Hey guys, seems I'm a bit late to the party, but I just ordered my set of prints. I mostly went with frosted detail and frosted ultra detail but on stuff that would be easy to sand I just went with the white polished option. I do a lot of work with tiny electronics and you can be sure I'm going to incorporate that into this build. SMD leds are a daily thing for me, so I don't forsee any issues with the build. I also am putting together a pepakura master chief suit, so I'm no stranger to sanding and painting and sanding and painting and... you get the idea. Now even if I slimmed down to 3% body fat I'd still be too big for a spiderman costume, but as a props guy, the shooter was the most important part for me to recreate.
Enough of that, now for me to jump into my plans for the build. As this is an open project, I feel like I should share my intentions from the getgo. First, I'm gonna make sure I have everything I need from smd leds to thin batteries and buttons, the MCU you guys found, and even the bingo chips (gears and straps will be the last things to do). I am probably going to put a white or blue smd led somewhere so that it illuminates in the nozzle. whether I have to use thin fiber optic line or actually put the smd led on the outside of the nozzle (not visibly outside, but also not on the inside of the shooter) is still up in the air. If there was just a little bit more room, I'd look into hiding a few components and actually make the MCU functional to power a tiny speaker that could play the web shooting sound, but I'd rather have an accurate prop than one that makes sound in this case. For those of you that have already done these, they look fantastic. To those who asked for a "bargraph" that is sensitive to the number of presses of the button, it's really not feasible in this amount of space as you would need a custom coded pcb with at least 7 free pins on it plus an MCU that controls it. it's possible, but it would be a lot of work just to have the leds actually "function". I may disappear for a while till my prints show up, but rest assured, I'll be around when I start my build. I am pushing hard to finish my master chief costume for the release of halo 4 and I build lightsabers in my normal free time plus my college classes, so I usually don't have time to check every forum that I am a part of.
Great job on these models and thanks a million for sharing them with us. I'll see you guys in a few weeks.
-Alex
EDIT: I've been reading for the better part of an hour and I see one post saying a certain battery holder would cramp everything for space, but I didn't really see anyone saying which one would work. Since I won't have mine in hand till probably october, I can't break out the calipers and see what will and what won't fit. So, those of you that have used batteries, which ones did you use? Forgive me if I just missed it, but I have been doing lots of reading in this thread, so I don't feel that I'm jumping the gun asking this. Thanks guys.
DOUBLE EDIT:
I've just realized that I can simply make my own 12mm battery holders with some smd holders and some pcb material from radioshack. I think I'll be good.
thanks again to epilepticsquirrel for doing an awesome job starting this project 
