Jump to content

K-2SO Security Droid


Recommended Posts

A little more progress has happened on K2. I still wasn't absolutely sure about the metallic base coat I'd used for the chipping. I was going to tone it down with a coat of matt varnish but after a bit of thought I decided to mist some pale grey over the Alclad which left a nice mattish grey silver. It doesn't actually matter that much as the chips are going to be pretty small, and the subsequent dirt and grime will tone them down anyway

 

31412843844_ac7bd5aa9c_b.jpg

 

The shot above includes the front and back hip/groin parts, which I'd have preferred to attach to the waist section before painting, but the waist has a couple of tiny grill panels that need to be painted in a polished finish first then masked off. The torso also has a bit of polished trim around the neck, so that and the waist have been sprayed with the AK polished aluminium I used for the mouth parts

 

32134928751_7e3a2e4641_b.jpg

 

I'll mask off the grills on the waist, then matt down the finish with another grey overspray. I was intending to do the same thing for the rim around the neck, but after a few failed attempts to cut a ring of masking tape with a compass cutter, I'll do it a different way. The rim is less the a mm thick and the tape kept breaking up as I tried to cut it, but I did end up with the left over inner and outer rings of tape, so I'll do the main painting on the torso then use them to mask and spray the polished rim at the end.

 

I'd ordered a jar of Gunze Aqueous H32 Field Grey 1 (Panzer Grey to you and me) for the main finish, as I thought it would be just about the right tone. What I didn't realise until it came is that it's a gloss finish and a little on the transparent side. It was also slightly lighter than I was expecting, so I mixed a drop of Tamiya flat black into it, which lessened the glossiness and darkened it at the same time.

After a coat of hairspray I gave the head and hip parts a coat of the darkened grey then, after drying for about 10 minutes, I wet the surface and started chipping the paint.

To begin with I used a cocktail stick that I'd sharpened to a chisel edge, but the wood started to soften from the water which was making the chips larger than I wanted, so I switched to using the point of a knife blade. Obviously you have to be pretty careful doing it that way as even a tiny amount of pressure with the blade will scratch the paint down to the plastic, but if you let the weight of the blade skip across the surface, you'll end up with tiny chips

 

31878162780_861319804d_b.jpg

 

I did start off trying to match the chips and scratches to the photo reference of K2, but in the end I just went with the general look of the original. I'm reasonably happy with how the head's come out. The chips are a bit too big, but in this scale it's hard to keep them small enough. The eyes had the holes in the back painted white which goes some way to replicating the look of the real ones

 

 31878157100_e31d5c7dc0_b.jpg

 

32134921591_c2cfe2b2af_b.jpg

 

Next job is to paint and chip his torso, then I'll have to build up the arms and legs, and decide what pose I want him in, as I'll probably have to glue the limbs in position.

 

Andy

Edited by AndyRM101
  • Like 17
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Looks good Andy - I wouldn't worry about the scale of the chips, they look fine to me :)  I'm wondering if some little punched discs of silver foil pasted into the centres of the eyes might do a slightly better job of reflecting the light and giving the impression of those movable "eyeballs" that gave him extra character.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

The chips on the head look fine Andy, as for the rest, well I think most comments so far sum it up!

 

On a side note I have managed to get 2 0.15mm enamelled wires down the leg and through the knee joint, there is a little trick in getting it through the knee involving making a notch in the clear centre.

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Andy if you need a bit more film reference for K2SO pause this video at around the 15 second mark. He has quite a bit of weathering around the arm joint I see.

 

Actually quite a cool video. Love this behind the scenes stuff, especially the aliens.

 

Neil Scanlon has one of the best jobs out there I'd say !

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ovgxkgiDQg

 

Edited by Portaler
Added info
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thanks guys. Sorry for the lack of updates. It's been a hectic week, but I've finally managed to get some more work done on him.

 

On 14/01/2017 at 08:36, Madmonk said:

On a side note I have managed to get 2 0.15mm enamelled wires down the leg and through the knee joint, there is a little trick in getting it through the knee involving making a notch in the clear centre.

 

I'm looking forward to seeing one lit. Painting the back of the lens works okay, and Mike's suggestion of putting foil at the back would work well too, but the effect tends to be lessened by the ribs moulded on the front of the eyes, which have a kind of fresnel effect that diffuse the sharpness of the painted eyeball. I imagine a lit one will probably look sharper as well as being brighter.

 

11 hours ago, Portaler said:

Andy if you need a bit more film reference for K2SO pause this video at around the 15 second mark. He has quite a bit of weathering around the arm joint I see.

 

Thanks for the link. He's actually got more weathering than you initially think, but a lot of it doesn't show up that well against the dark colouring. I'll have to be a little careful how I go about it, as I don't want to cover up the chipping with to much weathering. I'll probably stick to a few grimy filters and some oil runs and streaks.

 

So, as I said at the top, I've got a little more done. I'd kept the waist section separate as there are two little grills that needed painting in a polished finish. I used the AK polished aluminium for them, masked them off then gave the rest of the part a coat of pale grey for the chipping. After a couple of coats of hairspray, it got the same darkened Gunze Panzer grey top coat as used previously, then some light chipping with a small brush and a knife blade, after which the masking for the two grills was removed and the previously painted side panels were clipped into place

 

31588955653_9c81f9f800_b.jpg

 

With that all done I could fit the hip panels and leg joints, and this section, bar the weathering, is done

 

32022659440_7dfeb2f701_b.jpg

 

The torso is also now painted and chipped. As with the head, there was a half-hearted attempt to match the chipping to the real droid, and for the most part, the chips are roughly in the same place. I even added some of the darker scratches that show up on his shoulders by scratching through the metallic base coat to the black plastic underneath. I'd intended to mask and spray the polished ring around the neck, but I managed to rub the paint off the ring to reveal the base coat. It will need a bit of cleaning up, but it's saved me another masking job.

What I didn't do, but really should have, is fill the join across the top of the torso. For some reason, when I was putting it together, I didn't think it would show that much. Oh well, I'll just pretend there's a meant to be a panel line there.

 

31557531614_693ffba927_b.jpg

 

Real K2 for comparison

 

32023409520_34e8e1f3a5_b.jpg

 

So he's currently looking like this...

 

32360600956_67118620d8_b.jpg

 

There's some detail painting and/or decals to add, and I need to make the neck so I can add his head. I've also started on his legs, and I'll upload shots of those later.

 

Andy

 

 

 

  • Like 12
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I tried to use some 1mm fibre guide but there's is not much room in the head, opted for a couple of 0403 LEDs mounted horizontally in the eye holes then painted the rest of the clear part black.  Obviously left the front lenses clear! 

 

Will try try and get a decent photo to show.

 

That is looking good Andy, keep it up'

 

Are you at the Bolton Show on Sunday by any chance, will have the K-2SO lights there.

 

Cheers,

 

Warren

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Looking great. I did a quick check on the chipping accuracy. Not bad ! Close enough for me.

 

Don't know how you would close that panel line without re-painting everything. I'd leave it or convince myself it's on the original. (Just can't see it due to that light flare on the original picture ;-) ) Doesn't look bad at all IMO.

 

Andy are those stock antennae or paint brush ends ? :-)

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

23 hours ago, Madmonk said:

Are you at the Bolton Show on Sunday by any chance, will have the K-2SO lights there.

 

No, unfortunately not. It would have been nice to see the lights in person.

 

23 hours ago, Sgt.Squarehead said:

Reckon you should probably lose that panel line Andy.....Suspect it'll only bug you if you don't.  :whistle:

 

I suspect it will too, but since, as Portaler said, it'll require re-doing the base coat, top coat and chipping, I'm just going to leave it. I really don't know why it didn't occur to me to fill it at the time. I'd been looking at the ref pics for days and knew full well there wasn't a panel line there. Just a bit of brain fade, as I was thinking too much about the painting.

 

15 hours ago, Portaler said:

Andy are those stock antennae or paint brush ends ? :-)

 

You caught me, they're from my stash of 1/12 paint brushes :P. No, they are in fact the kit parts. Just need detail painting.

 

Andy

Link to comment
Share on other sites

As I mentioned a couple of posts up, I've started work on the legs, or one leg to be precise. One of the things I needed to check was whether I could make the knee joints without using the clear inserts, which are there to add some friction resistance to the joints. On the real droid the joints are completely open, which is how I want to make them.

 

The clear plug sits inside the centre section of the knee joint

 

32022653380_353da62e8e_b.jpg

 

Then the two outer halves of the joint clip over the plug from each side

 

31588946733_5d72d15e9a_b.jpg

 

If you leave the plug out, it looks like this, which is how the real thing looks

 

31588945453_0694312a33_b.jpg

 

With the plug out, the joint is just about tight enough to support the upper leg, but there's no way it would support the whole body with gluing the joint in a fixed position. You can also see that the upper leg has quite a prominent seam line where the two halves join. This sanded out okay, but you have to be quite careful with this kit because Bandai have used a really soft plastic across all the parts, soft enough that you can leave a mark in it with your finger nail. You have to be really gentle with any sanding to avoid leaving deep marks in the surface.

 

31588944403_3834e6843a_b.jpg

 

The lower leg is also a two-part assembly, but the join is on a panel line, so it doesn't need any filling/sanding. There's surprisingly little articulation on the legs, at least compared to the earlier figures, but that's probably down to them being so spindly

 

31588942813_887b992c73_b.jpg

 

As you can see, as soon as the hips and torso is added, the whole thing collapses from the weight of the upper body, so the joints will definitely need gluing

 

31588938393_feace33b8d_b.jpg

 

I've also been painting the shoulder rings. These had a metallic base coat like the body and head, then a coat of pale grey with more hairspray chipping

 

32022654540_76708a004a_b.jpg

 

The yellow band and the panels were then masked off and sprayed. There's actually two different greys on the panels, a mid shade on the lower panels and a darker grey on the upper ones

 

31583617434_2e8543ec32_b.jpg

 

They had a black pin wash on the panel lines and were clipped into place on the shoulders. The torso has been detail painted too. I didn't bother with any of the supplied decals, as they aren't that good. The white outline that goes on the front of the chest was particularly bad. Instead of a solid white line, the decal was made up of diagonal checks. It was easier to run some white paint into the panel line, then wipe off the excess

 

32387045996_0de9c7b266_b.jpg

 

32387041946_537b1ed63c_b.jpg

 

Andy

  • Like 11
Link to comment
Share on other sites

He's coming along Andy, and the eyes look ok now we're seeing them in context of the rest of the build.  Not quite a bright and contrasting as the original, but there was precious little you could do really without resorting to lighting. :clap2: Speaking of which, where's Warren with the pic of his lighting attempt? :hmmm:

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Nice build andy👍

Have you though of using some kind of pipe instead of the plug?

i honestly don't know how big the diameter of the hole is but an arrow shaft might be appropriate.

mine at least have nice thin wall relative to their diameter

in any case - nice build and good luck to find something for the joints.

Levin

 

Edited by Levin
  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...