Captured Martian tripods

[clipper1801]

Where are they? Out there somewhere . . . waiting to be painted . . . . ?

[matt56]

I am going to have to order a couple of extras from Keith to repaint as captured - right now I am planning on one captured by the British and one captured by the Germans...I will likely go with a MkI and a MkII...not too big but plenty of space to have fun with a new look.

As soon as they are out I had best get cracking on them - must pre-order from the Herrn Oberst this weekend...

All the best,
Matt

[gully_raker]

*******************************************************Snipped*******************************************

I still don't trust those chaps that came in the strange black aircraft and said they were Thai Fighters from the Empire. We all know that Thailand is not in the Empire. Ask any Australian.
Kyte.

[flash]

I can't wait to see the pictures of that one Matt. i bet the look on the punters' faces will be a treat.
Rob.

"Wait till you see what the red button does....!"

[Jager]

"Wait till you see what the red button does....!"

Now I need to get Matt a red button for Origins........just in case

[Flying Officer Kyte]

I can see that more martians are going to be needed plus an obligatory red button then.
I'd better get saving up my pennies.
Rob.

[matt56]

Perhaps a red button that makes cool space/aliens/invasion/theramyn sounds...

All the best,
Matt

[Flying Officer Kyte]

Now if you could find one of those I would be really interested Matt.
Rob.

[matt56]

Check these out, Rob - the first is more 'modern' Sci-Fi sound effects, while the second one is 'classic' SFX from 50s space movies...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lsZ7T4RuPYs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qHK4YjgDV9s

And then there's this that might have some possibilities...

https://www.discogs.com/BBC-Radiopho...elease/4414361

All the best,
Matt

[clipper1801]

I had the warning horn sfx on my phone for my ring tone from one of the movies until it went off in church once . . . would be cool in a game . . .

[OldGuy59]

Check these out, Rob - the first is more 'modern' Sci-Fi sound effects, while the second one is 'classic' SFX from 50s space movies...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lsZ7T4RuPYs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qHK4YjgDV9s

And then there's this that might have some possibilities...

https://www.discogs.com/BBC-Radiopho...elease/4414361

All the best,
Matt

Looking at the comments on the second link, no-body there was a 'Forbidden Planet' fan. How the sound effects were made - Link: Wikipedia.org - Bebe and Louis Barron

[Flying Officer Kyte]

I think the second one was more my era Matt.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qHK4YjgDV9s

Rob.

[Flying Officer Kyte]

I had the warning horn sfx on my phone for my ring tone from one of the movies until it went off in church once . . . would be cool in a game . . .

I sure would have liked to see the looks on the faces of the congregation Dave.
Could be worthy of Mr Bean. How did you react?
Rob.

[matt56]

I agree with you, Rob - the second is by far my idea of sci-fi alien sounds And "Forbidden Planet" is one of my all-time favorites, Mike - tons of great sound effects to be found there...

All the best,
Matt

[OldGuy59]

I like the flag idea, too, Dave - I had thought that perhaps might be an option, as well...your point about saving the Martians for reuse as themselves is well-taken, especially given the cost of the figures. Perhaps a mix will be in order? A couple of repaints and a number of attachable battle flags would look cool on the board and accomplish the purpose.

Do we have a scale on the Tripods? Has anyone seen mention of that? I don't recall seeing it myself in the various threads, but I could easily have missed it. They almost look like they could be 1/144, depending on how many Martians one assumes are inside piloting the walkers...

I love the creativity and ideas you all are coming up with here Your computer skills never cease to amaze, Mike!

All the best,
Matt

If the scale question was in order to figure out how big(small) flags would have to be to use for Tripod ID purposes, I'd ask you to tell me what scale this flag is:


www.flickr.com - Tallest Flagpole in the US

Flags need only be big enough for ready ID, and for 48' tall Tripods, they are whatever size they need to be. Scale doesn't need to be defined, as the user just says it's 'X by Y' (proportional to the Tripod, not to "standard" flag sizes).

[clipper1801]

Too easy, its 1:1 scale . . .

[matt56]

I certainly understand your point, Mike - as long as it doesn't look out of place on the tripod, it doesn't matter.

I was more concerned with trying to scale things to the planes and potential Thunder Child models - but as we've discussed earlier in the thread, even that is rather academic, as it is, after all, how things look in the game that matters. I think it's great to throw around ideas like this so that folks can pick and choose what works best for them.

I have some 1/300 WWI tanks and trucks as ground targets, and then I have one of Clipper's 1/144 WWI destroyers and a 1/144 WWI sub as sea target (in addition to a bunch of Topside Minis 1/1800 WWI ships to bomb, as well). I have even toyed with getting a 1/144 WWI A7V as a target to somehow use in an up-close-and-personal ground attack scenario...but I am still thinking that one through.

All the best,
Matt

[matt56]

I couldn't wait to get started on repainting one of my tripods - since I plan on getting more Locusts, repainting the one from the boxed set seemed like a good idea.

Since I wasn't planning on taking the tripod off its base - it seems pretty securely glued in - I needed to make a mask to protect the base details. I traced the octagonal base onto a 3x5 card, marking the location of the tripod's feet. After some fiddly cutting to get the card to fit around the feet, I realized the card had to be cut in half to fit into the area between the feet (Photo 1). I taped it together with green painter's tape and then taped around the feet (Photos 2). Finally, I taped all around the base, too, as I was planning on giving the repaint a spray of Testor's Dullcote when I was all finished (Photo 3). This typed of masking would also serve if one were to decide to prime the tripod before painting.







This shot shows the base colors applied - I used Vallejo paints, blocking in the three main camouflage colors first. I usually just paint over the existing Ares or Nexus paint/decal job - I have never had to prime a 'repaint' (so far...), and in this case, I just painted over the existing Locust paint scheme.



Then I painted the black 'stripes' deliniating the colored areas. The heat ray projector 'eye' was painted Vallejo Scarlet Red.



Once things had dried, I applied two washes of Vallejo Sepia ink (watered down to a 50/50 ratio) to the entire tripod - the figure has wonderful detail scuplted into it and I wanted that detail to be more obvious to the naked eye. I always find it is easier to build up the strength of the wash rather than have it too heavy to begin with, so I rarely use inks or stains straight from the bottle. I also painted the heat ray 'eye' in a similar fashion to how the Games Workshop folks suggest Eldar gems should be painted...



This shot shows the colors I used for the main camo - I added a couple of drops of the grey to the Russian Green when it came to painting that color, since the green in the scheme I was following had a definite greyish aspect to it.




Here you see my paint palette after all was finished. Once the whole figure had been painted and then received its two washes of Sepia, I went back over with the base colors straight from the bottle and dry-brushed the appropriate areas lightly to pick up the lovely raised details on the figure. I then mixed the Desert Yellow with each of the other two colors to get a little bit lighter highlight and dry-brushed that.




Once everything had dried satisfactorily, I spray-coated the figure with Testor's Dullcote, and then I gave the heat ray 'eye' two coats of gloss varnish (brushed on). The next four shots show the completed tripod on the Ares No-Man's-Land mat.









The last photo shows some of the great detail on the model - they really are nice little figures! I have some 10mm flags coming that a friend picked up for me at Historicon last weekend, so to finish this captured German tripod off, he will eventually have the Imperial flag flying from the top back of the engine nacelle - there is a spot perfect for drilling a small hole to insert the flag 'pole'. I will post a picture of it when it's added.

All in all, this was a pretty simple little project - I look forward to repainting at least one more, maybe two, tripod(s). Soon they will be marching into battle against their former masters...

All the best,
Matt

[Flying Officer Kyte]

A very neat job Matt, and I had almost forgotten about painting gemstones, although I did dozens for my Dwarf army over time.
Rob.

[matt56]

My 10mm WWI flags came in - it was a fairly easy process to attach an appropriate one to a brass rod flagpole and affix it to the tripod's engine housing. First photo is the sheet of flags - more than I will ever need! Second and third photos are the tripod from the front and rear - I'm fairly happy with how things look I might have wished for a shade-larger flag, but I didn't want to overdo things...







All the best,
Matt

[milcoll73]

Now I need to get Matt a red button for Origins........just in case

i forgot to bring my red button to origins with me.