How to create these parts.

[_ferry_]

I was checking this mod:
http://www.thebestcasescenario.com/index.php?module=photoshare&type=show&func=viewimage&iid=6&thumbnail=0&viewkey=
Because i want to create some kind of aliën too. but much bigger, +/- the height of a midi tower. So i started with a piece of hard foam, and made the shape of an aliën. After that i bondo'ed it, to make the skin hard. The foam was too soft to paint and not detailed enough, i guess you understand. But it is a hell of a job to get the whole thing covered without airgaps in the bondo. Sanding, bondo'ing, and repeat that a few times. I tried 1 leg and it worked out great, but still some gaps are left and not shure if it's strong enough.

So i was wondering how the alien in the link above was made. I wasn't able to find a worklog, it's smaller than my alien so it made the forming job might a bit easyer. Is there some kind of special clay? I've got milliput, but it's to expensive to create a whole alien of it. But it would be the perfect material for this.

IMHO the best way would be to create a foam body and cover it with clay, let it dry, add details with milliput and dremel and paint it after that. But i'm not shure if that's possible. Otherwise there is nothing left to take a lot of bondo and time and create it on the way i'm doing now.

[_ferry_]

Lol, i think i found something already :D
http://www.thebestcasescenario.com/forum/showthread.php?t=408&highlight=alien

Sculpey should do the trick? I still can make a mall so it don't need to be massive.

[Aero]

well, Sculpey is really only good for small models, I don't think it would work good for a whole case. It sounded like you were on the right track before. Foam, bondo, bondo, etc. I would recommend staying with that and then giving a layer of plaster to make fine details in, or jsut make them in the bondo. But I've never modled something this detailed before, might want to wait for some else to reply as well.

[_ferry_]

Thanks. :)

I was thinking about a rough modelframe from wood/silver foil, and cover that with clay. So the skin is only a few mm thick. Compared to bondo i can change it again and again until the result is right. I like that because it makes me able to modify the size of it when i found out it's too small.
The plan is to make a head, body, and arms+legs, see how the size is, and put it in the oven when it's the correct size. after that i can glue it together and fill the gaps with some bondo. Then sand it down a bit and paint it.

Another option witch other people told me about is polyester, but i think the time to get a good flat skin is just as hard as the bondo job.

At last there is special dentist plaster. But i don't know if i should make a hollow form for it to fill with plaster, or that i could use it like clay. Or maybe make a foam model and dip it into the plaster?

So many choises :?

[crazybillybob]

You can always make a Clay model then pour plaster around it (to form a mold) then Splash mold the skin with Plastic Resin. Splash molding is where you take the mold and pour just a bit of resin into it (1/8 -1/4 the total volume of the mold) then roll the mold around till the resin covers all of the inside, keep it moveing in diffrent directions till the resin hardens (about 5-10Mins)....Your literaly splashing resin around the inside of the mold. Plastic resins are very strong, and are mixed by weight.....for more on plastic resins got to SmoothOn 's How to website (http://www.smoothon.com/howto.htm) They have good tutorials on how to make molds and pour resin, they also sell a top qauilty plastic resin product.

Once the Resin is hard you can cut out segments with a dremel or razor knife, it picks up fine details from the mold, and after washing with dish soap and wipeing it back down with alcohol (this gets rid of the "mold" release normaly a silicon base product the doesn't allow anything to stick to it (paint just bubbles)) it paints very easily, with enamals or others.

If you want allot of detail in the mold use Silicone for the inside 1/2" of the mold and back it with a "mother" mold of plaster to keep it from flexing to much. This is all on the smoothon web site and the do a better job explaining the details them I'm doing.

OR you can make the model of the body part leg foot and the cover it in fiber glass. Use the fiberglass to hold the foot the the leg and so on...... Any way you do it it's going to cost some money and take allot of work to make it look Right. Just trying to give you a reality check, not stop you....(Like I'm going to tell anyone not to try it :) I'm the Crazy Redneck with a 1:1 R2 in his living room :) ) This could be a great mod, just settle in for allot of work and don't get dicouraged if it seems like you've been working on this thing for ever and you still just have apile of parts. Because once you have all those parts laying there it will go together in a hurry!!! and that my friend is when all that work is worth it!!!

Good Luck..... Love The Idea make sure you start a work log on this !!!!

CrazyBillyBob

[_ferry_]

Wow, lots of info. I have no experience with making a mold etc. In fact that's also 1 of the reasons i'm starting this mod hehe. But i gonna translate your reply after a few hours of sleep (plaster for example means 'gips' in Dutch, so the words doesn't realy look the same 8) ) When i translated it into dutch it should be clear to me i guess.

Offcourse i would like to start a worklog. It's now in the planning and experimental phase, when i have some real progress i'll start one.

[_ferry_]

I've received the sculpey clay, and made a basic head (it's working great!), but i'm wondering 1 thing: Can i put the rough made head in the oven, and after that use super sculpey to add the details and put it in the oven again. (to be shure it's not gonna break, dry-out or burn). The reason for that is that the head is too big to add all the details at once. I've got normal sculpey for the head, and super sculpey for the details. The frame is made of 1,2mm welding wire with aluminium foil around it.

Did some experiments:
http://tweakers.net/ext/f/b61f7a8a7bc0eaf16a6741baa249e752/full.jpg
The mainly part is normal sculpey (usualy white), the brown part is super.
The temperature was not high enough so it was not hardened as it should be i think. So i raised the temperature and added another piece of super skulpey on the top left. It's harder than the rest and kept the same color.

Simple test, but learned alot :D