So after my Masterpiece 2.0 Terrorsaur custom sold, someone wanted to commission me to make another using the Leader class Megatron instead of the Voyager. This has been fun to work with. Even though I spent over 2 weeks waiting for the parts I needed to arrive: Phase 1 : Beast Mode design So the first thing to figure out was how to make the beast mode look good. The Voyager had me pretty limited on options and I ended up with this weird lanky stretched out pterodactyl. This time I wanted something better. I came up with this first beast mode design: One of two, but definitely the better one. It uses the robot mode toes to pull off beast mode feet, the claws on Terrorsaur's robot arms are just going to be fake parts hidden in beast mode. The current beast mode is a little different from this picture now, because I realized I could get him more stumpy and accurate. But it was a start. Phase 2: Wing Design I feel like I could have just added onto the jet wings and nobody would have said anything about it...But I wanted to go a step further for something this scale. I planned to use the same wing design as my Generations-style Masterpiece Terrorsaur which was cloth sewn around Revoltech joints. It worked out great there... The wings were gonna be too large for the joints on this one though. Instead, I decided to use the Lego CCBS(Bionicle G2) joint system for it's strength, durability, and the fact that the wings could be easily removed/added if the buyer wanted a 100% clean Robot mode silhoutte. The wingspan should be about nine inches each, and the joint system consists of 3 standard balljoint connections(wingtip, middle of wing, and connection to backpack) and four swivel balljoints to limit the poseability to keep the wing from being floppy. This specific balljoint combination should let the wings flap up and down(middle joint) without curling into a fruit rollup. Phase 3: Implementation So after waiting about 2~3 bloody weeks while BOTH parts packages I needed got lost in the mail(I think I actually got a refund and had to reorder them from someone else, can't remember), I finally got to work chopping and shaving Megs apart. After that, I applied contour putty...which took days to fully cure because the hurricane weather here in Texas has shot the humidity through the roof. And badabing, the robot mode is almost done. As of today I can start adding the rest like the shoulder fins, robot feet proper, etc. So let's talk about the Pterodactyl head. Because I went through like four different designs trying to make this work so that the lower jaw could become the gun. Purely because I wanted to let the Pterodactyl breath TLK Leader Meg's fire stream. And he can. And it's better than I first thought. The pterodactyl head is made from the Leader Meg's arm cannon...and so is the removable gun. The lower jaw can move up&down by a CCBS swivel ball joint at the back. It'll attach to the neck by a CCBS normal balljoint so it can swing around and fold down for robot mode. Whereas the gun attaches to the roof of the beast head, which you can pull out by opening the jaw and just plucking it out. It's held in by a 5mm hole I burned into the head where the cockpit is. In fact, let's talk about the gun's peg? It's just a Lego Technic Pin. They're 5mm. Yes, you're welcome. You can just buy hundreds of 5mm pegs for like 2 bucks now. Yes, they're amazing and they come in gray/blue/black. I went with gray since the gun is mostly going to be silver, and they're all amazing. They also release easily when pulled, because the friction collapses into the cavity inside the pin. So they are LESS prone to breakage and it's amazing and I will use them forever now. Lower jaw still needs to be attached(was waiting for putty to cure first), entire head needs contour putty to get an organic beast mode. But this thing is just one more night of contour putty away from being ready to paint. I am SO excited for this, it has been insanely frustrating and insanely gratifying as things unfold. I can actually understand if someone isn't excited by it's current state, because I'm just looking at this thing and seeing how it's going to end up looking. This is the largest non-combiner custom I've ever done. The most expensive commission I've ever had. And I genuinely think this will be the best thing I've made yet.
Phase 4 : Poor scheduling, awful weather, and hobby lobby being out of stock of contour putty constantly...but the figure is about done aside from paintwork: - Chest/head had another layer of contour putty added to fill out the shaping more. - Shoulder wings and top of feet were done. - The pterodactyl head is about complete and just need some sanding the smooth out now that he final contour putty layer has cured completely. - The neck joint was replaced with a CCBS friction support ball socket instead so it can hold up the head's full weight with the gun&flamethrower. - The first wing has been sewn and attached, maintaining exactly the full range of motion I hoped for without floppy around or spinning on the joints. This week, I paint this absolute beast as well as make the other wing.
