01-02-2018, 07:33 AM
January Updates - 2018
Hello everyone! My apologies for the delays. I really have been working on my build, but Life just keeps getting in the way of my progress. Hopefully things will be a little better now that my peak season at work has calmed down.
For my project updates I have cast resin pieces for the outside details of the hanger bay lighting effects. I had to make the pieces transparent so you can see the actual lighting effects. I'm in the process of opaqueing the castings to prevent light leaks.
I was asked by my client to put some different lighting into the saucer section of the ship. So, I pulled all of the fluorescent lighting and ballasts out and I replaced them with LED lighting strips. This was a very good idea because the lighting will have a longer lifetime in the model. I also put some white styrene strips into the saucer sections behind the viewports to reflect the lighting better. I was originally going to insert some pictures of the corridors onto the strips but there was not enough depth to the pictures. So, I decided to do what I was originally going to do with the corridors and that was to build 3D versions of them. I built one master of the corridor section and made molds so that I could cast as many replicas as needed. I cast them in clear resin so that I could have the lower panels of the corridors lit as seen in the movies. After I cast all of the pieces I masked off all of the light panels. I then sprayed the first color which was FLAT WHITE. This would help reflect some of the lighting to make it appear more even. I then sprayed them FLAT BLACK to hide any light leaks. Next I sprayed them a medium BLUE/GRAY for the tops and bottoms of the corridors. Finally I hand panted the rest of the panels ALUMINUM, for the monochromatic look. After this I sprayed some flat pieces of styrene FLAT RED and then cut several pieces of them, all the same length, to use as the doors to the crews quarters. After all of this was done I then placed all of the finished corridors into an oven at 170F for ten minutes. This allowed the styrene to be pliable and I could then bend them into the shape of the outer rim of the saucer., Next I had to use a belt sander to sand down the tops and bottoms of the corridors to get rid of both the burrs from the casting process and to make them fit into the saucer. I aligned the corridors so they could be seen through the viewports.
Since the back sides of the castings were not painted, I added the LED strips to the backs of each of the corridor strips. Then I put electrical tape over the backs of the strips to prevent too much light from shining back into the model and ruining other lighting effects in the saucer. It was a lot of work, but worth the effort to give the corridors a little more 3D depth to them when looking through the viewports. To further help with the light leaks I found these foam rubber sheets at a hobby store and cut them into long strips and cemented them all along the perimeter of the upper saucer piece. This should help block light from showing through the seams of the upper and lower saucer pieces.
I have 16 New pics which can be viewed in the Members Gallery page under the January updates – 2018 album.
I can now finally seal up the saucer and get ready to permanently add the Enterprise into it’s new home in the Dock. Again, thanks for your patience with this build and I apologize for the long wait for this update. Hopefully I can now get this build finished. See you next update.
http://www.NemVia.net
Hello everyone! My apologies for the delays. I really have been working on my build, but Life just keeps getting in the way of my progress. Hopefully things will be a little better now that my peak season at work has calmed down.
For my project updates I have cast resin pieces for the outside details of the hanger bay lighting effects. I had to make the pieces transparent so you can see the actual lighting effects. I'm in the process of opaqueing the castings to prevent light leaks.
I was asked by my client to put some different lighting into the saucer section of the ship. So, I pulled all of the fluorescent lighting and ballasts out and I replaced them with LED lighting strips. This was a very good idea because the lighting will have a longer lifetime in the model. I also put some white styrene strips into the saucer sections behind the viewports to reflect the lighting better. I was originally going to insert some pictures of the corridors onto the strips but there was not enough depth to the pictures. So, I decided to do what I was originally going to do with the corridors and that was to build 3D versions of them. I built one master of the corridor section and made molds so that I could cast as many replicas as needed. I cast them in clear resin so that I could have the lower panels of the corridors lit as seen in the movies. After I cast all of the pieces I masked off all of the light panels. I then sprayed the first color which was FLAT WHITE. This would help reflect some of the lighting to make it appear more even. I then sprayed them FLAT BLACK to hide any light leaks. Next I sprayed them a medium BLUE/GRAY for the tops and bottoms of the corridors. Finally I hand panted the rest of the panels ALUMINUM, for the monochromatic look. After this I sprayed some flat pieces of styrene FLAT RED and then cut several pieces of them, all the same length, to use as the doors to the crews quarters. After all of this was done I then placed all of the finished corridors into an oven at 170F for ten minutes. This allowed the styrene to be pliable and I could then bend them into the shape of the outer rim of the saucer., Next I had to use a belt sander to sand down the tops and bottoms of the corridors to get rid of both the burrs from the casting process and to make them fit into the saucer. I aligned the corridors so they could be seen through the viewports.
Since the back sides of the castings were not painted, I added the LED strips to the backs of each of the corridor strips. Then I put electrical tape over the backs of the strips to prevent too much light from shining back into the model and ruining other lighting effects in the saucer. It was a lot of work, but worth the effort to give the corridors a little more 3D depth to them when looking through the viewports. To further help with the light leaks I found these foam rubber sheets at a hobby store and cut them into long strips and cemented them all along the perimeter of the upper saucer piece. This should help block light from showing through the seams of the upper and lower saucer pieces.
I have 16 New pics which can be viewed in the Members Gallery page under the January updates – 2018 album.
I can now finally seal up the saucer and get ready to permanently add the Enterprise into it’s new home in the Dock. Again, thanks for your patience with this build and I apologize for the long wait for this update. Hopefully I can now get this build finished. See you next update.
http://www.NemVia.net
"... once it's activated, there's no way to stop it!" - Scotty - DMa