, 2009 12:11:07 GMT -9
I still have some details that I'd like to add to the jump pack and a lot of modification to do on the smoke trails, but this is my first go at the Jump Troops. I'm still not quite sure how the transparent smoke will work with the outline, but I'll worry about that later. What do you think of the progress so far?
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Post by old squirmydad on Dec 2, 2009 14:30:50 GMT -9
I like the look of them, hard sc-fi looking guys all the way, I think their knees should be bent as if they've just sprung into the air. I think they need something to give them a little more appearance of dynamic motion.
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Post by Dagger on Dec 2, 2009 15:57:54 GMT -9
Wow... great idea. I really like the smoke trail... that looks great, even if it's not transparent in the final version.
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Post by enpeze on Dec 3, 2009 1:09:25 GMT -9
Wow... great idea. I really like the smoke trail... that looks great, even if it's not transparent in the final version. possibly one could print out the smoke on overhead transparencies?
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Post by anitangel on Dec 4, 2009 8:33:20 GMT -9
I love the rocket on his back ;D Not everyone uses transparencies... I for one just like the simple designs on paper and I don't mind the cartoony fire and interesting lightning effects if it's done right. Whoever wants fancies like the cutout transparencies are fiddling with the model to make it nicer taking time away from the fun.
Anita
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Post by WaffleM on Dec 8, 2009 7:44:49 GMT -9
When I said "transparent smoke", I meant that the color is "transparent" not the paper. Basically this is just a transparent effect for the color fill in Corel Draw.
For this project printing on transparency plastic would not be practical as the miniatures are at 15mm scale and the impact would probably be lost on figures that small. I do like some of the transparent wings and part that other modelers here have used, but my attempts have always failed due to smudging ink. This may be an inkjet problem, but I'm not sure.
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