Then the sun finally comes up.



I thought this shot might be of interest. This shows the four different materials that are part of the mask's structure. Even though I removed a lot of it, there is still some PC-Marine and Bondo that had been placed by T-VIRUS, and it worked out well; I saw no need to replace it.

There are some parts where there are adhesion problems between the bondo and the urethane, so I'm going to patch it up with Aquamend. So far, my Aquamend patches to solve such problems have been successful; Aquamend bonds great to the urethane and seems to get along to an extent with Bondo and PC-Marine.

Now the left lower tusk tube, as you may recall, is thinner than the one on the opposite side, if you could believe that.

So after I had cracked off the former bondo application on the tusk tube, I decided to use Aquamend.



Instead of thickening the tube all around, I thickened the bottom. I used flooring molding as a cutter and spreader to remove excess Aquamend. The reasoning is that the area where the tusk tubes join is a "V" shape, and that area is very difficult to sand, whereas the neck area has lots of room for sanding.

So after applying as regular a thickness as I could, I cut away excess Aquamend. The rubber flooring strip was then used to pat the Aquamend to the tusk tube, and I simply rolled my hand over the Aquamend to smooth it out. It's actually more irregular than you see in the photo, but good enough for me for the sanding phase.

On this side of the neck, I've patched dips in the neck with Aquamend. The other side was given similar treatment to repair gaps in the welds.

That's it for today!

Mac...you have accomplished more in these few days then I did in a month....truely amazing. I can't begin to tell you how good that is looking. These vaders may not be the best but it will be a prized peice in my collection. Many thanks to you for the help you are giving me!

I... hmm... you are gonna hate me...

Hate you how? No wait...I don't want to know.....yes I do....maybe....

Yeah, we know these Armormask urethane kits are utter crap and are not as advertised, so go ahead and spit it out.

In all honesty though, I'm not trying to do all the work here. I'd like to bring it up to a certain standard and then let T-VIRUS carry it from there. I still want him to have a sense of accomplishment, so I intend to leave the fine sanding and refining up to him!

Oh... this is regarding the nose ridges - everything else doesn't need any of my suggestions or comments as that is coming along nicely. However... the middle ridge is positioned wrong compared to the two others. You placed it pretty much in the middle... however, on the actual prop there is a larger gap between the middle and the top one than there is between the middle and the lower one:

(don't mind that I'm re-using the picture I posted for the Rubies Supreme mod thread... just focus on the original prop picture to see what I mean regarding the nose ridges)

NHM,

Thanks, you're right. I spaced. I was filing this upside-down!

This morning, I struck out to redo the nose. And I spaced again, so please ignore these shots. Honestly, the middle rectangle is closer to the bottom rectangle, but because of some widening it looks centered.

My focus was to refine the neck and make the patches even with the surface. However, the cheeks were crying for attention, so I tried something new. Most of the time when shaping the "hourglassing" of the neck, I used a cylindrical bit attachment on my Black & Decker "Mouse" sander. I used this for the three faces of the cheeks.

By sanding the three surface of the cheeks, I was able to sharpen those three lines. But that's not the breakthrough. You see, with my own Darth Ugly and Golden Armor, I've been accenting cheek details by hand, but I've not done it using a handheld electric sander. There is always risk of the sander being too aggressive. One has to treat these Vader masks as a miniature and do "micro" work instead of "macro".

When doing extreme rebuilds like the neck then,yes, a "macro" job needs to be done.



So I used the sanding bit on the forward-facing cheek surfaces and did what I've never done before: try to sand the edge of the cheek surface before the mouth walls form. As you know, when the mouth wall ends, there is a kind of groove before the cheek begins. That is a very difficult to access area. But I think I pulled it off. I see on some photos of the original prop this area might have some wobbles, so it was a challenge to keep the grinding okay. And anything I miss, I can do by hand later.

The primer started giving way showing my progress.

Did a little bit of sanding to the eyesockets.

I used a bit more acetone to remove the bondy paste (yes, a paste by bondo for filling scratches) that T-VIRUS had used on the upper cheeks.

This shot also shows how the forward cheek surfaces are essentially a triangle. Normally I'd be able to just sharpen the top line and the sides, but here you can see the definition of the bottom line before the mouth sidewalls begin.

THEN and NOW

So here I've come to the point of what to do next.

I should go back in and refine the bridge of the nose. I can't believe I still didn't get it right, but that comes from waking dehyrdated and going straight outside to work on these things. I wasn't fully awake. Coffee would have helped tremendously.

I had done some sanding to the tusk tube on the left. The shaping isn't quite perfect yet; there's a bit to even out.

There is still a LOT of work to be done in sanding and refining the surfaces. I'm only using primer to see the surface definition but if you look up close, you'll see imperfections. Some acetone or mineral spirits (weaker but still works) should be used to "erase" the primer so that the surfaces are sanded down until fully seamless, scratchess and crackless (the bondo paste had cracks).

I have to balance what I am able to do, versus what I should let T-VIRUS do. I know that if it weren't for T-VIRUS inspiring me to use heat, I would never have come this far with reshaping these ugly masks into what they are today. I look back and am grateful for the opportunity to not have lost an important victory to a difficult situation. So as his friend, I don't want to do all the work, but rather I did all the basic necessary work to turn the tides so that when this mask returns to T', it will still be a challenge and will still give him a sense of accomplishment when he finishes it.

Hopefully I've now turned the kit from "impossible" to "manageable."

I'm not belittling the rest. It's not "Oh, just sand it a little, shoot primer and it's ready to paint; what kind of challenge is that?" The sanding required is a good process to develop an eye for detail as well as patience to see this through. Detailing files are still needed to make the eyes and the sides of the bridge of the nose more refined. Also, I was primarily using 80 grit sandpaper to sand everything. Primer won't adequately cover this. He's have to go over everything in 120 grit and then wetsand at 200 grit before it's ready to do the primer. That's all hard work.

Okay, out to the back yard. Primer, he we go:



Pardon the wobbly lines; some of that is Photoshop's sharpening tool being a little too aggressive. But at least you see the line definitions of the cheeks now.

I like how this turned out: