Captain Phasma's spear

This one has been in my brain for a while since I've heard it's going to be a thing at all. Which was the time the Vanity Fair covers came out. And the Last Jedi trailer reaffirmed this with Phasma's spear going up against Finn with the z6 riot control baton (which was my favorite prop from TFA)
I haven't heard of anyone else starting on one I don't know if anyone has any info on it. I'd be immensely grateful if anyone did, I'm not incredibly confident in my abilities to scale props for overall size or for figuring details on the prop.
From watching videos about the toy from toy enthusiasts the spear looks like it's going to be collapsible. As I'm fairly sure the movie isn't going to do that practically and I'm taking a hiatus from my collapsible Gamora's sword project (why do I become enamored with female's collapsible weapons?). I'm just going focus on the full size spear.
Luckily I'm going to make it out of wood so the cost will be really flipping cheap.
$5.14 cheap (4.87 before tax) not counting paint that is, but I already have an almost full roll of aluminum tape or foil tape so that's going to be what I use for it.
Pretty damn inexpensive.



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I have to figure out from the pictures available what the dimensions are and what the breakdown of sections is.

From the receipt you see I have a 1 inch by 2 inch by four foot pine craft board (which in case you didn't know is actually a 3/4"x 1.5"x 4' because they're dirty liars, but that doesn't matter for this project) and a 3/4 inch by four foot poplar dowel (actually 3/4 inch). I have a total length of 8 feet

Gwendoline Christie is 6'3"according to imdb and even though in the pictures she isn't standing straight up at full height it's still almost a head above her (we can also assume it's not 100% perpendicular to the ground, also any angle would extend the length).
most people are 7.5 heads tall 6'3 is conveniently 75 inches making her head 10 inches so about a head above Christie is 7'1 I'm gonna call it 7 because I have to eyeball and from the pictures I definitely see some overlap area between the flatter side she holds on to and the business end (ends both sides come to a point).
The wider middle section which will be the pine 1x2x4 craft board(the body of the spear) is from her just under the top of her shoulder to her knee 4 1/6 heads (on my body proportion picture) I'm rounding it up to 3.5 feet leaving 3.5 feet for the spear part or business end... the dowel section (1.75' per end or 21 inches) checking my math with the head method from the knee down is 2 heads or 20 inches and we are guesstimating the tip is a head above her head so that's also 2 heads or 20 inches there's the unaccounted 3rd of a head for the section from chin to top of shoulder which works to 3 and a third inches (take 2 of those inches and add to each 20 inch business end making it 1.75' each)(I think the other inch is from my rounding 7'1 down to an even 7) then I have a 1/3" margin of error which I can totally live with.
So I need to chop my dowel into two 2 foot sections and chop 6 inches of my pine board (I may leave an inch to 1.33" for the spare I won't decide till I attach one end of the dowel) I want to seat the business end into the base pretty good so I'm going to put three inches of dowel into the craft board two inches glued and an inch I'm going to join and glue (sorta I'm not that good I'm gonna angle cut and glue more so it's really really locked in). 3 inches off the length of 2 for is my 1.75 foot goal.
Note: if I had a lathe I'd sharpen the points before glueing but I don't so I'm holding off till the end it's gonna be an arduous process. The business ends look to be sharpened for four or five inches at the end.
Also do I shave off any width from the body? I think I might take up to a half inch off. It's not the easiest thing to see how much wider the body is from the dowel. I'm not going to make that call yet either of anyone has info I'd welcome it.
Once that's done I'm gonna have to a: drill the detail holes (hey if anyone knows the info on those things, I'm all ears) then b: start the process of shaping the pine rectangle of the body into oval or football shape. Then c: sharpen the points d: aluminum foil tape it. Sounds easy as pie so I'm expecting Murphy to show up any time. I'll keep you up to date on what goes on. I'll try to put the pics of Phasma up and my sketches on the board.
I would put up the body proportion pic but it has a drawn nipple on it and I don't want to inadvertantly break a rule I googled it you can too.


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Well one and a half days to work on the spear. A bit less actually I had to make a bunch of pies today for Thanksgiving and I was at work (half day) yesterday.

I attached the dowel after cutting it in half to both sides of the spear's body. After the first side I checked whether I wanted extend the length of the pine board by an inch and a third to account for the margin between my two measuring systems but decided to cut it down to 3.5 ft after discovering that 7 ft is really tall and though it doesn't seem like an extra inch and a third would feel significant; it kinda did feel that way. I'm three and bit inches shorter than Gwendoline Christie so maybe it's my height, but I'm doing what feels comfortable. So 7" total 3.5 of which is craft board 3.5 of which is dowel with 3 inches of dowel each side sunk into the craft board for stability.
If I were to do it again I'd opt for two dowels sunken farther because I think the cylindrical business end portion is longer than the body portion. So dowel-body-dowel ratio should be 2'-3'-2'(possibly even 2.25'-2.5'-2.25' but that might be exaggeration) instead of 1.75'-3.5'-1.75'. The transition between sections isn't very clear in the pictures available to me. So it's tough to say.

I trimmed the craft board width from 1.5 inches to 1 1/8 inches that seemed closest to the pictures. So the centered holes the details below the business end (above her hand in the Vanity Fair pics) are 9/16ths inch in width-wise.

I'm waiting on glue to dry at the moment once the dowels are securely on I'll tackle those holes. Pics show the longest hole the size of her hand. My hand from pinky to pointer finger is 4 inches so I'm going with that. The next largest hole is about an inch and the smallest 1/3 to 1/2 inch. That's what I'm going with now. I'm sure I'll agonize about it some more and stare at the same four pictures... the picture of the toy accessories might be helpful there.

Not to mention I need to also figure out the width of the holes they appear pretty damn wide there's not a whole lot of material on that part of the spear (I'm sure the prop in the pics is machined from aluminum making that kind of work more stable. But it would at least quintuple the budget of the spear if I did that, septuple octuple more likely plus then I'd need a lot more tools too.) The width may be more than a quarter inch. I'll have to look at it more. (note: finding the hole width might be helpful in determining length the smallest hole is rectangular not square so the length is bigger than the width) (another note: pay attention to the holes depth in the pictures as that'll help determine the shape of the body) I can tell from the pictures that the holes were routed in but I don't have a router so my method will be slower.

Still want to shape the body down after I get the holes in. I might not wait till the holes are perfectly done because the stress of sanding for a tiny strip of wood I'm going to be concerned about it snapping (it's going to be a major concern anyway). But I want the pilot holes in for the detail holes and it fairly mapped out before doing the body shaping (hole cutting is most easiest accomplished onto flat surfaces so I'm not going to shape first and then have to drill straight down onto a curve).

I did examine the point that'll eventually go on the dowels in the full body shots it looks like the taper to the point starts above her ankle which should be 5 inches. It's 5 inches on me and according to the body proportion stuff it should be half a head which is 5 inches also... That seems excessively long to me. I sharpied in 3", 3.5", 4", 4.5", and 5 inches. And 5 seems so excessive but I think that it is correct. 5 inches also is the most work sharpening. Maybe my desire to get out of excessive sharpening is overriding my own perception.



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Well I have a theory and a method for the holes in the spear. I took a sheet of graph paper and since each square is a 1/4 inch I knew the width of the body of the spear is an inch and an eighth (four and a half squares). With a center point of 9/16 inch (2 and a quarter squares).try a few possibilities and start a new strip for other possibilities. I was able to fit 6 strips on a page (the picture only shows 5, I had a blank strip that I'll use as a spare if I need it) And tried to figure out hole configurations from there. I haven't gotten things set in stone yet but I'm fairly certain that:
* 4 inches is too long for longest hole.
* 3/8 inch is too narrow the holes are either half inch or 5/8 inch (maybe 9/16s)
* The smallest square is definitely rectangular and longer than it is wide.
* The widths are same for all three holes

I've been assuming that the most likely configuration for the holes is 3/4 inch for the smallest then 1.5 in the middle then 3 inches for the largest. It doubles each time which I like and it doesn't look bad placed against the body of the spear.
update: they definitely don't double each time the smallest hole upon inspection is definitely less than 3/4 inch long but probably still around half or larger the second hole is smaller than an inch and a half probably closer to an inch and it seems the largest definitely more than doubles the medium one.

You can see from the strips there there are 5 holes not 3. I figured by putting the longest hole in the middle I could test different sizes of spaces between the holes flipping them around to try the other side (so smallest, medium, largest, medium, smallest). I've been trying to decide if the spaces between holes are half an inch or 3/8 inch or something else I haven't thought of (so example is .75 hole then .5 inch space then a 1.5 inch hole then a .5 inch space then a 3 inch hole changing spacing now putting a 3/8 inch space then a 1.5 inch hole then a 3/8 inch space then the .75 inch hole.) Also the spaces between each hole may not be uniform either. update: they appear to be close but not quite even and a maximum of 3/8s inch maybe even under 1/4 inch

Finally the (current) last thing I don't know is where the holes begin in relation to the join of the dowel and craft boards. How far down is it down the spear?

I still have a bit of extra gaps to fill in with wood glue before the next steps or before I have to make decisions on what I'm trying to figure out now.

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Okay I'm meaning for this to be fairly quick and non rambly update I still have a bit more to do before the next big update.
I did a lot of measuring of my phone with a ruler to try to figure out some measurements on the spear. I'm not so sure about the length of the largest hole. But the rest I'm fairly to moderately confident about. So much so that I pulled the trigger and started drilling and cutting. The small hole is a length of 5/8 inch the space between smallest and middle is 5/16 inch the middle hole is an inch and 1/8. The space between the middle and longest hole is a sliver under a quarter inch (mathematically it's either 15/64s or 7/32; I think the former, either way I don't have fancy calipers or a micrometer so I'm using the inexact term "sliver") the width of all the holes is half an inch. The length of the longest isn't coming out with this method I'm getting different answers with different pictures which means I need to go back and check my work. At least I know where that hole begins.
Most importantly perhaps the best measurement I got was from the tip of the spear to the beginning of the smallest hole was 1 foot 10.5 inches. I got that one from the Vanity Fair pic that shows the spear tip. (Note to self try to use this method to see where the taper for the spear's point starts is it still five inches like you've been assuming.) It's the "if her head is 10 inches then what does that make x" method. Until someone gets to go over the original prop with a caliper measuring everything that the best I can do.
It took a while to figure out how to evenly draw the holes on both sides finally I used the edge of the board and taped that weird space invader looking piece of graph paper to it so my holes would line up on each side. (There is a picture of it taped and pretaped) If I were to do this again I should have plotted my holes exactly before ever cutting one side of the craft board's width. Luckily the other edge was still good enough to plot out the holes.
I used a thumb tack to poke holes in the corners and to score the edge of the holes. I also started before I fell asleep drilling with the cutting guide down into the holes but I didn't want to do the more exact/delicate work in a sleepy state.
Also putting up a new picture found of a cool ad including the spear


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So this is a double check my math update.

I had some time after work to use the computer I remember watching videos about ways to scale the full picture of the spear in ms publisher by messing about with transparency and guide lines, etc (also a bit of tweaking of the angle to make it fully perpendicular or upright our whatever)
By doing this I could measure both the top and bottom to make sure my measurements that I previously only got from the top match on the bottom. I also needed to get the measurements for where the spear point taper starts and the length of the longest hole.
I am quite happy to say most of my measurements were reconfirmed if about for a bit of margin of error on either side. From point to first hole is 22.5 inches (new measurements were top <22.25 and bottom 22.49 on this pic the very very tip of the top is missing so I maybe miscounted from where I guessed it should be around 1/4 inch is acceptable.) The 1st hole was 5/8 inch; top measured 11/16 inch bottom 19/32. The spaces between the first and middle holes in my original and the new measurements are bigger than the holes between middle and long hole.
Anyway I'll try to graph these:
Between small and medium holes my 5/16s new top 1/4 new bottom 5/16
Medium hole mine: 1 1/16 inch new top: 1 1/16 bottom: 15/16 inch (anomaly short by an eighth inch)
Space between medium and large hole mine: 15/64 inch new top: 11/64 new bottom: 17/64
Big hole I didn't have any surety at all 3.5 or 3 1/8 were guesses New top: 3 3/8 inches new bottom: 3 5/16

The taper begins at around 3.5 inches (the top is 3 1/16 inches and the bottom is 3 5/8 inches.

The width is odd It measures as 25/32 which is just over 3/4 inch. But the dowel portion is where the lines clearly line up the middle portion isn't clear. So my 1 1/8 inch I think it's still pretty darn close. It's possible my margin of error could remove 1/8 or even a quarter inch but I'm going to still run under the assumption that it isn't.

I didn't measure hole width (forgot) I'm not sure about the width at all but it can't hurt to get them. update: the hole width measures at just under 5/16s of an inch where as I've had them at half an inch. I think the skew is affecting the width of both the holes and the body. It's difficult to get the accurate straight on the face numbers when you're looking at something in 3/4 profile. Anyone know any tips for how to do that I'm all ears? It most likely won't affect this build but it's useful info to learn.

Next stop drill out big hole I'm missing likely going to go with 3 3/8. Then repeat on other side
Then shaping the body I am assuming it's nearly lenticular so I have a decent idea of the sanding method. I worry that it won't be as thin as the pictures but I worry more about the wood breaking. If I were working in aluminum I would be more drastic.

Then I don't know how I'm going to go about sharpening the dowels. I don't have a lathe as mentioned before a lot of sanding I presume.

Finally the aluminum taping in lieu of painting it and then finishing touches.
I don't think I'll have it done for tlj release but hopefully by new years.

I'll try to screenshot the publisher worksheet for everyone and edit it on or put it on the next post.

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Well it's been almost a week and progress has been made. I have all holes drilled and I started shaping.
Of course since the only time I was able to work was late at night I didn't really have the opportunity to use power tools so a whole heap of whittling with a work knife later I have 9/10s of the shaping done. The body was pretty easy to carve since it's pine at the moment I'm filling in a few unfortunate gouges with wood glue and I'll give it a sand down to smooth when it's dry. It's almost ready for aluminum taping. I'm also putting a wood glue coat for a bit more stability the dowels nearly disconnected during shaping and needed reglueing so I'm a bit worried about stability. Overall it is lenticular it probably could be thinner (still an inch and an 8th wide but thinner than the 3/4 inch depth) if someone was working in aluminum but in wood that's not possible.

For the numbers side of things the depth side of the body the 3/4 inch side was shaved down to 3/16 inch centered on each side. The top and bottom of the body were 1 1/8 inch wide which was shaved to a quarter inch (which is half the width of the holes) centered.

What is going much slower is the sharpening of the tips. The dowels are poplar so it's way more difficult to cut with a work knife so they are starting to take shape but only slowly. I also have to decide how pointy the point can be. Again the material dictates that if I sharpen it up to a pencil point it'll be far too flimsy. I wouldn't even recommend anyone working in metal to sharpen it that finely. I'm not positive yet how much finer of a point it'll be but I still have a bit to do on it either way.

Note: a tip out trick I'll share for shaping if you're using a work knife. Tape up the dowel section great where the body joins the dowel I didn't until after putting 3 deep gouging cuts into the part of the dowel that is supposed to stay cylindrical. I filled them with wood glue but it is more work and an ounce of prevention would've been better than pound of cure.

Dang it the gif of me turning/rolling the body to get the idea of lenticular-ness is too big to load. I uploaded a tiny video if it's helpful. https://youtu.be/ISYL6xG49hE


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Alright well I wanted to get this done before tlj and since i still haven't seen it (crowds bother me) I'm still happy that I got it done.

Well almost done. The aluminum tape is on there. It took a bit of work to get the tape into the holes but it got done.

One thing that took a bit of time was the sanding and filling in holes. I just used wood glue to fill in any divots. And sanded down any bumpy areas.
I had a hell of a time with the area between the dowel and craft board. There was too much gap between the two and the wood glue didn't dry well. Ended up alternating with wood glue and super glue till it was stable there was a lot of stabilization needed around the holes. I kept shaking the spear and heard a little cracking noise then had to find the crack put some glue to stabilize and after drying shake it again to find any other possible weak points. Overall I would say it's moderately stable now.

Getting the tape on was fairly easy especially since I got the wood surface to be pretty smooth. Which I'm convinced was a lot of my issues with other projects.
But it went on fine and I used a back of a knife to smooth it down.

Next step is to watch the movie. I obviously don't know what will be seen of it. Depending on how I think it looks I'll either reexamine and keep it pretty shiny it dull the shininess down. We'll see
I'll put the pictures up along with that picture which was the screenshot of the publisher worksheet

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