Author Topic: MW4 Mad Dog Mk.II (AKA: Vulture Mk.II) - WIP (Read 10595 times)

Cazaril · « **on:** 21 February 2013, 10:46:54 »

This started in another thread (http://bg.battletech.com/forums/index.php/topic,25389.0.html), but I figured I post it here...

Dembigtanks had commented that he wished that they would make a MW4 Vulture, and others agreed... After looking at the pictures and at the current sculpt of the Mad Dog, I got into the conversation, because honestly, how hard could it be...

Well, let me tell you... My first thoughts proved incorrect, and I had to revise... And then I had to rework and revise again... and again...

My original plan was to split the torso down the middle, and add plasticard to bulk it up (Ok, that part worked)... I was going to use the launcher that came with it, but they didn't have the right shape... Then I got ahold of an abused Thor/Summoner torso, and chopped that up, but even that didn't have the right look... So I ended up having to build most of the side torsos/launchers from scratch... Oh, there is metal in there... Just enough to drill out the missile holes, and attach it to the center torso... The rest, plasticard and green stuff (which is not my strong suit)... The chin turret is a scratch built piece too...

The arms ended up being a set of Thor D arms (IWM part OP-009 and OP-010), cut from the upper arm and flipped over. The upper arm is from the resculpted Mad Dog.

All the little details you see, are either green stuff or styrene strip..

The legs presented their own problems... Chief among them, a desire to not stay together... I drilled out the hip joint and added a piece of brass tubing to both side, that gave the waist post something more snug to fit into, and the pinned it all... But there just isn't enough there to work with, and it is a weak spot on the mini... In the end, I think it will be the rods coming up from the base, through the foot and into the leg, that hold the mini in place and together.

As for imagery... I leaned heavily on this image.

http://www.sarna.net/wiki/images/a/ab/MWDA_Mad_Dog-Vulture.jpg

but also took inspiration from these also;

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_9iMIweN5ntc/S8a1QFNrYAI/AAAAAAAABKw/D5kiv4Arj1w/s1600/Mech+Warrior+4+Vulture+Papercraft.jpg

http://home.roadrunner.com/~cmosturm/vulture-luftshark.jpg

In the end, it took two months get the concept, gather the parts and build it... And I owe both IAmClanWolf and Haku thanks for coming up with some of the parts I needed, and getting them out to me quickly. Otherwise I might still be in the planning stages...

As for the image below... Please forgive... On the best of days, my photo-fu is passible.... But this kind of white on white just doesn't like to show up... I had to play with the lighting a little bit, so the images are a bit dark... But you should be able to get the idea...

Anyway... Here is my take on the MW4 Mad Dog Mk.II

Originally I promised a parts list and how-to... Regrettably, there is so much custom made stuff in this, that what is the point... I used a Vulture "Mad Dog" Prime [20-600RE] and the arms listed above... I guess I also used the side torsos from an OOP Thor, but I wouldn't have bothered if I had known how much I was going to have to cut it down and reshape it. I'd probably have just used the included launchers if I had... (Note: While I guess I could have scratch built the launchers completely, but I prefer the metal to attach the torsos with)...

Finally... I never mention this much... But I want to take a moment to thank Diamond Shark... He's had my back on at least the last half dozen projects, and he's always pushing for me to do better. Which includes a desire to see me do more scratch build stuff... He's been my second set of eyes, my sounding board and my friend... And I honestly think his help shows.

Having said that... “Once you start down the dark path, forever will it dominate your destiny, consume you it will...” I'll get you for this D.S.

As always, comments and suggestions welcome.

Caz

Whitar · « **Reply #1 on:** 21 February 2013, 11:18:47 »

How cool! When may we see it painted? O0 O0

Cazaril · « **Reply #2 on:** 21 February 2013, 11:37:25 »

Quote from: Whitar on 21 February 2013, 11:18:47

How cool! When may we see it painted? O0 O0

Ouch!... That's a tough one...

I've got another mini on the bench, that has first priority to get painted (The fourth member of my 23rd Arcturan Guards, 1st Battalion, 1st Company, Command Lance... Of which the Warhammer, Thunderbolt and Crab I have already posted are members of)...

And I have a RL event, that will ramping up soon and probably start sucking away at my time...

Finally, there is FPG... Since this is a Clan mini, and I don't have any Clan decals (because I hate the Clans), I'm going to have to order them up... So I'll have to wait on them...

Basically... I don't know...

I might be able to get it painted in a week, or it could be June before it gets done..

The only thing I can really promise is that I put way too much work in this, just to leave it unpainted.

Caz

ShadowRaven · « **Reply #3 on:** 21 February 2013, 11:49:15 »

beautifully done good sir. I salute you

JadeHellbringer · « **Reply #4 on:** 21 February 2013, 12:08:26 »

Man, that is gorgeous. Very impressive work, you got the look of it dead-on.

IAMCLANWOLF · « **Reply #5 on:** 21 February 2013, 14:51:56 »

Solid work Caz! I can tell that you put in a ton of hours on this one. I especially like the beefed-up legs, and the overall pose you went with.

I can't discern from the pictures, but it looks like the hip section attaches to the torso just behind the turret? I think what I'm seeing is the original connection for the Mad Dog torso, but with the medium laser array in front it looks as though the entire torso is pushed backward. Since you removed the sensor box from the nose of the torso, making the front appear shorter, I might have moved this connection point to the hip back some. You wouldn't have to remove the large bulbous section from underneath the torso, just pin it further back within that area (if that makes sense). The only other thing I *might* have suggested would be to cut down the canopy. Chop it, in hot rod terms. The Mechwarrior 4 version is very low-profile.

At any rate, I think you have a real crowd pleaser here. Nice to see someone step up to the plate on the MW 4 mod. Looking forward to seeing her in some Inner Sphere scheme... O0

Sigma · « **Reply #6 on:** 21 February 2013, 15:00:25 »

Ditto on Justin's critique. Move her hips down and back just a tad and she'll be perfect. Hands down the best Mark Two I've ever seen in standard scale. O0

packhntr · « **Reply #7 on:** 21 February 2013, 15:06:02 »

WOW!!!! I LIKE!!!! [drool]

Diamond Shark · « **Reply #8 on:** 21 February 2013, 15:25:08 »

wow, this looked great in the wip pictures, but together? man it is amazing! the stance screams vulture to me too, how menacing it looked when the IS forces first encountered it.
great work on this and was no help, this one was all you!

Mr Balk · « **Reply #9 on:** 21 February 2013, 16:51:03 »

Cazaril,

I really like it and will need to put it on the "to do list".

I think I might go with building the side torso off of the Grigori missile pods. They have what looks to be the right angle to then do the Brown/Green Stuff and plastic stock build-up from there. This would not give the missle tip look, but may cut back on some of the overall build time.

I also got some extra Resculpted Avatar legs from IWM and wonder what that would look like with the Resculpted Vulture/MadCat feet.

Just a few thoughts from a fellow MODer. >:D

Mr Balk

Cazaril · « **Reply #10 on:** 21 February 2013, 17:02:41 »

Quote from: IAMCLANWOLF on 21 February 2013, 14:51:56

I can't discern from the pictures, but it looks like the hip section attaches to the torso just behind the turret? I think what I'm seeing is the original connection for the Mad Dog torso, but with the medium laser array in front it looks as though the entire torso is pushed backward. Since you removed the sensor box from the nose of the torso, making the front appear shorter, I might have moved this connection point to the hip back some. You wouldn't have to remove the large bulbous section from underneath the torso, just pin it further back within that area (if that makes sense). The only other thing I *might* have suggested would be to cut down the canopy. Chop it, in hot rod terms. The Mechwarrior 4 version is very low-profile.

I think what you are seeing is the torso twist, pushing the hip/waist connection forward (legs aligns with the point of the hex, the torso aligns with the flat side). If not for twisting, they would actually sit about center of the front of the missile launchers. Check out the third frame... You can see how far back that connection sits on the other side.

Where the torso and the waist plate meet... I cut the bulbous area at the bottom of the torso off, because once I added the plasticard, it would have stuck out to far over the edges. I also built up the back torso a little, and because of this, managed to scoot it forward some. Then I rebuilt the bulbous area to better match the raised cylinder that is meant for placement on the waist plate... What this also has done is when centered, the front "teeth" on the nose, the front edge of the chin turret and the front edge of the waist plate, all make a clean line (or pretty close to it)... What I didn't do, was take any off the front edge of the waist plate (partly because I like that line it forms), and that may have been a mistake. Seeing as how all three images show it farther back. I guess we'll have to chalk that one up to artistic license...

As for chopping the cockpit down... I thought about it, when I was looking at the 2nd and 3rd pictures... But the primary one I used has the cockpit sitting kind of high. And I was under the impression that that picture came from the game. So I went with what I was assuming was the more canon shot.... Plus, and you can sort of see this in the first frame, I like the line of the front torso almost matching that of the cockpit...

Even though I'm not going to change it, nor plan to make another one of these EVER again... I do, as always, appreciate the critique...

As to the topic of paint... I hate the Clans. I have no purpose for the Clans. And the Clans don't exist in my universe... BUT... She'll get a proper Clan paint job... Anything else would just be wrong...

And speaking of that... My understanding is that the Mad Dog is pretty much in every Clan... Is that true? Is there any Clan she would be in? I mean, other then Clan Wolverine...

Caz

Cazaril · « **Reply #11 on:** 21 February 2013, 17:05:00 »

Quote from: Mr Balk on 21 February 2013, 16:51:03

This would not give the missle tip look

Those missile tips are 40 little tiny pieces of .025 styrene rod, custom cut, rounded and placed... Which means you can duplicate it on anything... If you're willing to spend about three hours... ;)

Caz

jimdigris · « **Reply #12 on:** 21 February 2013, 17:09:41 »

worktroll · « **Reply #13 on:** 21 February 2013, 17:15:49 »

Cazaril, that is a truly amazing piece of work. Extremely well done. I'm in awe of it, and of your efforts.

W.

ghost13a · « **Reply #14 on:** 22 February 2013, 04:15:16 »

[drool]
I so love this mini, O0

Ryumyo · « **Reply #15 on:** 22 February 2013, 04:34:13 »

Truely a fine piece of art.

LastChanceCav · « **Reply #16 on:** 22 February 2013, 10:13:00 »

That is a beautiful piece of work Caz, your attention to detail shines through and is inspiring.

As for which Clan, I always understood that the Ghost Bears always had a higher proportion in their touman than other Clans.

Cheers,
LCC

Cazaril · « **Reply #17 on:** 22 February 2013, 10:40:54 »

The original post that all this started in... Someone mentioned that this is in universe for the Ghost Bears... But is there any Clan that this couldn't belong to? I'm considering my options, and am more trying to remove possibilities at this point.

Caz

IAMCLANWOLF · « **Reply #18 on:** 22 February 2013, 13:21:39 »

Hmm...I vote Clan Diamond Shark, Sigma Scheme... ^-^ ;)

worktroll · « **Reply #19 on:** 22 February 2013, 13:42:23 »

Smoke Jaguar Psi Galaxy.

Cazaril · « **Reply #20 on:** 22 February 2013, 16:00:38 »

Quote from: IAMCLANWOLF on 22 February 2013, 13:21:39

Hmm...I vote Clan Diamond Shark, Sigma Scheme... ^-^ ;)

Quote from: worktroll on 22 February 2013, 13:42:23

Smoke Jaguar Psi Galaxy.

I'm assuming these are votes for how you'd like it to be painted....

I'm looking for Clans that don't use the Mad Dog... Not because I want to paint it in their color, but so I don't consider them when I'm making up my mind.

Caz

Dragon41673 · « **Reply #21 on:** 22 February 2013, 16:06:44 »

That looks awesome Caz! Congrats.

What about Coyote or The Society for a paint job?

IAMCLANWOLF · « **Reply #22 on:** 22 February 2013, 17:36:11 »

Quote from: Cazaril on 22 February 2013, 16:00:38

I'm looking for Clans that don't use the Mad Dog...

I'm fairly certain all of the known Clans use the Mad Dog save Clan Wolverine (which you already noted).

TheMaster1955 · « **Reply #23 on:** 22 February 2013, 23:43:45 »

well done O0

Snake Eyes · « **Reply #24 on:** 23 February 2013, 02:12:03 »

Is this supposed to be the 70 ton Mad Dog II from MW4 Mercenaries?

BTW, that is a really cool mini O0

Maingunnery · « **Reply #25 on:** 23 February 2013, 04:51:58 »

Parts list please! O0

Mastergunz · « **Reply #26 on:** 26 February 2013, 19:15:30 »

Wow dude! very nice indeed! This was my ride from MW4 and too see it in metal form does my inner child good. O0

-Gunz

ShadowRaven · « **Reply #27 on:** 26 February 2013, 23:02:24 »

other then the exception of some of the periphery states (not including the OWA) I think pretty well every clan and house uses the Mad Dog/Vulture, Though any of the Homeworld clans would be unlikely to have any access to the Ghost Bear produced version

Auman · « **Reply #28 on:** 01 March 2013, 18:39:16 »