Marathon LOTR/TH WIP Custom Builds..Reaper/Rider Wraith Redone & Finished.

Stryker2011 wrote:Looking good. I wish I had your drive and commitment.

Your wife wouldn't, she'd never see you! You'd be in your man-cave forever!

GubernatorFan wrote:Wow, really coming together. But you are due your well-earned rest.

Taken a rest but got some more done too.

Tjolnir wrote:always inspiring to watch you cut up stuff and create something wonderful, keep up the great work

cheers
tjolnir

Thank you for the support tjolnir!

Nearly there now...

Wow this is coming along fantastically well mate. Great build thread as always.

Paul

Nearly there, indeed. Will he have flowing robes like the rest? Or will he be more like he is now?

That last shot is very encouraging... looks pretty much ready to go, in all its glorious detail. I would imagine that the flowing robes are part of the dress code, Stryker. In this case perhaps it might be cool if there are two long vertical slits for the arms, to give him better access and perhaps reveal a bit more of the armor in action poses. But I'm sure shovelchop has thought of what to do about that already.

scalawag wrote:Wow this is coming along fantastically well mate.  Great build thread as always.

Paul

Thanks scalawag!

Stryker2011 wrote:Nearly there, indeed. Will he have flowing robes like the rest? Or will he be more like he is now?

GubernatorFan wrote:That last shot is very encouraging... looks pretty much ready to go, in all its glorious detail. I would imagine that the flowing robes are part of the dress code, Stryker. In this case perhaps it might be cool if there are two long vertical slits for the arms, to give him better access and perhaps reveal a bit more of the armor in action poses. But I'm sure shovelchop has thought of what to do about that already.

Actually was pondering this in the morning, obviously I don't want to hide all the gorgeous armour but he still needs to be a Wraith! My custom Haradrim Wraith doesn't have a cloak for the same reason but he works well so I won't need full on robes but more along the lines of a long vest that samurai actually wore over their armour. I did the same with my custom shogun/samurai Darth Vader years ago.... Choosing between two damaged coats now to mod and use, the more billowy leatherette one is actually for a female body and I had it on my custom Selene before a major upgrade, the inner liner is hard to get black though, I'll try again. The other is an SS officers coat that was damaged years ago by a soldering accident so could be a nice fit, nice material too!

Very cool custom figures. Love the Samurai Vader. And love the progress. I'd say he still needs a bit more of an outer cape, but it looks like that's where you're headed anyway. But you should not pay me any mind... I am not as creative/willing to make departures (then again, from what?) as you.

GubernatorFan wrote:Very cool custom figures. Love the Samurai Vader. And love the progress. I'd say he still needs a bit more of an outer cape, but it looks like that's where you're headed anyway. But you should not pay me any mind... I am not as creative/willing to make departures (then again, from what?) as you.

Thanks! I sure am.. experimenting with this old Hasbro ROTJ Luke jumpsuit first as vest/cloak, got a few of them so thought try it as not to ruin the coats if I don't need to.

Tried on the tunic as is to see what needed what, then ironed out the creases with hair straighteners and glued the collars back. Went over it with a hook and scissors to weather/age/damage it a bit. I'm now going to build his war flags/banners using some scrap aluminium and a bit of old Korean fisherman's trousers' plain black cotton that will attach to his back giving him a more billowy wraith like look and just because they're cool!

Looking pretty cool. Like the extra tattering you did on his clothes.

Very impressive... and it keeps getting better. Also impressive that you have the trousers of an old Korean fisherman to add to the custom...

Stryker2011 wrote:Looking pretty cool. Like the extra tattering you did on his clothes.

Thanks! It's funny how we have to turn 1:1 weathering into 1/6 weathering!

GubernatorFan wrote:Very impressive... and it keeps getting better. Also impressive that you have the trousers of an old Korean fisherman to add to the custom...

Obviously they didn't belong to an old Korean fisherman! They're just the style of lounge trousers I like working in, great for catching small parts you drop!

Still need to add small metal rings to attach the flags to the poles but you can see the basic look after some aluminium origami!

Looking good!

CHEERS!

Get after it, man.

This is rockin'.

Cheers guys! Decided the aluminium looked far too modern and remembered I have loads of different coloured model runners just for this kind of part, so cut them up, trimmed off the trees, sanded them and then painted them. I tattered the flags up a bit, added metal rings to the vertical part of each flag that connect them to the poles that way with the seam connecting to the horizontal poles. I also added metal rings to the back of the armour to keep the war flags in place on the figure after wearing the tunic that now has holes in the back to allow the rings to protrude and the poles to be inserted. Basically he's fully dressed now! After painting and wrapping the handles of the glaives they still don't fit tight enough in his rather wide gripping hands so I'm ditching those as weapons, he'll still have a plethora of weapons still being made so probably just as well!

He came out great. And although I followed every step and had no doubt in your abilities, I am still somehow surprised. Very impressive. He does stick out from the others and from what I would imagine as a ring wraith (but remember my mind is conditioned by the fairly uniform look we got in the movies without the benefit of the other sources you have as inspiration), yet I wouldn't change a thing and love every detail.
One minor recommendation: get yourself a foamboard or blanket or even towel in one color to use as a background for the finished product photos of your finished figures, so that all the details will be easily visible -- this is especially helpful with these dark figures against the dark background of the room. It would be simple, affordable, and easy to use/place/store, while very effective. (On the other hand, I do love getting glimpses of your collection in these photos.)

GubernatorFan wrote:He came out great. And although I followed every step and had no doubt in your abilities, I am still somehow surprised. Very impressive. He does stick out from the others and from what I would imagine as a ring wraith (but remember my mind is conditioned by the fairly uniform look we got in the movies without the benefit of the other sources you have as inspiration), yet I wouldn't change a thing and love every detail.
One minor recommendation: get yourself a foamboard or blanket or even towel in one color to use as a background for the finished product photos of your finished figures, so that all the details will be easily visible -- this is especially helpful with these dark figures against the dark background of the room. It would be simple, affordable, and easy to use/place/store, while very effective. (On the other hand, I do love getting glimpses of your collection in these photos.)

Cheers! This is just a WIP picture, he's not finished! I have a photobooth for finished figure pictures remember?

eg:

Ah, you thought of everything! I guess in all the excitement, you sometimes forget to use the photobooth -- I had quite forgotten about that. I have the same turn table, by the way!

Looks ace, and great to see more of that famous ingenuity!

CHEERS!

Great work, he looks amazing.

Cheers,

Peter.

That turned out amazing. So cool. It's incredible seeing the destructive nature of your WIP pics, and then the final result turns out like THIS. Wow!

Damn fine work, Chop.

I kind of raised an eyebrow when you were describing what the helmet would look like, but...silly me...it fits just right with the character.

Another winner, brah.

Man, once more, you totally stick the landing. There really is a unifying aesthetic that fits right in with the rest of the wraiths. The tattered cloak and that empty helmet really give it that same eerie spectral feel. And I love the look of the Flags and the giant Sauron sigil on the helmet. Have you thought printing anything on the flags, like that same sigil?

GubernatorFan wrote:Ah, you thought of everything! I guess in all the excitement, you sometimes forget to use the photobooth -- I had quite forgotten about that. I have the same turn table, by the way!

Rogerbee wrote:Looks ace, and great to see more of that famous ingenuity!

CHEERS!

peter the painter wrote:Great work, he looks amazing.

Cheers,

Peter.

Stryker2011 wrote:That turned out amazing. So cool. It's incredible seeing the destructive nature of your WIP pics, and then the final result turns out like THIS. Wow!

dadrab wrote:Damn fine work, Chop.

I kind of raised an eyebrow when you were describing what the helmet would look like, but...silly me...it fits just right with the character.

Another winner, brah.

ReverendSpooky wrote:Man, once more, you totally stick the landing.  There really is a unifying aesthetic that fits right in with the rest of the wraiths.  The tattered cloak and that empty helmet really give it that same eerie spectral feel.  And I love the look of the Flags and the giant Sauron sigil on the helmet.  Have you thought printing anything on the flags, like that same sigil?

Thank you very much everyone!! He's still not finished though! That's why the pics are purposely dark and a bit of a preview since I plan to take proper pics in the photobooth or outside now the weather has improved, i.e. not raining.

RS: Yes I did think about a sigil but thought repeating the Eye Of Sauron would be OTT although I might look into Black Speech lettering since I think it exists somewhere on a Tolkien website or LOTR forum.

Okay, found a fairly comprehensive Black Speech dictionary source here:

Black Speech Dictionary

And alphabet here:



I read and write modern Greek and invented an alphabet for my foundation course in art and design specialising in illustration and graphics so I should be able to handle a couple of words! Hopefully... been a while since I've done any calligraphy..

shovelchop81 wrote:I read and write modern Greek and invented an alphabet for my foundation course in art and design specialising in illustration and graphics so I should be able to handle a couple of words! Hopefully... been a while since I've done any calligraphy..

Greek, but not Welsh! That is so classicist! just kidding, but it is impressive. Funny that this "alphabet" is just a specific calligraphic variation of the Latin one. Though of course this makes it more user-friendly than say Aurebesh.

Well I grew up in Athens for the first 18 years of my life, my folks still live there, I speak street Greek not classical! This Dwarvish alphabet is pretty cool:



Have a look at Klingon and Ancient from SG1, really hard!!

shovelchop81 wrote:Well I grew up in Athens for the first 18 years of my life, my folks still live there, I speak street Greek not classical!  This Dwarvish alphabet is pretty cool

Oh I remember why you had a connection to Greece (heck, even your name is Greek -- no no the screen name, the real one). Besides, I was mostly teasing. I don't know it intimately enough to spot it by mere glance, but the Dwarvish alphabet conveys the look of Gothic or Futhark or runic. You want strange real-world alphabets proper? Take a look at Armenian and Georgian. And the weirdest thing about them is that although they look nothing like it, they are supposedly based on Greek.

GubernatorFan wrote:

shovelchop81 wrote:Well I grew up in Athens for the first 18 years of my life, my folks still live there, I speak street Greek not classical!  This Dwarvish alphabet is pretty cool

Oh I remember why you had a connection to Greece (heck, even your name is Greek -- no no the screen name, the real one). Besides, I was mostly teasing. I don't know it intimately enough to spot it by mere glance, but the Dwarvish alphabet conveys the look of Gothic or Futhark or runic. You want strange real-world alphabets proper? Take a look at Armenian and Georgian. And the weirdest thing about them is that although they look nothing like it, they are supposedly based on Greek.

I'll have to take a look!

Been concentrating on his weapons, mostly his bow. I love archery and figured at least one Wraith should have a long range weapon as they are essentially a fighting unit and tend to fight Elves often enough. Samurai are also famous archers, in fact it was their primary weapon before and after the introduction of horses, only the introduction of the Portuguese matchlock arquebus to Japan saw the decline of the use of archery in warfare. It was a nice surprise to discover the tips of the tails I used to make the bow limbs are actually metal so I could safely carve notches in them for the bow string. The limbs themselves aren't flexible but I've incorporated a cheat where the riser actually is flexible to give the illusion that the limbs bend when the string is pulled back, kind of arse backwards to reality but looks the part (not pictured yet); works with his wide grip hands too. He also has a large katana almost an odachi (field sword) and two wakizashi like swords that can connect together to form a glaive/short polearm.

How did you make that bow? That is awesome.