Stormtrooper

Good news to see you posting again Tony... take it easy and concentrate on getting better I would raise a bottle of beer to you as well but... well I'm also on Tylenol (paracetomol) with codeine for a long-standing injury, resulting from a car-accident 3 years ago. A word of warning though....alcohol with Tylenol / Paracetomol is a *bad* idea for your liver... so you can choose to either mess-up your liver, or erm... mess-up your social life when you're on the stuff US doctors should be prescribing you something without Tylenol/paracetomol, like oxycontin / oxycodone (like Jonah mentioned) anyways... British doctors don't, unfortunately If it's any compensation I'm in severe pain at the mo' myself.... one of our firm's suppliers invited myself and a colleague out for an evening of go-karting yesterday evening. I *knew* it was a bad idea with how my back is, but I REALLY wanted to go! I lasted 4 laps and had to pull-out as the zero-suspension was like grinding a cheese-grater against my spine So now the only relief I can get is taking 60mg. codeine (WITH paracetomol - AARRRGGHH) and lying flat on our solid cement floor, in my living-room.... I also have a mains-powered blanket with heated pads in it which helps when I need to sit upright in a seat or whatever. Some ideas to hopefully relieve the pain, mate... Get well soon... I should have a box heading your way in about a month's time Cheers, John

This is terrible news... Tony is a top-guy and I haven't heard of ANYONE who has had bad dealings with him. I hope he has a speedy recovery, and all the well-wishes here help keep his morale up I hope they 'throw the book' at the suspect for resisting arrest / assault... and that Tony's partner gets a repremand for not helping-out So get well soon Tony, and concentrate on getting better (I speak from experience when I say that an injured back can be very difficult to deal with, if not treated properly and promptly) Cheers, John

Ohhh... nice work with the hand-painted 'decal areas' I'm hoping to receive a set of TE2 armour pretty soon, and these kinda threads are certainly building my anticipation! Cheers, John trooperglovesATyahooDOTcom

I think that there's some confusion here over 'Hero' blasters with basic greeblies vs. 'Stunt' blasters with *additional* greeblies, and IMO both should be acceptable for ESB Elite standards For ANH and ESB Lucasfilm owned NONE of the firing 'Hero' blasters... ie. the Sterlings which which were required to 'fire' on screen, producing muzzle-flash (and from which they would optically composite a red laser beam, in post production). Bapty's (the armourers for both movies), allowed LFL to add minor greeblies (T-Track, scopes, cut-down magazines) which would make the weapon look futuristic... whilst still being able to shoot blank-firing rounds. But after filing had wrapped, these 'Hero' E-11 blasters could easily be stripped back down to a base Sterling Sub Machine Gun, for use in later movies (including some of the Bond movies IIFC) Now check out the escape from Cloud City scenes in TESB and you'll see some pretty spectacular Stormtrooper deaths where the blasters are thrown into the air... it seems unlikely that these were Hero blasters which belonged to Bapty's... more likely they were resin-cast 'Stunt' blasters which LFL had made themselves, and could use in stunt scenes. That's why the 'Hero' blasters which Lando and Leia use near the end of the movie didn't have these additional greeblies - they were basically ANH-spec without the Hengstler and cylinders/wires. Whether the blaster I have in my collection is one of these 'Stunt' blasters and saw any screen-time is something we'll never know. But it sure was beat to hell when I receeived it with a couple of pieces chipped-off, which *may* be due to several drops onto Cloud City's hard floors at Elstree Here's a couple more pics of this style of resin blaster, used in various promotional scenes at the time of ESB (and yes, I *do* realise that a Luke in Hoth Gear costume doesn't meet Elite ESB Stormtrooper criteriea but it's a cool image I though you'd like to see anyways): (taken from the same photo-shoot as the image posted on the first page. Thanks to Anthony HDPE for the image ) Luke turned briefly to the dark side, when he realised the E-11 was superior to the DH-17 So that's my 2 cents... getting back ON-TOPIC, that's a fantastic ESB Stormtrooper that you have there Mark - congrats on getting the first Elite Status TESB Stormtrooper Cheers, John trooperglovesATyahooDOTcom

Maybe everyone's waiting on their rubber gloves with latex handplates, before submitting for ANH Elite status?! OH, wait... it isn't a requirement after all I always thought that Elite status was a particularly cool idea, and I hope to join the ranks of ANH Elite troopers by the Summer Good idea offering the exclusive decal as well, for obtaining Elite status! Cheers, John

Just to get this thread back on track I finally managed to make some of these accurate ANH gloves and handplates, which are now available in the For Sale section: Accurate ANH Gloves with Latex Handplates Signup Thread If anyone has any queries, please email me at troopergloves@yahoo.com Cheers, John

If you install cooling-fans and don't wear a balaclava, then this could be one helluva accident waiting to happen... OUCH! Cheers, John

Here you go... To avoid any confusion, I used the screen-name 'Pugman' before 'Stormtrooper'... hence the watermark on the pic. The O2 cannister is from an ANH / ESB costume that had seemingly been tossed into the same box as the ROTJ costume.... they certainly weren't handled with lambskin gloves back when the movies were being made! Yep, Paul's right - the helmet is glued together, as it is a 'studio' helmet from ROTJ. The 'location' helmets from the Endor scenes shot in Smith River had to be sturdier and therefore were riveted together, although the ear-covers were still GLUED ON... all ROTJ trooper helmets had glued-on ear-covers and didn't use screws like the ANH / ESB buckets. Cheers, John

Thanks for the mention Tony Unfortunately my latex supplier seems to have taken 2 full weeks off from before Christmas, and I'm still waiting on it to turn up That's why I haven't posted an Interest List yet, but if you'd like to get your name in there then please send me a PM I personally think rubber gloves are the way to go if you're interested in accuracy, unless you go trooping for hours at a time somewhere like Florida... then the sweating thang is not really a big deal I had previously used a pair of black lycra / cotton mix gloves that I got from a Camping store (back in the good ole' days before the accuracy bug bit me... LOL) Cheers, John

Look at how badly the vocoder is painted, with no definition in the 'ribs' Either a botched Archives restoration, or a very hasty on-set repair job IMO Cheers, John

The colour mis-match on the handplates / forearms doesn't bother me - I thought about leaving them in the sunshine for a couple of weeks to try and yellow them a bit (to match the 25-year old original pieces) but decided against it for 2 reasons: 1. The forerams and handplates are *replicas* and I want that to be obvious to anyone viewing the display... they are there to fill in the blank spaces and nothing more,and I wouldn't want anyone to think that they are being passed-off as originals 2. 2 weeks of sunshine (to artificially age the new plastic) is pretty hard to come by here in the U.k, even in the middle of Summer . The costume had a few accessories from an ANH/ESB original costume, namely the O2 belt-cannister, ESB Holster, ESB Stunt blaster and ANH/ESB black-soled boots. However, the boots in both of those pics are replica boots as I had to drill a big chunk out of the heel in order for the mannequin's stand to pass through.... so the original black-soled boots are displayed seperately. ROTJ boots should have white soles (hence the repainted replica boots) and as Paul said, there were some boots with tan-coloured soles, on the location-shoot (Crescent City / Smith River CA) Stormtrooper costumes (from the Endor scenes) And yes, 3 dark blue buttons on the ab-plate and the rest are black. Cheers, John

They are just black circular decals - it's an unmodified GF suit in the pics, so unfortunately not quite ready for ANH Elite status just yet Cheers, John

Wow, thanks for sharing this pic at such high resolution Tony! ... seems to have more detail than the Standee (same image) but preseumably the printing process of the Standee is the limiting factor - not the original source image <_< LOL... yeah I think mine are maybe too clean and 'nice' after all! D'OH! BTW, anyone waiting on an update - I'm waitiing on a drum of liquid latex which unfortunately didn't arrive before Christmas. I don't want to derail this thread, but there will be an official Interest Thread once I receive the latex Cheers, John

....but will it invalidate your car's warranty? Cheers, John

Thanks for the kind remarks guys... but it's not ingenuity on my part - just good ole' fashioned trial and error. I have many half-filled tins of silicone, polyurethane rubber, clay, plaster... the list is endlesss Actually I was working with a neighbour on a car that runs on banana peels... we got to the prototype stage but in the end we had too many slip-ups. Sorry... I'm much better at dirty jokes! Cheers, John

Yes, as 'ItsThatGuy' said, they are permanently glued onto the back of the rubber gloves... like the originals in ANH. More pics? You got it Mannequin hands, so fingers of glove looks kinda bunched-up This is me, not the mannequin.. you can get around the gauntlets under forearms problem, by putting the gloves on FIRST... not like how it shows in the 'Making of Star Wars' video I know, but it worked for me yesterday. I was home alone sick off work with inner-ear infection (giving me Vertigo and occaisional double-vision). I somehow managed to suit-up alone, put my digital camera on a tripod with the 10-second timer set and then dash in front of the camera in time for the shot.... LOL avoiding the legs of the camera tripod and swaying a wee bit with the vertigo thing (although I cheated by not wearing the trooper helmet), and I was wearing ordinary pants/trousers... and one of my forearms has rotated around a bit If my boss is reading this, I was in bed all day long, with the room spinning around me! ANd finally some reference pics and a shot of my clay handplates awaiting the mould being poured onto them: Paul, sillicone is sooo much easier to work with than latex, but it won't stick to anything but silicone. I did a couple of test casts in silicone and polyurethane foam (also easy to work with), but found that the surface finish wasn't as nice as with latex. Plus the originals are believed to have been latex, which made me want to use the same material if possible Cheers, John

Hi everyone, After months of searching for accurate ANH style rubber gloves (I've tried Army NBC chemical gloves but they didn't look 'right'... I even sourced a pair from an *ahem* online fetish store But they weren't right either IMO. Now I've finally found some that were supplied as NOS (New Old Stock) so I've no idea what age they are... again I'm not sure if they were the same ones used in ANH, but they have the same chequered patches on the outside of the fingertips (fingernail area) as shown on the pic of Han in Stormtrooper disguise in the pic at the bottom of this post. (thanks to Paul for supplying this movie still) I also made some latex handguards to glue onto the back of 'em...personally vac-formed handplates on ANH troopers always used to bug me. But then again I can be a wee bit obsessional about some things! If you look carefully throughout ANH you can see where the trooper's handguard paint/dye has chipped off, revealing the honey-coloured latex underneath. These things must have been a real pain in the butt for the costume department... I'm not surprised that they changed to vac-form handplates in TESB and ROTJ! And just for fun, here's a comparison pic of original ANH handguards (worn by Han in the detention block scene in ANH) compared to a cropped pic of my gloves (which I've gray-scaled to closer match the original movie still) So I'm not quite ready for ANH Elite status yet.... an otherwise standard GF movie-cast suit LOL, but there's some great inspiration elsewhere on this site, so I can take the next step... canvas belt here I come! Cheers, John

Nice work Mr.Furious... and I'm glad the Welsh police aren't like the pr!cks around here, otherwise *you* would be facing charges for assaulting the punks, not the other way around <_< Sadly in the U.K. Criminal Rights is vitally important, and these poor 'disadvantaged youths' will get a slap on the wrist. Victim Support is usually a 10 minute visit from a Community Police Officer who gives you a couple of leaflets to read! Next time these sh*theads decide to steal from a shop / assault the shopowner, they might go with Knives, and the outcome will not be so pleasant Policing in the U.K. is 75% catching speeding motorists and generating revenue for the government. O.K. I'm getting down off my soapbox now Cheers, John

Yeah, and I happen to know that there's a Toshi Station at the end of Paul's road, too... weird, eh? Paul, amazing piece of work and he looks great surrounded by all the fullsize troopers. I'm sure that he felt like a celebrity if people were going up to him asking for photographs with him etc. etc. Have you any other kids to pass it onto after he grows out of it? (Han, Lando, Anakin?) Cheers, John

Nice work Alex (and Paul / TM!) although for *true* ANH Elite status, you really need soem more white gaffer tape on your costume! LOL j/l Cheers, John

I think the ideal setup would be one of Tk4205's custom interior's with a hyperdyne / ROM FX board for static burst / click, and aerator speakers... for a fully self -container helmet solution... just like it was intended in the Star Wars universe. I love the look of this kit and I've ordered a set of Stomper's Hovi-Mix speaker aerators... if someone can shoe me hoe to integrate a sound FX board into all this, then I'll be a happy camper (PS - I'm a complete technophobe when it comes to electronics! D'OH!) Cheers, John

I'm glad that everyone likes it... I'll try to answer the questions as best as I can: How was the costume acquired? I can't go into too much detail here, but it was the result of a lot of detective work tracing the owner from a 7 year old message on UseNet, and then comparing the photos with detailed photographs of the 2 other background ROTJ studio helmets (Thanks to David O and Pete B for supplying detailed pics, including the inside of the helmet which included conclusive info that I couldn't have gained elsewhere) I had taken numerous pics of an ROTJ Stormtrooepr costume on display at the Art of Star Wars exhibition in Edinburgh, which proved invaluable in authenticating the actual armour components. The belt is made from a white nylon webbing type material, which is permanently riveted at either side directly onto the sides of the ab-armour. There are no rivets / snaps on the bottom edge of the chest armour or back armour - I believe this feature was only on the original ANH / ESB armour. I'm sorry, but I won't provide any info on the interior strapping of the costume, except to say that the ab-armour and back armour are secured to the wearer with elasticated braces (suspenders to our American cousins), much like the majority of fan-armour... with one notable difference, which I'd prefer not to reveal. The reason why I don't post detailed pictures / description of the strapping is to prevent some unscrupulous person from making a replica ROTJ stormtrooepr costume, and using my info to create an accurate interior which is indistinguishable from the real deal... and then sell it to some poor sod for a lot of $$$'s I don't mind posting pics of the outisde of the costume if it helps people make their replica costume that lil' bit more accurate, but I believe some information needs to be protected, in order to assist the authentication of any future ROTJ costumes which might appear. In truth, a movie-accurate strapping system will not make your ROTJ Stormtrooper costume look anymore accurate from the outisde anyways. Trooperdad - I haven't done a tutorial on the illuminated base, but I posted a thread about it on the RPF which has a few detailed pics of it's construction which you might find interesting: Illuminated Mannequin Base Cheers, John

Matt, can you tell me what you're referring to with this feature on the lower legs? I realise it's not relevant to this topic, so if you would rather PM the info to me.... John

Here's a couple of pics that some folks might find interesting: ------------ This is the partial ROTJ Stormtrooper costume that once belonged to Matt, and was used to create moulds from. ------------- Here's a pic of the moulds which he had made of the original ROTJ Stormtrooper helmet that passed through a number of private hands, and is now in a private collection in New York state. These pics are both on the 'Net and therefore public domain, so I hope I'm not stepping on anyone's toes by posting 'em Cheers, John

Matt, it must have been someone else you spoke to and thought it was me, or you dreamt it or something.. I'm being totally serious. But anyway, you mentioned this feature on the lower legs on previous forum posts that you made, and said 'all would be revealed after I get back from L.A.' but you never did reveal what you were referring to... So, I'm listening - what is this feature that all ROTJ Stormtroper legs have, that my costume seemingly doesn't have? John PS - I've started a new thread with pics over at the ROTJ Stormtrooper section, for everyone that wanted to see pics.