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Metal Captain America shield
While sitting in "Captain America: The Winter Soldier" on its opening day, instead of completely losing myself in the movie like the rest of the audience, I spent a lot of time analyzing and deconstructing Cap's "Stealth" suit in a sudden and completely unnecessary plan to clothe my naked Mego Captain America figure.
The idea of a "real metal" shield came to me in a flash -- why not simply use one of those dozens of 3" button/badge blanks I already own? With a diameter of 3", the (metal!) disk is only slightly larger than the true 1:9 size (2.88") of the screen-used 26" diameter shield. Plus: METAL (albeit steel and not vibranium).
I had no plan to reveal my nefarious scheme to the rest of the world until the final product could be realized and finally UNLEASHED UPON THE UNSUSPECTING WORLD, until this morning when, in another thread on this Forum (regarding replacement Captain America shields), I read Spyweb007's comment:
So, I figured I might as well share all of my (apparently non-unique) ideas and create a WIP thread at the same time to record the actual construction process. [Photos to be posted]
In my mind, there are two basic ways to go about this: (1) only use the existing badge face disk, but you need to turn under the lip or trim it off, or (2) actually make the entire button/badge as a shield through the use of the Badge Maker tool), which results in a somewhat thicker-than-desired product. Nonetheless, I like the second option -- especially since, if this works, I can crank out as many of these as I want.
My plan includes slipping leather loops through both pin holes in the badge back (omitting the pin), which will work as armholds. The leather-working aisle (or near the bracelet stuff) of most craft stores have various thicknesses of suede "ribbon" that I have found extremely useful in various Mego-scale projects.
The current hold-up on this project is I want to very carefully paint the face of the badge, then distress (scrape, etc.) the paint to simulate battle-damage and expose the underlying metal. This requires some good masking templates (already on it) and a lot of patience. And a lot of blanks for trial-and-error (and I have a whole lot of them!). I plan to pass this first hurdle very soon...
One last brilliant (IMHO) idea -- my plan includes a screen-accurate(?) leather harness for the figure, which will include a rare-earth magnet on the back to match the R.E. magnet attached to the underside of the shield. This would permit a very satisfying slap-the-shield-on-his-back-and-it-attaches action, just like in the movie. As I re-read this, I realize that the steel shield requires no magnet to attach to the magnetic harness; this eliminates several layers of complication which I will address later (when I reach that Build Stage).
If this works, and is not too difficult to replicate, I might make a whole bunch of these. Not for sale -- for Trade Only. For Apes.
WATCH THIS SPACE. Updates to be posted soon. Merely posting this Thread is going to motivate me into doing this.
The idea of a "real metal" shield came to me in a flash -- why not simply use one of those dozens of 3" button/badge blanks I already own? With a diameter of 3", the (metal!) disk is only slightly larger than the true 1:9 size (2.88") of the screen-used 26" diameter shield. Plus: METAL (albeit steel and not vibranium).
I had no plan to reveal my nefarious scheme to the rest of the world until the final product could be realized and finally UNLEASHED UPON THE UNSUSPECTING WORLD, until this morning when, in another thread on this Forum (regarding replacement Captain America shields), I read Spyweb007's comment:
So, I figured I might as well share all of my (apparently non-unique) ideas and create a WIP thread at the same time to record the actual construction process. [Photos to be posted]
In my mind, there are two basic ways to go about this: (1) only use the existing badge face disk, but you need to turn under the lip or trim it off, or (2) actually make the entire button/badge as a shield through the use of the Badge Maker tool), which results in a somewhat thicker-than-desired product. Nonetheless, I like the second option -- especially since, if this works, I can crank out as many of these as I want.
My plan includes slipping leather loops through both pin holes in the badge back (omitting the pin), which will work as armholds. The leather-working aisle (or near the bracelet stuff) of most craft stores have various thicknesses of suede "ribbon" that I have found extremely useful in various Mego-scale projects.
The current hold-up on this project is I want to very carefully paint the face of the badge, then distress (scrape, etc.) the paint to simulate battle-damage and expose the underlying metal. This requires some good masking templates (already on it) and a lot of patience. And a lot of blanks for trial-and-error (and I have a whole lot of them!). I plan to pass this first hurdle very soon...
One last brilliant (IMHO) idea -- my plan includes a screen-accurate(?) leather harness for the figure, which will include a rare-earth magnet on the back to match the R.E. magnet attached to the underside of the shield. This would permit a very satisfying slap-the-shield-on-his-back-and-it-attaches action, just like in the movie. As I re-read this, I realize that the steel shield requires no magnet to attach to the magnetic harness; this eliminates several layers of complication which I will address later (when I reach that Build Stage).
If this works, and is not too difficult to replicate, I might make a whole bunch of these. Not for sale -- for Trade Only. For Apes.
WATCH THIS SPACE. Updates to be posted soon. Merely posting this Thread is going to motivate me into doing this.
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