RogueTrooper

Now that you mentioned it, I remember Liam had a motorcycle accident. Neeson's frustration with the green screen and the non-direction from Lucas, was kind of echoed by Ewan McGregor and Natalie Portman. I guess they didn't understand "faster, and more intense" either. If Lucas had let loose of the reins a little bit on the prequels and allowed a good screen writer such as Lawrence Kasdan to help clean up and work on the storylines and character development, maybe brought in some other director, like he did on EP 5 and EP 6, to do Episodes 2 and 3. If Lucas could have stayed just in the executive producers spot, I think there would have been an extremely different outcome. In my mind it would have been on the better end of the spectrum with the prequels. It also would have been nice if he had brought Kersh back to have directed one of the prequels. But, getting back to the Clone Wars Cartoons, I am seeing the same thing too about the better direction with the characters and storyline in the series. I don't think Lucas has his hands totally in the mix with that.

Cool. I wish that they had done more with him in the prequels, even if it was as his ghost. I know Qui-Gon was one with the force/jedi ghost in AOTC. That's why you hear Qui-Gon voices yell " Anakin!Anakin! NOoooo!" when Anakin slaughtered the Tusken Raiders. But the didn't play that up too big, but in some of the SW novels they did.... go figure!?! Can wait to see it. Thanks Terry for posting!

You can trim the back of your thigh bottoms and the back of your shin/calf tops to give you more mobility. As for jogging, some TKers can jog without any problems and some TKers have some difficulty. It is how much space is in between your thigh armor to your calf armor. As for sitting, some TKers say they do sit for short periods of time with any problems (with the butt plate still on). And some TKers take off the butt plate before sitting ( for comfort and to keep from possibly damaging the butt plate armor).

It is a personal preference. Some people want the ears to fit seamless, and some people want to have the gaps like the original screen used lids had. It is up to you if you want to go for, idealized or screen accurate. BTW, here are some pix of original TK lids so you can see the gap between the ears and the helmet to help you decide: ------------

Your helmet is coming together nicely Arnold. One thing, which direction are you going, ANH or ESB? If you are going to do ESB then you will need to trim the eyes more. If you are going ANH Stunt, you will need eight teeth total, even though there were screen used ANH stunts lids that had 3 to 5 teeth per side or 6 to 10 teeth total cut out on the frown. But the CRL states for the ANH Stunt lid "Eight total teeth on the frown are to be cut out". CRL ANH Stunt TK: http://www.whitearmor.net/home/crl-overview/crl-anh-stunt.html CRL ANH Stunt helmet * Must be made out of fiberglass, ABS, or HIPS. It must be white. It must match proportionally to what was seen on screen. Note: the FX helmet is considered to be inaccurate but is acceptable for Legion acceptance. * Frown must be painted gray and not leave the teeth area. Eight total teeth on the frown are to be cut out. * Traps and tears must be gray. * Rear traps & tears must have vertical black lines. * Blue tube stripes, matching what was used on screen - navy blue and black are not acceptable. There must be at least 9 and a maximum of 15. The curve must bend backwards. There does not need to be an equal amount per side. * Lenses may be green or smoke, flat or bubbled. They should be dark enough that viewers cannot see the eyes behind them. * Chin must be black. * Ears have three or four bumps * Mic tips must be present. Here is what is posted for the CRL ESB lid on the FISD. For some wierd reason it doesn't have as much info as the 501st site. That is why I gave you both. But they both should be the same. I guess the person on the FISD who did it, didn't finish it out. CRL ESB on the FISD: http://www.whitearmor.net/home/crl-overview/crl-esb.html Helmet * Traps/tears should be ANH grey or a slightly bluer shade of ANH gray. * Frown must be painted black and not leave the teeth area. * Flat green or smoke lenses only, no bubble lenses allowed. * Traps/tears and tube stripes must be decals, no hand-painting. CRL ESB TK: http://www.501st.com/crl/TK_CRL/126_Stormtrooper_ESB/index126.php CRL ESB Helmet from the 501st site: Traps (trapezoids on dome of helmet) and tears (area beneath the corners of eye lenses) are gray. Rear traps and tears have vertical black lines. Lenses are a flat green or smoke sufficiently dark enough to obscure the costumer's eyes. The gray "ear" bars have four bumps, with a black outline. Frown is painted black and does not leave the teeth area. Eight or six total teeth on the frown are cut out. Tube stripes are medium blue, numbering between 9 and 15 per side with the curve bends extending backwards. Vocoder (vertically ribbed chin detail) is painted black Aerators (cylinders on either side of the vocoder) are black If you are going to do an ESB lid, here are some pix of original ESB lids as reference. Either way have fun and keep posting pix.

Very nice Terrell. Great work on the AB detail as well

Which image host are you using, Photobucket, flickr, imageshack, etc... You might want to start a new account with another image host. Personally, I like photobucket for my image hosting. Also, look over this to see if you are missing a step in posting your pix here on the forum: http://forum.whitearmor.net/index.php?showtopic=10747

Congratz Meagan, do you know if it's a boy or a girl? You local 501st can help you with your armor build. Georgia Garrison link: http://www.ga501st.com/ jump on and introduce yourself over on your local Garrison's forum, and get to know them. The members of the Georgia Garrison can also give you advice + hands on help, with your armor when you get it. Do your research, I get you links over on your intro that will help you.

Here is a great link with blue prints and tutorials to help you with your project: http://www.imperial-fleet.com/BBC/

Hey Graham , here's a link for a M19 Scope Tutorial with measurements over on the Blaster Builders Club: M19 Scope Tutorial Here are both sides of the ESB stunt E11. You can use the measurements of the M19 Scope Tutorial to gauge the size of the greebles in the pix, since this E11 has the M19 scope on it. Hope this helps ya with your scratchbuilding project.

Hey Peter, Looks like you have done a lot of great work. To me it looks like your thighs are a wee bit too long and will need trimming to shorten them just a little bit and make a return edge using a heat sealing iron. You can get a heat sealing iron at most hobby shops that deal in RC airplanes. Here is the link to show you how to do that: http://forum.whitearmor.net/index.php?showtopic=12972 Here are couple of places that you can get one online, if you can find one locally: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0006N6Y0Q/ref=pd_lpo_k2_dp_sr_2?pf_rd_p=486539851&pf_rd_s=lpo-top-stripe-1&pf_rd_t=201&pf_rd_i=B0006OBN2O&pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_r=1XBGZJHVP759RAADTQKS http://www3.towerhobbies.com/cgi-bin/wti0001p?&I=LXB357&P=FR For you shins, you can do one of two things. Take the calf pieces apart and add a shim to add a little bit more room around the ankle area, or you could try the heat gun process, but be very cautious because you could warp the plastic. Either way you do it, have your boots that you are going to wear on when test fitting, so you will allow for the extra material underneath the armor at the ankles. Also, I know it was just a test fitting, but your belt was a little low. I kind of gave you a line where the top should be in the pics below. Once you get the belt where you need it, just add a couple of snaps on the left and right side of the ab plate to hold the belt in place. Keep up the good work man! if you have questions just post. >

Here is a great tutorial by Noel/No'l on MRCE now eFx: ----------- If I may suggest, before doing buying and modding an eFx lid maybe look at getting a lid from one of the vendors here (some lid kits start at $125.00 and some of the "B" stock lid kits are well under $100.00) or when you order your armor, most of the kits come with a lid anyway. I think you will have more fun and end up with a lid that you will be happier with. Here are some links for just the helmets kits that are on sale right now. But, like I said if you are going to buy an armor kit, most of them come with the lid: -----------

Hey, the one on ebay must be version 2, because I found the V1 of this helmet on youtube. Take a look:

Rob is correct about it being an illusion. What you guys saw in the pic is not the sniper plate. It is just the way the half calf was formed. If you look at the little clay mock up that I did, you will see how the illusion of the half calf looks to be extended like the sniper plate. I only took about 10 to 15 minutes to mock the half calf. I didn't take the time to clean it up, so, please over look the un-sharpness of it. It is not to scale, and is just for the purpose of showing how the camera angle gave the illusion in the pic.

Holy piece of Ebay crap, Batman! I don't know which is the bigger crime, Robin, trying to sell it or having to look at it.

Congratz Matt, I think you will be very happy with AP. Post pix when you get the boxes!!! Tore, I think for your height and weight, you should go with one of the TE derived kits, like AP, ATA, TE2, Cap-w, etc...This kits are made for an average size person, (5'10" 160lbs). Or TM's kit will work for your too!

We suppose to trim this stuff!?!?! Ah, now I see, that's why my suit is sooo hard to wear... <_< All kidding aside, here is a link that gives you the basic tools needed for armor building: -----------

I have seen the three disc set from SDS that were originally used in the trial between Ainsworth and LFL. If you truly look through his catalog of prop products and study the originals to what he makes now, you will see that there are differences, not only in the Stormtrooper line but through the entire catalog. So, unfortunately Ainsworth does not have a good enough reputation and cannot remember what was done for the original props to be a reliable source. And, like I said before, I still think Ainsworth was running more than one mold and those molds possibly had variations.

Top notch work Dan, as always!

I do believe Ainsworth had more than one set of molds of everything, simply for the fact that he had a 15 foot thermoforming table that he constructed to do kit cars. In fact that is one of the reasons they hired him to thermoform the armor/helmets for ANH, because he could do it in mass quantity. It would not be savvy for someone to have a 15 foot table and only be pulling one suit at a time. So, we could be looking at stronger/sharper pulls because one set of molds may have been slightly altered to its' cousin. One of the other thoughts on the matter is that the make up of the HDPE back then, may not be the same formula as what is manufactured now. This could change how the HDPE reacted to being thermoformed 30+ years ago compared to today. There are little nuances or tells that show there were different molds. For instance take the ANH thermal detonator/CO2 canister, I have seen at least 3 different versions and I am not talking about about strange webbing or bad pulls, but how the molds were totally different. Also there are little nuances in the forearm of the ANH TD's and TK's and I am not talking how they were assembled/trimmed and other slight differences throughout some other parts of the armor. So if there are different versions of the other parts of the armor, then there could be different molds of the helmets, as well. Also, if you've read where they have talked about how George Lucas wanted the look of a lived in Universe, some of the helmet and armor blemishes could have been intentional to give that banged up look to some of them. You can also see in one of Ainsworth's prototypes of the Imperial navy/Cheese Grater helmet, that the helmet itself had some of the same rippling/wonky blemishes that we do see in the TK's and TD's. This effect could also be from reversing hair cell material so the hair cell side is on the outside(not touching the molds) and giving this prop a funky finished effect. Without being able to go back in time and witness the whole process, from beginning to end, we can only go on speculation and hypothesis on what totally occured. It is kind of like "how many licks does it take to get to the center of a Tooties Pop, the world may never know". I truly hope that the Blu rays will be un-doctored. Lucas in his inimitable ways may see imperfections throughout the film and may want to throw a gaussian blur or any number of techniques to clean up things that he doesn't like on the film that you the viewer would be able to pick up in the Hi Def version. If anyone remembers an old video of them talking about re-doing the Jabba/docking Bay 94 scene, LFL could not find the original film to that. All they had was an old beat up VHS copy and they put it through several processes to get it to what you see in the '97 SE and now the Redo on the 2004 DVD, which resulted in a truly night and day difference from the VHS copy of the scene to what you see now. Lucas may have gotten the itch to try to take out any imperfections that he sees in the films, but I hope that is not going to be the case and we can see more detail.

Great work Robert!! top notch!! As for the mesh for the Hovis, I would use a little drop of glue on two places, like 12, and 6 o'clock points of the mesh just to hold it in place. Any clear glue like, Zap-A-Gap or any other (CA)style glue. But thats just me. Also, the brow is a little low for an ANH Stunt lid. If it was mine, I would raise it just a wee bit.. Here are some pix of original AHN lids for reference if you want to raise the brow.

Stay away from Matt Gauthier A.K.A. T*E...... Look into one of the armor vendors here that have a good reputation!

I have seen first hand the HDPE plastic thermoformed by a professional company close to where I live. The man was doing custom radio/speaker housing for his motorcycles. During the cooling down process technique that he used, the HDPE did get a rippling effect on the first few pulls untill he got it to where it wasn't doing that. I know there are little nuances that transfer from the molds, as we have seen time and time again in some of the other helmets. But, I would hope that Liz Moore and Brian Muir would not put out molds with so many imperfections that they would come out looking like this almost everytime. I would expect from professional to put out a smooth professional mold. Unless, Ainsworh doctored them after he got them. Either way, you do have to love the wonky, bumpy, rippley finish of them all.

The process of thermoforming/and the cool down period with HDPE can cause the bumpy, rippled effect that we have seen in many of the original Stormtrooper lids. But that doesn't take into account the un-professional paint job. Here's video that will shed some light:

Looks like you are having great fun with your ANH stunt build! About the Hovis, there are two ways of doing this. One of which is the way you said to do it, but using that method the screw/bolt can loosen over time and you will have to take the mesh screen out in order to fix/tighten the screw/bolt. If I may suggest, below is an alternative method. Using the method below, I think is easier when needing to tighten the Hovi if and when it becomes loose. In this method you will need to purchase threaded rod, nuts and washers that will work with the threaded rod. You can find threaded rod at any hardware or home improvement store, in the nut and bolt section. Once you have the threaded rod you will need to drill a hole from the back side of the Hovi, not all the way through and make the hole smaller so the thread has something to grab on to. Now, glue the threaded rod into the hole that you just drilled, leaving enough length of the threaded rod so it will go through the helmet and have plenty of room to secure a nut and washer to it. For gluing the threaded rod into the hole in the Hovi, I suggest the JB Weld - two part liquid steel/epoxy resin. Below is a pic of one of Keith's Hovi tips to show you how the threaded rod should protrude.