Painting: ARC-170 (Micro Machines)

Some photoshop skills on a not-photoshop software! Background image from PatternPictures.com.

I finally got around to re-painting some more Star Wars. This time, it's the ARC-170, first seen, so far as I'm aware, in Star Wars III: Revenge of the Sith.

These were fun to paint. If I were to do anything differently, I would have used a lighter pigment in the wash I applied near the end, not black. Still, they turned out alright and I keep taking them down to look at them. I've liked the design of the ARC-170 from the first time I saw one. I think it's because the fuselage and engine cowlings are reminiscent of World War II and Crimson Skies aircraft designs. Thus, I felt like a paint job that wouldn't look too out of place in that time period would look really good on these. I am not the first to have had the same idea as with an image search it seems one guy made one up in the German mottled camo design used on their jet fighters and another guy did one up like the Red Baron's Dr.1.

So on with the pics!

I wanted them to look like they belonged together, as though part of the same flight wing or squadron, so they were painted at the same time and same base colour. You will notice that the areas painted red are the same for both (unless you happen to be colour blind maybe). Only the yellow is applied in unique ways, as though the crews had the option to add yellow paint how they liked.

I keep telling myself that one day, these guys are going to see some action. If I repeat it enough, it's bound to happen. Right?

Whittling away: Birdie

So I've been finding these burls on fallen branches of the trees at my workplace. They are poplar trees. Don't know what causes the growth but I've been carving off the softer outer layer to see what the wood looks like inside. This particular one had a particular look right away, so I whittled it down until I got it.

Tonight I painted it up just for fun.

I left the soft outer covering on the bottom part and left it unpainted. Looked more natural or something.

Framed!

I made a frame for my aunt. She will be giving it away as a gift (sans livre).

First book I picked off the shelf. It fit perfectly!

Game-Related Movie: Battleship

Classic Battleship

Yes, I watched Battleship. The movie based on the board game. Except that the combatants are a navy and a bunch of aliens that seemed to have decided that an aquatic base of operations was the optimal way to take over the Earth. Why not? The British did pretty well for themselves that way. Other things that the movie used from the game? How about setting up a virtual grid over the sea with which to direct Aegis missile fire? Or my favourite, the ordnance used by the invading aliens: explosive canisters shaped like the hit/miss pegs in the game.

In all the movie was better than I expected in some ways, though worse in others. Score one for the retired crewmen showing up to power up the retired USS Missouri (the first model ship I ever built) and score the winning blow. Also refreshing to see a veteran amputee as a main character. Actually, those were the highlights of the movie.

The aliens were really confusing, or just seemed confused themselves, which they might have been, having landed on a strange new world. They are trying to 'phone home' using the messaging system that signalled Earth's existence to them in the first place. They seemed to be okay with leaving humans alone, including (apparently) letting one go that had snuck into their camp, letting him just walk away with with a suitcase of super communication stuff. Were they just preserving their live for futures as slaves to the new alien overlords? Instead, the invaders prefer to destroy mechanical things and inert structures. But only some of them? No-one taught them to finish a job or what?

But the biggest laugh for me was the naming of Landsat 7 as the special satellite used to send the signals (or rather, boost them) toward the Earth-like planet. But, I guess only those familiar with Earth observation remote sensing would know that Landsat 7 (a) does not look like that, (b) is concerned only with looking at earth, not beaming signals to Rigel 12, (c) has a 16-day revisit rate, not 24 hours, and of course (d), it's broken, but that's beside the point. That point being, if you're going to have a fictitious satellite, why not give it a fictitious satellite name? How about Quarterback? Because it's passing a message. Or TinCan, 'cause it resembles a tin can phone when beaming the message? Anything!

Oh well, what more can one expect? It was an enjoyable show to watch while doing the laundry.

Further thoughts:

The aircraft carrier survives without a scratch. Don't think I've ever played a game of battleship and have a carrier survive.

During the 'sea grid and missiles' scene, the captain directing the firing should have called out D-3 (Delta 3), H-6 or one of the other coordinates that resulted in the famous "You sunk my Battleship!" from the commercials.

There were no cruisers or submarines. Cruisers may not have been much different from what was in the show, but the aliens did not seem to have an effective defense against underwater attacks. Seemed like a sub or two could have laid waste to the big boss alien structure, though I guess the shield extended under water to an unpassable depth and no sub were trapped inside. But come on! I want to see the USS Dallas pull an emergency surfacing maneuver again! "Come on, Big D! Fly!"

Photo source: www.pexels.com/photo/battleship-game-old-school-vintage-84833/, free use license.

Painting: Jedi Interceptor (Micro Machines)

So today's entry features the first of my Micro Machines Star Wars model re-paints. Yes, I am planning on doing more.

Before I get to that exciting bit, a little about the Micro Machines toys/models. Some of them are quite nice. I think that their TIE fighters are well done, and I don't plan on touching a brush to them. The same goes for the Droid Trifighter, a craft I was unfamiliar with until buying the pack that has one. I will likely leave the X-wings alone, except for the two duplicates I ended up with (both are Episode 7 versions). But the ones in my collection that cry out for a paint job are the ARC-170 and the Jedi Interceptors. I think the paint sprayers at the factory must have been mis-aligned on the one I painted as the spot that was supposed to colour the R2 unit's head looked like it was sliding off over its shoulder and running onto the craft.

One other thing to mention, a person might notice the stands I made for these Micro Machines miniatures. In the 90s, Star Wars Micros came with clear plastic stands, as did Star Trek and other sci-fi models. The ones sold in stores now do not include stands, which is just as well considering the old ones had a tendency to turn yellow with prolonged exposure to air. The ones I made are just 1 1/4" squares, about 3/8" thick with a machine bolt through the center (countersunk on the bottom). The machine bolt is just the right thickness to screw into the stand holes of the Micro Machines (yes, the holes are still included though the stands are not). Then, of course, I painted them black. I will likely paint lines for fire arcs as well.

So without any further stalling, here are the pictures of my work. Since I have to of the ships, I included the as yet unpainted one as a 'before' example.

Repaint on the right!

I dry-brushed some black smudges for battle-wear or something. Dark grey for the guns and some silver highlights here and there. Was planning on using some grey as well, but I forgot about it.

Kept the thrusters black, but dry-brushed some silver on them. The R2 unit was a little tough to get looking right, but still looks better than before.

Maybe can't tell in the image, but there's some kind of conduit visible that looks good in silver with the dark grey gun above it and the kind of dark blue around it.

Front view. A bit of a bend in the plastic so one of the wings looks out of line at the front. Wanted to highlight the TIE fighter-like window on the front of the cockpit. This window is not painted in on the original, which kinda makes it look weird.

All in all, a fun project. Turned out better than expected. As all of my model painting has been so far, I used craft acrylics with an finishing clear coat of Pledge with Future Shine. Itching to do some more, but can't make up my mind about which one to do next!

Siege the Day!

We were cleaning up for for Lawrence's upcoming birthday party. After vacuuming the floor, Lawrence wanted to play the castle game. Well, a nice, clean and uncluttered floor makes getting out the Siege! game so much easier. And a nice, thickish carpet makes for great slowing terrain, meaning errant shots don't roll too far away from the play area.

So we set it up, I did the fiddly castle-building while Lawrence set up the trees - his favourite part, next to shooting the siege weapons. We don't play the full rules, he gets tired of them too quickly, so we just set up some dudes and start firing.

The enemy siege works from the tower.

Some of the plastic soldiers were snapped off of their bases the last time they battled - the fight was unsupervised, I only saw the aftermath. I think the two sides must have resorted to the use of feet. Thus we can't fully staff the castle complement and invading army. In fact, some mercenaries were spotted...

The view from the invaders' side. Note time-travelling mercenary (centre).

I'm liking the catapults more for long range firing each time I pull this out. There's one on the right of the above image. I  seem to be more successful with them than with the cannon or the ballista, which are more deadly up close. But I seldom get so close. Of course, because of their coolness factor, I seldom get to use the cannon or ballista. There is a measure of control with the catapults: they have little adjustable bumpers to restrict how far back the flinging arm can go, so you can use that to set the general range and you ad least won't overshoot the target so often. The cannon only has one firing power: super hard. It does have a height adjustment, but that rarely seems to make a difference over the shots. I do like the ballista, which again allows more control over the power of the shot and so seems to allow the shooter to be more accurate. 

We never do figure out a winner. Lawrence has a hard time hitting any of my guys unless he is up close and then his guys start to respawn after a certain loss threshold is reached. 

Anyway, this game is bit nostalgic since I basically played the same thing with my brothers. We would divide dominoes and army men to build up our armies, then flick a marble at each other's forces. I remember seeing this game in the Sears Christmas catalogue or something and wanting it in order to upgrade the way we played at home.

Always fun though. Who doesn't want to to use catapults and cannons to fling marbles at an "exploding" castle.

Started one way, went another.

Boy, I keep hitting end of the month in my posting. I've got a couple of things I should post about at some point, but I want to wait a bit 'cause there ain't much to say about them. But I will tell a story. A story of hope, then woe, then searching, then rejoicing, then trepidation, then acceptance, and finally of compromise.

The Hope:

You may remember from previous posts my desire to build a gaming table for me to keep ongoing games in as I tend to life in between taking turns.

Well, I helped out with a little demolition project at the village skating rink and took home some of the discarded 2x6 planks that I thought would be useful for making a table. I switched up the design in my head again (and then again, and then another time) for how I am going to build my table.

On Friday, I decided to do it! I went out to the shed, pulled out those boards and started measuring and marking and cutting.

As the boards still had white paint on them or were fuzzy and uneven where there was no paint, I laid them out to go over them with a belt sander.

The Woe:

Sanding away and I start seeing green parts where I have gone over with the sander. Little patches of green are appearing all over the wood. Oh no! Is it pressure treated wood? There's no little holes, but that doesn't always mean there's no chemical. I've heard it's no good to use treated lumber indoors, it's toxic or something right?

The Searching:

Then I think, it can't be that bad can it? I go to Google. There's some woodworking sites and house inspection company sites weighing in on the question of using treated lumber indoors. Turns out...

The Rejoicing:

...it's not that bad! As long as you aren't eating off the surface or burning the wood and inhaling the smoke, there is no danger! Especially if finished with a good penetrating stain! I planned to finish it anyway. Yay! I can still use the wood! But I'll buy a mask for sanding it!

The Trepidation:

But there's still the green colour. I won't like that on there, and what if it remains more or less visible, even after staining? What if I decide to sell or give the table away? I might be okay with what I found out about the wood treatments, but others won't be. I'd feel bad giving someone something they didn't agree with without their knowledge.

The Acceptance

I don't want to use treated wood to make a table. Not knowing if the green will be covered adequately, or knowing it's treated but just not telling people who I know would not want to use it, even if their fears are unfounded.

The Compromise

So, hey. It's pressure treated wood. Good for using outdoors. The concrete flags at the bottom of our entrance stairs are all wonky and pose a tripping hazard. I'll use the wood to make a stair to cover up those slabs and reduce that risk. I, guess I can wait a little longer for my table.