JND Studios: Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade - 1:3 Harrison Ford and Sean Connery

[DarthAlias]

They've got 1.5 years to get it right. I think they will improve it given the criticism and fact it's Disney. I hope so. Definitely not the best likeness as many can't nail, but at this price point, should be better. Unfortunately, JND can't nail sculpts in general like HT can.

 

[Johnny Utah]

None of their sculpts have wowed me. The skin makes them all look shattered.

 

[Lokki]

They've got 1.5 years to get it right. I think they will improve it given the criticism and fact it's Disney. I hope so. Definitely not the best likeness as many can't nail, but at this price point, should be better. Unfortunately, JND can't nail sculpts in general like HT can.

None of their sculpts have wowed me. The skin makes them all look shattered.

I'm not trying to take away from your criticisms, especially as I'm in the club that thinks the actual base sculpt for Harrison Ford is "off".

But that said, I don't think you guys are considering the effects of lighting and filters - not just in terms of JND's own photography, but also in the film(s) their pieces are compared to. At the end of the day, you either like it or lump it and I'm not here to change your mind one way or the other - but I won't be in the least bit surprised to hear comments like "in person, it looks really good" or "in person, the aged or sickly look really isn't there".....this is the same rinse and repeat process for EVERY JND release - an outpouring of vitriol followed by - "it's the best thing ever sculpted by human hands"

 

[Johnny Utah]

I've watched reviews of their stuff in hand and my opinion didn't change. I do hope they make Indy as their first sixth scale figure, any news there?

 

[Mandible]

I'm not trying to take away from your criticisms, especially as I'm in the club that thinks the actual base sculpt for Harrison Ford is "off".

But that said, I don't think you guys are considering the effects of lighting and filters - not just in terms of JND's own photography, but also in the film(s) their pieces are compared to. At the end of the day, you either like it or lump it and I'm not here to change your mind one way or the other - but I won't be in the least bit surprised to hear comments like "in person, it looks really good" or "in person, the aged or sickly look really isn't there".....this is the same rinse and repeat process for EVERY JND release - an outpouring of vitriol followed by - "it's the best thing ever sculpted by human hands"

Can't go with you on most of this.

The Bale Bruce Wayne looked amazing in the proto photos and in hand is. of course better, but the skin tone didn't change dramatically at all.

I agreed about lighting in general, and find that most of JND's proto lighting photos don't do them justice (particularly the Cavill Superman), but an overtly tanned person vs what they've shown here isn't a lighting or color-grade issue.

At the end of the day, everyone wants every release to be perfect, but if there's things that are niggling now, they'll always be there - it's just whether or not you're happy to put up with those niggles.

 

[SAB]

Preordered!
I don’t really disagree with anyone’s criticism here but I still think that taken as a whole, this piece at 1/3 scale with real leather jacket and silicon skin will look incredible standing there.

 

[cking]

I sent my "suggestions" to JND and they thanked me for them. Who knows if that means they're listening or my comments will just go straigt into the recycle bin. What bugs me the most is the fact they they pull out all the stops on their elaborate release videos, lauding how amazing their pieces are, but there are VERY obvious issues with this (same as the Reeve Superman) which in hindsight, they acknowledged that it still needed work, so hopefully that means they will improve it. I think it's a mistake for them to do a resin hat on a Silicone head because that means the hat needs to be over-sized to fit onto the head. I think they should make the head have no hair on the top so they can taper the head and make the correctly scaled hat fit onto it properly so it looks like it's fitting tight on his head like the real hat did. If they wanted to do a full head with hair, they could offer that as a second display option. Of all my gripes with it, the stupid expression choice is the one that bugs me the most. They should have gone with a more relaxed, squint eyed expression that he has in a a lot of the publicity photos for the movie, or given him a determined, serious expression which he has a lot of time in the movie. This expression that they've gone with happens only a handful of times and it just doesn't work well with the choice of pose in my opinion. It's beyond me how the likes of Kojun could have let the statue progress this far without making these decisions for its improvement. His shoulders look too broad and square too, but that may not be helped by the fact that the head is too small for the body.

 

[cking]

Taking the same stance as SAB, I decided to pre-order it after all. I have reached out to JND Studios again and made them aware that I have a piece of fabric which is identical colour and fabric to the costume pants that were made for Harrison in the movie. This fabric sample was gifted to me by the late Noel Howard about 15 years ago when I was deeply into the Indy costuming community and visited Noel on several different occasions at MBA Costumes which he'd set up after working at Bermans and Nathans (who did the costumes for Raiders, Temple of Doom and Last Crusade). I actually got to wear Harrison's "hero" jacket from Temple of Doom on one of my visits (which was subsequently sold at auction by Propstore after Noel passed away). Cutting a long story short, I'm more than happy to send the accurate fabric sample to JND Studios so they can ensure their Indy statue has the correct coloured pants! Fingers crossed they will accept it and change the colour to match.

 

[Lokki]

I sent my "suggestions" to JND and they thanked me for them. Who knows if that means they're listening or my comments will just go straigt into the recycle bin. What bugs me the most is the fact they they pull out all the stops on their elaborate release videos, lauding how amazing their pieces are, but there are VERY obvious issues with this (same as the Reeve Superman) which in hindsight, they acknowledged that it still needed work, so hopefully that means they will improve it. I think it's a mistake for them to do a resin hat on a Silicone head because that means the hat needs to be over-sized to fit onto the head. I think they should make the head have no hair on the top so they can taper the head and make the correctly scaled hat fit onto it properly so it looks like it's fitting tight on his head like the real hat did. If they wanted to do a full head with hair, they could offer that as a second display option. Of all my gripes with it, the stupid expression choice is the one that bugs me the most. They should have gone with a more relaxed, squint eyed expression that he has in a a lot of the publicity photos for the movie, or given him a determined, serious expression which he has a lot of time in the movie. This expression that they've gone with happens only a handful of times and it just doesn't work well with the choice of pose in my opinion. It's beyond me how the likes of Kojun could have let the statue progress this far without making these decisions for its improvement. His shoulders look too broad and square too, but that may not be helped by the fact that the head is too small for the body.

Taking the same stance as SAB, I decided to pre-order it after all. I have reached out to JND Studios again and made them aware that I have a piece of fabric which is identical colour and fabric to the costume pants that were made for Harrison in the movie. This fabric sample was gifted to me by the late Noel Howard about 15 years ago when I was deeply into the Indy costuming community and visited Noel on several different occasions at MBA Costumes which he'd set up after working at Bermans and Nathans (who did the costumes for Raiders, Temple of Doom and Last Crusade). I actually got to wear Harrison's "hero" jacket from Temple of Doom on one of my visits (which was subsequently sold at auction by Propstore after Noel passed away). Cutting a long story short, I'm more than happy to send the accurate fabric sample to JND Studios so they can ensure their Indy statue has the correct coloured pants! Fingers crossed they will accept it and change the colour to match.

So, after writing a shopping list of complaints - you decided "shut up and take my money"?.....really. So, what happens now, when we fast forward to production release day and the only thing they change is the lighting they use for the production reveal video? At the very least you're giving them 1/2 your deposit when you cancel......ah, but that's assuming you bought direct, if you bought from a retailer, your whole deposit is toast....

And if you stay the course, because you don't want to just donate to the JND business charity - you just bought yourself a $3K monstrosity.......why?

The best way you could have driven home your criticisms would be by withholding your cash, no sales means they HAVE to change, or go eat grass.....all you've achieved here is to reward failure.

 

[cking]

You're entitled to your opinion. The choice is mine to make though

 

[Lokki]

You're entitled to your opinion. The choice is mine to make though

Quite true! And I sincerely hope you're happy with this piece, however it turns out. Regardless of anything negative said about the piece, it has the potential to be a stunning centrepiece, especially with Sean Connery standing side by side.

Just for the record, if you'd have said you absolutely love the piece, and it was the best version of Indiana Jones you've ever seen, my thoughts would have been - well done you, money well spent. I just struggle to get my head around why anyone would spend (any amount) of money on something they themselves consider to be flawed.

That said, it's your money, your choice....good luck, and happy collecting.

 

[cking]

I see it's potential and am hoping that some improvements are made. If they don't address any of the critiques, I'm capable of making some adjustments to improve the things where I think they missed the mark, so if JND don't fix things, I will try to do it myself - including getting a more accurately shaped / sized hat 3D printed and put onto his head! LOL.

 

[SAB]

I sent my "suggestions" to JND and they thanked me for them. Who knows if that means they're listening or my comments will just go straigt into the recycle bin. What bugs me the most is the fact they they pull out all the stops on their elaborate release videos, lauding how amazing their pieces are, but there are VERY obvious issues with this (same as the Reeve Superman) which in hindsight, they acknowledged that it still needed work, so hopefully that means they will improve it. I think it's a mistake for them to do a resin hat on a Silicone head because that means the hat needs to be over-sized to fit onto the head. I think they should make the head have no hair on the top so they can taper the head and make the correctly scaled hat fit onto it properly so it looks like it's fitting tight on his head like the real hat did. If they wanted to do a full head with hair, they could offer that as a second display option. Of all my gripes with it, the stupid expression choice is the one that bugs me the most. They should have gone with a more relaxed, squint eyed expression that he has in a a lot of the publicity photos for the movie, or given him a determined, serious expression which he has a lot of time in the movie. This expression that they've gone with happens only a handful of times and it just doesn't work well with the choice of pose in my opinion. It's beyond me how the likes of Kojun could have let the statue progress this far without making these decisions for its improvement. His shoulders look too broad and square too, but that may not be helped by the fact that the head is too small for the body.

I doubt they change expression but minor tweaks on things like hat size and pants color has a shot. Fingers crossed!

 

[SAB]

Taking the same stance as SAB, I decided to pre-order it after all. I have reached out to JND Studios again and made them aware that I have a piece of fabric which is identical colour and fabric to the costume pants that were made for Harrison in the movie. This fabric sample was gifted to me by the late Noel Howard about 15 years ago when I was deeply into the Indy costuming community and visited Noel on several different occasions at MBA Costumes which he'd set up after working at Bermans and Nathans (who did the costumes for Raiders, Temple of Doom and Last Crusade). I actually got to wear Harrison's "hero" jacket from Temple of Doom on one of my visits (which was subsequently sold at auction by Propstore after Noel passed away). Cutting a long story short, I'm more than happy to send the accurate fabric sample to JND Studios so they can ensure their Indy statue has the correct coloured pants! Fingers crossed they will accept it and change the colour to match.

Hell yeah! Let’s fly this crazy collectible journey and see if they can successfully land it!

 

[Gipetto0812]

I doubt they change expression but minor tweaks on things like hat size and pants color has a shot. Fingers crossed!

Yea I agree. The likelihood of any headsculpt changes are very slim. I remember with Reeve, they initially said they would make changes, then in one of Daniel’s update videos he said they concluded that it was the hair that was messing with the likeness so that was what they were going to tweak.

 

[noisyrobot]

It will have amazing presence in anyone's collection but I'm relieved this is so high priced (over $5000 in Australia) and the likeness so uncanny valley I can happily pass without regret.

Makes it easier to order HT's old man Indy now!

 

[Mandible]

Makes it easier to order HT's old man Indy now!

 

[Mandible]

As I have a sizable SW collection everyone automatically assumes the original SW is my favorite movie of all time, but in reality, Raiders sits side by side with it. So with that in mind I keep thinking about what DarthAlias said earlier, there's barely any good Indy merchandise and the previous "grail" piece was the Cinemaquette, (which, by all accounts is absolute *** nowadays), and prior to that the SSC 1/4. I had the SSC, which was okay for the time, but eventually I sold it.

So I've been bashing my head over this damn thing, and really battling with myself to hold out in the hope the JND do a Raiders version... but the FOMO is getting to me. With such a tiny edition size and limited availability, it's almost like Disney have set JND up to fail.

Is it perfect? No. Is it by far and away the best Indy statue/collectible we've seen? For me that became an obvious answer. Yes.

Caved. Ordered

Oh well, worst case scenario, I'll sell this version if they ever do a Raiders one...

 

[sabin23]

As I have a sizable SW collection everyone automatically assumes the original SW is my favorite movie of all time, but in reality, Raiders sits side by side with it. So with that in mind I keep thinking about what DarthAlias said earlier, there's barely any good Indy merchandise and the previous "grail" piece was the Cinemaquette, (which, by all accounts is absolute *** nowadays), and prior to that the SSC 1/4. I had the SSC, which was okay for the time, but eventually I sold it.

So I've been bashing my head over this damn thing, and really battling with myself to hold out in the hope the JND do a Raiders version... but the FOMO is getting to me. With such a tiny edition size and limited availability, it's almost like Disney have set JND up to fail.

Is it perfect? No. Is it by far and away the best Indy statue/collectible we've seen? For me that became an obvious answer. Yes.

Caved. Ordered

Oh well, worst case scenario, I'll sell this version if they ever do a Raiders one...

You got the single statue only?

I assumed you just got the Indy since you mentioned Raiders is your favorite and not Crusade so no need for Sir Connery.

I put down my PO deposit for the duo statues yesterday but I am dissapointed at the lack of accessories - a grail prop should be an essential item for Last Crusade.

 

[Mandible]

You got the single statue only?

I assumed you just got the Indy since you mentioned Raiders is your favorite and not Crusade so no need for Sir Connery.

I put down my PO deposit for the duo statues yesterday but I am dissapointed at the lack of accessories - a grail prop should be an essential item for Last Crusade.

Yeah, Indy only. The Connery is mind blowing good, but I couldn't justify spending the extra when I don't really want a Henry Sr. And justifying the spend on the Indy only has been a struggle when I'm not 100% on it.

I'm blaming Darth! His comments gave me fomo for the first time in my life!!!!