Donor kit list per each film

qcfoundry

Identifying donor pieces can be a *****. I've found myself spitballing & looking in all corners of websites and all manufacturers and all types of models well past 3 am.
Instead of looking for these donors in a shotgun manner, wouldn't it be grand if you knew which kits were on hand (in the studio) when each film was being made?

Kits for ANH

Kits for TESB

Kits for ROTJ

The concept is simple, but it is team effort. I would also think the process would snowball -- as donor kits are ID'd, then more and more missing pieces will be properly ID'd.

I know we have some serious eagle-eye kids out here who have spent a lot of time and energy ID'g on their own and may not be keen on sharing. If you don't have the kit yet, and don't want to share out of fear of raising the auction bids, I totally understand. However, if you've already got the kit -- please share. Its a bit zen -- the more people put into this, the more everyone will get out.

Even if you have no kits to vouch for, perhaps you know a site that can provide some links to the already noted kits?

I've only created (and will curate) over the SW films, however I hope to see other films represented. I know BSG was being put together at the same time and by some same persons as TESB -- there are some likely cross-referencing between those two subjects/threads.

Come one, come all --
I invite everyone to come and participate in this group project. This is the tool that may alleviate hair pulling and probably provide more sleep once all kit pieces have been identified.

Flintlock

You've given me a great idea...

qcfoundry

what i presented IS a "great idea" already!!, lol

don't just say "i've got a secret", then walk out of the room....do share!

ralphee

Great idea, love the format, but why on a site i dont get much time to frequent?
Cant a form of database be set up here on the RPF maybe?
Not bagging Jasons site, its great, but i dont get time to shift around various boards these days, do my best, but why not a one stop shop, or would that be too easy lol?

Lee

qcfoundry

in terms of not having "time"....its just a click away (going to a different site) - and getting to these particular threads are almost at the top of each page you navigate through.

from my POV,..or at least how I relate to the Jason's site and the RPF..
Jason's site is more a hardware store...a place to pick up info/tools (kit lists, kit scans, reference photos, my little thread idea, etc). Whereas the RPF is moreso a showcase site -- people showing their builds and in-progress shots. I realize there is a LOT of overlap on this idea and overlap between the sites.

Thats just how I relate to the two sites, I felt it more appropriate to start these threads over there.

Flintlock

I think separating kits by film has its limits. A long time ago I began putting together a cross-reference list with kits down the left side and models at the top. If a kit was used on a model, an X would go in the square in the proper row and column.

So I started thinking that maybe there could be some kind of wiki-type site with information on each model and each kit, and each kit could be 'tagged' as being used on a kit. Maybe even each part per kit could be tagged, and the site would generate kit lists on its own based on the tagging system. It could even generate the cross-reference spreadsheet I mentioned above.

The database behind it could even account for variant parts, alternatives, etc...

qcfoundry

beautiful utopian idea..
if you have the time....and the proper/reliable resources (see "vouching" on my thread).

there are a lot of caveats to that cross referencing:
-a kit can be repopped by different manf's
-one kit piece can possibly be found from different kits (eg prince of wales AND king george)
etc

Flintlock

Then I started thinking about capabilities of uploading images and having online tools where people can draw polygons around kit parts, tag them as being from a certain kit with certain part number, highlighting inside the polygon, and turning it into a shortcut that the user can click on to see a shot of the actual kit part. Or, maybe instead of clicking, just hover over it...

Big project, I know... but it would be nice.

jedimaster

I got one...

Aurora Sealab.....every f..king thing.

No seriously I love the idea of sharing this info.

Flintlock

It's possible to design a database that accounts for these cases. It doesn't matter what kit the actual part from the actual model came from. All that matters is providing builders the information they need to complete their builds. If the information is easily accessible, they can decide which kit they get depending on what they can find and what would cover most projects.

Case in point: There are parts from the British 25pdr Field Gun on the Y Wing, but no parts from the truck that it was also packaged with. However, it appears that this truck was used on other builds and it seems that that kit was available first, during ANH, before the Gun was sold on its own. I could be mistaken, but really it doesn't matter which kit you get if you are building a Y Wing. If you are building a Y Wing and something else that uses the truck also, you'd want to get the one where they're boxed together. The system that I am thinking about would list both for the Y Wing.

But, like you said, it would be a big undertaking and I do not have the time to work on it.

One more thing - my idea is for a site that multiple users can log in to to contribute to. It would be too much for one person to hard-code all the information in just to make it available for everyone else. It would be a dynamic site - online collaboration like a wiki that can always be easily updated and improved.

qcfoundry

Until you retire and have all the time in the world, why don't you/we work on an easier and achievable goal -- like the original subject of this thread?

-... . .- --..

Q, I have mixed feelings about these.

On the one hand, it's great that people are putting in the time and effort capturing this information somewhere.

On the other hand, as the creator of this forum and its first moderator, much of it seems like a lot of "borrowing" from here, mostly without attribution. In fact, with the system you've adopted so far it appears as if only a small number of people are claiming credit for having "discovered" these specific parts on these specific models, when in fact there are very few, if any, donor kits that are listed there that haven't also been mentioned at the RPF-SSM forum in countless threads over the last ten-plus years.

In other words, to me it feels very derivative from the cumulative knowledge of this place, but there's zero sense of any kind of attribution. I don't know if "plagiarism" is the exact word or not, but sometimes it feels that way.

I'm an old-timer, though, and may well be the only one who feels this way. And I'm trying to spend more time in the shop and less on the forums, so I probably shouldn't even be saying this much!

I will add that there are kits on the ANH list over there that just didn't exist when the ILM modelers were building those ships. Just because a part appeared on a model when it was exhibited in 2005 doesn't mean it was on that model in 1975...

Flintlock

Because I've been there - it's unwieldy, and it's still going to be a pain for people to wrap their heads around. It's a large amount of data, and in the end it's going to be as much of a pain for you to maintain these lists as it is to implement a system to manage it in the first place. In that case, the hard part is at the beginning, then it's over. In the end it's all good. The other way starts of good, and then becomes a tangled jungle that's a pain to navigate and understand.

I also don't have to share my information or ideas, you know. I'm not getting paid for this. I'll have a web programming degree in a year or so. Maybe I'll wait till then and implement it myself. Or, I could get some local people together to help me, then charge all of you for subscription.

Flintlock

That's the kind of thing I mean. Plus there are non-kit items - found shapes, bits, sheets, etc...

qcfoundry

I'm all for giving credit where credit is due. And I try to practice what I preach when it's applicable. However, guidelines of the thread was never to claim to have discovered any of those kits, it was simply a tool to help facilitate the hunt for unknown donor pieces, by looking at fellow film models and review what kits were used.

The thread doesn't require any person to have be the initial discoverer of a piece or a kit, only that they can vouch that the said kit contributes a donor piece to any studio model in that film. It sounds as if you would have liked to have seen each kits (not piece?) discoverer given credit. I don't know if thats actually possible. I, myself, can give credit to where I get my information, but by the time I got that info, it may have been a 5th generation passing of knowledge. In other cases, I may have no idea who the originator was -- only that I got the info, I've tested the piece for "fit", and that it actually works.

I however don't feel this is "burrowing" nor "derivative". This is an organizational tool to consolidate the information in a one-stop place. I don't see the "one-stop x-wing thread" getting any grief because it's "borrowing" info.

I'm currently attempting to build an escape pod, and I've read as many escape pod threads as I can get my hands on. However, I would have had to weed through threads on other models (TIE, X-wing, ISD, etc) I never intend on building -- all the while sorting through extra info I may not need (eg, how big is the TIE ball, etc) in order to get the info these three threads can offer.

As for some kits being kits being incorrectly identified....come help correct that faux pas instead of just only saying there's a mistake.

qcfoundry

Think I'm a bit confused. Are you saying the threads are unwieldly? Please explain. And what is hard to understand about the concept (re: "wrapping their head around").

It's really not that hard to maintain these threads (if I'm understanding you correctly). Can you explain why you think it would be difficult?

I never meant that you HAD to share your ideas. I was just asking that you come lend a hand, if you had the interest. No offense meant. None (well maybe a rare few) are getting paid for this -- its called a hobby.

There was no need for you to get snotty either (re: charging others for subscription). That idea is exactly the opposite of my concept for the threads -- the work of identification goes 20 times faster when it becomes communal instead of charging a subscription for it.

qcfoundry

The threads are not kit lists, hence no need to call out "objects". Its to cross reference different studio models to possible find donors.

Maybe you're speaking for yourself when you say you "can't wrap your head around it".

Flintlock

The information will become difficult to maintain for various reasons, already alluded to by Beaz and myself. It can become bewildering. You need something better than just a list of kits that you keep updating. I can explain what I mean in more detail, but right now I don't have time, and my mind's on something else.

As far as "getting snotty" - I have shared a lot of ideas here and in other places on the web (not model building related) and in real life. All I ever get is nay-saying. It's always the same story no matter what I talk about. "Oh, you can't do that. It would be too hard. It would be too expensive..." So, sometimes I get a little tired of it.

-... . .- --..

Never mind. Back to the shop...

Flintlock

Yeah, you've got the right idea. I'm not going any further myself.

And hey ... why aren't you showing us what's going on in your shop?

-... . .- --..

Heh, hopefully I'll have something new to show soon.

I just want to say in closing that this place has always been a research forum. It was created to preserve the research being done at a time when there was a very real risk of threads dropping to the bottom of the stack and lost forever, because there used to be a hard thread limit in every forum.

And not only is there a wealth of research information going back more than ten years here, but there are very active, incredibly collaborative research projects going on right here, right now.

The idea that somehow research should be happening at another board instead is antithetical to the charter of this forum. And the fact that much of the research posted at that new board has actually been "borrowed" from all of the hard work that has been done here over the years is a testament to that fact.

asemblyrequired

NOW that is something in a premium membership i would pay for . Of course I would pay someone for a complete kit list to the SS sandcrawler and ATAT any day. Having the kit list is only 10% of the project. You still have to have the money, time, planning, time , research, time , money , space , understand wife .
Not even having each kit part identified to each model either . Just a good list of models used in each era of builds would help others.
I enjoy reading the incredible 5' falcon ID thread just to learn about it. May never build it in my lifetime , but with the knowledge of the kits I might help someone else out if i found a good deal on a kit or something. After all I would love to help someone else out , and would require no plaque saying I did so.


-James

Flintlock

Alright! Your X Wing thread was a huge inspiration to me. Hope to see more updates like that!