The armor building adventures of an inexperienced newbie

[sitpadeshu]

Great job on the fix. are you going to extend your kidney the same way?

[Pixelito]

Looks good Brian, nice work.

Thanks Daryl!

Great job on the fix. are you going to extend your kidney the same way?

Thank you! As far as the kidney to ab shim, I think that I'm going to try a method that I found on Whitearmor
http://www.whitearmor.net/forum/topic/30448-adding-kidney-shims-for-larger-troopers/

[sitpadeshu]

I meant the length.  The gap between kidney and ab is a concern for higher levels, but by lengenthing the ab your ab and kidney will be different lengths. When I cut my ab down by an inch I had to do the same for the kidney plate so they matched.

[Pixelito]

OH! I misunderstood, sorry!
Yeah, I'll probably do the same thing to lengthen the kidney. I really want to make as few modifications as I can, but I'm left with very little choice in the matter.

[Pixelito]

Noob log:

Over the past few days I've been painting my helmet details since I haven't had enough time to finish the kidney plate after work. I'm starting to get very discouraged due to my lack of any skill. The painting looks terrible. Sure, the original ANH details weren't perfect, but they weren't as bad as mine. I'm doing my best but I don't think it'll be good enough. Will post some pictures later on, I guess.

I'm also left with another concern. Since I had to extend my ab and kidney pieces, where do I actually put the split rivets? Do I keep them in the same spots or do I space them out a bit?

Centurion is currently looking impossible.

[Pixelito]

Well, here it is. My first major failure, I'd say. I'm pretty unhappy about it, but I figured I'd share it anyway.

The tube stripes are too far back on one side
The paint is uneven
The black pinstripes aren't straight or uniform
The frown extensions look terrible

I could continue this list for a long time... Basically everything looks like $#!+
Really. This is the best I could do. I wasn't joking when I said that I have NO artistic skill at all.

I'm waiting for a few spots to dry before attempting to do some more cleanup. Specifically the ear bumps and the traps on the back.

This isn't totally done yet either. I still have some weathering to do.....hopefully that will hide some issues....
I want to finish it before I attempt to strip everything off and redo it all.... I really don't want to spend days doing that if I don't have to...







Uhg. I don't know what to do. I know this paint job won't get me 501 acceptance, let alone anything above and beyond.
Normally I'd say that I'm just being too hard on myself, but I don't feel like this is the case.
I'm honestly so discouraged that I would give up entirely if I didn't have so much time and money already invested in this.

[daryldoak]

Brian,

I'm not an expert, but from your pictures I don't see anything wrong with your paint job.    If you really hate your hand painting you can buy decals from Trooperbay.

Don't get discouraged, your doing a great job.  Let me know if I can be of any help.

You should connect with ST06 (Christopher) who apparently lives in Sun River.

[Pixelito]

Thanks for the encouragement, Daryl. I really do appreciate it.

Unless somebody suggests otherwise, I think that I'll probably do some final touching up to the best of my ability, weather it slightly and leave it alone. We'll see how far along it gets me, I suppose! I had looked at the Trooperbay decals and they're certainly an option if my painting isn't good enough.

[Pixelito]

I guess I'll post something positive to end on before my next major update. Don't wanna leave a depressing post as the most recent for a few days!
I finally got my hands on a DLT-19 from Hyperfirm!
Man is it pretty!
I'm going to do a little touch up here and there to remove some of the junk leftover from casting....but otherwise I think it's perfect!

[daryldoak]

That DLT-19 is awesome.

I'd love to have one but I started an AT-AT Driver build instead.

[Pixelito]

That DLT-19 is awesome.

I'd love to have one but I started an AT-AT Driver build instead.

That AT-AT driver is going to turn out SWEET though!

[RainTrooper]

Daryl is right. It doesn't look that bad at all! Just a bit of touch up paint here and there and you should be good. Remember these aren't supposed to be "perfect".
Me personally..  I went with the Dave M decals from trooperbay.com. I only painted the part that needed to be.
Keep up the good work!! 

[Pixelito]

Thank you, Jason!
You guys are certainly making me feel better about this. I might actually get some stress-free sleep tonight! 

[daryldoak]

When I felt overwhelmed during my TK build I would take a break, come back the next day and I always felt better about it.

[Pixelito]

I finished my helmet over the past few days. It's hard to do the more time consuming parts of this project after work, so I've been doing small pieces every day. I have to say, after touching up the paint a little bit and getting the lens and frown mesh installed, it actually doesn't look too bad! I'll post some pictures after I do some weathering on it.

Also got my Icomm in the mail yesterday. I'm finding that I have to talk kinda' loud for it to actually pick anything up. I don't have to yell, but I have to project my voice a little more than usual. Can anybody confirm if this is normal? I already tried sticking the mic right up against my mouth as was suggested by a number of people. Without the Icomm, the mic is really sensitive, so I don't think that's the issue... I think I'm just going to have to train myself to speak in a way that will work well with it.

I made all the snap plates for my strapping system last night. It was super tedious and I'm glad it's out of the way! I may have to make a few more for a thigh garter of some description.

I also got most of the parts needed for my backpack. It's hard to see all this random stuff coming together and looking cool, but it should, in theory!

And lastly, regarding the thighs... I have to shim the back of them about 1.5", maybe a little more. I'm looking for input on how to cover this up. Should I use a larger cover strip or should I fill the gap with more Apoxie Sculpt and use the normal size cover strip? I don't really know what is acceptable or recommended if I'm going for Centurion.

I think that's about it for now! Sorry for the lengthy update!

TL;DR
-Things are moving along
-Snap plates are tedious work
-Do you have to speak fairly loud for your Icomm to work?
-What is the proper method for covering a thigh shim that is larger than the standard cover strip?