eFX A New Hope Darth Vader Helmet

[SithLord]

Re: eFX ANH Vader?!?! WOW

You know, all these new SDCC photos of both helmet prototypes have shown sculptural details from the original ANH helmet design that - to my knowledge - in terms of replicas, only the DarthJones pull has shared in common. Noticing all that stuff led me to easily spot a plethora of those same, shared sculptural details in bluray screenshots (using only the EFX protos and DarthJones helmet for cross reference, mind you) that I hadn't *ever* noticed before. Granted, the DJ is a bit sharper than the EFX and a couple of random nicks and indentations have been filled in and leveled off on the EFX. However, remnants of those details are still readily visible and there isn't much of a difference otherwise. The level of true-to-life detail maintained in the creation of these EFX prototypes is nothing short of astonishing.

I'm always the first to appreciate a good comparison , and am naturally curious about the details you've compared. Your mention of the Darth Jones gave me an idea...

 

[SithLord]

Re: eFX ANH Vader?!?! WOW

Just another minor thing, I think there is some fill material in the undercut of the top of the tusk tube ends where they meet the mouth triangle...granted I understand why because that area is a bit messy...perhaps to keep the round of the tube the undercut could be cleaned a bit instead of filling.

 

[KevVader]

Re: eFX ANH Vader?!?! WOW

Not sure if anyone can say or even hint but has a ballpark release date been mentioned?

 

[illbethere1]

Re: eFX ANH Vader?!?! WOW

OMG...WTF is up with the dome flange . 1st time seeing paired off straight n center with the dj.... That's been purposely altered, not a warp by far. If that's the finished product, it looks like my Vader journey hasent ended after all. Simply put, Im not buying if that's the case. Man..... I could of done a better job than that.:eek

 

[Darth Infamous]

Re: eFX ANH Vader?!?! WOW

BTW I think the facemask shape looks fantastic compared to the DJ. Great job on that one. There maybe some minor things but that is the nature of castings.
Thanks SL for that comparison.

Carl

I'm always the first to appreciate a good comparison , and am naturally curious about the details you've compared. Your mention of the Darth Jones gave me an idea...

 

[danchia]

Re: eFX ANH Vader?!?! WOW

man...which to get? which to get? looking better each time i see it.

 

[SithLord]

Re: eFX ANH Vader?!?! WOW

Oh yes, I will say the mask itself is great in terms of having retained shape, sharpness of the checks, sides of the mouth triangle, shape and length of the neck....those things I am pleased with and hoped to see. I'm just pointing out things that I think could be improved especially since I hope to get one of these myself. :love

Just another note about the C-scar on Vader's right cheek, I've drawn where it should be...it is a bit too far off to the outside of the cheek. But I like how there has been a sincere attempt to faithfully duplicate the detail of the light and dark areas on that front cheek surface. I should say that I haven't seen anyone duplicate that so closely thus far...

 

[SithLord]

Re: eFX ANH Vader?!?! WOW

I mentioned before the top nose slot didn't look right, with a larger gap on Vader's left between it and the bottom slot. I thought it might have been reworked but I was wrong. The shape looks perfectly fine, just that for some reason it is higher on that side. I don't think it would be on account of any cleanup of where it joins the eyebrow, since both the clean and brushed castings have it. It could be related to the age of the mold but I really have no idea why it is slightly higher...

It is really minor but I thought I would correct myself on that...

 

[JoMamma_Smurf]

Re: eFX ANH Vader?!?! WOW

Thank God I'm not into Vader. Vader folk are the absolute most anal of all the costumers :lol

 

[voice in the crowd]

Re: eFX ANH Vader?!?! WOW

There would be one master casting from the ILM mold. They wouldn't send that out to Gino. They can only do one pull since that mold is so old they wouldn't risk it, nor would they have to, make more than one master pull.

Hi Thomas,

What makes you think they would only make one master?

The mould is aging and degrading and will eventually become useless. If I were LFL I would make as many copies as possible before the mould falls to pieces.

It makes more sense to use it whilst they can still get something of worth from it.

I would love to see pictures of a helmet straight from the mould and see what condition the helmet coming from a mould that age looked like.

It looks good but not great so far. I might get this from eFX but to be honest their studio scale TIE fighter looks so good it will come first for me.

Thanks for the pictures Art.

Cheers Chris

 

[Darth Niob]

Re: eFX ANH Vader?!?! WOW

At the moment i would prefer the cleaned version much better than the "accurate" version which isnt one. The dome of the cleaned looks way better and the accurate was cleaned of too many details...on the dome and on the mask. Also i still think the paintjob isnt 100& right on the accurate one......so i think if they didnt manage to get the accurate version really accurate it would be better to go with the idealised version.

Also its curious to see that the DJ (seems to be brother of the eFX) has much more details although it was cleaned up also a little bit. That should show how much the eFX version was cleaned and how many details were removed.

 

[voice in the crowd]

Re: eFX ANH Vader?!?! WOW

Thank God I'm not into Vader. Vader folk are the absolute most anal of all the costumers :lol

Oh no you used the C word :lol

There will be hell to pay for calling the anal Vader guys costumers.

Cheers Chris

 

[HAL9000]

Re: eFX ANH Vader?!?! WOW

It's beyond anal. It's an all new form of pedantry.

 

[jkno]

Re: eFX ANH Vader?!?! WOW

Yep thanks see post #483.

Interesting they do mention there might be a Muir signature version....it appeared to me like they were not going that route. I hope they do; I would prefer that over Dave Prowse' signature so as to finally give Brian his due credit.

Unfortunately with the "good" relations between George Lucas and Dave Prowse I'm not sure we'll see very soon a Prowse signed licensed item. But Muir is great to get to autograph these. They could also have James Earl Jones - Mr. Jones was always great to sign TTM, so if he is the eFX choice, better go for the unsigned version - you can always write him and send a customized plaque to be signed. But all will depend on what price the signed and unsigned versions go for.

 

[SithLord]

Re: eFX ANH Vader?!?! WOW

Hi Thomas,

What makes you think they would only make one master?

The mould is aging and degrading and will eventually become useless. If I were LFL I would make as many copies as possible before the mould falls to pieces.

Well, personally I think it is a matter of preserving the mold, not using it up. We know that when Master Replicas did the ROTS helmet that they had the one master pull from the original production mold and worked from that. They only got one pull. Part of it too is that there will be some sort of agreement between LFL and eFX in terms of what sort of materials they can use for a project, although I'm assuming eFX has access to anything they might need. Since LFL can't go back and remold the original ANH helmet, and obviously they've kept this particular mold well preserved for 33 years (and that does take some care and effort to do so), it will be in their best interest to continue to preserve it and minimize the number of pulls coming from it unless absolutely necessary.

Of course, naturally, I might be completely wrong and they got two pulls... But it just makes sense to me that they would want to minimize any stress to the mold given its age.

 

[SithLord]

Re: eFX ANH Vader?!?! WOW

At the moment i would prefer the cleaned version much better than the "accurate" version which isnt one. The dome of the cleaned looks way better and the accurate was cleaned of too many details...on the dome and on the mask. Also i still think the paintjob isnt 100& right on the accurate one......so i think if they didnt manage to get the accurate version really accurate it would be better to go with the idealised version.

Also its curious to see that the DJ (seems to be brother of the eFX) has much more details although it was cleaned up also a little bit. That should show how much the eFX version was cleaned and how many details were removed.

Well I think it would be not too difficult to correct the dome flaring issue so I wouldn't worry about that, as long as eFX is aware of it and I am sure Gino knows this as well. Something like the trimming of the lower flaring would be intentional and that is up to their planning and how they want to present the product. As far as painting goes, as others have mentioned here, you could always repaint it.

The DJ is indeed a brother of the master pull that eFX has, just as the SL and MP are (at least I strongly think the MP is). I do think they could get away with less cleaning on the accurate one because when you paint it you lose a bit of detail anyway. But when DJ painted his helmet he did do a little bit of cleaning to prep it. Remember he also made an "idealized" ANH helmet that is perfectly clean with every surface smoothed out. I hope he'll chime in here at some point with his impressions since he has seen the ILM mold in person.

That being said, yes, the DJ still has more detail coming through the paintwork than the eFX. Would stripping off the paint of the eFX make it equal to the DJ? No, because I can tell in certain areas for example the sides and surface of the nosebridge, where a lot of more obvious course detail is, that it has been taken down a bit. For example, those tiny divets on Vader's right side of the top and bottom noseslots...I can tell by their smaller size how much material was removed on that side of the nosebridge. Since they are still there, that means it wasn't really taken down a lot...nothing like we would see on other licensed helmets, so that's good, but because we are so used to seeing raw authentic castings we want there to be NO cleanup. But, we don't know what the condition of the mold is at this point unless we see the master pull. Its condition may have dictated the minimal amount of cleanup on the brushed version of the mask, so perhaps that is the best compromise they could achieve between quality and retaining detail. However, that is all well and good for the masks but that doesn't explain why the dome is cleaned up on the brushed version just as much as on the clean version.

 

[SithLord]

Re: eFX ANH Vader?!?! WOW

It's beyond anal. It's an all new form of pedantry.

ped·antry (ped′'n trē)

noun pl. pedantries -·ries

1. the qualities, practices, etc. of a pedant; ostentatious display of knowledge, or an instance of this

os·ten·ta·tion (ŏsˌtĕn-tāˈshən, -tən-)
noun

1. Pretentious display meant to impress others; boastful showiness.
2. Archaic The act or an instance of showing; an exhibition.

Well, that's funny but actually I just gobble up details when I see a new casting and spit them out again. :lol If some appreciate it that's great and if not well all I can say is that I think it is important to discuss the quality of new castings licensed or otherwise and I do think of myself as a customer that wants the best in this case, not just for myself, but for everyone.

 

[Darth Niob]

Re: eFX ANH Vader?!?! WOW

Thomas, in my personal case it wouldnt make sense to strip the paint of the eFX (you know why). The only reason i would buy this helmet is its overall look. Its a little bit like with the MR Fett. I own two Fett helmets...one very accurate and than the MR with the known faults. But i wont sell it because i like the look of it and as long as i have something more accurate there is no reason to sell it. Thats one more reason i would prefer the idealised version of the eFX more at the moment.

I'm curious to see if they rework something on the two versions.

 

[Too Much Garlic]

Re: eFX ANH Vader?!?! WOW

Again, many thanks for all those great photos, Art! :cheers

 

[Too Much Garlic]

Re: eFX ANH Vader?!?! WOW

Just another note about the C-scar on Vader's right cheek, I've drawn where it should be...it is a bit too far off to the outside of the cheek. But I like how there has been a sincere attempt to faithfully duplicate the detail of the light and dark areas on that front cheek surface. I should say that I haven't seen anyone duplicate that so closely thus far...

You said earlier it was correct... huh. Guess you do listen to me when I say you are incorrect.

Also, it's a bit odd since the C-scar is supposedly a part of the cast, to fill the original scar and then re-carve it again. Weird and deceptive. Can only be due to recasting issues.