Darth Vader ROTJ Build - Studio 49

Looking very nice indeed! I can't imagine there'll be any approval issues, great job pulling everything together.

To answer the hinge question, these are the exact hinges I use http://www.homebase.co.uk/en/homebaseuk/butt-hinge-steel---38mm-799120 The bolts are fibreglassed into the armour to make sure they won't come loose, before the hinges are held on with nuts. Although the hinges have close to a 360° range of motion, the design of the armour itself limits the shoulder bell to about 25-30° once everything is fitted together.

Outdated

Are you going to use more of the peel off paint? If so, I'd paint the case grey or black and put some Imperial decals on it, to theme it. But, it looks great as is.

Lt Washburn said:

Are you going to use more of the peel off paint? If so, I'd paint the case grey or black and put some Imperial decals on it, to theme it. But, it looks great as is.

Click to expand...

I had to end up removing the paint unfortunately, it just wasn;t going to last and with the cape needing to be strapped on top I didn't want any of it flaking off. I honestly don't mind the bright blue, at least it'll be crazy easy to spot at troops!

Didn't pass approvals the first time around since I was waiting for my cape to get hemmed it was till long in the pictures so that's no surprise.
But I just got the cape back today and it's perfect and tomorrow will mean getting into my gear and cracking on with photos for approvals, I see no reason why I won't get it this time!

Tomorrow is going to be good fun, I can tell already (especially now I have fans in the helmet it won't be so hot and it won't fog up!) plus the hemmed cape will be nice

All I can say is bring it on!

May the force be with you Jonah

Just finished suiting up for my second crack at Approvals pictures today and it should go with out saying I enjoyed every second of it!

So here we go, time for a tonne of photos! And it was so much better with the hemmed cape. I could actually walk this time! And my lenses didn't fog up since I had the fans installed. I also have a video that I'll be uploading shortly as well



The wait to hear back on whether I'm approved or not is already driving me crazy!

On to the pictures!


















The cape is absolutely brilliant with the hem! I can walk around now

Outdated

I always assumed that Vader's cape touched the floor lightly in the movies ... however I can relate to having it hemmed a tad higher as to not gather i.e. cigarette butts and other stuff whilest trooping :wacko

Chaim

Ain't it beautiful? Crikey, yes!
That helmet does look like it has jumped off the screen

SL49000 Reporting for duty!


Just received confirmation that I have just been approved!
http://www.501st.com/members/displaymember.php?userID=21262&costumeID=96

Congrats Jonah!!

Congratulations, and welcome! Great job on the costume

Sym-Cha said:

I always assumed that Vader's cape touched the floor lightly in the movies ... however I can relate to having it hemmed a tad higher as to not gather i.e. cigarette butts and other stuff whilest trooping :wacko

Chaim

Click to expand...

I do have screen caps to support the 1 inch some guys even go to 1.5 - 2 inches which in my opinion is too much

First troop tomorrow morning, bring it on!!!

I was finally able to do my first ever troop today! We were at Central Train station in the Brisbane CBD raising money for the the Starlight Foundation. I got mobbed for photos and we got so many donations in the donation bucket between 7:30-9:30am it was insane! They were already getting heavy wishing 10-20 minutes and most of that was from heaps of 5 and 10 dollar notes! So we raised a heap of money this morning and it was an absolute blast!

In terms of the actual trooping, it went really really well. Yesterday I redid the foam under my chest amor to be much softer and that was super comfortable! Way better than how it was before with the stiffer foam (it looks really think when I'm not wearing it but it's a really low density foam so it compress down really nicely)

I Went for one and a half hours before I took a break, had a really nice breeze going through the station and there were fans on the ceiling so I was set! Wasn't hot at all and only took a break to get the weight of the cape off for a bit. In terms of any physical tiredness I was fine with everything really, only this that was a bit tiring was the weight of the cape on the shoulders as I said above and a little bit from the helmet. But other than that it was perfect which pleasantly surprised me


I had an absolutely brilliant time and I can say I'm now hooked! Plus just trooping as Vader was everything I hoped it'd be and more!
And that first photo with the police on duty has got to be my favourite from this morning. Let's just say Lord Vader has some new enforcers

Now onto the photos! Sorry they're a bit blurry, there was something weird going on with the camera)


First up my new recruits to the Empire

The elite Starlight task force from this morning (minus rogue TK)

​One for the Car lovers out there

​No I explicitly said I like my coffee like my Death Stars! Gigantic, on the Dark Side and Powerful enough to destroy planets!

\




So... Um... How do I drink out of this thing again Palpy??

And yes Vader always chooses Concession when travelling, he is an crazy old dismembered man after all

Why is it so hard to get a good coffee around here? My cup is empty!

Dreamworld Stormtrooper Weekend
Dreamworld - Gold Coast
14/05/16 - 15/05/16


And the Dreamworld Weekend comes to a close for its final year. Disappointed to see it go but stoked I was lucky enough to troop Vader for it!
This troop had everything and I couldn't wipe the smile off my face! The place was absolutely packed the entire weekend and I couldn't move more than a few meters before getting overrun by people looking for photos (huge thank you to the wranglers who helped get me from the cinema to booths each time, without you I'd wouldn't have made it far! )


And of course the "Most Impressive" group photo of the largest gathering of Star Wars Characters in the Southern Hemisphere!
(I'm the Vader on the right of the line up and I was pleasantly surprised that I was pretty much the same height as the other local Vader's Although the Vader on the far left is up an extra step I think)

Managed to grab myself a huge print of this one and although I don't have much room, I'll be making room for this one!

Quote of the day was from a little guy dressed as Vader coming for a photo who said "Kylo Ren will never be as good as you!!!" That made my day








I was probably out there for 5-6 hours total in Vader on the Saturday and when I wasn't, since we had the Dreamworld Cinema as our suit up area they had the Star Wars movie on loop the entire weekend, not a bad way to take a break in between being on the booths! And it was also the first time I've ever seen any part of a Star Wars Movie on the big screen part from TFA.




Calm before the storm just before the gates open on Saturday!

A collection of photos from throughout the weekend that I could find of me

You need more black and less hair mate

Fanboys, am I right!

Alright so it's time to satisfy that OVD hunger! First order of business, a custom belt box soundboard system.
So now after a few troops with no way to audibly communicate with the public I have really want a way to get some level of interaction.
I do have Robovox but it's proved uncooperative in that the mic is picking up the breathing loop no matter how quite it is and create an ear shattering feedback loop. So in looking for solutions I looped back to my idea of using the silver knobs on the belt box to trigger Vader quotes that play through the speakers. It's cheaper than getting a top of the line voice modulator (which I currently can't afford) and it give me the ability to interact with people with famous lines form the movies.

The game plan is to 3D print another right belt box which I will then fit out with all the electronics allowing me to design it to fit all the switches I need. I'll then pick up the LED's form jay car and the Soundboard from online.


/////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////


Tonight I ordered the soundboard itself, I'll be visiting Jaycar electronic tomorrow to pick up 4 momentary switches to replace the ones that come on the board. That's as easy as a cutting off the old ones and soldering the new ones.

I'll also be remove the speaker that comes with it and using the audio jack/port to run it to both AKER speakers

300 second (5 minutes) USB recording module with 4 buttons
This module plugs directly into the USB port of your PC. Then use the free software to record up to 300 seconds of .wav files to this module. Comes with a speaker and a line out for an additional amplifier or external speakers.
Features:
- Up to 300 seconds of re-recordable voice message (4.7K sample rate)
- Includes 6 different playback settings including repeat and continuous playback.
- Easy to transfer software for windows of WAV audio file.
- Range of 4K - 20K sample rate.
- 300 seconds non-volatile recordable IC.
- 4 Push switches for playback / stop of up to four different messages

http://www.electronics123.com/shop/...utes-usb-recording-module-with-4-buttons-5320

Click to expand...

/////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////


I've also been spending some time trying to work out what the 4 quote I want to use are. I've used a screen recorded that record the audio of the computer rather than a microphone to record the quotes from the Vader soundboard on starwars.com

And I've narrowed it down to about 5 that I like and can't decide which one I'd want to drop
I'm going in with a few things to consider with each quote:
1 - Is it an iconic Vader quote?
2 - Can I use it in a large variety of situations/troops
3 - Would it be inappropriate at some events (e.g. Hospital troops), if not then it's probably not to use it

With that said here's the 5 I've narrowed it down to:
1 - "The Force is with you Young Skywalker... But you are not a Jedi Yet" (I'd seamlessly edit out "Skywalker" so that I can use it for anybody)
2 - "I am your Farther..." Because of course
3 - "The Emperor does not share your optimistic appraisal of the situation" This one I reckon would be fun for if someone is trying to ask a silly question and get a response
4 - "Impressive... Most Impressive" A classic and easy to use just about anywhere
5 - "Join me, and together we can rule the Galaxy as farther and son" I'd cut off "farther and son" then that could be used for anybody

After a very productive day collecting materials I was able to start my build for this properly!

First of all I visited the dedicated 3D Printing store that was about 35 minutes down the road, really interesting to be able to have a look at the variety of brands all in one place. While I was there I picked up two spools of 1.75mm ABS Filament, come of which I'm using to print the box as I'm posting this right now. I've been lucky in being able to get a ahold of a printer to borrow for a few weeks so I'm all set to print whatever I need over the coming weeks now I have filament!








Found a good spot to pop the rolls on the shelf in the workshop next to a thank you plaque from the gent who built the first Z6 from my Schematics I have for sale here

Next up was a visit to "Jaycar Electronics" and they never fail to disappoint when it comes to building Belt boxes!
Here's a list of what I picked up:
- x2 Green Rectangular LED's
- x1 Red Chrome Ring LED
- x4 Momentary Switches
- x1 9V Battery connector
- x1 Toggle Switch

I really am lucky that I can pretty much just drive 20 minutes down the road and I have all the supplies I need for Belt Boxes!













So the one thing I spent some good time mulling over was the switches that trigger the sound effects/ quotes and as luck would have it the switches I chose actually could not be more perfect if I tried!

As it would turn out they are pretty well identical to the knobs I have for my Belt boxes already! Only being a fraction of a millimetre bigger, so much so I'd really be the only one to ever notice. So I'll just be painting the caps silver and I'll be good to go. And if they don't work I'll just 3D print some instead