marsprojectmattknott

[marsprojectmattknott]

Audience.

With my final work, I tried to aim it towards movie/merchandise production, being as example of a mock-up of a suggested movie scene, maybe to help with directing, or as a model of a pre-existing movie scene, to be sold to the public. Therefore it would be aimed towards being placed on shop shelves for March production, or on my website, probably linked in to a store with more of my work, to allow for commissions or custom-made items.

The three main things to consider when making this kind of work is time management, paint work, and moulding quality. 

[marsprojectmattknott]

Final Model Pictures

After the model was done, I took it into the photography room and started taking pictures. At one point I ended up setting the camera up wrong, so it produced these odd yellow/red tinted pictures, but at the same time, I kinda liked the look they had. It made the sunlight look really angry and menacing, fitting the look of my cars and this race well.

[marsprojectmattknott]

Finishing work

Finally, after getting everything ready, i was able to glue the cars into the base.

My old plan was to use some more garden wire to create a little peg to stab into the base, like shown here:

Unfortunately, this didn't really work, since the peg just kept coming off, so instead i decided to hook two small pegs around the axels, like so:

This ended up looking a lot more natural on the model than the old peg design.

After that i drilled a couple small holes for the pegs and glued them in with PVA, and it worked really well.

I'm really happy with how the model turned out overall, though i should've prepared myself this project and come up with a final idea sooner, so i had more time to work on stuff like the base. I need to improve my time management for the FMP.

[marsprojectmattknott]

Finishing/Painting the Base

After getting the base out, of the mould, i got to work making tyre tracks for the cars. My original plan was to have a small amount of thick plaster, to run the cars' wheels through to create the tracks, however i realised this would be a lot of hassle, so i used a layer of leftover clay instead.

After finishing the base, i went over it with spray paints. The first one being a layer of grey primer, the same used for the cars, which i also ended up using later.

After that, i went back over it with some dark grey, and then a little bit of metallic paint dotted around. This was to simulate the shine you might get from the glass shards of moon dust.

Finally, i went back over it in the primer, since it matched the colour i was going for perfectly.

The base ended up looking better than i'd thought, with the only issue being that i seemingly used too much metallic paint, since now the model has a odd shine in some areas, despite the thick layer of primer over the top. Next time, learn to use less metallic.

[marsprojectmattknott]

Creating the Base

After creating the cars, i made a plaster mould using clay, creating the rough moon landscape using rocks, and i decided to make it a bit more interesting by adding cubic structures around the work, emphasizing how unusual this moon is. A friend also had the suggestion of making a crater with a large asteroid crashed in the center.

The plaster base turned out looking really good, with my only issue being the asteroid's look. It doesn't really resemble an asteroid, but i still think it looks interesting nonetheless. I should've made the asteroid look a lot smaller, given asteroid impacts usually create a shockwave, and i completely forgot about that.

[marsprojectmattknott]

Painting models

I started painting the weathering effects on my models, starting with the rust on my Cadillac, using two main colours from a weathering paint kit. I watered them down a bit to create the different shades of rust, and layered it up, following pictures of rusty cars found online.

After that, i worked on the Plymouth, where i used a dremmel grinding tool to create scratches along the base.

Finally, i use my spray primer to create a kicked-up-dust effect on the cars.

Surprisingly, despite just diving in and doing the work, it all seemed to go well. I wish i had added a bit more rust paint though, because it was rather hard to see after the dust-paint.

[marsprojectmattknott]

Cadillac suspension

I got to work making the Eldorado's suspension, as well as painting the base.

I got some garden wire and just wrapped it round the axel twice to make some solid suspension, before gluing them in place in the slots for the old axels.

I hooked them up over the base, gluing them under the interior piece, before repeating the same for the back. I also glued down a piece from the base of another truck to help hold the rear suspension in, and support the engine.

Pretty much all went well. My only issue was that i forgot to sand down the base, so the primer that i ended up putting on started chipping off very quickly. Next time i'll remember to do so before painting.

[marsprojectmattknott]

Continued cars work

After working on the Cadillac, i started pulling apart the Plymouth and getting that ready.

The main thing i wanted to do with the plymouth was replace the wheels, which i took out of an F1 car (they looked a lot like slick muscle car wheels.)

I had to glue the axels in place, since the brackets holding the old axels in had to be broken off in order to take them off.

After this, i realised i had to make the wheels a bit more stable. The F1 axels were far too long to allow the wheels to comfortably sit under the car, so i sanded out the wheelarches slightly to help make room, and fed some wire suspension across the inside of the car's base to hold the wheels out toward the ends of the axels.

My original plan was to use Rigor Motor's engine on the Plymouth, but since it was already used for the Cadillac, I had to find another one. Luckily i found this old ruined dinosaur car with a perfect engine.

After cutting a hole in the Plymouth's bonnet, the engine dropped right into place, so i glued it in.

I did have one problem, being that i did want to glue the engine to one of the inside parts, or the base, instead of the body, but the exhausts ended up getting in the way. Next time i'd scratch build some new exhausts to put elsewhere on the car, and re-paint the engine to hide old exhaust's cut marks.

[marsprojectmattknott]

Starting my cars

I started making my cars at last, first by drilling the body off, and then sanding off the paint. I decided to leave some of it on the body to make it look a bit more like it had been in rough conditions. I also went over one of the fenders with a grinding tool on a dremmel, to create a dented-looking uneven surface, so it looks like it's been in a crash in the past, and hurriedly repaired.

Afterwards I cut out an area for the engine. After seeing where the post was that held the front of the car down, i decided it would be easier to make the car mid-engined. I removed the engine from another car, called "Rigor Motor", and traced out the area to be cut.

I had tried cutting out the area with a small hacksaw, but it wasn't working, so i had to turn to using a file to grind down area. Then i polished up the body.

I found some larger off-road style wheels from another car, and clipped everything together to see how it looked. After that, i decided to try glueing the suspension from another car onto the bottom to fit the wheels, but they looked pretty bad, so i ended up later removing them and sticking with the original idea of making suspension out of wire. I also used a scalpel to cut into the windscreen, and make it look cracked.

So far it's going well, the only problem being with the paint. I don't have any clear coat or a airbrush, so i'm going to have to stick to brush painting and using rattle cans.

[marsprojectmattknott]

Cadillac Eldorado 1959

A very stylish looking american saloon, I managed to find an old model of one laying around my house, and i'm going to use that to start off my raised-up off-roader.

[marsprojectmattknott]

Off-road Suspension

On one of my cars, i want to add offroad suspension and it look really raised up, to contrast with the Plymouth. After looking at some reference pictures, i should be able to recreate it using some garden wire.

[marsprojectmattknott]

AMC Javelin

The AMC Javelin's design is certainly a controvertial one, with very mixed views. Some really like the look, and others hate it. I personally really like the smoothened-off look it has, and the rear headlight design.

[marsprojectmattknott]

Plymouth GTX '71

One of the cars i managed to acquire for my model was a hotwheels 1971 Plymouth GTX. Given the very large bonnet, it'll allow me to add a larger engine and a supercharger to stick out.

[marsprojectmattknott]

Moon dust

The moon’s surface consists largely of Silicon Dioxide glass, which is very sharp, and it’s also likes to cling to things, so much so that it wore through three layers of kevlar-like covering on Harrison Schmitt’s Moon boot

Knowing this, it’s fair to assume that if my cars raced on the moon, they would be heavily scratched up and worn on the lower halves of the cars, plus moon dust would be collected all over the bottoms of the cars.

[marsprojectmattknott]

Lancia Stratos HF Zero

The Stratos Zero is a legendary concept car, and an originally proposed design for the ever more legendary Stratos, a V6 Rally Car.

Made in 1970, it looks similar to a lot of other concept vehicles at the time, such as the Nissan 126x Concept.

Nissan 126x

[marsprojectmattknott]

Nova Sterling

The Nova Sterling, released in 1968, was a car way ahead of its’ time. With a canopy roof instead of side doors.

The streamlined design is very clean looking, it reminds me a lot of the Shelby Cobra Daytona Coupe, and the 1969 Corvette Stingray.

‘69 Corvette Stingray

‘65 Shelby Cobra Daytona Coupe

[marsprojectmattknott]

Chevrolet Muscle Cars

Chevrolet is probably most famous for their Camaro and Chevelle SS Models.

Their F-Body vehicles are by far some of the most recognisable among car culture. The Camaro especially, in all models. I personally really like the classic F-body style, and I’ve used it in a couple of designs myself.