Happy New Year!
I'm sure many of you noticed, but I've been on an extended break from doing any modeling not associated with my day job the last several months. I took a much needed break, did lots of meditation, got a promotion at work, and eventually got decided and got busy moving out of the house I was living in with roomates in San Jose into my own apartment in Los Gatos, California. Now that the move and the holidays have settled, I've been itching to get back into modeling my passion projects.
I started with another prop, because props are always a light re-entry into modeling, and I just enjoy getting super detailed with them. Years ago I started modeling the WNMHGB Phaser Rifle, but for various reasons gave up (my modeling skills weren't nearly as advanced), but the itch has always remained to bring that bulky piece of machinery to life. So in November, before my move, I started modeling it. I decided to break the rifle into parts, full detailing each component and displaying it in both assembled and disassembled modes, much like I did with the TUC Assault Phaser last year (or was that the year before?). I modeled the main body structures over Thanksgiving break, not touching it until about 6 days ago when I modeled the details and then gave it a good texturing pass and taking final renders tonight.
Anyway, I had a lot of fun coming up with what the "unseen" parts of the phaser rifle would appear, such as the connection points between the barrel and the rifle body. I also decided to make the aft panel a battery/power pack compartment, and designed what the power-pack may look like, based on the handle/power pack combo of the Phaser II. I did take a couple more creative licenses, such making the targeting screen a curved CRT monitor (like we see on the Tricorder) instead of the flat display with targeting reticle we see on the canon prop.
Anyway, here are the results!
First up are the images of it full assembled:
