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Post by PitYak Studios on Mar 18, 2006 10:14:16 GMT 12
Over 15" long and 7" high, I've always wanted to a dino so when I saw a Jurassic Park Raptor going for $10 I had to get it. My first impression was that the pose was a bit stiff, and I thought about altering it, but I would have had to move all four limbs, neck and tail to achieve something more lively, so I left it. Glad I did too, because it has taken a lot of work just building straight from the box. It has a lot of bad mold lines, and very dodgy seems, with a lot of the detail petering out as you get to the edges of each piece. So I've spent about 48 hours already dremelling in new wrinkles and building up new details. Looks like I've got several more hours ahead too. I even managed to glue the claws on the wrong legs (I'm blaming the bad instructions) so had to Dremel them off. Then someone on another board mentioned the claws are worng anyway, they should be on a small toe, not just projecting from the leg, so it turned out fortuitous. I have now added the claws to the correct legs, and started puttying up the missing toes. Here's where we're at so far;   (I also managed to knock him off the bench, so one hand broke off completely, and two fingers broke off the other one  ) |
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Post by c0d3monk33 on Mar 18, 2006 12:21:30 GMT 12
Looks interesting! Definitely an airbrush paint job for that beastie though surely?
It is a really stiff pose. I think the ramrod straight tail probably contributes a lot to that though...no real creature ever holds their tail like that.
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Post by PitYak Studios on Mar 18, 2006 12:41:29 GMT 12
If he was moving the straight tail would be spot on, but since he's not it does look a bit stink. If I'd known how much work it was going to take anyway, (by the time it's finished I think I'll have gone over most of the existing detail) I would have alterred the pose.
And yes, most likely this will get airbrushed. or a combination of airbrush and paintbrush anyway
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Post by c0d3monk33 on Mar 19, 2006 12:08:02 GMT 12
Nice to see you green stuffing the seams though...I hate it when you can see the seams on finished figures. Really ruins the effect. GW avoid a lot of seam problems but chucking shoulder pads on everybody and their dog...with the notable exception of the ugly Catachans...
Hmmm you reckon? Personally I'd be inclined to think there's no animal in nature that holds their tail straight....even when running like the wind (cheetah's tails bob up and down vertically at 100kmh). Looks more like the figure isn't balanced properly so they made the tail straight to keep it upright?
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Post by PitYak Studios on Mar 20, 2006 8:28:52 GMT 12
Not a dino man then stu? Current thinking suggests most dinos, of this type anyway, were very much like this model, with a long tail held straight out backwards as a counterbalance to the forward mass of the rest of the body. like this;  |
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Post by c0d3monk33 on Mar 20, 2006 8:37:14 GMT 12
Heh, nice 3d model! But imagine it running something tasty down... I guess my point is that any animal in motion is not going to have a perfectly straight tail...particularly since it's attached to their hips. Dinosaurs are funny things...what was that Victorian dinosaur they built completely wrong? Gave it bony upright thumbs that were in fact part of it's headgear? The figure isn't too bad though...but what on earth are you going to use it for? ACW in the Lost Lands  (actually that would be kinda cool...I've always been a sucker for wierd settings...British Empire vs. Martians has tempted me in the past). |
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Post by c0d3monk33 on Mar 20, 2006 8:39:33 GMT 12
Actually now I look at the critter...it's actually standing still isn't it...so there goes my argument . Tail still looks too straight to me...it's unnatural I tell you! |
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Post by PitYak Studios on Mar 20, 2006 14:45:58 GMT 12
That was the iguanadon I think. They had it's thumb spikes on the end of it's nose.
This is an area i'm interested in, namely the accuracy of experts' dino reconstructions. I imagine those victorian experts were quite confident in their reconstruction, but with each passing generation we learn more and realise how wrong the old ideas were. I wonder how confident today's experts are; are they arrogant enough to think they are definately right, or do they accept that theirs is merely the closest yet approximation. and if the latter, how confident are they?
The tales are a biggy. The dino models I had as a ween (which wasn't all that long ago) had all the bipeds as upright ponderous staggering things with tails dragging on the floor. I remember as a young boy looking at pictures of dino tracks and thinking "hang on, shouldn't there be tail marks in their somewhere...?" We now accept that the bipedal predators (raptors, t-rex and what have you) Where incredibly fast and agile creatures, with a horizontal spine and tail which was held out to counterbalance the forward slung head. A flexible tail, true, but not generally used as a weapon or waved around or anything like that, just held straight out the back for balance.
The big quadrupeds too; originally they were thought to be too massive to support their own bodies, so were reconstructed as spreadeagled creatures flopping around in swamps. We now figure they were walking along pretty upright.
But then again, we don't know how wrong we are now.
Dino colours, scales vs feathers, warm blooded? and many more are the discussions curently going on. We just have to figure we're never going to know, we can only make best guesses basedd on what we do know.
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Post by PitYak Studios on Mar 20, 2006 15:26:07 GMT 12
... and British Empire vs martians, sounds pretty steampunk to me. I'm working on an alternate vicorian setup at the mo, although all it is so far is a half built gatling steam engine, two primed lancers and a couple of figures. but lots more in the wings.
Space 1899!
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Post by c0d3monk33 on Mar 20, 2006 16:03:49 GMT 12
Ahhh it wouldn't be academia if palenotologists couldn't spend their entire careers arguing about the hip joints of a fossilised corpse of a creature that died millions of years ago . Space 1889 was a great idea...never played it but loved the setting. I was thinking more HG Wells after seeing some nice 15mm scale martian tripods on the web somewhere... |
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(actually that would be kinda cool...I've always been a sucker for wierd settings...British Empire vs. Martians has tempted me in the past).