SS Buck Rogers Starfighter

Regarding the first link - most of the photos there are of the Monogram kit or of a studio scale replica, EXCEPT for the straight on, top down shot. That one matches a Hartland photo that was also used on an old poster book from the film.

The canopy piece in the second link is interesting. The color is consistent with the color of a real canopy that I saw. I didn't really believe some of the photos that I had seen until I saw a real piece. Even in some of the photos that are on Ken Larson's site show an off-white Starfighter. Rather than having an off-white model blow out and be overexposed when hit with film lights, I guess the beige registered as off-white. I mixed up some paint and had a base coat down, but it looked wrong. I finally said 'screw it' and painted it the way I was used to seeing it. At a certain point, I plan on going back and tweaking the weathering on mine (it was weathered in under an hour on the day of the screening it was to be displayed at).

I can't post pix here cuz I'm new. I'll try to dig out the ones I took of my replica and send them to Steve for posting.

GK
 
<div class='quotetop'>(GKvfx @ Oct 4 2006, 12:05 AM) [snapback]1331626[/snapback]</div>
Regarding the first link - most of the photos there are of the Monogram kit or of a studio scale replica, EXCEPT for the straight on, top down shot. That one matches a Hartland photo that was also used on an old poster book from the film.

The canopy piece in the second link is interesting. The color is consistent with the color of a real canopy that I saw. I didn't really believe some of the photos that I had seen until I saw a real piece. Even in some of the photos that are on Ken Larson's site show an off-white Starfighter. Rather than having an off-white model blow out and be overexposed when hit with film lights, I guess the beige registered as off-white. I mixed up some paint and had a base coat down, but it looked wrong. I finally said 'screw it' and painted it the way I was used to seeing it. At a certain point, I plan on going back and tweaking the weathering on mine (it was weathered in under an hour on the day of the screening it was to be displayed at).

I can't post pix here cuz I'm new. I'll try to dig out the ones I took of my replica and send them to Steve for posting.

GK
[/b]



GK are you Gary Kerr? If so hello stranger. It's been a while. PM me.

Now, what GK said is true. They did paint several of the models darker colors then the lights blew them out and registered as white or off whites. The Canaris shuttle from BSG is one of them. On the DVDs you see a white ship with red markings. When in reality it was a yellowish color. Before you say it, the picts I have of it show different views and one of the bottom. On the bottom in the yellowish colors are white and gray areas so its not a color shift in the photo. Also is the Base Star. I was able to see it and photograph it before it was sold off on EBay. It photographs light gray or white but is really a med to dark gray with areas painted various shades of warm and cool gray. Even some yellow and aqua blue highlights but in the end the lighting blew it out and it looks WAY lighter in color then it really is. So I think it likely they painted the Star Fighter in the tan spectrum. It was a practiced method.



Mark
 
Thanks for the great info Mark..

So is this "true" color we're trying to go for for the main body???
[image]http://www.yourprops.com/norm-4522fa5b4603a-Buck+Rogers+in+the+25th+Century+%28TV%29.jpeg[/image]


So do think the darker panles were a grey or dark tan or dark beige?
[image]http://www.universalhartland.com/medium/buckr0_thunder03.jpg[/image]

Lynn
 
To my eye, it loks like a little bit of gray added to the beige. Careful what shade of gray you use - too 'blue' a shade of gray added to the 'yellow-ish' beige = green-ish (and that's a whole different show.....).

GK
 
I remember when I built the scale model in the '80s Pactra Camouflage Grey looked right. Wonder if it would look good on this studio scale one since it does have a warm beige look to it without being spot on white.

Also, how nice, Thunder Fighters don't require too much weathering since it looks like the Earth Directorate kept them clean like the Empire kept their TIEs clean...

Did you know that these were originally going to be used for the Colonial Forces Vipers in "Battlestar Galactica"? Ralph McQuarrie designed them then they opted for the design we all know so well.

JV
 
Jesse - good eye for the color. I would think that if you were looking to get a "close enough right out of the can" color, that would likely do it. I've done a SS scale X-Wing in ModelMaster Camoflage Gray and it looks pretty good.

As for the design of the thing - Ralph McQuarrie and Joe Johnston had to begin working on GALACTICA sometime during the spring/early summer of 1977 - probably before STAR WARS hit. My logic behind this stems from a GALACTICA script that included pre-production art that was distributed to the key players and is dated August of 1977.

The earliest sketches of the Viper I have seen all feature the same distinctive Starfighter characteristics - twin booms coming to a point, elongated engines, small horizontal wings, larger angled wings underneath, and a cockpit far forward.

It seems McQuarrie went through a series of sketches and then did a refined set of drawings. These nice blueprint-like drawings include a head on view (published in the Starlog Spacehips Vol2 book as the BUCK ROGERS Starfighter), the 3/4 view on the Cylon.org site, and a side view (that wound up in the Star Wars Chronicles book (more on that later). He also did a painting of the ship.

At some point, and nobody I've talked to can tell me when or why, the design of the Viper just changed to the three engine triangle design. New drawings/paintings were done and the design was actually refined more by the Apogee model makers as they built it. At this point, we're probably talking fall/winter of 1977. (Though the script I mentioned above contains the "new" Viper design artwork).

At the same time this was going on, work on BUCK ROGERS was starting up over at the old facility used on CLOSE ENCOUNTERS. This was for a feature, not a TV series. David Gerrold was the one of the writers and Glen Larson had nothing to do with it ....yet. Design work was done for the Draconia, the Marauder, and the Ranger 3, and model work was progressing till December of 1977. Just before Christmas, Universal junked the script and laid off most of the FX staff (to avoid paying them their holiday pay). Big studios sucked, even back then.

Shortly after the first of the year (1978), Universal got Glen Larson involved on BUCK ROGERS. Universal probably reasoned that since he was doing one sci-fi series, why not have him do another one as well. By February of 1978, BUCK ROGERS was back on. Didn't know if it was going to be a feature or a TV series. Since they had spent time and money on the bad guy ships, that stuff remained unchanged. The good guy ships had never really been developed/approved, so they sort of started over where GALACTICA had left off. The BUCK folks got all of the old GALACTICA artwork and at some point, the old GALACTICA Viper was looked upon as a possibility for the BUCK ROGERS Starfighter. Dave Jones, who was VFX Art Director on BUCK, took over McQuarries design and changed it around and bulked it up a bit for armature points and all that and also changed the canopy quite a bit (turning it from a one man craft to a two man craft).

Now, here's the weird thing - somewhere along the line, the original drawing of the profile of the GALACTICA Starfighter by McQuarrie wound up in the LucasFilm archives as part of the STAR WARS file. As near as anyone can tell, it was never considered as a Star Wars design. The only thing we can think of is that when ILM packed up and moved up north in 1978, they took it with them (they really cleared out the original ILM facility - down to the chairs, the coffee pot, and some electrical fixtures) and it just got mis-labled by someone who didn't really know better. A friend of mine actually confirmed that the original is up there when he was doing research for the Original Trilogy DVD set a couple of years ago and he stumbled across it.

Anyways, I hope this wasn't too boring and helps somewhat.

Regards,

GK
 
<div class='quotetop'>(GKvfx @ Oct 7 2006, 03:48 AM) [snapback]1333526[/snapback]</div>
Jesse - good eye for the color. I would think that if you were looking to get a "close enough right out of the can" color, that would likely do it. I've done a SS scale X-Wing in ModelMaster Camoflage Gray and it looks pretty good.[/b]

It's Jerry. Thanks for the great background. ;)

I had the opportunity to interview Glen Larson in his home a few years back for a 25th Anniversary retrospective I did on "Battlestar" for the 25th Anniversary convention put together by Richard Hatch (who is a friend of mine). Glen had some great stories to tell on the genesis of "Battlestar", not all of it ended up in the retrospective but it was a real priviledge getting a chance to hear a lot of that kind of stuff firsthand.

If anyone wants to see the retrospective, they can see the Quicktime here (there goes my bandwidth lol):

http://www.nitestar.com/media/GALACTICA_RETROSPECTIVE.mov

Maybe the best thing to do is right click and save it to your comps guys instead of streaming it.

I love what Larson did with "Battlestar" and the "Buck Rogers" movie, but I never cared for the path the "Buck Rogers" tv series went aside from the SPFX. And I love the thunderfighter design as well as the Draconia. I will have to save some cash for a thunderfighter.

JV
 
<div class='quotetop'>(Jestefarean @ Oct 7 2006, 01:49 PM) [snapback]1333673[/snapback]</div>
Doh, I can't access the URL.

GK..>THANKS. Awesome history.
[/b]

Sorry, I mispelled the link, it's been corrected now and should work.

JV
 
Not yet. I'm waiting the decals. Since today is a holiday, I will have them tomorrow. Kits will ship this week.
George :D
 
Here's Pics of first castings were up to 9 now. If you asked to get on the list contact George. We will ship this week once Decals arrive.

194314942.jpg

194314937.jpg

194314932.jpg


Steve
 
This thread is more than 6 years old.

Your message may be considered spam for the following reasons:

  1. This thread hasn't been active in some time. A new post in this thread might not contribute constructively to this discussion after so long.
If you wish to reply despite these issues, check the box below before replying.
Be aware that malicious compliance may result in more severe penalties.
Back
Top