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[Byron_Grom]

So my previous WIP log was extremely cluttered, and I just wanted to put up a nice clean summary of my progress so far.

I started with the concept for a desert survivalist build, taking some inspiration from the tusken raiders.


I got started on my plates, and ordered a bucket from Lonewolf Customs (he really does great work, check him out).



Then there was a whole lot of painting, tinkering, and weathering, leaving me with these:





I struggled to find the Swarzy-aesthetic for a while, but I finally got these put together:






That's right, one rifle with three different barrel options!

The soft parts have been a slow process, but I have a set of scrubs for the flightsuit that just need weathered, and a vest in progress. I still need to do the cape, which I'm thinking of putting a hood on that'll have studs sticking out from it (reminiscent of the tuskens), and a girth sash. I do however have a gunbelt put together (it was pointed out to me that I should consider darkening the pouches to match the belt), and a pair of steel-toes which have been weathered since this picture was taken through daily wear.



I did build a pair of gauntlets, but I didn't feel that they were up to par, so I'm restarting from scratch on those, keeping some of the major design elements.


Thanks for reading, and let me know what you guys think.

[Byron_Grom]

I got my gauntlets put together over the last couple of weeks.





I also made this grenade.

[Naran Baatar]

Really solid work so fair vod. The spacing on your chest plates need to be tuned in a bit but they are taped in place right now so it is understandable

The issues with your spacing right now is; chest plates and collar isn't even and your left side chest plate is hanging over your ab plate. You need to get that spacing even across all the distances.

But other than tightening up your spacing a bit. The paint is spot on, the weathering is great and the weapons looks very "starwazy"

Make sure you carry that weathering over to your soft goods as well as you move into your soft goods.

Keep up the good work vod!

[Byron_Grom]

Really solid work so fair vod. The spacing on your chest plates need to be tuned in a bit but they are taped in place right now so it is understandable

The issues with your spacing right now is; chest plates and collar isn't even and your left side chest plate is hanging over your ab plate. You need to get that spacing even across all the distances.

But other than tightening up your spacing a bit. The paint is spot on, the weathering is great and the weapons looks very "starwazy"

Make sure you carry that weathering over to your soft goods as well as you move into your soft goods.

Keep up the good work vod!

Thank you. I really appreciate hearing all of that. I'm hoping once the plates are mounted to an actual vest, not just taped to a t-shirt that the spacing issues will more or less disappear, and if not, it should just be a few minor tweaks.

As for the weapons, I feel like I'm always tinkering with something. I've got a couple of cheap knockoff nerf mausers in the mail that I'm going to use as bases for a pair of custom DL-style blasters (NOT DL-44s though, there are far too many of those in my opinion). And I've also been working on a concept for a Verpine with EE-3 styling (I also feel like I see a lot of poorly-done Verpines out there and I kind of just want to do one up right).

And yep, weathering soft parts is definitely on my to-do list. Thanks.

[Naran Baatar]

Look forward to seeing what you work up for those blasters and I agree. I am want to stay away from the really common weapons myself it is a big wide world of star wars lots of fun weapons to draw from when crafting if you haven't already take a look at all the random weapons from The Force Awakens there are some really cool designs floating out there, that have a very rough and tumble sort of look to them and base on your work so far I feel like they would be right up your alley!

Keep up the good work vod!

[Byron_Grom]

Thanks. For the mausers, I'm thinking of doing sort of an elongated rectangular barrel, drilling vent holes down the length of it and running copper tube inside and some type of plumbing component for the muzzle. I'm shying away from scopes since they are going to be paired and it wouldn't make any sense to look down a scope when wielding two guns. And lastly, I'm going to cut a pair of name plates with Mando'a script. The left will be named "Fame" and the right will be "Fortune."

I also doodled a sketch of my EE-3 Verpine concept. I believe it checks all the boxes for Verpine, and looks good doing it.

You can't really tell from the sketch, but it'll have 2 scopes mounted side by side for maximum swarzyness.

[Naran Baatar]

Good looking concept you have there sir. I don't see any issue with it.

Look forward to see them come together!

[Byron_Grom]

Good looking concept you have there sir. I don't see any issue with it.

Look forward to see them come together!

Thank you, and it's been a while but here's what I'm thinking for my custom DLs.




In other news, my vest is just about done, and I should be doing plate mounting on Saturday so stay tuned.

[Byron_Grom]

So it's been a little while, but I've been plugging away at it slowly. I put the twin DLs on the back burner and churned out these babies instead.



I've also begun mounting my plates. Apart from the spacing, I've got a lot issues that are surfacing with sizing and angles, but I'm hoping to be able to trim and tweak a few things without having to remake any of the plates.




Let me know what you think and any suggestions you have on improving the plates. Thanks.

*edit

Here's a quick mock-up of what I'm thinking trimming-wise.

[Kruser]

Your red lines look spot on.  If you trim to those dimensions, you'll be in much better shape.  Keep up the good work.

[Chaab Skul]

I ordered from Mandalorain Arsenal... unfortunately.
However I found out LWC is local to me, and I have a side by side Comparison and I'm going to invest in a bucket from him.

[Byron_Grom]

Your red lines look spot on.  If you trim to those dimensions, you'll be in much better shape.  Keep up the good work.

Thank you. I'm just hoping I don't run into issues with the paint chipping.

I ordered from Mandalorain Arsenal... unfortunately.
However I found out LWC is local to me, and I have a side by side Comparison and I'm going to invest in a bucket from him.

I'm very happy with my Lonewolf Customs helmet. The only thing I would say is that the sort of face-plate portion (the bit to either side of where the visor will go) seemed very asymmetrical. I know the original Boba Fett helmet was asymmetrical, but it bothered me enough to warm it up with a heat gun and gently even it out. This process was super easy and not a big deal though, so don't let it scare you away.

[Byron_Grom]

So I had a chance to trim the plates down a little and I ended up with this. The picture quality isn't great, but it should be good enough to see the difference.



Now, I did have an issue with the paint chipping/peeling away from the edges that I trimmed so I'm thinking I'll sand it back and repaint the edges. Does anyone have any recommendations on a better fix for this? I've also been considering a full repaint anyway since I've gotten a lot better at painting and weathering since I did these. Thoughts?

Thanks.

[Ruus bal'Neta]

Rather than do a full repaint, try making the areas where the paint is pulling up battle damage first. The edges would naturally be worn and scuffed over time so it makes sense in an in-universe way.

But if the paint peel is widespread a sand and repaint might be in order. Paint peeling is indicative of something wrong in your paint process, either application, prep or the paint itself. It could be a problem later down the road.

[Byron_Grom]

Rather than do a full repaint, try making the areas where the paint is pulling up battle damage first. The edges would naturally be worn and scuffed over time so it makes sense in an in-universe way.

But if the paint peel is widespread a sand and repaint might be in order. Paint peeling is indicative of something wrong in your paint process, either application, prep or the paint itself. It could be a problem later down the road.

I just decided to do the full repaint. I probably could have gotten away with just "damaging" the edges I trimmed, since the chipping was limited to just those sections, but there were a number of reasons to just go for it and redo the whole job. 1, I've learned a bunch of new techniques for doing weathering since I did the plates. 2, I had actually simplified my paint design the first time around, and now that I'm more confident in my abilities I'd like to do the full thing. 3, (and this is a big one) I hadn't mounted my plates before painting the design on last time so it didn't line up perfectly (it was close, but not perfect) and I wanted to fix that issue. So, I've just decided that a full repaint is the way to go.

[Byron_Grom]

So here's where I'm at plate-wise.







Issues I've noticed:
-Right chest plate looks a little low
-Right shoulder plate seems to be sitting high, but that might just be how I had my arm
-Velcro is visible underneath the plates from the sides, I'm planning to trim it back, color it to match the vest, and eventually add snaps to bring the vest and plates closer together.
-Complete new paint job on front plates
-Picture of the back wasn't dead-on, so the spacing appears off
-Lose about 30 pounds, and tailor the vest to fit 

Let me know if you see anything else, and thanks for checking in.

[Byron_Grom]

Here's where my kit is at.





There are a number of things I still need to do, and a bunch of things I've noticed in these pictures, but at least it's wear-able. Here is my to-do list. Any feedback you might have is very much appreciated.
- Need neck seal, sash, and cape
- Weather soft parts
- Snug up gunbelt (it kept sliding down)
- complete paint job on front torso plates and then sand and blackwash
- Pants look a bit baggy, I'm going to try tucking them in better, but if that doesn't fix it they will get tailored.
- Pant bottoms should have been tucked into boots
- Paint pop rivets on shins
- Trim velcro around edges of plates
- put snaps in key points to sure-up plates
- (eventually) get leather holsters for pistols (I'm not loving the security latch method)
- create attachment methods for grenade and other accessory items

These are just the things that stood out to me/things that I need to do. Let me know what else you see as I'm sure I've missed things. Thanks.

[Byron_Grom]

I've begun adding snaps to a few points where the plates want to pull away from the vest. I've also trimmed back the velcro in a few spots where it was peeking out.



The other thing I've been working on is getting my soft parts weathered. There's still more to do, but here's a quick look.




It's not a huge update, but it's something. Thanks for reading.

[Ruus bal'Neta]

You need a girth or sash belt in there. That will help with the fit and spacing of your plates and gun belt.

[Byron_Grom]

You need a girth or sash belt in there. That will help with the fit and spacing of your plates and gun belt.

Yep, it's on my to-do list.  Thanks

[Byron_Grom]

When I get the chance, I'll be adding my markings back onto my torso plates. Just waiting for a warmer day.

This time around I'll be adding the lower section that I skipped the first time, and bring my chest diamond into the design.

[Byron_Grom]

So here's the repaint. Now I haven't had a chance to put them on yet, but it looks like there's still going to be an issue with the collar and chest plates not lining up paint-job-wise. I'm hoping it will look better once I put everything on, but if it doesn't I'll touch up the lower boundary of the crescent on the collar. I'm also probably going to go in by hand and add in some more white to the more heavily damaged regions to give the pattern a little more life to it.



As always, let me know if you have any suggestions. Thanks.

[Mavik]

You have a solid grasp on what needs to be done. I can add your shoulder bells look pretty small to me. I think it may help the look of them if you made some larger ones.

[Byron_Grom]

You have a solid grasp on what needs to be done. I can add your shoulder bells look pretty small to me. I think it may help the look of them if you made some larger ones.

Hmm, that's not something I'd seen or thought of, but they do look kind of small in the pictures from the side. I think they definitely could be wider, do you think they should be longer too?

*edit

I've gone back in and added more black around the blast marks. I love this part of the job.

[Byron_Grom]

I've begun work on a pack to wear with my kit ( http://mandalorianmercs.org/forum/index.php?topic=130880.0 ). I'm still in the early stages, but it'll look something like the sandtrooper packs, just a bit more streamlined. It will be modular so even when it's "done" I'll be able to build additional units (med kits, environmental-based add-ons, etc) and swap out units when I eventually go for a brigade.

I'll need to redo my backplate to accommodate it (which is probably a good thing anyway since the back plates are probably the weakest part of my kit anyway from a design standpoint), so I've come up with this design.



I'm going to be overlapping the collar plate over top of the back plate and attaching the two of them with snaps so the back plate has a little extra support when I introduce the pack and harness. Hopefully that will keep it from shifting or lifting up.

In other news, my friend should have my remaining soft parts done shortly (I'm hoping to get them tomorrow actually) and then I'll be in a lot better shape. I'll be able to get some fresh pictures up and see what needs to be done.

Thanks for reading, and as always, I appreciate any feedback.