ALIENS Colonial Marines reference request

To all the Colonial Marine costume makers out there, I have a request. I'm working on a poster for a friend that depicts a bunch of Colonial Marines stumbling upon an egg chamber chock full of Aliens from the POV of one of the Marines, so one of the other Marines being attacked by a facehugger is shown from the back. I've found a good amount of reference for the back of the Marines' equipment but it seems like I can never find one that's clear and shows the guy fully kitted up with all his gear (or they have too much on, like the smart gun) and the whole drawing is being done in colored pencil so it's not like I can just hide erased lines when I have to make changes. Do any of you guys have a picture of yourselves with all your gear on from the back that I can use? I don't need the smart gun or anything, the guy for whom I need the reference had come into the room and lit up a bunch of eggs with a flamethrower before being attacked and at the moment I'm depicting the flamethrower is discarded and he's trying to fend the facehugger off. The position doesn't matter, I have that all done up and I don't even really like using direct reference for what I do so it can't be picked out as a swipe. No matter what I was going to post the finished result on here somewhere as I really like how it's coming out and I think a few people here would appreciate it as well. Thanks!

EDIT: If you like, I'll change the whole guy to look like whoever ends up posting the first, best pic, although being that it's a back view of a fully armored guy I'm thinking the only way I can do that is if you have an identifying mark like a tattoo on your right arm as that's the only bare body part that's really showing. Either way, if you want a specific detail added in I have no problem doing that, I love hiding little in-jokes in my drawings.

This any use to ya, bud?

I have the basic armor, I just don't know exactly what straps would be over the armor and where they go. I'm looking for a pic of somebody in theirs all ready to go, although I think I can hide a few of my mistakes in the belt area with pouches and an extra canister for the flame thrower (I've never been able to buy that you'd get as much flame out of it as they show in the movie unless the canister could be removed, so I was going to put that in anyway) if need be. However, that's a really good angle on the helmet that I hadn't really found before so it does help out quite a bit, thanks! Do you want me to work in some of the graffiti you have on there? I like those a lot and hadn't gotten around to doing the Marines' personal decorations yet.

Here's the piece of the poster I'm asking about the reference for, there's a piece of tracing paper over the part I'm editing so I can do it on there and get it right before going final with it. He needs the motion tracker and I'm not against having the pulse rifle strapped around his shoulder as well just for an extra bit of movement.

Oh, and if I've got anything wrong going on with the armor let me know, I've been going through the quadrilogy dvd set, other threads on the RPF and any google images I can find so it's a bit of a mishmash, which is why I wanted to ask for a full-on picture all in one so I know exactly what goes where without anything contradicting what I've already done.

Thanks. Those are actually the quadrilogy images I was looking at though and they don't have the motion tracker or anything put on there. However, having them that big does solve one of my problems, which is that on my TV I could see that there were brackets other than the three I have on there already but I couldn't see enough detail to see what they were, so that's also useful.

EDIT: Oooh and I just noticed I have the leg armor slightly wrong, I'm missing the back piece. Couldn't see that on my tv either. Plus this illustrates one of the main things that confused me about the harness/belt: how does it go from over the armor on the front to under it on the back? His arms are blocking the sides where it looks like the transition is taking place. Thanks yet again!

Keep 'em comin, guys, these are all great! Thanks sooooooo much to everyone who's contributed so far and (hopefully) will after this. I've got another Marine in the pic who's barely showing because he's supposed to be just in front of "camera" so all you see of him is a huge closeup of his helmet and part of his face, I'm thinking he needs an RPF tribute written on there somewhere. Will post pics when he's done.

Where are you based?
Perhaps one of the guys can come model for you?

Adam H said:

an extra canister for the flame thrower (I've never been able to buy that you'd get as much flame out of it as they show in the movie unless the canister could be removed, so I was going to put that in anyway) if need be.

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TBH, they got it about right. The WW2 ones had about 10 seconds of flame, but with a 75 yard range. The M240 looks to have a shorter range, but longer burn time. Nice idea with the spare canister, though!

Adam H said:

the harness/belt: how does it go from over the armor on the front to under it on the back? His arms are blocking the sides where it looks like the transition is taking place.

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Point 1 - The pouches on the rear are weighing the back of the belt down.

Point 2 - See where you've got the breastplate, with the belt just over the lower edge of it, then another metal plate coming from under the belt? That lower plate is a seperate piece, attached to the leather/vinyl ab pad.
Alles klar?

If you can, alter his boots in the sketch - They look a bit like trainers/sneakers.

You'll find loads of references and photos on the Aliens Legacy forum, too. We're almost as much a bunch of camera-whores as the Aliens themselves!!

Ttaskmaster said:

Where are you based?
Perhaps one of the guys can come model for you?

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I'm in Brooklyn, NY. Wouldn't want anyone to go to that kind of trouble though. Hell, I'm reluctant to even ask anyone to even take a new picture for me; ideally somebody just has an old photo they can dig out that shows how a lot of the equipment is put on the outfit.

Ttaskmaster said:

TBH, they got it about right. The WW2 ones had about 10 seconds of flame, but with a 75 yard range. The M240 looks to have a shorter range, but longer burn time. Nice idea with the spare canister, though!

Click to expand...

Huh, cool. I'm still probably putting the spare canister in there, always nice to have extra if you're going into that situation.

Ttaskmaster said:

Point 1 - The pouches on the rear are weighing the back of the belt down.

Point 2 - See where you've got the breastplate, with the belt just over the lower edge of it, then another metal plate coming from under the belt? That lower plate is a seperate piece, attached to the leather/vinyl ab pad.
Alles klar?

Click to expand...

I *think* I've got it. Basically I'm wrong about the belt being over the main part of the armor at all and it goes over the crotch plate but under the butt flap and is brought down farther by the pouches? Makes sense.

Ttaskmaster said:

If you can, alter his boots in the sketch - They look a bit like trainers/sneakers.

Click to expand...

I'll give it a shot, though it's kinda hard to show that it's a boot that goes farther up when the pants and leg armor cover the ankle of the boot. I do think the foot looks a little small anyway, which might be contributing to it looking like a sneaker. I'll fool around with it a bit.

Ttaskmaster said:

You'll find loads of references and photos on the Aliens Legacy forum, too. We're almost as much a bunch of camera-whores as the Aliens themselves!!

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0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0 sweet! I'll definitely go check that site out. I'm a big Alien series nut overall anyway so even after I'm done with the poster that might be an awesome place for me to hang out. Thanks for everything!

Adam H said:

I'm in Brooklyn, NY. Wouldn't want anyone to go to that kind of trouble though.

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If there's someone nearby who can chuck their kit on and hold a specific pose, you never know...

It'd be useful as the armour does move about slightly.

Adam H said:

I *think* I've got it. Basically I'm wrong about the belt being over the main part of the armor at all and it goes over the crotch plate but under the butt flap and is brought down farther by the pouches? Makes sense.

Click to expand...

At the back, yes.

For the front, the black ab pad goes from the crotch up to about mid-chest level. Affixed to this at the lower end is a small armour piece over the actual crotch, a cup if you will, and a letterbox-shaped piece around the level of the hips. The main breastplate then sits over the top end of the ab pad. The webbing belt usually sits somewhere between this.

Some useful photos here:
The Aliens Legacy • View topic - Gi-rene tries the armor.

Adam H said:

I'll give it a shot, though it's kinda hard to show that it's a boot that goes farther up when the pants and leg armor cover the ankle of the boot. I do think the foot looks a little small anyway, which might be contributing to it looking like a sneaker. I'll fool around with it a bit.

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The feet you sketched look quite chunky, as if he's wearing Nikes or something. The SA boots in Aliens are the Vietnam issue Jungle Boot and are quite thin by comparison.


But yeah - Stop by the Legacy. We're mostly a friendly bunch.... mostly!! :lol

Interesting image of the shoulder lamp's side bracket! I never did like the way mine fits, with a notch rather than a hole... Relying on the pressure of the screw head at 90* to the direction you wanna stop the thing moving seems illogical...

I think I have enough ref or at least sources for it at this point that I'm just about good to go. I've taken a couple of liberties with the xenomorphs themselves as far as mixing details I liked from each movie so as long as there are no huge errors on the Marines I think i'm all good. I still need to do the helmet & shoulder lamp and fix mistakes over various places but all of this has been a Huge help. Thanks again for all the pics and advice! I've been reading the Legacy forums for the past couple hours and found a lot of great stuff for the poster and just for interesting reading. The "I love the corps" article was a great read and now I have to check out the rest of the site that was on too. This is going to be a very nerdy day . I'll finish off the Marine probably some time today and put pics of him and the other Marine with the RPF on his helmet when I can and then update this thread once the whole poster is done with a full actual scan of it rather than just camera phone pics like I have to do for the pieces. Thanks for everything and I'm sure I'll see you guys over on the Legacy forums at some point as well. I see we share quite a few members although that's really no surprise.