Officer, he stole my nailgun

[MmM]

This is a Gremlin action figure I started working on yesterday afternoon, so far all I have done is the head. These aren't the Gremlins that take apart planes or come from cuddly Mogwais who eat after midnight, rather they're demonic fiends from the Quake: Scourge of Armagon PC game that enjoy stealing your arsenal of weapons and reproducing by devouring corpses.

Head shots:



Reference sketches:



Game polygon model:

[printz]

MmM said:

that enjoy stealing your arsenal of weapons and reproducing by devouring corpses.

They're no joke really. Once I died instantly; the screen had switched horizontally, no noise, but I had <0 health, just because I let ones live and dig corpses. Otherwise they aren't very evil. They usually helped when they stealed the gun.

Your rendition is quite accurate, I'm curious how flexible will the end-product be.

[Shapeless]

Great job as always MmM. although I would have prefered a more recognizable character like the feind or Ogre, at least it resembles the feind. I never played scourge of Armagon. I got the other expansion pack DoE. cause I thought it was the better one. but all I ever heard was about SoA. bummer.

[MmM]

Here's what I got done over the weekend; I didn't do any work on it Friday:

Day 2 Progress (6/23/07): Upper body completed and painted but still needs the mohawk. Head still unattached.



Day 3 Progress (6/24/07): Head attached to body, fur mohawk added, arms completed and attached. Seventeen points of articulation at this point (neck, shoulders, elbows, wrists, and finger/pincer knuckle joints). My Gremlin, even though incomplete, has already begun a life of thievery by stealing the Mani Wizard's lower body. The arms are unpainted in all of the photos except for (1) the aforementioned Mani Wizard mock-up one, where they have the basement coat of nutmeg brown, and (2) the very bottom, large one where the paint job is complete.



Shapeless, if you search your memory, you may recall that I have already made a Fiend. In fact, you were the one that told me I made its tail too short. :) Like yourself, I only have the Dissolution of Eternity mission pack, all my Scourge knowledge comes from research I've done.

[Vader]

Looks fantastic!
I really like the fur :)

[Cupboard]

The region where his neck/head merges with his torso is really well done with all of the veins and muscle (last shot).

[Da Spadger]

With that thread title, you should consider making a nailgun for it. :D

[VileSlay]

sweet. lookin mighty vicious. can't wait for the completed figure.

[Trilinear]

Wow, looking good MmM!

I have fond memories of Scourge, and remember these little dudes well. The other monsters in the pack would make good future candidates also, namely the Centroids (mechanised scorpions), and Armagon himself.

[Shapeless]

*searches memory* Oh yaa!! now I remember. Well it's a sick looking creature to do a sculpt of. So I'm happy. man your inspiring me now.

[Inferno]

Awesome figure what's made out so far. Detail in the skin is great. Very scary looking thing! Keep it up!

[MmM]

Rounding third and heading for home . . .

This is the state of the figure as of yesterday, day 4 (6/26/07)--I didn't mess with it at all on Monday. The waist/crotch and upper legs were made and attached; 20 joints total now (I'm planning on a final count of 26). At this point, I haven't made a final decison on whether or not I'm going to make any accessories. On one hand, I've got all sorts of ideas for a literal pile of stuff [various Quake guns/items--probably the three exclusive Scourge of Armagon weapons--proximity launcher, Mjolnir, and laser--and other assorted Quake nonsense like a tiny MOC (mint on card) Shambler action figure and a tasty bag of 'Shamblo's Bite-Sized Gibs'], but, on the other hand, I wonder if I shouldn't keep with the thieving nature of the creature and inform my Gremlin that if it wants some gear, it's going to have to go out and steal some from my other figures/toys.



Trilinear: The Centroids don't do much for me (they remind me too much of the Hexen 2 scorpions, although obviously the Hexen ones don't have nailguns for claws--I realize Armagon probably came out first, but I can't look at them without thinking Hexen 2). I won't say I'll never make a Centroid, but they rank last on my list of Scourge-exclusive monsters. I have come close to making Armagon many times (in fact, it was a choice between him and the Gremlin), so it's quite likely I'll do him someday.

Da Spadger: I've told myself the same thing, but I think the Scourge of Armagon exclusive weapons would be more appropriate accessories. I've always wanted to make a little NIN box with nails in it though, so we'll see . . .

[Trilinear]

Looking really sweet. The mowhawk which stands away from his body is a big improvement over the original design. I really like the goat-style legs you did for him in the bottom-right reference sketch in your first post. Hopefully these will carry through to the final model if they're not too difficult to do (i.e. balance issues).

MmM said:

On one hand, I've got all sorts of ideas for a literal pile of stuff [various Quake guns/items--probably the three exclusive Scourge of Armagon weapons--proximity launcher, Mjolnir, and laser--and other assorted Quake nonsense like a tiny MOC (mint on card) Shambler action figure and a tasty bag of 'Shamblo's Bite-Sized Gibs']

Hah, a bag of gib snacks would be awesome :)

Cool idea with the weapons, but just a small point with regards to the Mjonlnir - the Gremlin never steals that weapon from the player in the game (along with the shotgun and axe).

[MmM]

The Gremlin figure is finished (popped its lower legs on Wednesday, total construction time: 5 days), but I'm going to hold off on taking final photos till I get all the accessories made and painted. So, all I have at this point is a rotating animation:



And this sad attempt at photoshopping four Gremlins attacking two of my 1:6-scale Power Team Elite World Peacekeepers military figures:



This is the unpainted sculpt for the Proximity Bomb Launcher accessory that I made very late last night. I might add a few more doodads/panels to the surfaces, although I don't want to go too overboard in that regard or the relatively simplistic look/geometry of the Quake weapons will be lost, but it's essentially done and ready for a coat of paint. I was thinking about sticking a rubber band inside the barrel so I could launch projectiles across the room, but decided not to. I am planning on making a few proximity bombs with magnets inside them, or on their surface, to go along with this gun so that I can stick them to various metal objects. As you can see from the reference sketches, Mjolnir is next (alas, I have no Thor figures in my Marvel Comics toy collection, so I won't be able to make any silly photos depicting Thor ridiculing the Gremlin for not being able to lift Mjolnir . . .)



Trilinear: As you can see, the goat legs made it a-ok, although probably a tad too long. While they might look like they could cause difficulty, I’ve never had trouble with them on any of the other figures I’ve made that sport them. I used thicker wire (paperclips) in the lower legs joints and made the hooves fairly large/wide, all which contribute to the Gremlin being quite stable whilst standing.

Thanks for the info regarding Mjolnir and the other weapons Gremlins may not steal. I couldn’t find any data regarding that, so I went with the liberal idea that they can steal anything that isn’t nailed down (and in those situations, they pry the nails up and take it anyway). I can understand not being able to take the axe/shotgun, as those are the default weapons and would leave the player seriously screwed if they were stolen. Well, accurate or not, my Gremlin is getting a Mjolnir so that it may enjoy an exhilarating game of whack-a-spawn (and get blown to smithereens in the process). I wrote you up some credit in the ‘reference’ section at the bottom of my Gremlin webpage (still unpublished, but 90% complete) for your input.

[leileilol]

that's the first fan grenade launcher that looks like a grenade launcher

[Trilinear]

Fantastic job MmM, it looks great! The goat legs look excellent, glad they weren't a problem to do.

Looking forward to seeing the finished weapons. In particular, I appreciate your desire to stay close to the simple geometry of the original models - it really preserves that "Quakey" feel.

MmM said:

I wrote you up some credit in the ‘reference’ section at the bottom of my Gremlin webpage (still unpublished, but 90% complete) for your input.

Thanks! :) If it would help, I can provide you with the .mdl files from the Scourge .pak files if you're wanting a more complete reference for any of the other models.

With regards to the Gremlin's inability to steal certain weapons, this fact is revealed in Scourge's manual (which I happened to be browsing through a few days ago). But regardless, I look forward to seeing the finished Mjolnir :)

[VileSlay]

nice. can't wait for the finished shots. I LOL'ed at the photoshop. the proximity bomb launcher looks pretty nice. it shouldn't be too complicated for sake of realism and staying true to the quake look. I'm not familiar with the game (only played quake 1 a couple of times) but the mjolnir with a bone handle is pretty cool.

[Inferno]

The Gremlin looks great. Vicious, and the fuzzy hair is good too. The rocket launcher looks nicely done as well.

[MmM]

Weekend weapon progress:







Trilinear: I’ve been using Ritual Entertainment’s website for my weapon model references (they’ve got rotating gifs of all the exclusive weapons/items). For the proximity launcher, seeing as how that’s just a new skin applied to an existing weapon, I just fired up the regular version of Quake and took some screenshots of the grenade launcher to work from.

Offhand, I don’t think I have any programs for viewing .mdl files, plus, as I’m getting pretty close to finishing this figure, there usefulness would be limited at this point. I appreciate the offer though; I might take you up on it sometimes if I decide to make Armagon or a Centroid. Alternatively, if you don’t mind, I would like (1) to have a digital copy of the Scourge instruction manual file (I’m assuming it’s on the Scourge disc in both text/html formats—I’d prefer the html if there’s photos of weapons/monsters/items, but if it’s all text, then a text file is fine) and (2) some screenshots, from different angles, of proximity mines being launched and sticking to things (I scoured the internet, but I can’t find a single photo of one). Without reference to work from, I was thinking I’d just make a normal Quake grenade, but have the back half of the explosive open up into 3-4 little, articulated legs/attachers, which would also expose the magnet(s) in the center. I’ve been meaning to have a look at how the proximity mines look/work in my copy of Quake II: Ground Zero for inspiration as well, but I keep forgetting.

[MmM]

Finished up the laser cannon. My productivity has suffered as of late, due to sculpting/modeling Quake stuff making me want to play Quake (I spent hours on my PC yesterday playing Quake deathmatch with Omicron bots and fooling around with Aftershock instead of working on accessories).

[leileilol]

heh those guns look more faithful than any 'hi res' quake project

[Inferno]

The weapons came out very nice, the Gremlin would have a field day with those if it were alive.

[Kirby]

I do say, those bring back the mission pack 1 memories. Great job on both the weapons and the gremlin, they look quite awesome :)

[Trilinear]

Great job on those weapons mate, especially the Laser Cannon (one of the better looking Quake weapons).

The only thing which I think could be improved slightly is the colour scheme of the Proximity Mine Launcher - it seems a bit too basic compared to the others, and not as true to the original. The model is excellent, however :)

[VileSlay]

MmM said:

My productivity has suffered as of late, due to sculpting/modeling Quake stuff making me want to play Quake (I spent hours on my PC yesterday playing Quake deathmatch with Omicron bots and fooling around with Aftershock instead of working on accessories).

no worries though cuz your work is great. the weapons came out fantastic and the gremlin is a vicious little bugger.

[MmM]

Here's some more items for my Gremlin's ever-expanding pile of crap that I made over the last few days.

Magnetic Proximity Bombs (5) for the Proximity Bomb Launcher:



Empathy Shield (the drying paint warped this a bit on me, so it's not a perfect, flat circle anymore):



Horn of Conjuring:



Mini Armagon Action Figure (~ 2 inches tall, 14 points of articulation). I know I said I was going to do a Shambler mini figure in a previous post, but, keeping with the Scourge of Armagon theme, I went with Armagon himself instead:



Gremlin admiring its new items, but still greedy for more:



Group photo of the accessories so far:



These are some process odds-and-ends from the construction of the shield. The first item is a paper mache skull mold that I sculpted to make multiple copies of the four skulls on the Empathy Shield (cuz, I was too darn lazy to sculpt four of them the 'hard' way). I just took some Play-Doh, stuck my skull mold in it four times, shot some hot glue into the impressions, and, after waiting a little while for them to cool (and cleaning them up), instant skulls. The second item is a chunk of 'hot glue and cardboard sandwich' that I used to punch all the rivets/bolts on the shield from with a hole puncher; I also cut some sections out of this for pieces of Armagon's legs as well.



These are the ten 'failed' proximity mines that I made prior to the final set of five. The first set, aside from being too big to even conceivably fit inside the launcher's barrel (not something that would particularly bother me, but I'm sure someone on one of the forums I post my art on would have taken me to task over it), weren't meeting the magnetic criteria I had set for myself: namely they had to stick, and stay, indefinitely, to magnetic surfaces at any angle. They stuck to floors and ceilings okay, but only one of them would stay on vertical surfaces. Considering the situation I determined the problem was one, or more, of the following: (1) They were too heavy; (2) the magnets, which were inside the spheres, weren't getting good enough contact to hold well through the spheres' walls; and (3) the shape of a sphere inherently results in very little of it being in direct contact with a flat surface, again resulting in poor attraction potential. Rather than mess with troubleshooting these problems individually, I solved them all at once with the design of my second set: (1) I made the spheres themselves smaller to reduce their weight and also decreased the size of the magnets for the same purpose; (2) I put the magnet's surface on the outside of the sphere to improve contact; and (3) I flattened out the area of the sphere where the magnet is to provide a larger surface area for contact. So, hooray, my improvements worked and they finally stuck to magnetic surfaces at any angle. Umm, then, why did I have to make a third set? I ruined the second set while burning the detail lines into them, which I foolishly attempted after I had painted them, instead of before (the dried paint clumped up all over the place around my woodburned lines and looked terrible).



A couple of package designs. The first item is the cardback for Armagon's toy package (he may be running free now, but his cyborg butt shall shortly be locked in a transparent plastic prison forever). I used ID Software's Quake box art for the front of the cardback, the reverse side I designed with the GIMP art program. The images are 1:1 scale (the cardback will measure 4.0 x 7.0 cm). The second item is the box graphic design for 'Shamblo's Bite-Size Gibs' . . . what will the secret prize inside be? This was also created using GIMP.



Trilinear: I’ve been thinking the same thing about the proximity launcher. When I used Ritual’s animated gif as a color reference, I thought that the image was just too dark, so I increased the brightness significantly in the image and then used that as my paint guide. Now, looking at the .mdl file you gave me, I can see that the weapon really is that dingy looking. I can dirty it up with a black paint wash pretty easily, but, thus far, haven’t been able to bring myself to do it.

[Trilinear]

Woah, some awesome work there. I have to admire your productivity :)

The Empathy Shield and the Horn are excellent, as is the mini Armagon. Very impressive detail. One thing that stood out for me was the accurate colour scheme of the models - they all have that consistent "look" about them, which is very close to the original Quake pallete.

[MmM]

Finally finished as of Saturday afternoon. I was considering making even more accessories (a set of six Quake keys, more weapons, etc), but I have to draw the line somewhere. I've already been working on this for half a month, which is more than enough time in my book. Plus, I entered a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles custom figure contest at the beginning of July, on another forum, that I need to get cracking on. I can always make the Gremlin an 'accessory pack' with even more crap someday if I'm in the mood.

Armagon 'carded'. Curse Duke Nukem and his Shrink Ray! The conniving Gremlin will doubtlessly end up selling this limited edition collectible on qBay (eBay in Quake Land) for big bucks . . . In a previous post, I said the cardback was 4.0 x 7.0 cm, well something went wrong in the printer, and it came out 3.5 x 6.0 cm; it still worked out okay though.



Box of Shamblo's Bite-Sized Gibs--just like Mama Niggurath used to make. I had a little too much fun making this; I was even coming up with, and singing, commecial jingles for this thing while I was working on it--and no, I'm not going to bore you, or embarrass myself, by sharing them with you, trust me, they were god-awful and didn't even rhyme.



Group photos:



Final accessory selection. As Trilinear suggested, I altered the paint job of the Proximity Bomb Launcher to make it look closer to what's in the game.





And here's the webpage. There's some new photos on it, but most of them you've already seen if you've been following this thread from the beginning. However, the trivia, background info, strengths/weaknesses, dimensions, materials used, etc, might be worth checking out if you're interested in learning more about Gremlins in general or want to see some of the statistical data related to this figure.

http://kramwartap.fortunecity.com/gremlin.html

And, finally, big thanks goes out to Trilinear for going the extra mile(s) in helping me out on this project by providing me with tons or Quake:SoA reference material, information, and utilities/tools!

[VileSlay]

nice work. the paint job on the launcher is much better. it looks nice and aged. I love the MOC armagon figure. the shamblo's bite sized gibs are great as well. I love the blood soaked bag and the prize inside. great work all around.

[Trilinear]

Awesome job with the accessories MmM, my comments basically mirror VileSlay's. The box of gibs is priceless, and the attention-to-detail visible there is impressive.

Checked out the Gremlin page on the site - looks great. The photo with the gremlin holding the Mjolnir and the Shield reminds me a bit of the game "Rune" (might install that later :).

Overall, one of your best figures to-date!