Colonial Landram from Battlestar Galactica

[ASC Mclaren]

YES!!! And on St. Patrick's day!!! You have made an Irishman happy! This will move to the top of the build pile.

[Revell-Fan]

Originally Posted by Kjev

Awesome! I have to ask (because I want to copy the technique): How did you do the laser blasts?

Quite simple: I bought some laser torpedos at the local ordnance depot, aimed at the skies, fired ... and took the picture. OR DID YOU REALLY THINK THAT WAS A VFX???

[Revell-Fan]

Originally Posted by Revell-Fan

Quite simple: I bought some laser torpedos at the local ordnance depot, aimed at the skies, fired ... and took the picture. OR DID YOU REALLY THINK THAT WAS A VFX???

Well, I guess you already know it. I opened the pic in Gimp, created a new empty layer, drew a path with the path tool, made a selection from the path, filled the selection with red, unselected everything and ran a Gaussian blur over it. Then I played around with the layer modes, added a blurred white streak to it on another layer, and that's it. I'll add some howto pics soon.

Geez, you make it sound so simple, I would love to see a tutorial on that!

[ASC Mclaren]

Originally Posted by Revell-Fan

Well, I guess you already know it. I opened the pic in Gimp, created a new empty layer, drew a path with the path tool, made a selection from the path, filled the selection with red, unselected everything and ran a Gaussian blur over it. Then I played around with the layer modes, added a blurred white streak to it on another layer, and that's it. I'll add some howto pics soon.

I like the idea of going to the hardware store and picking up the laser cannons better then VFX in GIMP

[Revell-Fan]

Originally Posted by Zathros

Geez, you make it sound so simple, I would love to see a tutorial on that!

By your command!

Here comes a little tut on the laser beams. You can make your own light saber, flash and halo effects with it, too. Please note that this is not an in-depth tut on how The Gimp works (that will be covered in other tuts or can be found out on various sites dealing with TheGimp). There is a special light saber script for Gimp available which produces a similar effect but the results are not so good when you are working with large images. You may replicate the effect with other graphic programs which can handle layers, of course (e. g. Photoshop). The basic principle is always the same. And if you create another layer and use an effect brush on the muzzle (e. g. a star-shaped brush) you can enhance the effect further.

In the old days VFX artists made this effect virtually BY HAND when it came to animate laser beams in a film. It was called "rotoscoping": They in effect painted the effect onto each frame, and 24 frames make one second of film. So it was a tremendous amount of work when the Millennium Falcon escaped the Death Star, the Cylons destroyed the fleet and Buck saved the day (once a week) ! Have fun and enjoy!

[Revell-Fan]

RB has completed his test-build and helped me improve the kit. I have revised everything and declare the kit as "ready for distribution". If the admins approve, you may grab the LR from the download section soon!

[ASC Mclaren]

You are so awesome RF!

Originally Posted by Revell-Fan

RB has completed his test-build and helped me improve the kit. I have revised everything and declare the kit as "ready for distribution". If the admins approve, you may grab the LR from the download section soon!

Everything pending Approval has been approved. Thank You so much for this wonderful, bad a$$ed, Battlestar Galactica homage!

This is the way to design, make, and release a model!!

[Patron_zero]

Waiting patiently but admittedly anxious for this model, thanks !

[Revell-Fan]

Thank you all for your creative support and patience! And now: Go and get'em!

[Patron_zero]

Many many sincere thanks R-F, thinking of doing the 1/24 scale in sheet styrene and 'down-scaling' the pattern for a 1/48 and 1/72 !

Again sir, sincere appreciation and kudos !

[gg56]

Very nice work. How was the suspension on the test ride?

[Revell-Fan]

Originally Posted by Patron_zero

Many many sincere thanks R-F, thinking of doing the 1/24 scale in sheet styrene and 'down-scaling' the pattern for a 1/48 and 1/72 !

Again sir, sincere appreciation and kudos !

If you do so you'll HAVE to put LEDs in it! Of course, you could also turn it into an RC model...

[Revell-Fan]

A little update: ASC requested a model of the Landram Chariot from the episode "The Magnificent Warriors". Since I have the 3D model of the Landram, I fired up SketchUp and made the necessary changes. To all of you who might have been thinking about converting the Landram into the Chariot: The vehicle differs from the Landram in so many respects that all efforts may be in vain. The angles, lights, wheels and tracks are different and one axle is missing. The differences may be of some advantage though: Assembly of this model will be much easier. All parts and instructions have been sent to ASC for test-bulding. Here are some pics for your viewing pleasure. Stay tuned!