Building The Death Star - PRODUCTION

Here's a shot of what I'm talking about in my last two posts...

All the vertical and horizontal red lines in the image are the same size. The center cone on the original is also larger in diameter than mine.

006.jpg
 
You just know if you don't address this now you are going to be bothered by it and redo it later anyway.
 
dbuck said:
You just know if you don't address this now you are going to be bothered by it and redo it later anyway.
Click to expand...

Plus, its like our fellow bust sculpters - many get the likeness withing 90%, but few if any make it so dead-on its like a life cast.

Why...?

Because subtle little things that are not quite right set us off. Every little detail adds up, and this one is the dead center focal point.

This new image allows me to nail the dimensions to within 98%, and the diameter of the center disc dictates pretty much everything else.

Yes - I'm talking myself into re-doing this part too!
 
Don't beat yourself up Rob, I know it's frustrating but some times ya just gotta role with the flow! :thumbsup
 
replace the disk Rob........it throws the whole thing off. You'll be delighted when it's done because it will make everything you do to the rest of it....fall right into place. such a small sacrifice but such huge rewards!!!!!
 
Man looking at that comparison, it makes me feel so happy to have had any involvement with this project so long ago. It is simply beautiful Rob. Man what an undertaking. This was my first real intro to prop Replicas.
 
Some more thoughts on this...

I'm getting pretty excited about what is appearing to be a notable improvement. Excitement leads to motivation; motivation leads to progress!

In sanding clean the dish and re-painting, I sort of gunked up the gap between the center disc and the dish, so re-doing it will correct that.

Funny thing is the one part I'm intimidated about is re-doing the center cone. I dug out my pics from when I did the dish (FIRST thin I did on this project!), but there are not any images that demonstrate how I acoomplised the cone in the first place. And being over five years ago, I don't remember!

Wonder if I wrote it down in this thread...?
 
Found this...

PHArchivist said:
I'm going to remove the small center disc. Then, on the second largest disc, I'll cut out a circle the same size as the center disc (and perhaps even sand down a circular impression in the main dish.

Also, on the back side of the small center disc, I added about .5mm worth of styrene about the size of my pinky nail to allow the center disc to stand off a bit. I did this because in the reference photo, the shadow around this center disc seems notable, suggesting its raised a bit. But now I'm second guessing this.

Finally, I'm going to reduce the diameter of the small center disc by .5mm or so, and that may allow it to sit deeper in the overall dish, and enhance the illusion of depth by making it smaller, appearing a bit farther away.

With all these mods, I should be able to gain back an additional 1mm - 2mm in depth. Considering the scale of the Death Star that'd probably be like 30 - 50 feet!
Click to expand...
 
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Interesting...!

PHArchivist said:
...we'll never know [regarding lines that are not straight on the original], unless some previously unseen reference shots of of the original pop up. In all the ref pics I have, you can barely make out the details on that center disc, and the shots are not taken straight on like my pics here are.
Click to expand...
 
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Over the hurdle! Got the new inner cone shaped up today from a part in my Spare Parts box... Wan't easy and had just one part that was even close, but as it turned out, it worked well.

You can see how much bigger it is than my first effort. The new one is actually about 1mm bigger in diamter than it should be, but nobody's counting rivets here...!

View attachment 293281
 

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