JVR's ROTJ Boba: Armor Updates

So after an extremely frustrating day in the shop I figured I would make a thread detailing my progress on my ROTJ Boba Fett costume. I started this back in November, but have just recently started some of the "heavy lifting" within the past month and a half. Any advice or constructive criticism would be highly encouraged. Thanks!

It's a hodge podge of different sources and materials; Boba Maker, Pepakura, trash can armor, rattle can paints, MOW, animefan, ALL of Rafal's templates, etc.

So for the past week I've been working on getting the helmet done. I purchased an animefan Boba bucket a while back and it is absolutely great for the money. The trimming and prep work didn't take more than a night and I got out of it without any sort of problems or setbacks. I mounted the visor using the chicago screws + rubber grommet method and I'm very pleased with the result.



Next, I drilled holes for the ear piece that covers the rangefinder, epoxied 1 - 1/4 bolts to the ear piece, and attached the earpiece and rangefinder via bolts and rubber grommets. I am still unsure whether or not I will be making the rangefinder functional or not, but I wanted the option there, so I made sure it had the full range of movement.

As I have somewhat limited funds and shop tools I decided to go with the rattlecan route for painting. I am using a combination of Rafal's painting templates and stormtrooperguy's rattlecan paint tutorial and reference photos. So far I have the back panels, the visor and red trim, and the keyholes done. I used a large amount of layering and masking and layering and masking. I used a handful of difference methods for applying the spray paint. It may be a little over weathered, but overall I'm quite pleased with it. After all, I'm not so much going for 100% movie accuracy, I'm just going for movie quality. I'm more or less using the more noticeable details as "landmarks" and doing it all by eye, so it's certainly not as movie-accurate as it could be.

Here are the back panels and keyholes





The visor is where the frustration began tonight. It seemed like everything I was doing was going wrong- my masking wasn't effective so I started from square one, then I accidentally painted the silver parts with gray only to realize "something doesn't look right"... I just about had a melt down when I realized what I'd done... but then 3rd time's the charm- I decided I'd lay down the red via spray, and brush the silver and metal colors on by hand. I'm extremely pleased with how the visor came out... AFTER 3 tries.





I'll post up the armor soon. The shoulder bells, chest plate and center diamond, and abdominal plate are all finished and just need a little weathering before I call them complete.

Thanks for looking,
Joshua C.

Update 6-2-16: New Armor and paint job starting at Post # 32!

Good work so far. Keep it up.

So this picture was taken with a ****** cell phone, but it was taken in natural lighting.

Upon further inspection of the reference photos I've realized that my red is far too dark. I fear I may have misted too much black over the top. I am planning on repainting that area. I'm very pleased with how the dome has come out so far. All I have left are the ears, some touchup, kill stripes, and repainting the red areas.

I'm going to have to start doing a better job of cataloging my build progress. So it's been a handful of months and I've made a bunch of progress, but there is still a lot more to go.

Currently I'm working on my jetpack, knees, and will probably redo my chest armor soon. I need to find a new ammo belt, because the one I bought was the first item I ever purchased for the build, and is nowhere near correct for Boba.

I'm pretty happy with how the helmet came out. I was going to repaint the red because it is to dark, but I think I'll just save that for the next helmet build.



I've been really happy with Stormtrooperguy's rattlecan colors and Raf's templates.

This is almost the most current picture I have of Manny in the Boba outfit. Again, please excuse the belt. I promise I'll fix it.



I'll try and get some pictures up of the knees, jetpack, and shin tool progress over the next few days.

Looking good so far the chest armor looks a little small in my opinion though I'm no expert, and I must say I'm lovin that bucket!

grenater said:

Looking good so far the chest armor looks a little small in my opinion though I'm no expert, and I must say I'm lovin that bucket!

Click to expand...

I'm actually going to be ordering some larger armor from RKD soon. It is definitely just a shade too small. The vest came fitted with grommets from BM, and the armor I have on there just barely makes the grommets.

Does anybody have any idea of a thread or personal experience of what rattle can colors to use on the jetpack? I thought I'd seen a thread on it a while ago, but I just did a search and couldn't find it. Any help would be greatly appreciated. I think it used deep blue, antique white, and of course silver, but I can't remember the other colors.

Never mind! I found the thread. It is Toolguy's awesome rattle can paint up.

http://www.thedentedhelmet.com/f20/pepakura-jetpack-47919/

This will definitely be what I'll be going off of to paint up my pack.

So I have finished the cod and kidney plates. Unfortunately I don't have any progress pictures of the paint work.

I got a new ammo belt that is far better than the one I had before. It's non-functional, but it'll work for now.

I finished the knee pads. They are RKD shells, but I can't remember exactly where I got the darts from. They might have been off eBay? I went with heavy duty snap fasteners for the elastic band, and I'll probably attach some heavy duty velcro to the knees of the flight suit as well.



And here is where I stand currently with the whole set.



I have started painting the JP. That is the next immediate project. I got in my RKD chest set, and the size looked much better than the set I currently have on the flak vest.

Again, any comments or criticism would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
JVR

I like your overall progress, looks good!... My suggestion would be weathering and harmonizing the overall look as you put the pieces of your Boba puzzle together

MasterEdi said:

I like your overall progress, looks good!... My suggestion would be weathering and harmonizing the overall look as you put the pieces of your Boba puzzle together

Click to expand...

What do you mean by harmonizing, or how would you go about doing it?

So far everything has been weathered, either by myself, or by the person I purchased it from. I've weathered pretty much everything, but the flightsuit and flak vest were done by BobaMaker.

Believe me, I'm a new guy to the whole TDH, and I'm not an expert. The quality of work produced by all these pros is great! But when we piece things together from different makers things can start to look great but a little off. Harmonize your whole costume with screen shots... Like for ROTJ, you want it to feel like Fett in the Dunes of Tatooine right? ...sand, dirt, weathered.. I suggest taking screenshots, production shots, and your Fett, compare them closely, adjust accordingly... I hope I'm making sense. But believe me your Fett looks great!

Most of the parts I've done have been weathered with coffee grounds, graphite, and various paints. Looking at this picture it would appear that my flak vest is not weathered quite enough, but I don't want to overdo it either.

Thanks for the compliments as well.

Pictures will definitely wash out the weathering, or make it look like there isn't as much as there is. In this case, I went for more weathering so that the work I did is picked up in pictures. As of right now, I can see you've done the spats, but the rest of the soft parts could use more layers.

I'll definitely do some more weathering once I complete all the parts. Mostly I'd like to grey up the flak vest a bit more. So thanks for the recommendations on that guys.

I just recently started the paint up on the jetpack. The thrusters are done and I've started doing the rocket/ top of jetpack.

Keep up the good work man.

Well, here comes my annual update I guess.

I finished the paint job on my jetpack, which was one of the parts I had been dreading the most. The masking alone was enough to drive a man insane, but it's done, and I'm pretty darn happy about it. I ended up securing my thrusters with hooks and paracord, which helps cut down on a tiny bit of weight. Being that I have a MOW jetpack, I will take any weight loss I can get.



Next on the slate was doing THE part I was dreading the most... gauntlets. I finally started learning to airbrush while I was doing the gauntlets, so they are a mixture of rattlecan and (crappy beginner) airbrush. The painting went fine. The assembly and shaping went pretty well. Staining the hoses went pretty well. Attaching the hoses to the inside of the sleeve did not go great. As soon as I went to bend my arm, I apparently didn't leave enough slack in the elastic because I snapped off the hose connector on the whipcord housing. Some things were said. A few things were thrown... After an appropriate cool-down period I drilled a hole into the whipcord housing, ran a screw half way into the connector, and epoxied the other half into the whipcord housing. I tested it's strength a bit ago and it is stout. I had to kind of rush the repaint on the broken area though, so that is something I'll have to revisit soon.



I've also made a few adjustments to the flightsuit and flak jacket. I added a cord to the zipper on the back of the flak vest so I can put it on myself. I took Edi's advice and added a lot of black and brown to all of the fabric pieces. I added velcro to the flightsuit to keep the knees, cod, and kidney plate in place. I darkened up the boots considerably compared to the shade I had them painted before.



All I have left is jetpack harness straps, and to cut the appropriate holes in the flak vest for the harness. At that point I will have a complete ROTJ Boba, but obviously I won't be finished.



So I have Minneapolis Wizard World this coming weekend, and that is my deadline for having things complete. It will be far from being 501st approved, but it's time for me to get this project out there and enjoy it. I'm hoping I can put some fans in the helmet prior to the con. I actually put on the entire costume (minus the jetpack and gauntlets) tonight and it felt great. Everything feels pretty sturdy and it wasn't too hot just walking around the house for a bit. I can put on everything by myself aside from my right gauntlet and the jetpack. Has anyone here figured out a way to get the jetpack on by themselves? Eventually I'd love to be able to make the suit work without needing a handler.

The list of things I still plan on fixing after the con are:

Make a larger set of chest armor
Repaint all of the body armor pieces with Humbrol colors
Get a more accurate cape
Eventually get a MOW 2 piece flightsuit- Put mesh fabric between the shoulder blades and on the chest of the flightsuit
Eventually repaint the helmet and gaunts with Humbrol colors

So there it is for now. I'll be happy to have it completed and get a few photos soon.

Joshua

So tonight I ran into a bit of an issue...

Now that I finished my harness and adjusted it for my jetpack, whenever I put on my backplate and collar piece over the harness, the harness is pulling that whole assembly rearward to the point of it contacting my throat slightly. It wouldn't be such an issue, but it is widening the gap between my chest armor and the collar piece, making the whole front look a little wonky.

Maybe it's because I'm really sleep deprived, but I cannot seem to figure out what is causing this. Without the harness the backplate and collar sit fine, and without the backplate and collar the harness and JP sit fine, but together it is a colossal nightmare (read: fairly minor inconvenience). Any ideas on how to remedy this situation, or at least what could be causing it? I just spent 2 hours adjusting the harness up and down, the upper straps forward and backward... and nothing seemed to do it.

It sounds like the collar and backplate are too tight to fit over the jetpack harness, can you adjust the fit at the collar ends? Make sure the bottom horizontal plate ends are outside the backplate.

Beautiful airbrush work - have professional experience?