The 10th Planet Cyberman Build Diary Part 3: Rings, Suit, and Chest progress
Hey Gang,
So the build continues. Malaki Keller and I continue down the Mondas path as we prep the jersey suit, assemble some limb rings, put together the shell of the Chest unit, bring together just about all of the helmet, and scratch our heads on the lights.
More Pics and Info
Using the 15 or so yards of cotton twill trim I got at Jo-Ann I attached it in long strips down each leg and arm. A tedious process but one which allowed me to watch some Hartnell Doctor Who Recon goodness for a while in peace. After finishing this, I did a test fit with the rain suit to get a sense of how it was coming together. I was pretty happy. I may still remove the pockets on the suit but that's a delicate procedure to make sure you don't cut the suit itself and leave clean lines. I left that for another day.
Back to the Helmet - the top was now essentially finished. Mal took a soldering iron to the side foam pieces to carve out the grooves in the helmet and gave it a silver paint job. Came out rather smashing!
Cyber cap ready to go
Trusty all important references
The Quaker can was given a plastic over-treatment and backing for structure. Then it was drilled and to allow placement for the PVC elbows on the back and sides. The large flashlight was added and connected to a switch in the back so it would be functional. The light had to get a little jiggerpkoery- with added plastic and a ring of mylar tape to extend it to meet the edge of the quaker can but it came out looking pretty awesome.
Helmet lamp assembled
In working order!
Helmet back light switch
The one thing we caught though was the PVC tubes need to come out more slightly to create the right profile down the side sof my head so some small add-ons will be in order there. Otherwise this gets the primer paint ready for a silver coat very soon.
Heat gun test on the Vinyl tubing to round it our for the PVC on the helmet handles.
For the middle portion of the handles we got thick vinyl tubing, applied a heat gun to make it pliable and just got it to work on the PVC tube. The test worked great after tom finangling (it's a very snug fit!) but..... turns out we got the wrong diameter but a margin. We'll have to go and get a larger vinyl tube to match the PVC on the helmet. So..success... and minor setback.
Ready for the final coat of paint
Back tot he Gun Mount. The handles were cut from the wood, glued together and then belt sanded in areas to smooth edges and improve any angles for attachment. Edges were then puttied to further smooth joins and sanded. The back thin dowels were also cut down and hot glued in place.
Belt sanding the handle edges and angles to attach to the Gun mount
Attached handles
hot gluing the dowel struts in place
putty and sanding down said putty to smooth joins
After this is done the piece is primed for painting. Now we just have to wrry about the light, the girll... oh and the mechnics of attaching it to the chest... yay....
The gun is primed
While painting these parts, the vintage switches were sanded and painted- the chicken head white and the larger round switch (which was green) black.
Painting the chicken head switch
Back to the chest unit- the center box which was been cut from thick hard styrene- was hot glued together. Then given the putty and sanding treatment like the gun.
Hot gluing the center box together
Putty to smooth joins and edges
Then the Grill and back mesh peices were hot glued together into one piece.
Center portion begins
And this center grill piece was then heavily hot glued into place in the center of the styrene box.
Hot glued center metal grill to back mesh
With this done it was done to priming and then painting it silver.
Box paint
Cutting the styrene for the back of the chest unit.
Something we caught in the reference was the area with the knobs was an off color grey. So the area on the box was masked and painted a steel grey to offset this and recreate the look.
Painting the center switch portion a steel off-shade gray.
Then came the fun of taking the pre-cut clear acrylic pieces and gluing them together with a special acylric cement- which melts the plastic together and creates a strong bond.
Special acylic cement- don't leave home without it
Gluing the acrylic pieces together to make the sides
Nearly Finished box
Finally the painted knobs were super glued in place on the lower center section.... now to figure out the lights...
The Chest unit coming together
The lights proved tricky. We discovered that they are not a single row but DOUBLE rows of lights inside the the clear sections. Each are perpendicular to each other- most confusing! One set- the main 5 that go down each side are silver stemmed and smoky black bulbs. These however are Non functional. The lights in between these- 4 on each side- 8 in all the point outwards away from the chest towards the observer - these have a black base and ARE functional! So we rigged up some PVC pipe, wrapped in mylar and then added for one set of lights a plastic clear chip and the other a vacu-formed pull from some toy pegs Malaki's son had to cap (and they fit perfectly) the others with a little foil to brighten the LED light it will contain. Rather tricky but here's some sample pics.
Lights test and housing.
On to the rings. The precut 1/2" foam was meausured or wrapped around portions of my arms and legs to measure and cut down. Once labelled, each one was barged together to create the 10 rings.
http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7338/12431224065_0a36e09442_z.jpg
Previously cut 1/2" foam mats for the rings.
Barging them together
Finishing the set of ten (4 for the leg and 6 for the arms)
Testing the lower leg ring on the boot for scale and placement.
We noticed the upper arm rings looked fatter or thicker than the others so a layer of 1/4 foam was sized, cut and barged onto those to create the same effect. After there was minor belt sanding to smooth any areas of the join.
adding 1/4" foam to thicken the upper arm rings.
Belt sanding down any edges that need leveling/smoothing
With that done these rings were subjected to the heat gun to seal the pores, then given a few sealant coats and finally primed for painting silver.
Cutting two sleeves off the donor shirt to make the head stocking.
On to the stocking for the head. I ordered a spare 2XL jersey shirt to cut off the sleeves and use them for this purpose so it would match the suit. Ideally more of a dance tight might be etter to be more form fitting and I may look into that later but I wanted something easy that I know would go color wise for now. So using one of the spare sleeves I sliped it over my head to map eye and mouth placment.
test fit the head stocking to determine where to cut the eyes and mouth
Once determined, the areas were cut out. We found on the first try due to stretch the holes were a margin too large. So luckily I had the second sleeve and we redid this with a smaller holes and the effect was much better- you'll see this new 'upgrade' in Part 4.
Surgery begins
Test cut done. Ready to rob some banks.
We acquired some black mesh dirt cheap at Wal mart to sew in behind the eyes (although it looks like they just blackened the area around thier eyes in the original I really wanted to sell the dead black eye effect and NOT see my eyes.) for the mouth we're using a stretch nylon like panty hose so I can open my mouth but keep the creepy black void effect. We plan to create the rings/mouth rims with 1/8" foam for flexibility.
An idea of the finished effect- still a good ways to go.
And now my cyber-conversion continues....
Look for this at Gallifrey One leading a Cyber Troop charge so "You Will Be Like Uzzzzz"
More in Part 4!
-honorarydoctor
So the build continues. Malaki Keller and I continue down the Mondas path as we prep the jersey suit, assemble some limb rings, put together the shell of the Chest unit, bring together just about all of the helmet, and scratch our heads on the lights.
More Pics and Info
Using the 15 or so yards of cotton twill trim I got at Jo-Ann I attached it in long strips down each leg and arm. A tedious process but one which allowed me to watch some Hartnell Doctor Who Recon goodness for a while in peace. After finishing this, I did a test fit with the rain suit to get a sense of how it was coming together. I was pretty happy. I may still remove the pockets on the suit but that's a delicate procedure to make sure you don't cut the suit itself and leave clean lines. I left that for another day.
Back to the Helmet - the top was now essentially finished. Mal took a soldering iron to the side foam pieces to carve out the grooves in the helmet and gave it a silver paint job. Came out rather smashing!
Cyber cap ready to go
Trusty all important references
The Quaker can was given a plastic over-treatment and backing for structure. Then it was drilled and to allow placement for the PVC elbows on the back and sides. The large flashlight was added and connected to a switch in the back so it would be functional. The light had to get a little jiggerpkoery- with added plastic and a ring of mylar tape to extend it to meet the edge of the quaker can but it came out looking pretty awesome.
Helmet lamp assembled
In working order!
Helmet back light switch
The one thing we caught though was the PVC tubes need to come out more slightly to create the right profile down the side sof my head so some small add-ons will be in order there. Otherwise this gets the primer paint ready for a silver coat very soon.
Heat gun test on the Vinyl tubing to round it our for the PVC on the helmet handles.
For the middle portion of the handles we got thick vinyl tubing, applied a heat gun to make it pliable and just got it to work on the PVC tube. The test worked great after tom finangling (it's a very snug fit!) but..... turns out we got the wrong diameter but a margin. We'll have to go and get a larger vinyl tube to match the PVC on the helmet. So..success... and minor setback.
Ready for the final coat of paint
Back tot he Gun Mount. The handles were cut from the wood, glued together and then belt sanded in areas to smooth edges and improve any angles for attachment. Edges were then puttied to further smooth joins and sanded. The back thin dowels were also cut down and hot glued in place.
Belt sanding the handle edges and angles to attach to the Gun mount
Attached handles
hot gluing the dowel struts in place
putty and sanding down said putty to smooth joins
After this is done the piece is primed for painting. Now we just have to wrry about the light, the girll... oh and the mechnics of attaching it to the chest... yay....
The gun is primed
While painting these parts, the vintage switches were sanded and painted- the chicken head white and the larger round switch (which was green) black.
Painting the chicken head switch
Back to the chest unit- the center box which was been cut from thick hard styrene- was hot glued together. Then given the putty and sanding treatment like the gun.
Hot gluing the center box together
Putty to smooth joins and edges
Then the Grill and back mesh peices were hot glued together into one piece.
Center portion begins
And this center grill piece was then heavily hot glued into place in the center of the styrene box.
Hot glued center metal grill to back mesh
With this done it was done to priming and then painting it silver.
Box paint
Cutting the styrene for the back of the chest unit.
Something we caught in the reference was the area with the knobs was an off color grey. So the area on the box was masked and painted a steel grey to offset this and recreate the look.
Painting the center switch portion a steel off-shade gray.
Then came the fun of taking the pre-cut clear acrylic pieces and gluing them together with a special acylric cement- which melts the plastic together and creates a strong bond.
Special acylic cement- don't leave home without it
Gluing the acrylic pieces together to make the sides
Nearly Finished box
Finally the painted knobs were super glued in place on the lower center section.... now to figure out the lights...
The Chest unit coming together
The lights proved tricky. We discovered that they are not a single row but DOUBLE rows of lights inside the the clear sections. Each are perpendicular to each other- most confusing! One set- the main 5 that go down each side are silver stemmed and smoky black bulbs. These however are Non functional. The lights in between these- 4 on each side- 8 in all the point outwards away from the chest towards the observer - these have a black base and ARE functional! So we rigged up some PVC pipe, wrapped in mylar and then added for one set of lights a plastic clear chip and the other a vacu-formed pull from some toy pegs Malaki's son had to cap (and they fit perfectly) the others with a little foil to brighten the LED light it will contain. Rather tricky but here's some sample pics.
Lights test and housing.
On to the rings. The precut 1/2" foam was meausured or wrapped around portions of my arms and legs to measure and cut down. Once labelled, each one was barged together to create the 10 rings.
http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7338/12431224065_0a36e09442_z.jpg
Previously cut 1/2" foam mats for the rings.
Barging them together
Finishing the set of ten (4 for the leg and 6 for the arms)
Testing the lower leg ring on the boot for scale and placement.
We noticed the upper arm rings looked fatter or thicker than the others so a layer of 1/4 foam was sized, cut and barged onto those to create the same effect. After there was minor belt sanding to smooth any areas of the join.
adding 1/4" foam to thicken the upper arm rings.
Belt sanding down any edges that need leveling/smoothing
With that done these rings were subjected to the heat gun to seal the pores, then given a few sealant coats and finally primed for painting silver.
Cutting two sleeves off the donor shirt to make the head stocking.
On to the stocking for the head. I ordered a spare 2XL jersey shirt to cut off the sleeves and use them for this purpose so it would match the suit. Ideally more of a dance tight might be etter to be more form fitting and I may look into that later but I wanted something easy that I know would go color wise for now. So using one of the spare sleeves I sliped it over my head to map eye and mouth placment.
test fit the head stocking to determine where to cut the eyes and mouth
Once determined, the areas were cut out. We found on the first try due to stretch the holes were a margin too large. So luckily I had the second sleeve and we redid this with a smaller holes and the effect was much better- you'll see this new 'upgrade' in Part 4.
Surgery begins
Test cut done. Ready to rob some banks.
We acquired some black mesh dirt cheap at Wal mart to sew in behind the eyes (although it looks like they just blackened the area around thier eyes in the original I really wanted to sell the dead black eye effect and NOT see my eyes.) for the mouth we're using a stretch nylon like panty hose so I can open my mouth but keep the creepy black void effect. We plan to create the rings/mouth rims with 1/8" foam for flexibility.
An idea of the finished effect- still a good ways to go.
And now my cyber-conversion continues....
Look for this at Gallifrey One leading a Cyber Troop charge so "You Will Be Like Uzzzzz"
More in Part 4!
-honorarydoctor