Tag Archives: ahsokalives

Determined today is the last for my hilts

#ahsokalives hilts are looking lovely. But there is an entity that skews when I try to slice through to make the hilts in short sections. I have a feeling it actually is SKU trying to tidy. So I’ll have to move the body of the hilts, erase one entity look inside and then close it all up before putting the cutting entity through.

So I am preparing for a day of swears. Yes. I do. I try to turn them into not obvious swears but sometimes it sort of slips through.

Right. Prep.

Also i’m allowed the glass topped TV table to use for my 3D printer! Woo. That means I can print with ABS as you need a well ventilated area. My workroom is, but I do not have any stable surface. Aside from my overlocker. I coooouuld use that. Actually. we’ll see. I want to replace the current heavy frame tv table out there with shelve for my molds anyway. The Togruta molds will be difficult but I also have a cunning plan (Trademark Baldrick) to help. Also the new position would be ideal.

Okay.

Now to prep for the day as this is all very exciting.

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Ahsoka hilt madness

As in the so called definition of madness. Yes I spent a lot of time yesterday trying to do something expecting it to work. In part because the tutortial I used did not really make full use of SKUs component and group features.

I want to make my hilt fool proof for printing and so I’m dividing them up into shorter sections to print only so high- they are hollow so too tall and there is the risk they will skew. This has to do with Z axis (though my machine has a steel frame- less of an issue unless there is a flaw) and cooling/heating issues. I have a heated plate so that is good.

Anyway. to make a slice. Make a square on the green axis make it a component. And then you can merrily place it through your model and it won’t move anything. Then select everything, explode curves, and intersect selection. Then you have the slices in place.

But keep them all as separate pieces before then.

On the right is me using the guide and this shape stretched some interior planes. No idea why. But I didn’t notice until I have all my hilts divided and ready for adding internal support for snapping the pieces together.

So….. I know now. I have had practice now and it means I should., should, be able to do the last tidying of proportions today.

I have been working to the limits of the resolution my printer can manage (apparently 100microns, 0.1mm) but I need to test my machine. PLA at 0.2mm is a bit chunky. I have seen how fine 0.1mm looks on the standard owl model but I don’t know it if was PLA or ABS.

I now have 1.75mm ABS so can test the machine again. And at 0.1mm

I want to make it easier so I’m trying to round all my measurements to full mm so that’s what I’m doing today. Except for anything to do with the emitter. Though I guess I do now know how to cut through a little more easily…

Oh man. What took a couple of days to get “mostly done” for a solid print is taking ages because I want a fancy one that can hold a blade.

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Ahsoka progress

I sometimes think I should try and capture the fun times of working with SKU on screen record. And with mic on so you can hear the sears. They get a creative. Though the f’bomb is usually muttered. and the s’bomb gets stretched out to sheee-er-gerrr.

I saw my PC space with other so it means trying for levity in the stress.

So lots of what the foo, whyyyyyyy? *push keyboard away*  but whhh-hy-hhy-hy-hy-hy???

Never the less she persisted! Yes I went there. It’s basically the mantra of my life. And there will be a post!

I started with the original images, Note, this is a screenshot, it really is that blurry to work with. I wanted to do a line art originally but used a photocopy in hand and on screen just scaled to hight.

I actually then started a new model with the hilts cropped to height to make it muuuuch easier. And yes, when you import images you need to scale them once in as well. Unless there is a keyboard trick… there probably is.

 

then I made a series of guides and then drew curves and loved it. Until I realised yes, the sides are totally rounded, I did say the images are fuzzy!

So, Viola! (that was a pun.) New guides new scaled image and new face made the same way. From here I extruded a series of tubes leaving the inside empty. It worked really well for Asajj. But I am making mie a touch simple in the joins this time.

Guides guides everywhere!!!!! This was to create the inset grip of the longer hilt. Basically pecil and extrude and some maths!

And yep the decorations are in place. But I wound up having to move them on my longer hilt. That was just a bit frustrating.

Then came the other pieces; inset switches, what i think are peg/screws to hold the end caps in place, the long end cap holder, and the large button. Finally the emitter caps!

The large button. I goofed and wound up with the circle not centred so yesterday was a day of fixing issues like this. I placed everything together (they are all separate components so they will print separately and in whatever orientation works best. I also adjusted length and made the end cap holders fit smoothly to let them pass so we can gain acccess to the insides to put electronics inside.

Here you can see I had yet to place the end caps. But the are there not. I also got the emitters to their final shapes and sizes. One emitter needs some smoothing but aside from that I think I’m happy.

So today with the emitters lined up correctly it’s time to get the pencil out and start cutting.! Had a few practices but it’s not really been perfectly even as I didn’t have then perfectly on my guides.

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ahsoka greeblies!

#ahsokalives hilts with nearly all the little buttons. I also cleaned out the inside of each piece, tidying up guidelines or removing interior lines and planes.

So to make the D ring holder actually fit I have to be very careful about the curves. I see they sort of curve there in the line art but it is a bit much to try to do right now. Also I need to make the emmitter and make sure that fits in the end of the sabers. They are different to each other too.

I need to rest my ribs again. It’s also quite cold so a bit of warmth from the blanket will be good too 🙂

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Ahsoka hilt snag

I’ve been using the @starwarsrebels supplied concept images of Ahsoka and found I’m only a tiny bit shorter than her, which sort of balances out if I wear orthotics in the boots, which is sensible, and can potentially just pad a little more between me and the headpiece.

(edit, this was supposed to be posted before my last post but well.. I mistake the “add tags” and “publish” buttons!)

So I decided I will scale to the appropriate height of her vs me as it won’t be so far off as to look like I’m carrying oversized versions.

But I want to eventually put a blade in. But even with a little rounding up to account for the blurring of the lines when scaled I wind up with a 20mm thickness. My Shaak Ti and Talon blades are 20mm. I find it mimics the OT and SWR style well while the 25mm (1″) blades often used really mimic the prequels and TCW.

What this means is I would want at least 24mm thickness. This is because there is an inset piece that should be at least 1mm. That gives me 1mm thickness around the blade- a bit close but my ventress hilts are that thin in places. And I could also cut a piece of the same acrylic tubing to support vertically on the belts. Or I could just accept that I can’t have both? Though I did just scale the fronts to match as if I was going for 22mm thickness and that is not so bad. So maybe I could do that.

This has a 3mm thickness and is at the to scale size. Now to see what I can do with a 2mm thickness.

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Ahsoka progress means sketchup progress

I totally forgot how to do all of this so what should have taken a half hour took a few. But I did finally settle on scale. I enlarged 10% on the face and 20% on the side. It really was the only way to keep length and minimise thickness disruption. Now I need to remeasure and work on the weird grip.

Okay I forgot to publish so here is where I am now!

Next is to figure out the size of the diamonds to add them in and also make the emitter. But I forgot to have lunch and also my ribs are so sore I have to have a lie down.

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ahsoka progress

I was very worried as my latex thickener took a while to arrive and my molds wound up soaking too long. But it’s all good 🙂 But the latex I had was certainly bad. Not so bad that it couldn’t be rescued but rescuing requires a lot of work 🙂

Thickener and coloidal silica 🙂 I probably should have grabbed microballoons, explained later 🙂

I used up as much of my latex as I could- two bottles of thickener will turn 2.5L of latex into a very thick consistancy, but it does still run, not immediately but over a few hours.

What have I done here you may ask. Well here is the answer 🙂

Self supporting latex

In order to have self supporting horns but an adjustable thickness tentacle latex layer I first lay up a thick layer of the thickened latex (for this also with some added silica to limit warping) then  a layer of peeled foam in 5mm or 10mm thicknesses soaked in a latex and water mix. I push the foam into the latex just enough to adhere but leave a layer of just latex to create a skin to the foam.

This is tricky! If the environment is too warm the latex well turn tacky while working with it causing deformities. This has been my fifth run and it’s the first time this hasn’t happened because it was much cooler yesterday than any other day this summer.

The peeled foam is very soft, very soft and not at all self supporting alone. In fact its use is to pad and create a soft layer.

But once soaked in latex and left to cure it becomes fairly rigid. The cells become rigid but the air pockets remain.

The foam also tends to not pull away from the walls of the mold while the latex is curing. This makes it much easier to be able to control warping of large pieces like this. It also reduces weight and can be stitched then glued/latexed to hide the join. It is also possible to pare back the foam with a knife to thin it out for the tentacles.

This is sort of a reverse industry standard method of skinning foam for creature effects. Having a mold means I control the skin texture a lot more but means working a bit blind in terms of being able to know exactly how thick that skin is.

This standard method is how I make my lekku in general. And as I work to finish this piece I’ll be able to share tips on how to do that- it still requires skill to avoid limiting stretch of the foam and adding  weight! I also want to update my Rachi Lekku and Talon lekku 🙂

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ahsoka progress

That is leather wetforming on two sets of forms. So lucky to have been given one and the other was a very reasonable auction!

 

Today I have put some chrome tanned leather in water to soften so I can form those. There will be a layer of cloth between to keep them stabilised.

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scaling part 2

Whoops, I miscalculated yesterday. The figure is actually 135mm from heel to crown. And the saber definitely is shorter than inside elbow to knuckles.

So

x/168=23/135

x= 28.622

30492887806_b8d8f53d6d_o ahsokascalere2 ahsokascalere

So that actually works. I know this is shorter than in the show, and is shorter if I go by the same calculation of the concept art. That is by all the means possible- comparing the length of forearm or hip to knee or straight up measurement from crown to heel.

So I think if I go for 12″ or 30cm (probably 30cm as I can more easily work out wall thickness based on current 3D printer specs) I’ll have something that is as close to perfect as possible.

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Scaling funtimes

I’ve taken the concept art of Ahsoka and scaled her to my height- so 168cm from heel to top of head- so I cropped the montral off and the heels of the boots.

And I have checked head height is accurate, height from waist to should is right..

Her “big” lightsaber hilt winds up 34cm long! And yeah in the concept you can see it goes from about hip crease to above the knee.

It just feels very weird!

I’m going to check the scale on the figure because I don’t think they follow that proportion. The figure is about 125mm from heel to crown.

X/168= 21/125

X= 28.224

Hmmm. I wonder if I should just say 30cm/12″? I know one person has gone for 12″ and it does seem to be the middle ground.

I grabbed these images as screencaps, her arm and saber are approximately on the same angle, mirrored, and then in line:

ahsokascalere ahsokascalere2

I used a line tool for the length of the light saber then copied to a new layer and altered the angle to follow the arm.

In both cases they line up.

And that is as close to 30cm on me as can be fairly judged.

To note, the saber is curved, quite definitely so, but I have printed out and used my ruler to compare length from top to bottom along the surface and at right angle to the top. It’s very similar.

So, now that I have a dimension I am happy with I can actually start work in Sketchup!

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