Hot Toys ESB FETT tips tricks and other cool mods

[Matt S]

Dabble away!

It's not as hard as it looks. I only started doing this a couple years ago, you'll learn fast!

thanks, one of these days....

 

[Preshea]

It?s funny you should mention that. I was just thinking about that the other night.

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I was thinking I could 3D print a transparent model of it in amber resin and paint everything except the little slots that the light comes out of.

Then rig an led into the base of it inside the jet pack, so that the light will travel up the inside and only be visible through the slits that are unpainted.

Theres probably a way to rig one of the jet nozzles so that when It's rotated it turns the light on and off. There?s even a panel on the back side of the real prop that would make a perfect battery compartment. That's probably what it was for in the first place.

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That's my idea anyway.


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Sounds brilliant!! Looking forward to seeing you tackle this I hope!..... then doing mine too. Lol

 

[Waste Time Continuum]

I did some research on how to light the Jetpack Beacon. All the info is below. I ordered everything today, so hopefully I can get it and test it out soon. I'll give you guys an update once I have tested everything.

First off is the beacon itself. For that I reached out to Rafal Works on Shapeways who continues to be amazing to work with. He's super enthusiastic, and works very quickly. He made his 1/1 scale beacon, 1/6 scale for me, and made it hollow so I can instal a light. Here's a link to it if you want one of your own.

https://www.shapeways.com/product/CEPLFTNWC/esb-rotj-jetpack-beacon-1-6th-scale?optionId=152557268&li=shops

Here's a pic of the model, and the cutaway graphic of it.




As for the light itself, I found an awesome kit with a Pico LED (1mm), power source (small coin cell & holder), and power switch. You can buy the kit yourself at "Evan Designs" here's the link:

https://evandesigns.com/products/chip-light-kit?pr_prod_strat=copurchase&pr_rec_pid=485938102320&pr_ref_pid=485937610800&pr_seq=uniform

Here's what the kit looks like, and below that is a video that explains the system.

 

[Preshea]

Excited!!
Good work bro. Thanks for that info too.

 

[Waste Time Continuum]

Did some work yesterday on replacing the “keyholes” on the back of the Sideshow Fett helmet I’m using, with the more accurate Hot Toys keyholes. I also filed away the back of the top three keyholes until they were paper thin then (very nervously) cut away the thin material so you can see straight through to the Casio circuit board. i have the 1/6 scale circuit board coming, and it should be here by Monday I think.

At first I thought the circuit board wouldn’t really be all that visible, but when I put my file up against the the keyholes inside of the helmet, you could see it really well. So the circuit board should show up well enough to sell the accuracy.

Here’s a bunch of progress pics of the process. The first pic is from a supposedly film accurate replica of the helmet, but there are no little red lights in the bottom keyholes. I though there was lights back there, but maybe I’m thinking of the RotJ helmet, or perhaps I’m just having a case of false memories.

 

[Waste Time Continuum]

I’m inordinately excited!!!!

The ”Pico” size LED kit came today. Just tested the light, and scale against my Jango jetpack, which has a more accurately scaled beacon, and It’s so incredibly small. It’s the size of a large grain of salt, and the wires are like hairs. This will totally fit into the hollow of the 3D printed beacon that’s coming and it’s super bright, so it will be bright enough as well. The warm color is perfect as well.

 

[Waste Time Continuum]

I want to rig the left jet nozzle so it activates the power switch internally by pressing it in using an internal spring, the way a click pen works. I can cannibalize a pen for the hardware I need.

 

[Wchow16]

Can I ask you how you dissembled your helmet? Do you just heat it with a hairdryer to loosen the glue?

Thanks

Inspired by your recent work matrix, I finally started customizing my spare helmet. I bought the deluxe just for customizing fun, to see if I can make the helmet more accurate, most importantly the visor.

So far, the only thing I did was move the ears a couple of mm further to the front. Comparing it to the screenshot below (despite slightly different angle and likely aperture), you can see how far off it still is however. I was hoping that I would not have to resculpt the cheeks, but it's starting to look like I have to. I have no idea if this will lead anywhere, but at least I'm having fun doing it.

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[Matt S]

any of you crazy madmen gonna try to light up the chest armor?

 

[Waste Time Continuum]

I gently squeeze and pull at the helmet. You'll hear the glue creaking and cracking. boiling hot water definitely helps. Just keep doing that till it comes apart. You may need to use a hobby knife to gently pry apart the more stubborn parts. The important thing to remember is patience.

Can I ask you how you dissembled your helmet? Do you just heat it with a hairdryer to loosen the glue?

Thanks

 

[Waste Time Continuum]

Yup,

There's an LED thats even smaller than Pico that's simply called "Z" it's the size of a crumb. They make red, and they make some that blink.

any of you crazy madmen gonna try to light up the chest armor?

 

[Matt S]

Yup,

There's an LED thats even smaller than Pico that's simply called "Z" it's the size of a crumb. They make red, and they make some that blink.

amazing how small the LEDs are now. Thanks for the info

 

[Waste Time Continuum]

The Jetpack Frame came in the mail today!



Other than the main “U” shape, the rest of the print is very fragile. I may just use it as a guide and scratch build a metal one from one of these.



The thickness of the black metal is correct for the scale of the jetpack frame, and the silver metal is the same diameter of the metal “U” shaped part of the frame.

I suppose I could make life easier and just reenforce the back of those thin cross beams with styrene trips. Or I could get John DeGuzman to make one out of metal for me but that would be at least $150, and thats a lot for something you won't see.

What do you guys think?

 

[Wchow16]

I gently squeeze and pull at the helmet. You'll hear the glue creaking and cracking. boiling hot water definitely helps. Just keep doing that till it comes apart. You may need to use a hobby knife to gently pry apart the more stubborn parts. The important thing to remember is patience.

Thanks

 

[McHaleyArt]

What do you guys think?

If it doesn?t mess with the figure?s overall look, I?m sure it would be nice, knowing an accurate jet pack frame was there. I know I would skip it, because you don?t see it and I don?t know that it would add to the correct or accurate body language. It might be harder to pose as well. Still love what your are doing and I think your drive is probably going to make you go through trying to make the harness work anyway. That?s half the fun.

 

[Waste Time Continuum]

LOL, this is true. I'm completely obsessed. Sometimes I think I get too ambitious with these custom projects. There's a lot of "But I know it's there..." going on with my approach. But if I don't do it I'll know it isn't there.

Since Since the frame isn't something that's visible, I think I'm just going to add some styrene to the back, for added strength. I'm planning to use velcro to keep the frame in place, so the styrene will help with that too. For the bar that the jetpack hooks sit on at the bottom, I might use some thin metal since it will have a little weight on it. I have some thin sheet metal I can cut for that.

If it doesn?t mess with the figure?s overall look, I?m sure it would be nice, knowing an accurate jet pack frame was there. I know I would skip it, because you don?t see it and I don?t know that it would add to the correct or accurate body language. It might be harder to pose as well. Still love what your are doing and I think your drive is probably going to make you go through trying to make the harness work anyway. That?s half the fun.

 

[Waste Time Continuum]

Progress report for today.

I cut out the vinyl visor so I can replace it with the much nicer Hot Toys visor. Made me nervous as hell cutting that away. Every part I work on with this helmet feels like “The hard part” LOL!



I have to cut little channels into the back side of the opening so that the Hot Toys visor will seat properly. That’s hard too!



I think It’s going to look great though.

 

[Matt S]

Never seen that BTS 'U' bracket pic before; thank you all. this thread has been fun to watch and learn from.

 

[Waste Time Continuum]

I didn't know about it either before starting this project.

Learning about the little details of a costume or prop is one of my favorite parts of customizing figures.

Never seen that BTS 'U' bracket pic before; thank you all. this thread has been fun to watch and learn from.

 

[Waste Time Continuum]

Took a stab at the Mythos flack jacket, and it's looking pretty great actually. I didn't like how ideally fitted the Hot Toys flack jacket looked on the Hot Toys ESB figure, since it's somewhat ill fitting in ESB. You can tell because in the film, the shoulder seam on the flack jacket hangs over Bullock's shoulders, whereas on the Hot Toys figure the seam hangs barely over the shoulder, which would be a correctly tailored fit on a real life garment, but is inaccurate based on Fett's appearance in ESB. Pics below, I have marked the Hot Toys ESB shoulder seams in red, and the Sideshow Mythos shoulder seams in green to illustrate what I'm talking about. Mythos looks much more accurate to the film. I'll be swapping the Sideshow armor with the Hot Toys armor which I think is more accurate, and the color is a bit too gray and dirty on the jacket, so I need to figure out how to lighten it up to more of a grayish-white, but that shouldn't be too difficult.

What do you guys think?