TKfett

Thanks Dan! Much appreciated. I love the painted helmets as well, but I’d love to add a hero at some point! Something about the texture and appearance of the paint seems to add ‘weight’ to the helmet visually.

Awesome, thanks for the info. And that is a beautiful Sandy! The weathering is just right and tastefully done; not too much, not too little.

Thanks! Yes, will plan on adding more dirt to it soon! One question though, did the Sandys all have 13 blue tube stripes? I just noticed that in the references. I have 15 on one side and 16 on the other on mine (based on the Dave M helmet).

thanks for the pics! For now, I'm probably just going to leave it as a sandtrooper helmet. Got lazy and didn't want to paint all the extra lines haha!

It's been a long while since I'd worked on a stormtrooper helmet; been collecting other types of props lately. I got a hold of an unfinished HDPE piece by 'Anon' (hard to find info on him, I believe he's in Australia? https://www.facebook.com/Anonstormtrooper/), and finished the ears and painting it up about a month ago. As expected, HDPE was a pain to paint, but it worked out fine after I applied a fairly thick coat of paint. It could still crack and chip from rough use, but generally it seems durable enough so far. I didn't try to base it on any particular screen helmet, but took cues from a number of ANH stunt references to make something influenced from the general style of the originals. The eyes look bluish in some of the pics; just the weird light hitting it from the windows. It's actually green This was a fun one to work on!

Cool! Looking forward to this!

It does look pretty awesome, but I agree that he doesn't take constructive criticism very well. Kind of just blows it off and says that he's always doing the most accurate work possible. It's too bad though, as the talent is there. Everyone can improve upon their work!

Looks fantastic

Looks perfectly fine!

Looks great to me!

Nice build! The ATA kits look very nice.

Wow! In great shape.

Thanks for the comments; I appreciate it! I've painted other props, but this was a first on the ABS material on a trooper helmet, so in the beginning I was a bit unsure how things would work out. Sure no problem! I had originally wanted to do a "chipped" look, so I bought a can of Krylon khaki type color, but decided to pass on that after I then decided to keep the white paint intact. I did first take some fine steel wool to knock down the shine of that ABS first, because I wasn't sure if it would affect how the primer sprayed on. I used a can of a reddish oxide looking color (Rustoleum flat red primer 249086), mainly because I had read somewhere something similar was used on some of the helmets. Next was the Rustoleum Pro Enamel white (I used 7592, but others should be fine). Applying it took a few quick experiments. Seeing as it was a bit colder than usual here in Seattle when I sprayed it, I made a few quick thin passes just to get some paint on the helmet, as I didn't want to get too thick of a coat on the first layer. Best thing to do is wait for a warmer day to spray. Waited a few minutes and then started to put on a thicker coat (quick, short passes, but at a closer distance to get a more glossy shine). The can says to spray additional coats within a few minutes of each other, which is a little different than other paints I've used. Waiting to see how the paint would cure was somewhat scary, as I've had issues with some Rustoleum colors in the past (stayed sticky to the touch, mainly metallics). It was reasonably dry to the touch fairly quickly (although soft), and within a day, the paint felt really solid even despite the thicker paint application. I didn't use any clear coat on mine because the natural gloss of the white was actually a lot more shiny than I had thought it would be! But a clear coat could possibly provide a more even gloss all around in case some overspray dulled things down in some areas. I'd be interested in hearing how your painting turns out! The RS helmet is my favorite. Last thing was chipping very tiny bits of paint to reveal some of the primer color underneath, hand painting the graphics, and then adding some weathering by rubbing newspaper over the surface.

Beautiful helmets!

I'm still new to the world of trooper gear, but I recently got a hold of my first ATA helmet. Really love this piece! It was pretty well built by another member (unpainted ABS), but I was itching to paint it to make it look a little bit more "messy" and aged like the original stunt helmets. Pretty fun experience, but now I'm hoping to add to my collection different examples of the stormtrooper helmet (hoping to an RS one someday) !! I also replaced the green lens material with acetate and starfoam from Trooperbay. It's been fun scouring through the threads here for tips. Really appreciate how everyone shares their knowledge here. The white paint used is the Rustoleum Pro Enamel (as suggested in various threads); really good stuff and cures well. I was worried at first how it would cure, as I've used Rustoleum paints that never seemed to dry, but this white enamel is real tough. The hand painted details are Testors colors, with the exception of the blue tube stripes which were done with the Humbrol French Blue. Thanks for looking! (larger pics below)