UPDATED PICS! Modular Death Star

[Jesse James]

I'd like to second the congratulations on the review.  Well deserved.  You made a playset Hasbro seems incapable of doing, and made it with fun playable features to boot.  Can't beat that kind of customizing Muftak.

Glad you got recognized for it beyond forums and things in a publication.  It's much deserved.

[Muftak]

Well, if there's one thing I've learned over the years, it's to not take praise from Jesse James too lightly. Thanks for the very kind words!

Here, as promised, are the final level pictures, starting with the chasm:





As I was building I realized the bottom of the doorways would be very visible over the Stormtrooper hallway below, so I seized the opportunity to do a mostly-accurate ceiling for that scene:

[Muftak]

Here's the tractor beam control tower, which sits behind and slightly above the chasm doorways:



I used parts from an R2 cutting-arm and Jango's blasters to make the controls "grip-able" for Obi-Wan. The whole thing is built form scratch, with a film canister on top for detail.

I also put together a bridge to span the chasm:



It slides easily over the pegs of the anniversary Luke/Leia footbase, and locks into place very solidly, almost as if Hasbro designed it that way to help me out. I added silver paint details to better match the platforms.

[Muftak]

And finally, here are the pictures of the completed playset:





This shot is a bird's-eye view looking directly down the center. It really gives a feel for how each level takes up it's own space within the body of the tower, you can see all the way down to the orange floors of the detention level, and then the two first level rooms jutting out below that:



Once again, thanks to Chirs Berry for helping me out with these pictures, and thanks to all of you for the encouragement and support as I brought this "technological terror" to life.

[jokabofe]

awesome. what more needs to be said?

[Depmode]

Simply amazing. Good work.

[jadesfire]

 

Absolutely incredible.  I love the last shot (or birds eye view), it's awesome.
Great job.  There just aren't enough adjectives to describe your fantastic work!!!

[Snively Bandar]

Holy crap, that's absolutely mindboggling!  Words can't even describe how impressive and cool that thing is Muftak.  Absolutely amazing work there.  I'm almost sad to see your project come to an end.  One question though: no conference room for the Imperials?  Or did you already address that somewhere and I just missed it?  Regardless, it's so pretty I almost want to cry.  

So can you provide us with any teaser info on what you've got in store for the Bespin set?  How many components, or are you not yet finished with the preliminary planning stages yet?  Can't wait to see that one!  If you're taking requests, after you finish Bespin, you'll have to do the Cantina, Jabba's Palace, and Death Star II.  But I'm sure you already knew that.  

Keep up the brilliant work Muftak.  You're a true credit to the customizing community!  

[Muftak]

Thanks again, everyone.

Grant, my take on the conference room was basically "no imperial officers to put in it=big empty space or a lot of extra customizing work." Vader has been finding lots of other fun places to choke Motti--the bridge, the superlaser room, while walking down the hall...

Cloud City will be a little smaller than the Death Star, only three (stackable) levels tall but with a wider footprint. I'm visualizing it as sort of the Palitoy Death Star with Cloud City interiors and a Carbon Freezing Chamber (custom, not the miniscule Hasbro release) on the roof.

I'm also going to build a gantry that attaches to the back of the diorama proper--think of it as a 3 3/4" version of the two Kenner Micro World gantry sets. With the whole thing put together, it will be longer than the Death Star is tall (and I'll have nowhere to display it!)

After it's done, (I'm thinking next Christmas again) I'll start work on an Ewok Village set that's been brewing in my mind for a while (hopefully they'll make some new Ewoks before then.) That takes me through 2005, so who knows after that?

[DSJ™]

Absolutely amazing.    Well done.

[Scott]

Anyone catch the blurb in our Comic Con coverage that Hasbro has toyed with an idea like this...but can't get it to a pricepoint they want yet and haven't had the time to devote to it.  Nothing is going to top Bobb's work here though, it is truly one of the greatest 3-3/4" things I have ever seen (besides the 1:1/18:1/1:18 Tantive IV  )

[Jesse James]

Yeah, that Tantive IV rocked harder than that hairdo there...

Well, I got a playset in the mail today.  A modular 1:18 "bombed building" you set up yurself in the order you want.  It's a knock off, came with 150 accessories, 8 figures (with removable helmets and super articulation), and you just slap it together.

Grand total:  $15.

It's a cheap knock-off toy of BBI's Elite Frce or 21st Cent. Toys XD figures, but it's really quite nice.  Hasbro really could do something similar, but better, and even in "sections" that they could price each section at $20 or less even.  Make each section interlocking (stackable, or interlock from either side), and you'd have an incredible ENDLESS modular Death Star.

Alas, this seems a bit too cmplex.  You can't tell me that, if it isn't overly complex in design, that they couldn't get that out for $20.  One figure pack-in, and even that I'd make either a straight repack like the CT Stormie, 4-pack Stormie, or something similar, or a cheap kitbash like a POTJ Officer with DST head.

Do different rooms over time, people will go nuts.

I still say the same methd could be used to make a to-scale Millenium Falcon that you build over time.  They release 2 pieces once...  Sell through thse then 2 more...  Then the cockpit's released and it snaps to the rest of it.

Voila, super Falcon.  To-Scale.  Adult collectors go ape**** with glee and hang it from their celing as the "ultimate" piece.

[Muftak]

NiubNiub has updated with news on his Modular Death Star, to be featured as the Diorama Workshop at this year's Celebration:



Now, while I called my playset modular, this is the real deal. Interchangable pieces that can be put together in a million different combinations, and likely will be as the thing comes together at the celebration. My one beef is the reliance on stickers, but it's designed to be an entry-level diorama so not much you can do there. At sixty feet wide or so, it's gonna be neat to see...

[CHEWIE]

I'd love to be able to go to C3 and see that....

Yeah, looks like Niub Niub is finally getting geared back up into his dioramas.

I still say Hasbro should make a modular Death Star... damn them for not doing it.

 

[Matt_Fury]

Niub Niub makes some incredible dioramas...but I'd put your Deathstar up to anything he's done!

Great work!