The scene where Luke Skywalker removes his fathers mask in ROTJ was the greatest experience for me as I was a kid...and it hasn´t changed.
So I was looking for a really accurate ROTJ-Reveal set over the years.But I found nothing...the ketzermask was the best...but it is impossible to become one and in a good quality.And the ketzer has not all details in the mold.


To build a Reveal is an own science.The most pics of this prop are made on the SW-expos over the years.There are some very nice shots and detailshots out there..but its hard to say how the mask would look in neutral position.Most times they used thick rubberpieces under under the backsides of the mask,complete cloth material under the mask or only put the back of the mask on a platform.
All this methodes are adulterate the overall look of the mask.Same with the lights and the flash...so its impossible to find the 100% right color.






But there will be some good shots and positions where you can see the right shape...I will show some of them in this thread later.


I collected over 1000 pics of this prop over the years..some are great others not.But I think I´ve seen most important details of this mask .

So it is on me to build a reveal that looks not like a joke next to the original.I really hope that I can do that.;-)


I bought an old portumac set years ago...he told me that his mask is absolute screenaccurate...a joke.The only points that are useful on his mold are the position of the windows for the dynodes,the size of this crown and that he used an old DP DLX Vaderhelmet as the base of his mask.Every of the other details are wrong!



And it was a lot of work to make the 2 parts inline..



and overall not a good quality in my eyes...




So what is to do?

-The complete shape of the crown is wrong.
-The edge of the crown is wrong
-The nose is too small and wrong shape
-bottom edge of the lower jaw is wrong
-the mask has no rails under the facemask
-and no slots in the lower jaw for the rails
-the round sidetubes are not on the sides of the mask
-the small ramps are not on the lower jawpiece
-the eyebrows are too pointed





Ok...lets start with the new crown...to find out the right size of my disc I used this trick:



All parts I found online from plastruct and others had not the right shape and dimensions..so I used a metaldisc that I´ve found in a hardwarestore.
After cutting the old crown away and sand the rest down to the right height I build it in:



After that the really hard way...cutting the big and the 2 small holes in the disc...I used 4 diamond dremel discs and became some burned fingers for that...








The next step is the edge of the disc...its round and not sharp:






And needs to mold the rest of the crown,too:




Here next to the original:











So ok...next step is the nose...that is very tricky to sculpt that from hand but I have a ROTJ fiberglasshelmet in my collection to
show the right dimensions.

Ok it starts with a lot of green putty to become the rough shape...








Then starts the sanding and molding...a long process...you need to add very fine material in the spaces because portumacs are
complete out of shape...



My nose and grooves next to the originals:








The back and some little details of the facemask I will do later...lets look on the lower jaw piece:
Portumac created his own railsystem for the facemask but he cutted the sidetubes in the half.So the upper mask can be fixed between this half tubes.



That is ok..but complete wrong.The original has a "grooves/rails"system and on the front are "ramps" that are looking a little bit over the sidetubes.








The sidetubes are complete round with a thin piece of metal or something between the mask and the tubes.
This is the hardest part of the complete build,because facemask,sidetubes and the little tubes on the front must fit perfect together.







First step is to cut the wrong tubes away:



After that I cutted the spaces under the mask and molded the ramps on the lower jaw:




The next step are the grooves in the lower jaw and the rails under the facemask.

I used stripes ABS-Plastic and putty for that:






The new tubes...:













So...and here the finished tubes and next to the originalpart:

Great eye for detail & fantastic work.
Thanks for posting.. looking forward to following your developments..
Where's the popcorn...

Cool project.

Hey Marc you old bone.
Great progress you have made so far.
Looks realy amazing so far!

Stefan,altes Haus...ewig nichts von dir gehört!

Thanks for your great words...hope I can finish the build very soon.

Looking great so far, you have a good eye for details, I would love to attempt a build like this one day so I will be watching your progress, good job and thanks for posting

Yeah be prepared for a big mail mate!

Anwered you!

Ok...I think its time to build the keys on the crown.The keys from portumac are way too small for my mask and wrong shape.The distance from to the keys to the sinkpart is very important.
Not only from the top..from the front look,too.

I made it with photocomparison...left is my mask...right the originalprop..you can see that the originalkeys are a lot longer:




My keys are also made from pics of the originalmask...left Originals...right my masters made from aluminium:



Its time to make a mold and casting a lot of keys.....:

Cool work. Looking great so far. Keep up the good work!

Indeed your dedication could be seen - i'll follow this WIP with interest

Thanks guys...happy that you like it.

Ok the next step are this "lines"on the front of the facemask.I wanna have this in my mold.



I use fine wire for that.





Molded in the masksurface:




Next step is the lower edge of the bottompart..the most vaderhelmets having a great molded edge for comfortable wearing the facemask.But the reveal has a cutted egde and is slopy to the right side.So I made this too.First step is to cut the edge on the right height.

Are you planning on molding this face mask and jaw piece? That is not advisable unless you have permission from Portumac, since it is his kit you are using.

Also, the marked lines are not as raised as you are doing with the wire. The one at the brow between the eyes and nose bridge looks like a masking tape line and the one up at the crown is a crack in the paint that wasn't there during filming - that happened when the face mask was dropped accidentally.

What is still from portumac on my mask?I rebuild all of his mold..only the parts that he recasted from a DP-Deluxe are still there.

And I think your wrong...the lines are no stripes from a tape...they are glue or something in line under the paint and ripped paint on this areas.






And the nose...:

That's not the point. The base piece is still a Portumac. You cannot just copy his piece without his permission, regardless of how much you alter it.

Also, the ridge above the nose bridge is exactly what a tape line can look like. The brow groove is damage caused by the helmet dropping, making the paint crack between the face mask and whatever they used for the top dome mount piece. We know that is what caused that damage, so there's really no arguing it.