Dtrasler
Sr Member
I've recently joined, so I thought I'd start by showcasing the first things I made - the ones that didn't turn out so well.
I'd read the Karen Traviss books, and fancied a Mando bucket, even though I've not been much of a Fettishist. I decided to go with the black and silver look, but here's what marks me out as an amateur - I didn't go find plans. I didn't print out lots of reference pics. I did the barest - ablsolute barest - minimum research online and just got stuck in. Starting with an old hockey helmet from a sports sale and - I'm really, really sorry about this - an old plastic coffee can.
As for equipment... I had nothing. No hot glue gun, no bondo, no... well, no anything. Just the regular tools of the household and lots of tape.
Here the coffee can got augmented with an old ice-cream tub. You can see I'm working to the highest standards, and also spray-painting as often as possible to try and make it look less crappy.
I considered the dome and decided that rather than try to re-shape the helmet itself, I should paper mache a dome from a balloon form.
I splashed out on a tub of filler and went to town on the new dome, plus the front of the helmet too. I'd added a shaped piece of corrugated plastic to outline the t-slit. It was a terrible idea, as it didn't take the curve at all. Also, due to my lack of reference pictures and stubborn belief that I knew what this thing looked like, I got the cheek shapes wrong. You will see they remain wrong for a very, very long time.
A balloon form gives you the wrong shape for the dome. It took some sanding and shaping for me to believe this.
I even tried spraying it again in case it looked better. But no, it was too rounded on top, too bulbous. I sawed the top off and shaved the sides.
Things were coming together a little more. SO I decided to plough on and make the ears. Out of MDF. Without measuring.
You can see I had already encountered surface smoothness issues and was combatting them by using cereal boxes to replace the rough filler. The ears are too thick and not symmetrical. I think I may have bought my hot glue gun by this point. I had a vague idea that it was easy and clean to use, and could be smoothed out really nicely.
I added the rangefinder by using a piece of dowel I had lying around. Again, no measuring, just cut it by eye. You can tell how good my eye is at this stuff by now. I drilled down into the ear and hot glued the dowel in. I was hot gluing everything at this point. EVERYTHING.
After a lot more sanding, I resprayed the helm again to try and make it look better. This is a mantra of mine that I cannot shake - "Maybe it will look cool if I paint it?" The colour is not significant, I just have a bunch of old spray cans in my workshop, and use the fullest. Note how straight and perfect the rangefinder stalk is not.
I bought the silver paint for finishing, then cracked and gave the helm a coat, hoping it would magically become brilliant. Instead, it just showed up all the surface imperfections, and those areas where the glue did NOT end up nice and smooth. Incidentally, you can't hi-speed sand hot glue, because it just melts, did you know that?
At this point, the dedicated professional would have gone to town with sanding and filling, getting the surface sorted out and checking all the angles against the reference photos. I decided that more paint and some pointless (and non-authentic) detailing on the ears might distract people from the fact that the helmet looks like a Bantha sat on it.
I still didn't notice that the cheek shapes were utterly wrong.
I finally added a top to the rangefinder, and filled out the space for the visor with a plastic school binder cover. It was cheap, but.... well, there's no "but". It was cheap, that was it.
Although the bucket was the main plan, making it raised a few questions in the household, so I threw together the rest of the armour to pretend I had been doing all this for Halloween. I won't embarrass myself further by outlining THAT disaster, but I'll leave you with this photo, which shows it off to best advantage, on the stand I made for it.
Next Post - A Biker Scout Helmet - how hard could it be?
I'd read the Karen Traviss books, and fancied a Mando bucket, even though I've not been much of a Fettishist. I decided to go with the black and silver look, but here's what marks me out as an amateur - I didn't go find plans. I didn't print out lots of reference pics. I did the barest - ablsolute barest - minimum research online and just got stuck in. Starting with an old hockey helmet from a sports sale and - I'm really, really sorry about this - an old plastic coffee can.
As for equipment... I had nothing. No hot glue gun, no bondo, no... well, no anything. Just the regular tools of the household and lots of tape.
Here the coffee can got augmented with an old ice-cream tub. You can see I'm working to the highest standards, and also spray-painting as often as possible to try and make it look less crappy.I considered the dome and decided that rather than try to re-shape the helmet itself, I should paper mache a dome from a balloon form.
I splashed out on a tub of filler and went to town on the new dome, plus the front of the helmet too. I'd added a shaped piece of corrugated plastic to outline the t-slit. It was a terrible idea, as it didn't take the curve at all. Also, due to my lack of reference pictures and stubborn belief that I knew what this thing looked like, I got the cheek shapes wrong. You will see they remain wrong for a very, very long time.A balloon form gives you the wrong shape for the dome. It took some sanding and shaping for me to believe this.
I even tried spraying it again in case it looked better. But no, it was too rounded on top, too bulbous. I sawed the top off and shaved the sides.
Things were coming together a little more. SO I decided to plough on and make the ears. Out of MDF. Without measuring.You can see I had already encountered surface smoothness issues and was combatting them by using cereal boxes to replace the rough filler. The ears are too thick and not symmetrical. I think I may have bought my hot glue gun by this point. I had a vague idea that it was easy and clean to use, and could be smoothed out really nicely.I added the rangefinder by using a piece of dowel I had lying around. Again, no measuring, just cut it by eye. You can tell how good my eye is at this stuff by now. I drilled down into the ear and hot glued the dowel in. I was hot gluing everything at this point. EVERYTHING.After a lot more sanding, I resprayed the helm again to try and make it look better. This is a mantra of mine that I cannot shake - "Maybe it will look cool if I paint it?" The colour is not significant, I just have a bunch of old spray cans in my workshop, and use the fullest. Note how straight and perfect the rangefinder stalk is not.I bought the silver paint for finishing, then cracked and gave the helm a coat, hoping it would magically become brilliant. Instead, it just showed up all the surface imperfections, and those areas where the glue did NOT end up nice and smooth. Incidentally, you can't hi-speed sand hot glue, because it just melts, did you know that?At this point, the dedicated professional would have gone to town with sanding and filling, getting the surface sorted out and checking all the angles against the reference photos. I decided that more paint and some pointless (and non-authentic) detailing on the ears might distract people from the fact that the helmet looks like a Bantha sat on it.I still didn't notice that the cheek shapes were utterly wrong.I finally added a top to the rangefinder, and filled out the space for the visor with a plastic school binder cover. It was cheap, but.... well, there's no "but". It was cheap, that was it.Although the bucket was the main plan, making it raised a few questions in the household, so I threw together the rest of the armour to pretend I had been doing all this for Halloween. I won't embarrass myself further by outlining THAT disaster, but I'll leave you with this photo, which shows it off to best advantage, on the stand I made for it.
Next Post - A Biker Scout Helmet - how hard could it be?
. Love your thread and can't wait to see your next post.
