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Ultimate Captain America WW2 Helmet (pic intensive)
http://thepropden.aokforums.com/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=2220		 Page 1 of 1
Author:  CSMacLaren [ Fri Oct 03, 2008 5:56 pm ]
Post subject:  Ultimate Captain America WW2 Helmet (pic intensive)
I'm a big fan of "Ultimates 1 and 2" by Mark Millar and Bryan Hitch. The writing and the movie-like treatment to the layouts are just astounding. The realism treatment gave me a profound appreciation for Captain America.

Reference:
http://www.bacakomik.com/ultimates1.jpg

There is a scene at the end of Book 1 after fighting the Hulk when Tony Stark has Thor and Cap over at his pad. Tony presents Cap with a gift: Cap's original WW2 helmet that had all the scuffs and dirt on it from back in WW2. It was a moment of great sentiment. So I sought to capture that old look.

This wasn't going to be easy for me. One of my challenges was to create something not too cartoony. I'm new at painting, and chose some non-permanent (well, I think they're non-permanent) water-based acrylics.

Let me know what you think. Anything is subject to change.

Image
Author:  CSMacLaren [ Fri Oct 03, 2008 5:57 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Ultimate Captain America WW2 Helmet (pic intensive)
The paint drips were already on the original green paint.

Image
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Author:  CSMacLaren [ Fri Oct 03, 2008 5:58 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Ultimate Captain America WW2 Helmet (pic intensive)
I was told by a friend that the Vietnam era helmets are similar to the WW2 ones, and that most don't know the differences. I'm not studied on militaria, so I wouldn't know, but I'm recreating the comic book look.

Image
Author:  CSMacLaren [ Fri Oct 03, 2008 5:59 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Ultimate Captain America WW2 Helmet (pic intensive)
Unfortunately the helmet doesn't look great if you don't light it directly from above.

I wondered if the baby blue was too bright and if I should go darker. However, that's more or less the blue they used in the comic. Somehow it occurred to me that because Cap is a symbol, that he'd be more visible on the battlefield. And, given his training, he could dodge bullets, so the scuffing on the helmet I painted was basically debris. I chose a helmet without dings because I believe Cap wouldn't ever have gotten clocked on the helmet.

Here is an old-style photo treatment.

Image

Looking forward to your feedback and advice.
Author:  clutch [ Fri Oct 03, 2008 7:16 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Ultimate Captain America WW2 Helmet (pic intensive)
Nice helmet although I wouldn't want to be wearing it on the front line. :hehe-err
Author:  CSMacLaren [ Fri Oct 03, 2008 8:44 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Ultimate Captain America WW2 Helmet (pic intensive)
clutch wrote:
Nice helmet although I wouldn't want to be wearing it on the front line. :hehe-err


You'd need to be a Super Soldier. Cap was a rallying symbol on the battlefield, so he needed to be visible. I thought about that very carefully when selecting the blue. With the Super Soldier serum in his blood, he had very advanced reflexes and response times. He remarked once that he was able to see bullets coming and respond to that. This isn't impossible for regular human beings, as on the old show "That's Incredible" a karate black belt had trained himself to catch arrows. Nick Fury, in his files in "Secret War", said that Cap's high visibility makes him ideal for distracting the enemy. In WW2, while Cap would make a big scene taking the enemy head on, Bucky would do the more black ops type stuff ranging from infiltration and demolition to assassination - so as to not sully the American Flag that Cap symbolized.
Author:  Dann [ Wed Oct 08, 2008 3:55 am ]
Post subject:  Re: Ultimate Captain America WW2 Helmet (pic intensive)
Very very cool. I've never been a huge Cap fan but I can just imagine how sweet the rest of the suit would be just from looking at this awesome helmet.
Author:  jay [ Thu Oct 09, 2008 4:20 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Ultimate Captain America WW2 Helmet (pic intensive)
really great work.
although the lighting makes the piece i think its hard to get the right look when worn, right?
Author:  CSMacLaren [ Tue Jul 21, 2009 4:55 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Ultimate Captain America WW2 Helmet (pic intensive)
jay wrote:
really great work.
although the lighting makes the piece i think its hard to get the right look when worn, right?


Well, from my experience in photography Vader domes, there can be a remarkable difference between photographing at 6 feet versus, say, 20+ feet but zoomed in. Also the "dome positioning" we fuss over with respect to Vader props equally applies here.

Image

In a shot like this, you can see the rear rim of the pot. In the case of Hank's character, he's worn his - or the camera is angled - such that his eyebrows are visible to make the character's emotion evident. The actor behind him tilts his back. The forward pitch angle of the pot will affect what shape the camera picks up.

I have read conflicting web reports on the silhouette of the M1 and M2 helmets. The "Band of Brothers" movie seems to have M2 helmets (they are paratroopers, after all). One web report says the M2's head is more dome-like, but another says it's basically an M1 shell with a different specification of D-shaped bales, chins traps, etc. It's hard to find an original condition M2 and not an M1 that's been modified to look like an M2.

But the M2 is the look I'd be going for - since Cap was with the paratroopers in "The Ultimates" - and it's also how Bryan Hitch drew him! :thumbsup
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