X wings were not white!!!!

S

SD Studios

Well-Known Member
I ate TWO bowls of Wheeties this morning, so I am feeling kind-of feisty. (see my Falcon thread).

People paint ILM replica models white and it drives me NUTS!

And people say: GREAT JOB!!!

Not quite.

X-WINGS were NOT white!

Y-WINGS were NOT white!

The FALCON is NOT white!

The blockage runner model was NOT "6-feet long".

etc etc.

And y'all are missing a lot of details!!!!

So, who is this jack-off to tell US what is right and wrong? This is the STUDIO SCALE FORUM. You don't mess with us. You will be found, face-down in an alley somewhere, sparky. People have DISAPPEARED for saying less that that. You better watch your step! We are wanted men...we have the death sentence on twel...

WHAAAATEEEEVER!

I spent 4 1/2 years going to the archive to study, photograph, scan, measure, fondle, and pantone the original props and models. I picked the models up and played with them in front of the archive staff. Zooom zooommmm. pow! pow!

I am the guy who would be left alone in the archive when the staff went to lunch for an hour. Seriously.

THAT'S WHO! :lol


OOOOH> It is GO time, it's ON now, baby! he stepped in some REAL purty $^T now! He thinks his stuff don't stink!

I have been watching people make their models WRONG for a long time and bragging about it. I can't be silent any longer.

If ya'll want some help, I can help! (depending on how much time I have available).

I have like... 250,000 reference images on my hard-drives and CDs/DVDs, so if anyone needs pics, I have 17 years of prop and model reference collected. Happy to assist in any way that I can...

Bring it!!!
 
This thread was educational for the newbies. Every now and then, people need to know these things though. Most of us know your bonafides.
 
I thought the general consensus was thet they were painted gloss black, over-coated with white and the sanded down with a scotch-brite pad, until they were some light-ish grey color.

But, even spending time with the original models would make it hard to discern the original colors as most white paint tends to yellow, over time - especially 20 years of sitting under florescent lighting.

And unless you took every picture with an 18% grey card in the photo, color correction could be near impossible.

I'm not arguing with you, Steve, I'm just saying that while the originals might not have been white, 20 year old paint is just as difficult to discern as watching them on screen. Just too many factors to consider to call anything 100% certain.

-Fred
 
I dug around in some older posts from SD Studios to try to find the answer to the "Not White" question. Here is what I found and the reference.

"It is very difficult to color match an ILM model, as you are looking at 3 or 4 layers of color, blending together to create what your eye now sees. (side note: The Falcon, as well as ILM X-Wings are NOT white. They are a very light gray with that color then sanded down to expose white and darker gray underneath along panel edges…and then oversprayed with a slightly darker gray. The gray color almost always “blows out” in flash photography and really looks white…but it is NOT WHITE. When you see them right in front of your face, you can see this. Sorry. That has been bugging me). The Falcon is light gray with a cool-yellow cast. The X-wings and Y-wings were a warmer gray. That is how I painted both of mine."

http://www.therpf.com/f10/how-accurize-mr-falcon-40248/


 
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Gigatron said:
I thought the general consensus was thet they were painted gloss black, over-coated with white and the sanded down with a scotch-brite pad, until they were some light-ish grey color.

But, even spending time with the original models would make it hard to discern the original colors as most white paint tends to yellow, over time - especially 20 years of sitting under florescent lighting.

And unless you took every picture with an 18% grey card in the photo, color correction could be near impossible.

I'm not arguing with you, Steve, I'm just saying that while the originals might not have been white, 20 year old paint is just as difficult to discern as watching them on screen. Just too many factors to consider to call anything 100% certain.

-Fred
Click to expand...

You ARE arguing with me! How DARE you!!!

SCHMACK! (that was me slapping you in the face with a virtual glove).

:lol

I don't care what everyone read that the ILM guy said they did. I have read ILM interviews that were point-blank WRONG. I have also spoken to a number of the original ILM crew.

These guys just don't remember. It was a "gig" 35 years ago and they were wasted a lot of the time. :lol

Sure, the models were probably primered in white, but if you stand RIGHT IN FRONT of the model (as in...your eyes are three inches from the paint) you can see that it isn't black over white sanded down. As both model painters, Jason and I both agreed it was NOT that.

Let's agree on something. Photos LIE. Even close-up pics can be deceiving. I have seen that, many many times.

You could SWEAR that you are seeing something in a pic, that upon close-up examination of the same model is just completely different. Period. pics blend colors and details together. There is fore-shortening. Shadows alter colors and details. Flash photos hide and alter LOTS of things.

Gotta go do some work. I will give more details later.
 
I'll poke the bear with a stick, what the hell..

So if the true color is an impossible to match mystical concoction of painted, stripped, buffed, sanded, peed on, allowed to dry, heated, frozen, sent intospace for 17 seconds, repainted, sanded, sprayed with fetid hose water and finally hugged by a leperous badger -"SECRET"- off white blue greyish color. Who cares if people are going after "as close as I can get to what the pictures look like"?
 
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I keep writing paragraph after paragraph & deleting it as I dont want to be taken the wrong way, so I'll just type this instead.

Nope! I keep deleting!!!

Gunna go and have some Wheeties, back soon :lol
 
Is this like Charlie Sheen on RPF or what?! Winning!

So far, there's no info and this seems pointless. Looking forward to information.
 
Yeah, it is indeed maddening. The lighting at the archives is not optimal. The models themselves are 30 years old and have changed. There is a film of dirt and dust over everything due to age, cigarettes, etc. Heat from the studio lights probably altered things during filming.

So speaking personally, I just match this stuff to what I see in my head/on screen - taking an average and getting it to a "I personally like this best" point. Right now I'm on Blue 1, which sure as hell looks white to me in certain lighting/angles. LOL! But it also now looks like a putty color (as it exists as Red 2) - it's maddening.

redblue12.jpg


Red 5 looks like Red 3, in color. I think?

red5.jpg
 
Yeah, I'm going with white, and a layer of weathering. It looks to be the same color as the armature... which looks white to me! Plus, is was built when the Falcon/Blockade Runner and ISD were bright white (in photos).

blue1top.jpg
 
I found Blue Leader was really hard to paint because you have to be very subtle with all the stains/blast marks etc on the white basecoat !
 
Charlie Sheen: what did you sprinkle on those wheaties this morning?!

You know, back in the days of these models, if you didn't use tungsten film indoors the pics would tint yellow too. I assume whoever took most of the pics in those days used indoor film, so the colors are somewhat accurate.

The problem with photos, even well lit and color corrected, is that the colors often look vague.

The MR Millennium Falcon looks good to me and is painted off white towards a tan color, as noted above. Looks pretty accurate.

Jason: what do you think the black tick marks are on that model? Letraset dry transfers or pencil/ink? It seems the marks on the TIE Bomber are hand drawn. I'm curious to know if x-wings were the same.
 
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