TABLE OF CONTENTS: SS-18 Bumblebee - YOU ARE HERE (Face has been updated here) SS-14 Ironhide SS-22 Dropkick SS-38 Optimus Prime SS-40 Shatter So for accuracy's sake, I ended up adding touch-ups to nearly every Studio Series figure I had, some extensive, some barely distinguishable to the naked eye. Since I planned on putting these in a BST thread or eBay, I decided to get them into a photo shoot together, starting with... SS-18 BUMBLEBEE So at first, this one wasn't too complicated as to what the goal was: make the silver parts darker, panel line the yellow pieces with brown, and bring out any details missing from the vehicle mode. So it came, so it went. The battle mask definitely benefited from black outlines around the eyes, while the regular face allowed for some playing around with different shades of metallic grey to get the details just right. I also ended up applying a brighter blue to the eyes so that they could stick out more easily. For the blade, wheels, and rear view mirrors, I applied some chrome which really helped complete the whole figure. Sadly, the plastic isn't too tolerant of excessive amounts of paint thinner and the left knee ended up breaking as some eagle eyes may have noticed. Miraculously, it didn't effect the stability of the figure, but I ended up tightening up the joints with some Pledge just in case so now the whole build is super solid. Anyhow, that's all the photos I've got so far. For any questions, comments or the like, you know what to do. Expect more pictures of more figures very soon!
Good call! The figure doesn't have any sort of groove there like it does with a lot of other areas meant to be silver, so that detail somehow went right under the radar for me. I just grabbed my silver paint, put some gunmetal under the eyebrow ridge to bring out the eyes some more, and voila!
Alright, another day, another shoot. Here goes! This time, it's... SS-14 IRONHIDE So, lots of things to talk about with this guy: First, looking up reference shots for Movieverse characters without a distinguishable color is ridiculous. Going between movie capture, high-grade statues and renders turned out to be more trouble than it's worth since many of them have different colors for the same parts. More often than not, I was left wondering whether a particular detail was either silver or just really reflective. That said, expect minor inaccuracies along the black, grey and silver bots down the line. Second, stock SS Ironhide has loads of unpainted plastic. I'm pretty sure both of the legs were entirely unpainted apart from the truck details on the back and a small silver cylinder on the knees. What I'm getting at is Ironhide really benefited from the touch ups. Some of the right hand's gun barrels were grating on me so I used a panel liner to make them look deeper and help them blend in with the actual deeper barrels. Third was a detail I'm surprised I didn't notice until I started painting. That big grey front bumper piece that didn't fold up like it does in the movie? Turns out the piece meant to represent that folded bumper is directly above the original. As unsettling as it is to have the fake kibble and real kibble right next to each other, painting the former grey does help add to the color diversity this figure was begging for. Apart from all that, the customization was pretty cut and dry. The truck mode was simple in its improvements: chrome headlights and rear view mirrors, paint the back bumper grey to match the front, and accentuate the side steps with silver. That's all for now!
New bot? New bot. Here comes... SS-22 DROPKICK Alright, where to begin? I'm sure most people know by now that just about all the Bumblebee movie toys were built off of prototype designs, leading Dropkick here to bear an almost entirely different look from his theatrical debut. With that in mind, I still tried picking out whatever details from said prototype shots as I could, most noticeably the addition of blue on the legs, pecs and hands. Some gunmetal, gold and plenty of panel lining helped bring out the other details, especially with the face. Considering the original helicopter mode was all grey, however, I decided to stray off the beaten path and keep the blue from the toy while still aiming for whatever realistic touches were necessary to keep it from looking like a toy.
Hi again, sorry to keep people waiting. After a long break, I finally got more pictures to show off, starting it off right with one of my favorite figures of the line: SS-38 OPTIMUS PRIME Not much to say about painting this guy that hasn't already been said. In fact, this may have been the easiest character to find reference pictures for, considering how much of his airtime in the movie have his details clearly visible with minimal blur. The weathering was especially fun to try this time around, and I was surprised to see how well the Autobot stickers I had fit in the shoulder areas where they were supposed to be. Again, this guy's up for sale on my BST thread, so feel free to PM me if you'd like him for yourself!
Finally got me some of the new ones coming up. So without further ado, here comes.. SS-40 SHATTER So that thing I said earlier about Bumblebee's prototypes? Seems that Shatter ended up bearing the most radical changes after being one of the first Decepticons proposed for the movie. Case and point, I had to do quite a bit of digging to keep track which piece of this figure was based on what concept art. For instance, it turns out this face with the visor shows up in the final cut of the move, just after she and Dropkick transform upon encountering Sector Seven. Using those shots, the SS artwork, and various concepts for reference, I whipped up this little amalgamation with some extra drybrushing and chrome pens.
