Final Frontier had one good moment. When Kirk asked the entity, "What does God need with a starship?" Overall, the movie was arguably the worst of all the Trek movies.
Altaira V'ger Build - hold onto your hats
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Final Frontier had one good moment. When Kirk asked the entity, "What does God need with a starship?" Overall, the movie was arguably the worst of all the Trek movies.
grapetang
Space Frog Fan
The "Wreath of Khan"??? 
Where's the V'ger launch report? I'm curious about it's flight characteristics. I seem to recall a video of an upscale looping all over the place...
Where's the V'ger launch report? I'm curious about it's flight characteristics. I seem to recall a video of an upscale looping all over the place...
I have a ced videodisk of this. I've never had a player to watch them; those disappeared faster than betamax, lol.
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Star Trek Movie Rule of Thumb: Only even-numbered movies are worth watching.
Back in my fandom days (when I was the Communications Officer for a Star Trek fan club called "Starfleet"), it was "Star Trek: The Motion Sickness," "Star Trek III: The Search for a Plot," "Star Trek IV: Save the Whales," etc.
"Too much LDS in the sixties."
"I'm from Iowa. I just work in space."
Back in my fandom days (when I was the Communications Officer for a Star Trek fan club called "Starfleet"), it was "Star Trek: The Motion Sickness," "Star Trek III: The Search for a Plot," "Star Trek IV: Save the Whales," etc.
"Too much LDS in the sixties."
"I'm from Iowa. I just work in space."
TMP set up many important icons for the later TNG eps. The Klingons look completely different but we don't talk about it. They also had the first warp core used in future series. The movie was supposed to be the reinvigorated Star Trek 2 series. Probably turned out to be more lucrative as a movie series.
TMP has a special place for me because we went to McDonalds to get the first sponsored Happy Meal before watching the movie. I was 11 and it was awesome.
Jumping to Star Wars, the movie series has a different peculiarity. There's basically three different generations of movies. Each generation thinks the series they watched as a kid were the best and the others are ridiculous. For example, my son thinks Jar Jar is a great character but Ewoks and most everything in the sequels are silly. Regardless, the 9th movie revealed that the Star Wars movies were not about the Skywalkers but were about the Palpatines.
TMP has a special place for me because we went to McDonalds to get the first sponsored Happy Meal before watching the movie. I was 11 and it was awesome.
Jumping to Star Wars, the movie series has a different peculiarity. There's basically three different generations of movies. Each generation thinks the series they watched as a kid were the best and the others are ridiculous. For example, my son thinks Jar Jar is a great character but Ewoks and most everything in the sequels are silly. Regardless, the 9th movie revealed that the Star Wars movies were not about the Skywalkers but were about the Palpatines.
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Where can we get the artwork for this?
Or is it included in the kit?
such talent, something I have very little of.
I have never heard of anyone who thinks the original trilogy is ridiculous, aside from a few odd choices in Return of the Jedi. I will say the original plan was to have the final battle on and above the wookiee homeworld and I wish they had stuck with that. I think we can all agree it would be much easier to take a tribe of angry wookiees seriously than a tribe of teddy bears.
I grew up during the prequel era and generally consider them to have some good ideas with bad execution. At the very least they are not written-by-committee movies designed to appeal to nostalgia - the entire atmosphere of those movies was very different from the originals.
I refuse to acknowledge the sequel trilogy as part of Star Wars canon. They are loaded with missed opportunities and wasted potential that can all be blamed on crappy writing. Disacknowledging all the post RotJ books was possibly the dumbest move Disney could have made. If they had done the smart thing and adapted Timothy Zahn's Thrawn trilogy for a sequel trilogy, people would still be raving about how good the sequels were and Disney would be gearing up to adapt more of those books while raking in cash from movie tickets and merch.
GlenP
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Re: Star Wars books, you might find your local library has online audio books from that series.
For example, this one is read by the voice actor from the clone wars cartoons, yeah not the same as the movies and merch, but maybe better? Remember the Star Wars radio show?
https://www.audible.com/pd/Star-Wars-Ahsoka-Audiobook/B01M0YKIZA
Also, there are a few audiobooks narrated by Will Wheaton and he does a pretty good job, like Ready Player One, I think. Not related to either universe just new, good stories.
I used to have a long commute and would listen to audiobooks, not so much lately since I am working from home still.
For example, this one is read by the voice actor from the clone wars cartoons, yeah not the same as the movies and merch, but maybe better? Remember the Star Wars radio show?
https://www.audible.com/pd/Star-Wars-Ahsoka-Audiobook/B01M0YKIZA
Also, there are a few audiobooks narrated by Will Wheaton and he does a pretty good job, like Ready Player One, I think. Not related to either universe just new, good stories.
I used to have a long commute and would listen to audiobooks, not so much lately since I am working from home still.
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My hearing impairment precludes me from getting much use out of audiobooks. Print for me.
That book is also a Disney canon book, not one of the old ones.
boomtube-mk2
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When it comes to the Star Wars sequels, all I want to know is who thought it was a good idea to cast Adam Driver as the "Villain"? That guy was about as threatening as I would have been in that part.
And exactly what was John Boyega's part in the entire storyline?
Now Daisy Ridley showed her acting chops in Ophelia and Chaos Walking to a much greater degree than in those three Star Wars movies, where she wasn't really given much to work with.
IMO Rogue One was the best Star Wars movie next to The Empire Strikes Back and A New Hope.
And exactly what was John Boyega's part in the entire storyline?
Now Daisy Ridley showed her acting chops in Ophelia and Chaos Walking to a much greater degree than in those three Star Wars movies, where she wasn't really given much to work with.
IMO Rogue One was the best Star Wars movie next to The Empire Strikes Back and A New Hope.
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I actually thought he was fantastic, and his character got better and better over the course of the three movies. Rey and Kylo were by far the best parts of the sequel trilogy IMHO.
There I am in 100% agreement. I *loved* Rogue One.
Rogue One had its flaws but I agree in principle. Of the five Star Wars movies made by Disney, it's the only one that's really good. (I am going by heresay on Solo being mediocre, as I have never seen it.) Chirrut and Baze should not have been in it, and been in their own TV series or something instead. They were really interesting in concept, but I didn't think they fit in that well with the rest of the cast. Leaving them out would also have left more character development time for Jyn, Cassian, and Bohdi Rook; I think we can all agree that lack of character development was Rogue One's biggest weakness.
I also was really hoping to get a cool special effects scene of the Death Star jumping into or dropping out of hyperspace, which didn't happen.
I feel like I should mention at this point, to give my posts on this thread some context, that I have been a hardcore Star Wars geek since elementary school in the 90's and only fairly recently became a Star Trek fan.
I hate to tell you this but the original series was 40 years ago.
It's starting to become out of reach of the current generation. I think that's what Kathleen Kennedy was thinking. However, the hyperspeed ramming scene was unforgivable for me. How is she still in charge of Lucasfilm?Anyways, back to Star Trek. Nope, I got nothing. Back to Star Wars...
I hate to tell you this but the original series was 40 years ago.
Ridiculous, some art is timeless and the original trilogy is one of those timeless pieces. It's just The Hero's Journey in space, perfectly executed. Also, original trilogy merch still sells far better than any other, and Kathleen Kennedy, frankly, has no idea what she is doing. She was involved heavily in the reviled sequel trilogy and uninvolved in creating The Mandalorian. That should tell you something.
Pretty much - when ST:TMP came out I gave it a lot of slack, so much of it was showing off special effects, but it does drag a little now. The re-mastered original series still holds it's own well compared to a lot of stuff. Crap - Harlan Ellison, Theodore Sturgeon, James Blish, Robert Bloch as screenwriters, and even an Alan Dean Foster and Larry Niven in the animated series. The Golden Age and New Wave SF writers make Abrams and co. look pretty sad
And on everything beyond Lucas = DISNEY-DOLLAR-WARS! It is now a franked and franchised product : / they'll grind it up until it quits making money.
I watched the "new" version of the movie for the approaching Earth cislunar scene - all of the printed photopaper comes with the kit. If you guys want I will drive out to Dayton and retrieve it from E-Rockets and attempt to take some better pics.
Cheers / Robert
Not necessary Robert.
Just wanted to know if that was your own touch or part of the kit.
Looks fantastic!
here are some more pics of build...I used a lot of Titebond II on mine, with super glue for tack. Figured I would get more strength out of the Tite-Bond with card-stock. Altaira recommends high quality super glue - split the difference. Here are some externals (and I'll show my flubs). Hexagonal front structure: used paper clamps with pieces of card-stock as dent protection to put lots of it together. The clamps came about as I creased one of the sections and was looking for a neater, less dangerous method than forcing things together with my fingers 
Thankfully this mistake was covered by green lightning photo paper.
Thankfully this mistake was covered by green lightning photo paper.
Next the sphere, some tricky fitting issues. Spacing between the arched supports must be exact or you'll end up with lots of work like I did!
I found a cool way to put a bend in the flat portions of the arched supports: dampened and clamped to a cup with card-stock shims to protect from denting. When dry, tacked with super glue and paint-brushed with Tite-Bond II. Strong. Next post will be mistake #2 - doozy if you want to fly it, no problem if you don't.
I found a cool way to put a bend in the flat portions of the arched supports: dampened and clamped to a cup with card-stock shims to protect from denting. When dry, tacked with super glue and paint-brushed with Tite-Bond II. Strong. Next post will be mistake #2 - doozy if you want to fly it, no problem if you don't.
Attaching the C - arches to the rear tube. 2 mistakes - not exact spacing causing me to make sphere sections that actually fit, and I didn't get the tubes precisely spaced. If you do fly it, you'll need to make the motor mount EXTEND so you can put a retainer on it.
My spacing of the front hex sections put the sphere frame spacing off - near perfection required or you'll make new sphere pieces for some and lots of putty. The sphere sections are like pieces for a hot air balloon - gores.
GlenP
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Just kind of a tangent here, the new movie about Lucy and Desi is streaming this week, set in 1952, being the Ricardos, about ten years later Lucy buys out Desi and is running the Desilu production company herself when Gene Roddenberry pitches an idea for a new TV show, kind of like a Western in SPACE! So, thanks to Lucille Ball for Star Trek! I guess when they pitched the script to the network, she had a lot of es-plainin’ to do!
Finis - rear sections. Gluing the small detail pieces to the model prior to painting is pretty fun and low stress. Get the hex pieces and sphere frames right and alls well.
alignment right and all's well.
alignment right and all's well.
Paint: regular (not high build) gray. Then darker gray for accent and the metallic coating. When I put the blue metallic on, knew it was going to be an airbrush job -way too brash in sunlight. You'll have to watch the movie for the several seconds of cislunar approach - went to the end and replayed scene. The very thin dark gray mist over the blue did the trick.
The dark blue in the 'glyph' panels on the rear turned out nice - since it was a guess, way better than I expected. Wanted depth. Here's the styro-dome I made by cutting a section off a sphere. Texture of styro is PERFECT for this detail with a black dry-brush. Altaira will provide dimensions if you decide to do it. The photo paper behind the card-stock frames was a kick. You can see frames in prev post.
Final you have seen - I ended up damping down almost all of the metallic - just seemed too bright to me out of the can. I think you just need "enough." Here are some lighting differences. Darker makes better up to a point. Altaira says SKL 3 - but Altaira is GOOD at 3d geometry. For a builder, I would say overall SKL 4, and pay lots of attention to the surface alignment.
I recommend Satin clear coat - gets rid of paper gloss and super glue shine w/o putting a haze on the photo paper. I also painted the beads tangerine to get rid of the plastic finish a bit - satin clear also helped with that.
Cheers / Robert
I recommend Satin clear coat - gets rid of paper gloss and super glue shine w/o putting a haze on the photo paper. I also painted the beads tangerine to get rid of the plastic finish a bit - satin clear also helped with that.
Cheers / Robert
