Morgi

If you like going by pictures that you want to recreate, I can only recommend this thread: Joseph selected several references that show what the armor should look like, which means that if you look for the brow (for example), you will only find those "ideal" pictures without the outliers. It's always important to remember that those armors weren't perfect and just because they were used in the movie, it doesn't mean that we want ours to look exactly like that (tape and all, haha). In case of the brow, Glen has already provided some amazing images, but perhaps the post above might help with other parts My helmet is an ANH helmet and therefore handpainted without any decals, but technically that would be the right terminology if I had used decals BTW, I love that you're asking so many questions, this is super interesting to read!

Looking good so far! One thing that I noticed is that the brow trim seems to be a little short: You could try to press the helmet into the original shape, but I've found that when I aligned those with my helmet it caused a bit of a gap between the face plate and the cap. With the brow trim that gets easily hidden, but the face plate not fitting 100% into the cap seems to be a side effect of the screen used helmets being made out of a different material, so I wouldn't worry too much about it. Now, some DO's might say differently, so I can't promise anything, but I'd say that's okay. Side view of my RS helmet, I hope this helps, sir

This might help when it comes to applying the ABS paste: Whilst you're at it, it might not be a bad idea to fill the dents in the front as well, because that way you can just sand everything smooth at once. I'm no DO, so it might be better to listen to them, but at least to me those seem okay

How to: Apply ABS Paste For those of you that are new and have just clicked on this thread because you're curious, you might be wondering what ABS paste even is and why I would be making a guide on how to apply it. The first thing you need to know is that ABS paste is, well, it's basically what the name suggests. It's a slurry made out of ABS scraps and acetone that you can use to fill in holes, thigh ridge gaps and cracks. Because it's made out of scrap material from your armor build you don't even need to paint it after using it, because it's already exactly the right colour. The most you need to do is sand it down and polish it to match the look of the armor. Simple enough, right? So let's get going! First thing you need to do is make the paste! You can find a good tutorial over here: https://www.whitearmor.net/forum/topic/42866-how-to-make-abs-paste/ Because of something that I noticed with my first batch, I would like to suggest that you wash all of your ABS scraps and your jar before putting it all together so you won't have any debris in your final product. So, I scrapped that one and started a new batch, where I washed every piece of scrap before I cut it and put it in the jar. It's looking much better than the other one, if you ask me. In the next step, once you've got your paste ready to go (it should be the consistency of toothpaste) you're going to prepare your armor for applying the it. This means taking a piece of scrap ABS and putting it behind whatever you want to fill, so you can apply the paste onto that area and just use the paste to fill in the gap/hole/crack. Time to apply! I've taken several pictures of my progress, I hope this might be helpful! A quick reminder: please make sure to work in a properly ventilated area since you're going to be working with acetone. First I gathered my materials - several sizes of wooden sticks, the ABS paste and (of course) the armor (the thighs in this case), where I had a piece of ABS with some tape to hold it in place. This keeps the paste from seeping through to the other side. I actually needed two pieces of ABS due to the shape of the ridge -- one inside the ridge and one on top of that to cover the gap between the ridge and the cover strip. Whether you can reach your goal with only one piece of scrap or with several, make sure you've covered all the gaps that you need to have covered! Time to apply the paste. Now you open that jar with the paste, have your wooden stick ready and preferably some tissue paper to the side for cleaning the stick. You can simply apply the paste by scooping some up and putting it into the gap. I've found that if the ABS just covers the tip of a toothpick, it was easy to get in the gap without smearing it all over or getting too much on there. After ~2-3 layers After applying layer I would press down with a clean toothpick to make sure it lays flat and that there would be no bubbles or gaps. I also used this time to push in any of the paste outside of the gap. Because of the fast drying consistency of the paste, it felt like moving around chewing gum that has been chewed on for a few hours already. Remember: every bit of paste outside of where you want it is going to have to be sanded. So go slow, work carefully and you'll be able to save yourself some time. I repeated this process several times until the paste matched up with the armor. The closer I got to the top edge of the armor, the smaller the drop of paste got. I had to clean my toothpick every now and then to make sure that I could still work cleanly. I also had to add a drop or two of acetone every now and then to my paste in the jar and stir it in with a toothpick, to make sure the consistency stayed roughly the same and that it didn't harden in a layer at the top. Once I got to a point where I was happy with the results, I closed the other gaps as well in the same way. Afterwards I went back to this one and closed up a few spots that weren't as clean as they could be and still had some gaps. Once it dried, I took some scissors and cut away the visible part of the tape that wasn't covered with the paste. Next I had to wait until it dried (about 24 hours) then sand the paste smooth and maybe cut the return edge so it looks smoother. Once I've got it sanded down, I'll see if there are any gaps that I've missed that need another bit of paste, fill them up, sand it down and so on until I'm happy. If you worked carefully enough, you might be able to skip sanding because it's already flat and aligns perfectly with your armor. If that isn't the case, here's a great tutorial on how to get things sanded shiny again: https://www.whitearmor.net/forum/topic/45052-howto-wetsand-polish-for-a-great-shine/ I hope this could help you! At this point a huge thank you to @justjoseph63 who inspired this, proof-read and helped with editing the pictures!

Oh wow, amazing memes, Glen! I see you've taken over this thread, haha

Congratulations, Glen, consider me very impressed!

*enters with large, stuffed trenchcoat* Wanna have some memes? So glad to see this thread in the newsletter and to see others joining in with the memes! They're awesome, especially yours, Glen, with the editing! Just an example

Hallo und herzlichen Glückwunsch! Hello and congratulations! Your armor looks amazing, you definitely made the right choice going with an RS kit A belated congratulations for this as well! That's quite the impressive feat and I'm sure that armor was a great motivator, haha Hopefully your first troop will come soon and maybe we'll get to meet each other in armor one day LG, Luca

I've seldom felt as validated as I did, seeing Glen's newest EIB application not even 24 hours after me making a joke about it. Absolutely stunning armor, I'm already very scared of your deathtrooper and it'll fuel my nightmares the nights to come, and it also inspired this newest meme: I mean, it's seemingly never truly complete ... Maybe I'll go for a conversion from ANH Stunt to ANH Hero or ESB instead. Now, if the owner could please share the original pauldron picture meme that this was clearly inspired by? So, don't expect three memes updates within twenty-four hours to become a regular thing

Oh wow, high praise! Glad to hear that! I do not have Facebook, so if anyone wants them shared on there, or any other social media platform for that matter, it would have to be done by others. I'll make sure to reach out to the responsible staff once I get back from work So glad to see another meme on here and its even one of the classics

Well, we still see you as the Stormtroopers But don't worry, I personally loved all the insanely focused feedback, it's great to know that others spend time trying to help you get better! Thanks for your comment and the appreciation! I'm very glad people are liking them and I'm very much looking forward to seeing more memes here -- both from others and from myself. Considering that I've got a list of planned and completed improvements lying right next to me, this is very relatable And because I'm very happy to have gotten such amazing feedback, I've already made a few new memes that I'd like to share as well I do not know if this is just me, but this is literally me right now, haha Chemi, this one is for you And everyone will gladly provide both. Just something that I noticed scrolling through old blogs, haha Okay, so there'll definitely be more from me in the future, and hopefully some others will join in as well, so this isn't just "Morgi's Memes" . I know we've got a few pretty neat memes around here and whilst I've even got some of them saved on my phone for personal enjoyment, I'm loath to share them without consulting their creators. So, if you've got a meme about the FISD, please feel free to share it! Whilst we're at it, my memes are generally made to be shared, so feel free to use them at your own leisure. I wouldn't mind getting credited tho

Haha, thanks! So glad to hear that! Sounds awesome! I'm sure there'll be more memes in the future and I'd love to see them in the newsletter

Hello! I hope this topic is fine, if not, feel free to remove it. So, whilst I've seen memes pop up every now and then, I haven't seen any actual thread with memes about the FISD. Because I personally love commenting the things in my life in memes, I decided to make a few memes about the FISD, based on things that I've noticed on here so far. Please feel free to share your own memes as well, if you've got any This was something that I had a bit of trouble with in the beginning... Perhaps some of you can relate, haha Don't worry, we appreciate it I've only been on here for a short time, but during that time there've been a lot of armors by Glen. Most impressive! The struggle is real. Now I just need the money and to decide on what I am going to build. "Troopers helping Troopers" really encompasses the spirit of the FISD and I appreciate that very much. No explanation needed Feel free to share some more memes or to take this post down if it's too off-topic for the off-topic area

[1] 03/10/2021 -- Annotopia Lüdinghausen If I had to summarise my first troop in three words, I would probably say "rainy, exhausting, awesome". The German Garrison appeared at Annotopia Lüdinghausen on Sunday with thirteen members. Whilst the event itself did not have a Star Wars focus, plenty of people still appreciated the costumes as we got to appreciate theirs. I would like to thank all of my fellow troopers for helping me through the event and making it easy to ignore the rain, because I was having so much fun. A special thanks goes to TK-61276 (you might know him better as Tino) who took the time to help me prepare for the troop, then drove over and let me borrow one of his blasters. A huge thank you also for staying at my side throughout the troop and being the first to help me when I got a dizzy spell towards the end. Honestly the best mentor a new TK could ask for! Another thank you goes to TK-10868 (also known as Andreas) for taking me to the event! And because we all love some pictures:

I give permission for FISD to repost my photos on social media in an appropriate fashion. Because these were (and are) always a joy to go through, I decided to start one of my own. Enjoy! Troops Number: DD/MM/YYYY -- Event Name 01: 03/10/2021 -- Annotopia Lüdinghausen 02: 30/10/2021 -- Saalbau Witten 03: 27/11/2021 -- Comic Con Stuttgart 04: 18/12/2021 -- Lichterfahrt Hildesheim XX: 26/02/2022 -- Phaeno Wolfsburg 05: 05/03/2022 -- Sound of [...] Munich 06: 06/03/2022 -- Sound of [...] Munich 07: 02/04/2022 -- Power of the Force Cologne, Day 1 08: 03/04/2022 -- Power of the Force Cologne, Day 2 09: 08/04/2022 -- Sound of [...] Düsseldorf 10: 10/04/2022 -- Sound of [...] Dortmund 11: 29/04/2022 -- Star Wars in Concert Oberhausen 12: 22/05/2022 -- Galactic Days in the Zoo Münster 13: 04/06/2022 -- Wedding in Bremen 14: 17/06/2022 | 18/06/2022 -- 18th Birthday in Wolfsburg 15: 25/06/2022 -- Cosplay Day Movie Park Bottrop 16: 02/07/2022 -- Benefizevent Wolfsburg 17: 04/07/2022 -- Outpost One Dassow XX: 15/07/2022 -- Officer's Dinner Kiel 18: 16/07/2022 -- Project Area51 Kiel, Day 1 19: 17/07/2022 -- Project Area51 Kiel, Day 2 20: 05/08/2022 -- Elbenwald Festival Cottbus, Day 1 21: 06/08/2022 -- Elbenwald Festival Cottbus, Day 2 22: 07/08/2022 -- Elbenwald Festival Cottbus, Day 3 23: 20/08/2022 -- 14. Stadtteilfest Kiel Wellsee 24: 10/09/2022 -- Fanfilm Premiere Kiel 25: 16/09/2022 -- Noris Force Con Fürth, Day 1 26: 17/09/2022 -- Noris Force Con Fürth, Day 2 27: 18/09/2022 -- Noris Force Con Fürth, Day 3 28: 19/09/2022 -- Andor Premiere Cologne 29: 24/09/2022 -- Cosplay Tage Speyer, Day 1 30: 25/09/2022 -- Cosplay Tage Speyer, Day 2 31: 01/10/2022 -- Annotopia Lüdinghausen XX: 22/10/2022 -- Photoshooting Belgium XX: 23/10/2022 -- Photoshooting Netherlands 32: 28/10/2022 -- 18th Leverkusener Kunstnacht 33: 29/10/2022 -- Celebration for a recovered Child, Wolfsburg XX: 29/10/2022 -- 40th Birthday; Wolfsburg 34: 30/10/2022 -- Fleamarket Wendeburg 35: 26/11/2022 -- Comic Con Stuttgart, Saturday 36: 27/11/2022 -- Comic Con Stuttgart, Sunday 37: 03/11/2022 -- Tilta Lastertag, Hamburg 38: 04/11/2022 -- Outpost One Dassow 39: 02/02/2023 -- Star Wars Reads Day Lohmar 40: 04/02/2023 -- Globus Bedburg 41: 05/02/2023 -- Retro Amour Dortmund 42: 01/04/2023 -- Power of the Force Cologne, Day 1 43: 02/04/2023 -- Power of the Force Cologne, Day 2 44: 07/04/2023 -- Star Wars Celebration London, Friday 45: 08/04/2023 -- Star Wars Celebration London, Saturday 46: 09/04/2023 -- Star Wars Celebration London, Sunday 47: 10/04/2023 -- Star Wars Celebration London, Monday 48: 04/05/2023 -- Elbenwald Store Kiel 49: 06/05/2023 -- Lego Store Hamburg 50: 07/05/2023 -- HerzogTumult Children's Festival Mölln 51: 13/05/2023 -- Galactic Days in the Zoo Münster 52: 03/06/2023 -- NordCon Hamburg 53: 10/06/2023 -- Galactic Academy Event Hagen XX: 25/06/2023 -- Lütt im Park Hamburg 54: 15/07/2023 -- Family Party Kropp 55: 11/08/2023 -- Elbenwald Festival Cottbus, Day 1 56: 12/08/2023 -- Elbenwald Festival Cottbus, Day 2 57: 13/08/2023 -- Elbenwald Festival Cottbus, Day 3 58: 23/09/2023 -- VW Family Day, Wolfsburg, Day 1 59: 24/09/2023 -- VW Family Day, Wolfsburg, Day 2 60: 21/10/2023 -- Elbenwald Store Hamburg 61: 09/12/2023 -- Comic Con Stuttgart, Saturday 62: 10/12/2023 -- Comic Con Stuttgart, Sunday 63: 16/12/2023 -- Dreamhack Hannover 64: 03/02/2024 -- Retro Amour Dortmund, Day 1 65: 04/02/2024 -- Retro Amour Dortmund, Day 2 66: 28/03/2024 -- Retirement at the Airbase Jagel 67: 03/05/2024 -- Star Wars in Concert Hamburg 68: 04/05/2024 -- Planetarium Wolfsburg 69: 04/05/2024 -- Cinema Wolfenbüttel *Events marked with XX were troops not officially sanctioned by the 501st Legion that still appear in my Troop Log; unlike with Legion troops, not all of these occasions are represented in this listing/ my troop log Stats: ANH-S: 69 ESB: -- 2021: 4 2022: 34 2023: 25 2024: 6

Thanks! Danke! I'm sure the event will be amazing and I'm very much looking forward to it

Most of the screws for the original strapping are not needed. So you can skip the brackets entirely if you want to. In case you still want those screws, feel free to go ahead and use the brackets to install the small screws for the torso (3 sets of two screws for the chest, ab, back, upper and lower kidney and top of the butt plate). I first tried the original strapping, then removed everything aside from the screws and installed the snaps. In my experience, you could skip installing the original strapping if you do not plan on keeping it. Feel free to only add the screws in case you're interested in having that small extra, without the need to go as far as adding the elastic. The set-up that I use from the inside. Hope this helped!

Hallo Andreas! (or would you prefer "Grüß Gott"? haha) Good to have you here. RS makes some excellent armors, I'm sure you'll be happy with yours. I'm looking forward to seeing some pictures once it arrives -- it will be a memorable day for sure, so you'll want to take some photos

I'd suggest you go head over to the "request an appearance" page on the 501st Legion website https://501st.com/request.php Good luck!

My helmet is an RS helmet as well and I mainly followed their tutorial, with some additional help from the people on here and some small variations that I found improved the overall appearance. Maybe go one video at a time and whenever you're done with a video or have any questions about a certain step or procedure you can come back here and ask for help. As long as you post pictures after every step, so that the people on here can catch any potential mistakes, those tutorials will be very helpful -- even if you decide to not always follow them to the letter and instead go with some other techniques

I'd suggest getting your (on the picture left) shoulder bell closer to the shoulder bridge. This isn't required for basic approval, but I've found that it improves the overall appearance of the shoulder bells to minimise that gap. Another gap that you might want to minimise is the gap between the bicep armor and the shoulder bell, possibly by taking away a bit of the armor on the shoulder bell in roughly the shape that MaskedVengeance already lined out. Another thing that might help would be taking away the return edge. Justjoseph63 has a great post on how much return edge you can take away: As for cutting off too much, simply try to cut a few millimetres at a time and do another test fit, then cut again and so on. Just don't forget to compare your armor to the references. I hope this might have helped you!

Thanks guys! I'm sure I'll enjoy it a lot!

The padding behind the sniper plate is really good. I've tried walking around with it a bit and it's helped a lot. Additionally I've added a bit of thinner padding to the back of my thigh on that same leg, so there's a smaller chance of the thigh sliding forward over the sniper plate additionally to the lowered chance of the sniper plate sliding back enough to get underneath the thigh. It also has the added benefit that both paddings can be a bit thinner, so the armor overall stays closer to my leg. Don't know if you want to do that as well, but it's working for me so far. Glad to hear you've found that useful! You can thank Tino (T-Jay) for the idea with the thick front padding -- without him I'd still be insisting that I'm fine without my glasses, never knowing the immense improvement in sight that I got by wearing them

Thanks for the warm welcome, guys! I really appreciate it Thanks! A long, long, long story? Well, I sure hope so! Given that I'm only eighteen, I'm sure there's tons more to come -- maybe EIB or Centurion? A new armor? Who knows, but let's hope it'll become a long, long, long story Glad you enjoyed reading all of that (perhaps it's gotten this long, since a fanfiction with over 200 000 words was my inspiration to become a TK?). I'm looking forward to having fun! Thanks! Danke! Ah, I appreciate that bit in German and I'm glad you liked it. (There's over a thousand members in the German Garrison and its still growing. I'm sure you'll get to see many more of us German newcomers on here in the future, haha) Another newbie, wohoo! Thanks, I'm glad to hear that! Never too late to join the party You already heard the story in person, I'm glad you like the written version as well, haha And what a world...! There's still so much to discover and I'm looking forward to it Thanks, I'm sure I'll have a blast! ... And once again I've written a whole essay in what was supposed to be a quick thank you A huge thank you for all the kind words, it truly made my day to open this forum to another notification.