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New Battle Spec armour from SDS


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Thank you, Luis. I seem to have touched a nerve. It's easier to write me off as a troll or AA plant than debate the issue calmly in a respectful manner.

For the record, I'm no more than a spectator and have no connection to AA other than being a customer as I stated openly. I appear to be the only impartial one here....

If I've come over as arrogant, I apologise unreservedly. Isn't it the ultimate arrogance to belittle me as a novice

and tell me to accept the "fact" that AA is a liar, rather than address the issues I raised and present me with answers? I wanted more than BM's word against AA's ad infinitum.

I am well aware of BM's wealth of talent and take nothing away from the quality of the pieces he is proven to have sculpted. I have seen many superb examples from his portfolio. Sadly, he is probably the only person who can answer my questions. I will have to wait and hope he returns and is willing to offer an explanation. If you remember, it was he himself who encouraged me to find the facts for myself. I've raised a few awkward questions and I'm sorry if some people are uncomfortable with them.

In the meantime, I'll reserve my judgement, as I have done all along.

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As previously mentioned, AA may say whatever he wants but proof lays in his product. We have pictures of original armour from the LFL archives, as well as RS Props who have their own original sandtrooper and are making 1st generation casts of it. What we see in the original armour is not present or different in AA's product. It doesn't matter if he has the skins or not. What matters is that his product differs from proven original armour, yet he claims that his product is cast from "original" when it clearly isn't.

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Thank you Mathias. I have read that AA openly admits to using skins and resculpting. As we know, the original moulds didn't even survive the original casting run for ANH. They were falling apart and repaired on the fly in a desperate attempt to finish the run.

Given this fact, no-one would believe that these same bucks were in any fit state to be used to make the current SDS armour 35 years on. I don't believe that AA has claimed or would claim this as it is beyond belief.

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Hi Josh,

As I said, I am also on no-one's side...I am here to be convinced. At the end of the day, the original armour bucks are long gone. AA readily admits he reworked/sculpted the armour bucks anew, whichever point of reference he may or may not have used to do so. All subsequent original (ESB/ROTJ) and fan made armour derives from HIS originals.

Worst case scenario: He made the originals. They were copied. He copied the copies, or the new sculpts of those trying to emulate his work.

I'm surprised AA's detractors haven't done something more scientific than comparison photos to prove their plagiarism claims. Strikes me as funny that people don't believe that the man who made the originals would not have kept them or their skins...More likely he had them than didn't. Is that such a leap of faith?

And to those who say he didn't sculpt the originals...even Brian Muir readily admits that there is no evidence to disprove his claims. I invited Mr Muir to comment on the "facts" I listed on a previous page of this thread, to no avail. I was particularly keen to hear his views on the point I made about the convenience of GL crediting a tragically deceased sculptress with sculpting the stormtrooper helmet and learn how he managed to remain ignorant of its authorship until just before the court LFL/AA courtcase...

Furthermore, no-one has explained away the inferior prototypes that AA sold at Christies. Why did he make those if he had the perfectly formed "terracotta" sculpt to copy?...regardless of its author. Could it be that it was accidentally destroyed as he has claimed? Likewise, why are NP and AA mentioned over 100 times in JM's sketchbook while BM and LM are not mentioned once? Anyone....?

Regardless of how he arrived at his new bucks, he has the ultimate USP...the original maker, making them in the very place the originals were made. Certainly carries a lot of sway. No argument there, then...

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You are completely missing the point. If AA still had original skins, why did he recast a suit from a fan that is a reworked ROTJ suit and call it original ANH? I know a few people have said this here, but I wanted to reiterate the point that - AA's products don't match ANH. It doesn't even remotely match up with ANH "original skins". There is irrefutable photographic proof of this. There is no need for "more scientific" proof, as the photos speak volumes about the differences, and I myself have seen Ainsworth's parts fit like a glove onto other fans bucks. Do you know why they fit like a glove? Shhh, don't tell anyone. They were "copies". Why the original maker would have to make copies of a fans suit is beyond me. You know he had the original skins from ANH, right? He could have just used those, but he probably felt that this fans work was much more accurate. /dreamworld

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Being lied to extensively does hit a nerve with some folks, yes. You weren't around for this, but back in the day, one of the primary armor replica makers was discussing all of this Stormtroopery business with AA because he wanted to develop a partnership with AA to pay homage to AA's work on forming the original suits. This was right before SDS started producing Star Wars related products. These two guys didn't really see eye to eye and AA wasn't willing to share the limelight (big surprise). In the end, AA dug out what he still had of the Stormtrooper parts and went to work to carve out his own niche in the costume sales market.

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Your assumptions about the Christies helmet are simply an issue of chronology. AA had forgotten a great deal about how he originally assembled the helmets and rightly so, since a lot of time had passed. He hadn't held one in his hands for many decades. By the time he went into recreating his own previous work, he had devised new ways to assemble helmets, such as using brads instead of rivets, and many strange differences of that sort. The Christie's helmet had all the telltale signs of something that had either been sitting in pieces over the years and was finally tossed together in the later years to fetch some cash. Regardless of when it was produced, it was obvious that it was the donor for what came to be the cap and back of the current SDS helmet. The lack of rear swoop in both the rear tube and the equator ridge, combined with the odd cranial shape was a dead giveaway that the "prototype ribbed cap and back" was reworked to attempt to make it look like the cap and back of the screen used helmets. The face assembly (also seen in his video) with the cap and back was also very different, causing a less than accurate appearance. This is a provable fact when comparing any existing original helmet to that of the SDS product.

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Original skins? Maybe an old face plate - which by the way was over-trimmed on the underside, so it created a strange issue with the S trim being visible at almost any front angle of the helmet. The ear forms don't match screen used helmets when compared side by side either, so there's that. Just because someone says that the ribbed back helmet is a prototype, predating the screen used trooper helmets, does not make it so. Obviously, some aspects of the production remained in his shop, and he openly admitted that he had "some remaining parts" in his shop to the armor maker that tried to bring him into the costuming community. Mind you, Ainsworth had no idea that replica helmets and armor were in such demand until this resident armor maker told him so. I believe he had an original faceplate remaining and the very odd ribbed cap and back that was later reworked to look like the original helmets. The ears don't match so they are a new sculpt entirely, but that makes perfect sense. The ribbed helmet didn't have ears at all.

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You used the term "those trying to emulate his work". I don't think you want to believe that they weren't his "work". I saw this same kind of debate years ago on the RPF when his supporters would say just about anything to explain away the inaccuracies in his product, only to later eat their words when they realized that AA changes his story and his claims on his website so often that he has contradicted himself more times than anyone could count. Why change your story if the original story was true?

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He vacuformed the parts for the production, using bucks given to him. His own sculpture video was the best proof of his lack of ability. Even the court system does not believe that he sculpted the original suits. Did you watch the video? And somehow you were convinced by his methods that he somehow came up with all of this himself? I have to say, even if he wasn't caught in endless lies about his product, and had not repeatedly changed his story, his "sculpting" methods and ability was glaring proof that he was not the sculptor. His response to there being an original "clay" sculpt was hilarious. He went on to say that clay is not a good material as a buck to form plastic from because it is not made from the same heat resistant materials as what he uses to sculpt from. I....think...he's basically clueless. The clay was never meant to be a forming buck and that is not it's purpose. Really??

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Your comments about JM's sketchbook doesn't really carry any weight compared to the endless facts of Ainsworth's proven lies over the years. The omission of something does not account for evidence. Did Brian not sculpt Vader because he wasn't mentioned in JM's sketchbook? That is another really big stretch.

Edited by JPM
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Thank you Mathias. I have read that AA openly admits to using skins and resculpting. As we know, the original moulds didn't even survive the original casting run for ANH. They were falling apart and repaired on the fly in a desperate attempt to finish the run.

Given this fact, no-one would believe that these same bucks were in any fit state to be used to make the current SDS armour 35 years on. I don't believe that AA has claimed or would claim this as it is beyond belief.

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Yes, AA did claim this. Perhaps you didn't witness it in all of his press releases and magazine ads. Original molds, original maker. (before the story changed again and again)

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And this comment only implies that he still had the original skins, but made modifications while restoring them. Clearly, some people don't understand how this works. Have you seen an original forearm piece from ANH next to an SDS forearm? It isn't that things were fixed or altered. It's that they were never alike. The squares in the forearm are not spaced the same, similar size, similar sharpness, or similar anything. There aren't even an equal number of squares and they are entirely different sizes. SDS armor parts, all of them, match a fan made replica of a ROTJ suit, altered to look more like ANH.

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Are you familiar with the ridge under the chest plate? How is it that the AA ridge also matched exactly to another persons (ROTJ reworked to ANH) fan-made replica suit, and in no way matched the original ANH chest plate? 50 points if you get the answer right.

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There is no reworking the original molds to look exactly like someone else's work. If you sincerely believe otherwise, then you simply don't understand the gravity of the impossibility of your claims.

Edited by JPM
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Yep thats a surefire tell of SDS armor and those recasted from it. "cough" Jedi robe....

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jedi robe armor looks like the old FX kit.

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the contribution to star wars is lost from AA since he did create helmets himself, not stormtrooper helmets

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but several helmets used in production.

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it's clear that the whole situation with AA is that he formed the armor, and then the original bucks were lost in the fire.

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his only creative situation is the many helmet designs he did create. and any industrial design elements to make

the original bucks from the sculpts he was given as part of the design team

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while brian and liz created the original form, it's another thing to make a forming tool. so his industry requires taking an original

form and modifying it for production. if you look at a cap and back tool, or a faceplate tool, it's not just a cast of the original sculpt

it has to be greatly modified to allow it to be a forming tool.

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he was trained as an industrial designer, so his methods of fabrication are gained from that schooling.

it's sad that he had to resort to recasting to bring his shop back to the current state it's in.

Edited by TK Bondservnt 2392
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The Jedi Robe kit is recast FX armour, but a recast SDS helmet.

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Secondly, no AA did not convert the sculpt to forming bucks. Elstree studios already had those since they had already made a few suits in-house before the rest of the work was outsourced to SDS.

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Edited by Sly11
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