Superjedi's Joe Johnston Concept "Eyeball" Fett helmet

[superjedi]

Hi all!
I'm working on a quick personal project before I begin my next ESB paint commission.
Way back in the 20th century, there was a series of books called "The Art of [Star Wars,
The Empire Strikes Back, Return of the Jedi]." They had a lot of concept art, and
behind the scenes pics from the trilogy.
In The Art of The Empire Strikes Back, there was a whole page devoted to concept
art depicting different Boba Fett helmet designs. At that stage, I'm not sure if the
character was cemented as Boba Fett, or if it was still the Supercommando. In any
case, the helmet drawings look a lot different than what we're used to seeing!
There are 9 helmet drawings, plus a couple of full body sketches on the page. This
one is one of my favorites:

I decided to do this helmet pretty much as weathering practice. I began with
one of Animefan's excellent dentless Mando helmets. Since the concept has a totally
different ear/RF arrangement, Ryan was nice enough to sell me a helmet by itself with
no accessories. Thanks, man!

Here are a couple of shots of the helmet in primer, along with descriptions of the modifications.

Above, the left ear platform is simply that. . . a flat platform. The concept drawing shows
a slightly thicker section toward the top, so I measured and cut a simple rectangle of .020"
styrene and glued it on. I used some Bondo to fill in around the front and top faces. I also
filled the little rectangle in the surface of the cheek.

On the right side, the lower portion of the ear platform seems to be devoid of detail, so again,
I left it flat. The upper ear section was built up from 2 layers of 1/8" Sintra, laminated together
and carved to match the shape of the ear arch. A couple of small details were then glued on.
In the inner piece of Sintra, I cut out a slot for the RF stalk before gluing the 2 pieces together.
Using some Bondo, I filled in the circle where the Borden would normally go.
Pics of the RF assembly will come later.

Finally, there's absolutely no reference for the back of this helmet. The single drawing at the
beginning of this post is the only one. So I took a bit of artistic license and decided to change up
the detail in the keyslot section. I found a nice detail strip in my spare parts box and glued it
over the existing keyslots. I'm sure a lot of people will recognize the donor of that detail strip!

So that's the helmet in primer. The primer will actually be the base gray that shows through the
white topcoat. I have gone over the helmet with some Winsor & Newton masking fluid to mask
off those gray chips, and I'm getting ready to spray an off-white primer over that, then a random
cloudy coat of flat white.
More to come!

 

[Kimelius]

Interesting lil side project...

BTW, re: the pic with the keyhole modification - did you purposely put a dvd copy of "Adaptation" in the background? I thought it was rather funny to see the other titles "I love you, man" (a b/romance movie about a guy and Boba Fett?) and "Curb your enthusiasm" (a reality movie about a guy and his finance-minister/wife/significant other) :cry

 

[Mullreel]

Very cool. I will watch this thread.

 

[animefan]

Wow love what you've done with it so far, looks great!

 

[Jayvee]

Oooh, shiny!

 

[toofastrobot]

I love seeing builds like these!

Sent from my SGH-M919

 

[superjedi]

Thanks, all. This is meant to be a fun, quick project!
Kimelius, none of those DVDs were placed on purpose, but funny observations.

OK, got several stages complete now. I had applied some liquid mask to the areas
that I wanted to remain gray. I then sprayed on a "dirty white" primer, then a white
topcoat. After that had dried, I removed the masking fluid and went back over the
entire helmet with my airbrush and some flat white. That toned down the contrast
between the white and gray.

I then airbrushed 2 different weathering shades in patchy patterns. I used some
Polly Scale Concrete, and CSX Gray. After that, I airbrushed some flat white AGAIN,
to tone down the weathering a bit and blend everything together.

The last thing I did this morning was to take a fine Microbrush and some Floquil Primer
and re-added some gray. This gives a nice multi-layered effect to the gray areas.
Here are a few pics showing where the helmet stands now.

The opposite angle:

The back:

Here's a close up of the left cheek showing the multi-layered gray. Some areas look
really faded, and I re-added the Floquil Primer within some of those areas.

Next up will be masking the dome for the yellow stripe!

 

[superjedi]

Told you this was going to be a quick one!
Pending a bit of weathering on the RF and installing a visor, this little guy is done.

Here are some pics with descriptions of the additional work.

With the misting and weathering of the white complete, I masked for the yellow stripe.
I just ran it back over the span of the dome and stopped at the band over the keyslot/detail area.

Winsor & Newton on the job again for the chips in the yellow stripe. I've had the same bottle
for at least 5 years now, and it's still going strong!

The blue marking on the front of the dome was first sketched on a piece of scratch paper to
get the size and proportions down, then (very carefully) transferred onto the helmet. I hand
painted these details with 2 different shades: Tamiya Sky Blue for the "pupil," and Polly Scale
BAR Blue for the oval and the wings. I went back with some of the base white to do the chips.

There are also some small black markings over the left ear. I don't know if these are meant to
be recognizable letters or numbers, but I tried to copy the shapes as best I could. I cut these
out of some black sign vinyl I had left over from another long-finished project. The very small
black marks along the band just under the dome, and at the top of the inner cheeks were done
with sections of rub-on lettering.

The RF assembly was scratch built from some 1/8" Sintra, and some black .015" styrene. I used
black so that the opening at the front would show a dark interior. I found some cool looking
aluminum tube with an elliptical profile, and used a section of that for the RF stalk.

Finally, a couple of coat buttons from the craft store were painted with Polly Scale PRR Maroon
and secured onto the inner cheeks. Done!

For fun, here's a comp shot of the original sketch and my helmet. The proportions of the sketch
are obviously different from what we're accustomed to, so I had to take a few liberties with the
shapes of some of the damage. Very similar to bringing a Holiday Special helmet to life. Without
a totally new sculpt, there's no way to match everything 100%.

I need to hit the helmet with some Dullcoat and order a visor, and then I'll post some
completed pics with a less cluttered background. All in all, this was a lot of fun! I have
always loved the Pre-Pro helmets, but this project took Pre-Pro to a whole new level!

 

[xanthis02]

great build your in va as well also no shame for a guy to like chick flicks

 

[Jayvee]

You're a legend Eric, that looks fantastic, and as accurate as possible with the limited resource pics. Another stellar job, and probably a nice change to be a quick job for once

 

[superjedi]

Thanks, guys.
Xanthis, yep, another Virginian! There are only a handful of us here.

Jonny, it really was nice to do something a little different. My next ESB
commission helmet arrived 2 days ago, so it'll be straight to work on that tomorrow!

 

[animefan]

Wow that looks outstanding, love your paint work.

 

[Darth Voorhees]

that is so awesome man, i love it!

 

[RafalFett]

Wow! Awesome job as always, Eric! You are a great example of the fact that there are no impossible tasks if you have the willpower.

 

[locitus]

Nice one Eric!

 

[toofastrobot]

Wow you work very quickly!

 

[superjedi]

Thanks again! I need to order a visor for this puppy. I think I'll just
go with a plain ol' shade 3. Easy peasy.

Wow you work very quickly!

Well, when I'm not trying to recreate a screen-used paint scheme it
does tend to go quicker!

 

[Major]

That is great work......

 

[Wolfsburg]

This is awesome! Can't wait to see it with the visor!

 

[AFettFullofDollars]

FANTASTIC!!!