KFC Stratotanker & UT Sworder completed!

 

Got some extra LEDs installed into Kup & Hot Rod in their alt-modes. I'm pretty happy with the results.

 

 
Wow, I've never seen a display that required this much time and effort! It looks incredible though. I have two questions:
1) Do you rearrange/play with/transform these figures after they've been LEDified?
2) What do you do about dust?

 

Thank you!! It definitely is a fun hobby for me; although I wish I had more time for it!
To answer your questions:
1) Yes, I will still transform them on occasion-- although really only for taking photos or videos. Most of the time, they stay on the display. From time to time, I will also try to re-arrange certain shelves/displays to make them more interesting!
2) I have a pretty low tolerance of dust, to be honest. When I do notice figures getting overly dusty, I have an electric duster and/or compressed air duster that I use to clean them.

Many blessings & Happy New Year my friend!

 

Fembots from G1 Season 2 customized. Took out the alt-modes in favor of a cleaner G1 look. (Their alt-modes were trash anyways!)

 

Every time i get an alert that you posted something new its like Christmas morning 

 

Thank you; I really appreciate it!! Many blessings to you my friend!

 

Bandai Tamashii Effects used on some seekers!

 

Added Quint-04 & Quint-05. Quintesson Collection is finally Complete!

 

Love how you posed them to scenes from the movie, great work again

 

NEW MP-39 Sunstreaker & MP-12+ Sideswipe completed!

 

Absolutely love your display. Just incredible and I have thoroughly enjoyed looking at the pictures and updates.

May love, peace and fruitfulness be yours in Christ.

 

Thank you so much; I really appreciate it!!

I haven't updated this thread in a while; all my most recent activity is on my FB page MP Crafts By Pastor Robin

Feel free to visit the photo galleries & video section; I think you may like a fair bit of the content posted there!

Have a most blessed week my friend!

(I need to update this thread, but here's a sample of a recent post)

 

Pastor Robin...

Love your workmanship and creativity. And my three young boys (1, 2 and 4) love your displays. However, my only recommendation is to consider uploading previous and future videos over to Youtube. I'm sure that you'd get a great number of followers/patreon subscribers....especially if your videos highlight your expertise. And your work would definately gather a following even outside the TF fandom.

Please continue your great work....and God Bless!

 

And you’ve gone from genius to visionary

 

Major upgrade to the display. Feel free to check it out!

Pastor Robin's Office (updated 09-2018)

3 Minute Demo

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=357284875064871

Full Video

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=897561947109694

More pictures & videos here:
https://www.facebook.com/mpcraftsbyrobin/

Video Highlights

 

I love how awesome your rainmakers look all lit up! Alpha Trion and Arcee have a Secret of NIMH thing going on. The dioramas, poses, arrangements and props is truly spectacular.

 

Best masterpiece collection displays I have ever seen.

The led work is amazing.

 

Awesome scene!    

 

EVOLUTION OF THE DISPLAY

The display began with humble beginnings in early 2016 when I first removed by desk hutch to install my first set of LACK floating shelves on my wall behind my PC. My very first LED mod was in March of 2016, when I drilled a gaping 5mm hole in the back of my MP-10 to install an LED to light up his matrix. I've since removed that LED in favor of installing an LED within the matrix itself, but I leave that hole there as a reminder of how this all started. "Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new." -- Albert Einstein


As the months went by I had installed many more LEDs amongst the figures, including a variety of accessories such as energon cubes, kremzeeks and explosion effects. They were all battery powered and could individually be turned on by remote control. As the collection grew, I also started to expand the display by installing more floating shelves around the room.


The display was really starting to look beautiful even in the dark. However, I soon discovered a flaw in the remote control sensors I had installed on each of them. They were constantly draining the batteries even when they were turned off. This was necessary for the sensors to constantly remain active to the remote control. I realized that needed another solution.


By November 2016, I had rewired all my figures to run by AC adapter instead of battery power. This was quite the project, as I had to set up many wires and splitters around the room to provide power to each figure. The wires were a lot messier than what I'd had hoped for, but at the time it was a worthwhile tradeoff. During that time, I also took an interest in fairy string lights as a nice (and affordable) means to provide lighting to the display.


I was also able to install different colored lights to different shelves, based on theme. The fairy string lights are not rigid and so each light had to be measured by distance and glued in place by hand with hot glue gun. It was quite a bit of work, but the overall result was fairly impressive. Every single power adapter was extended and united to a common power strip and soon the entire collection was able to be turned on by the press of a single button. "Patience is bitter, but its fruit is sweet." -- Aristotle


The next step for me was to install some creative backdrops. Since we own our own color copier & color printer, I printed my own backdrops and pieced them together to install onto the walls. By May 2017, the entire display had taken on a new personality and had also gained some public interest at that time. Many thanks to Maz @ TFSource for a Collectors interview that year.


The following year. as the collection continued to grow, I saw that I was running out of space in my room for each figure and so I had to make some very difficult decisions for the display. An "MP display" is just as important as an "MP figure" in my opinion and deserves just as much attention. Overcrowding of figures on a shelf is simply not an option for me. So in May of 2018 (12 months later), I had decided to tear down and renovate the entire display. Every backdrop was torn up and trashed. Every fairy string light was torn down, never to be used again. I removed my bookcase (and other furniture) and rearranged all the floating shelves to maximize room for all the figures (including combiners). I also sold off my entire Beast Wars collection and numerous figures from CHUG & other lines and focused purely on G1 Seasons 1-3 only (MP/3P). "Better one handful with tranquillity than two handfuls with toil and chasing after the wind." Ecclesiastes 4:6


During the renovation, I took the opportunity to upgrade the lighting for the entire display. Instead of fairy string lights (which I thought were nice, but fairly distracting), I looked for the most densely compacted LED strips I could find on the market. I eventually found an SMD2835 strip featuring 240LED/m. It was obviously more expensive than the string lights, but SO worth it (and easier to install as well!). By that time, I had also learned a lot more about customizing my own wires instead of purchasing them. Not only would I save money, but a lot of space as well.


Although the strips were easier to install, there was even more work than before because I had many more shelves to work with now than I had just 12 months earlier. I had to blueprint all 4 walls of my display to figure out how I was going to connect each strip to each other and somehow unite them to a single source. It was a fair bit of work, but the overall look was so nice that it was well worth it.


The next step was to restore power to each of the figures. By this time, I had at least 14 AC adapters being used to power the room. Since I work extensively with computers, I carry a fair bit of spare parts and so I decided that I'd try opening up an old 400W desktop power supply (PSU) and see if I can run the room with a single power source instead. After a bit of simple hacking, it worked! I found that not only would I have the means to power the 12V shelf lighting, but the 3V figures as well, since both voltages are provided by the PSU (yellow & orange wires respectively).


If the installation of the LED strip lighting was a challenge, providing power to each shelf would be a nightmare by comparison. It would require manually twisting many hundreds of feet of enameled wire and preparing (soldering & gluing) almost 200 power connectors across all of the shelves. The 4 walls had to be blueprinted a 2nd time around so all the splitting wires could be mapped and directed to the PSU. It took a while to get them all prepared, but the difference it would make in cleaning up all the wires for each shelf was so worth it, I would gladly do it all over again without hesitation.


Finally, it was time to get the backdrops printed and installed again. Neither my printer nor my copier supports borderless printing and so I searched online to see what service options would be available. I soon found BestValueCopy.com, which offered 11x17 borderless printing on cardstock for $0.22 per sheet. I gave them a try and sent in a big order (about 170 pages), and I was truly amazed at the quality that I saw (I will never print my own backdrops again!). As of the end of 2018, the display should now be ready to handle the rest of the incoming figures to complete the collection. It's been quite the journey, and a lot of mistakes made, but if I had to do it all over again, I wouldn't change a thing. Always looking forward to seeing what the future holds!

"Through hard work, perseverance and a faith in God, you can live your dreams." -- Ben Carson