Eli Jinn's 3D Printed & Spray Painted ESB Helmet

[Eli Jinn]

Who is the make of your helmet?? I only ask because that’s why you might have been having so many problems with scaling for the stencils. If you don’t have a lineage helmet for ESB than the stencils won’t work quite well and things will look off if you aren’t careful.

I'm using a 3D printed helmet. The model was from stryker181 who based it off of RafalFett's helmet model. I've heard that MinuteFett is working on a helmet .stl though, so I'll definitely get my hands on that as soon as it's available.

 

[robotzo]

is that maroon layer supposed to be your purplish layer, or the main red layer?

 

[Eli Jinn]

is that maroon layer supposed to be your purplish layer, or the main red layer?

The purple, the lighting makes it look significantly brighter than it really is, but once the red is on, it figures itself out. For example, the back headband looked the same way when I took pictures without the red:

 

[robotzo]

oh yeah thats a major difference

 

[spicy fett]

Have you thought about making the switch to airbrushing?? I’m only asking because from what I can see especially just starting out you got some skill and I really think if you got even a cheap airbrush I personally like single action but that’s another thing lol I just think it would help you get more accuracy and it would take your game to a new level!!

 

[Eli Jinn]

Have you thought about making the switch to airbrushing?? I’m only asking because from what I can see especially just starting out you got some skill and I really think if you got even a cheap airbrush I personally like single action but that’s another thing lol I just think it would help you get more accuracy and it would take your game to a new level!!

Absolutely! I'm just working with what I've got right now, but I could probably sell this bucket and use the money to get myself an airbrush

 

[Eli Jinn]

Mandibles are done, without the silver as usual.

I don't know how I feel about them. I'm not super happy with how they turned out, but it seems like too much effort to restart just to be slightly happier with them. I especially don't like the contrast between the red and the maroon, or rather the lack of it. I definitely misted a lot more Dark Walnut last time. But I also need to remember to be a little more forgiving of myself, since this is still the first time I've ever "properly" painted a Fett helmet. When I painted my last helmet, I did no stenciling, instead using the whole helmet view of RafalFett's stencils as a REFERENCE and painted the entire thing in one night. Here's a picture:

What I'm trying to say is that the fact that I'm doing anything at all on this helmet is a huge step in the right direction.
Did you also notice I put those white smudges on the right mandible? Yeah, those made their "debut" on the helmet in the Executor Bridge scene. The thing about limiting yourself to a specific scene is that it becomes a bit of a challenge researching what specific details to add. So the next thing to do is either the upper cheeks or the left ear.

 

[Eli Jinn]

Totally forgot to mention that I repainted the rangefinder for the 3rd time. I'm REALLY happy with how this one came out so I don't think I'll be making any changes to it any time soon.

Repainting the stalk also gives me an excuse to do another...
Accuracy Tip!!!
I'll try my hardest to make this one quick but I've got a lot to cover...
I strongly believe that the ESB "screen used" helmet (it is extremely important that I emphasize this is PRE-ROTJ SE or whenever they dug the helmet out of the broom closet it was hanging out in) has NO WEATHERING on the inside and back of the rangefinder stalk.
I hereby present to the jury Figure #1:

This is self explanatory. This is a screen cap from ESB clearly showing clean sides of the stalk. Figure #2:

This one is harder to see but it proves that the weathering was not added in a later scene. Trust me, I've sifted through each scene in ESB, and I believe this weathering was added along with the extra gunk for SE, like the black muck on the left side of the forehead, the greasy burger stains on the back of the dome, etc. (Have we figured out yet if those stains were from Burger King or McDonald's???)
Anyways, along with Figure #3:

Now, keen Fett-Fanatics will know from the fancy white cotton gloves alone that this is in fact, not the ESB helmet, but the Pre-Pro 3 helmet. The reason PP3 is important however, is because the PP3 and the ESB were painted to be identical (aside from specific shapes of damage obviously). And since the PP3 is relatively untouched compared to the ESB helmet, it means that any detail present on the PP3 helmet was most likely also on the ESB helmet at the time of filming. The PP3 helmet confirms the existence of the reddish-brown splatters on the right side, the yellowish splatters on the left ear, and of course, the absence of weathering on these two sides of the rangefinder stalk. It always intrigued me as to why they decided to use the helmet they did when the PP3 was painted so much better. The ESB has so many issues, like the crack on the cheek, the missed paint on the earcap, the white thumbprints on the headband, etc. etc. etc...
And with that, I rest my case. If you have any objections, leave them in this thread here that I dedicated to this very topic. Thank you.
Oh wait another thing I wanted to mention is that there is a clear separation between the weathered and unweathered portions on the outside of the stalk. Pretty much, the rust stops right at the top of the earcap when the stalk is up. You can see it clearly here:

i just thought that was a cool detail.
Oh yeah I also also painted the borden connector and weathered that too.

 

[Eli Jinn]

Look at how I massacred my boy again...

At least this time it was on purpose lol.
I also made a dumb revelation when I was painting the thin red stripe between the upper cheek and the left ear.

This is partly my fault and partly the modelers fault. The built in slash on the cheek was in this location, and I simply carved it to look a bit better, but I didn't notice until after the paintjob that it's in the complete wrong place. Here's the screen used helmet compared to mine:

Yeah, completely wrong. I marked out the new gash with a sharpie...

And then I tried my best to fill the old slash without disturbing the paintjob and carved in the new one.

We'll see how it looks when I get some primer on it. You can also see I epoxied the left ear to the helmet so I can paint it green eventually.

 

[Eli Jinn]

Happy Star Wars Day! Actually it's 11:48 pm right now so it's almost not anymore lol.
Not a lot of work getting done on the old bucket because of AP testing going on at school. Did y'all even have that stuff "back in your day?" Anyways, I did find some time to adjust the maroon on the mandibles. I was really getting bugged by how red it was and I could totally tell it wasn't the same color as on the back headband, so I decided the best thing to do would be to mix up some acrylics and recolor it topically. This was super scary but I am super glad I did it. Before on the left vs. After on the right:

The end result isn't perfect, but I'm much happier with it now. I have some nice tiny brushes (the smallest one I have that I used for this job was 10/0) but even then, topical painting is hard! Props to all you topical painters. I'm not looking forward to going back and adding all the silver by hand...

 

[BudaFett]

I hate painting the mandible area! Looks great!

 

[Eli Jinn]

I painted the left ear with Moss Green before adding a darker, slightly brownish green wash. I then added the yellowish splatters to the front side of the ear, trying to get it heavier at the bottom to match references.

I think I went a little heavy and uncontrolled with the wash, but I'll chalk it up to weathering.
What we're really here for are the...
Accuracy Tips!
As you can see, my left ear features the prominent yellowish splatters seen in modern photos, despite me building a strictly ESB Boba. I really don't know why more people don't add these splatters to film-era ESB buckets, because they definitely are there during filming. Here comes evidence number 1...

This is the best film-era reference that has the slightest hint of these splatters, but they are visible. Evidence number 2...

If that first picture wasn't enough, notice how the same patch of untouched gray can be seen at both times. Evidence number 3...

2 things here, both on the topic of masking. First, the splatters do not cover the white arch, despite going all the way up the ear. Second, the splatters do not touch anything other than the ear. They stop abruptly at the edge of the ears instead of flying all over the side of the helmet. This means that the splatters were applied with the tape still over the rest of the helmet and before the arch was painted on. If these splatters were added post filming, that would have been some unnecessarily meticulous masking for such a tiny thing. And evidence number 4...

And here we go again with the Pre Pro 3... Again, the PP3 helmet was painted identically to the ESB, is relatively untouched, and it features these splatters. The PP3 even has that untouched spot in the same location. Weird. The only differences between the splats on PP3 and on ESB is that the PP3's go across the entire ear from all directions, where as the ESB's clearly were applied from one direction towards the front, as they mostly disappear at the back. There's no logical situation where these two helmets share this detail but was added post filming.
That's it for Accuracy Tips #3, see you next time.

Oh and I also painted the right ear platform tan. No pictures of that because it's just tan.

 

[stryker181]

So some details on my work on the files that I modified from Rafafett as the modeler. I cannot comment on the size but I did not increase size of the model. I adjusted the size for what I thought I needed and I overcompensated when I printed it out for my head. I agree that this model is big and I agree that the scale affords an ample head. The addition of thickening the model was to compensate for the printing method of production. 3d printing in PLA+ or PETG (what I use) requires additional layers to add strength. Based on the cracking in the location on the mandible that you experienced I thick the thickening is required. Perhaps thinning around the visor is required and I can adjust for that in future versions. The location of the damage I will adjust for as well to be more accurate. Rafalfett models are great and nothing but accolades for his work. I increased internal thickness by 2mm and smoothed out the sunken interior around the band. Meshmixer identified this as a weak band and I smoothed this area out to ensure consistency and continuity between the dome and the lower helmet. This model is free for those to use. As you have identified the time I invested into smoothing out allows for far less time in post processing. I have enjoyed your biuld of this model.

 

[Eli Jinn]

So some details on my work on the files that I modified from Rafafett as the modeler. I cannot comment on the size but I did not increase size of the model. I adjusted the size for what I thought I needed and I overcompensated when I printed it out for my head. I agree that this model is big and I agree that the scale affords an ample head. The addition of thickening the model was to compensate for the printing method of production. 3d printing in PLA+ or PETG (what I use) requires additional layers to add strength. Based on the cracking in the location on the mandible that you experienced I thick the thickening is required. Perhaps thinning around the visor is required and I can adjust for that in future versions. The location of the damage I will adjust for as well to be more accurate. Rafalfett models are great and nothing but accolades for his work. I increased internal thickness by 2mm and smoothed out the sunken interior around the band. Meshmixer identified this as a weak band and I smoothed this area out to ensure consistency and continuity between the dome and the lower helmet. This model is free for those to use. As you have identified the time I invested into smoothing out allows for far less time in post processing. I have enjoyed your biuld of this model.

Thank you so much for your work! I hope this build does your model justice and I'm excited to see what you do next.

 

[stryker181]

Eli. Thanks for your work on this and proving that a 3d Printing is a viable process in this forum. The increase in poly count really taxxed my computer to process. Tenth gen i7 with 32 gigs was barely enough. I understand why the original was kept at a reduced number. I am currently working on modifying Rafalfetts EE-3 models as a high poly count and include the original Webley and Scott stamp in the barrel and housing to be more accurate. I have a thread on this and I just printed the prototypes. I will be seeking his authority to make some runs of these. Lots of modeling work. All the best and great work.

 

[Eli Jinn]

Eli. Thanks for your work on this and proving that a 3d Printing is a viable process in this forum. The increase in poly count really taxxed my computer to process. Tenth gen i7 with 32 gigs was barely enough. I understand why the original was kept at a reduced number. I am currently working on modifying Rafalfetts EE-3 models as a high poly count and include the original Webley and Scott stamp in the barrel and housing to be more accurate. I have a thread on this and I just printed the prototypes. I will be seeking his authority to make some runs of these. Lots of modeling work. All the best and great work.

That sounds awesome!

 

[Eli Jinn]

I'm back! I had an entire month of vacations and family events going on back to back, and I haven't been able to get any painting done on the helmet, but I did get some clear PETG filament to mess around with, and I printed out the perspex block, the polaroid lens, and the clear tip of the flamethrower (not pictured)

After some post processing I got the lens to look like this

Not clear enough to lens standards in the slightest but who cares.
And here's a rough demonstration of what it might look like with the lights on in the rangefinder using the flashlight on my mom's phone...

That's all for now. I have no clue when I'll get back to painting the helmet, I still have yet to fix the crack on the eye permanently and finish the cheeks so I can paint them.

 

[BudaFett]

Hmm that came out pretty nice. I've been wanted to play with clear resin.

 

[Eli Jinn]

Ok... I haven't worked on the helmet in months but that doesn't stop the deadline from coming so here goes.
In an attempt to get back into the swing of painting, I decided to tackle a smaller bit and paint the arch on the left ear. This is my best attempt at hand painting the Lettering. No tape, no decals, just a paintbrush and a reference image, like God intended.

Ok that's it, bye.
See you again in a month!

 

[Eli Jinn]

I masked and painted the killstripes

Eventually I will have to face the silver. I'm worried I won't have the time because it's basically painting the entire helmet over again. At least that's what I'm telling myself it will be like. I'm planning to do a kind of "reverse masking" where I'll use tape and maskol to mask off everything except where I'll paint the silver, then paint the silver with my Vallejo Model Air Silver. Wish me luck.