So, I was rooting around my papercraft directory, and came across a number of Ebbles ships that I'd never built. I don't remember where I even got them from, so I figured better safe than sorry I'd go and buy them from the WWG store. I figure at worst, I've just paid twice to support someone with serious talent. Anyway, here are a couple pieces I built for the kids this weekend:





I am looking forward to building some of the larger pieces, but I still feel like I need some practice with these. I haven't been edging the pieces, since they're for the kids to play with, and frankly they don't care about that sort of thing at all. I am thinking of building an additional Crotale or two since they are just gorgeous little ships, and they are easy to build. The GSD files kinda make a mess of some of the little score lines, so I might opt to cut the pieces out with the cutter after I've hand-scored them. After that, I really want to get the hang of putting tires together. Still working up the courage for one of the bigger pieces.

I love these, and so do my kids. Really a great set of toys to make for them. My oldest wants to make a stop-motion video tribute to the 16-hour war - I guess you've made an impression, Mel!

mproteau, I found, with my grandkids, that they have better respect for Grampa's card stock cars and SiFi, ebbles items that the metal/plastic toys they have.

When they visit they prefer my " toys" to the older metal, plastic cars etc they have.

Their comment was: These cars feel nicer than the other cars because Grampa made them for us".
(comment to designers: Many thanks for your efforts, without it I could not build/assemble "Toys" for the kids)

Mproteau: I think I know where you got them--right after I closed down Ebbles Miniatures and while I was working on the WWG storefront, I posted a selection of Saga Of The Uppity Robots models on my blog for people to download. Plus, in the twilight months, I was also experimenting with a "try before you buy" sort of thing for downloads because I'd made an enjoyable hobby out of trying out oddball new ideas--if you see hyperlinks at the bottom of each PDF page, then the models you got date back to those freewheeling, throw-it-at-the-wall-and-see-what-sticks days.

I always get a big smile on my face when people post photos of my models, especially the SOTUR ones. That was the first time I really sat down and worked out a backstory that went further than "Uh, it's whatever you want it to be", and the starting point for me was my dissatisfaction with how the reimagined Battlestar Galactica series ended. I suddenly remembered one day that there's a pronounced cyclical aspect to that show's mythos, and I thought it'd be funny to start the cycle all over again in our own timeline in the spirit of "If you want it done right, quit bitching and do it yourself".

Speaking of which, the Crotale and Percheron are going to have company on the WWG storefront pretty soon. My blog followers basically commissioned me to complete one of the SOTUR models that didn't see release before Ebbles Miniatures closed down:





The beta is wrapping up, and it should be ready to go by mid-month.

Haydn: Funny you should mention that--my grandson (by way of my stepson) is the kind of kid who can inexplicably turn solid metal Tonka trucks and whatnot into useless wrecks in the course of ordinary play, and my ongoing joke used to be that we shouldn't buy him any presents that aren't made of rubber or milled tungsten. The last time he came for a visit, my stepdaughter Sara suggested I let him play with my paper models. Needless to say, I wrote them off before handing them over. To my extreme surprise, he was very gentle with them and the only damage I saw after the fact was just a few tiny little water droplet blemishes from all the "pew pew pew" sound effects he was making. I upgraded to a water-resistant glossy stock shortly afterwards, and knowing that my grandson gets a huge kick out of playing with my stuff without destroying it is a nice motivator for me to build more stuff.

I have so wanted that one for a LONG TIME...

Looking good. And the preview is intriguing too.

If that is the result of one sponsor, you guys have to set up a Kickstarter project -- You could have some seriously awesome swag for people who donate, you'd get a raft of preorders and working capital. There have been some really notable recent successes (Order of the Stick being the over-the-top poster child, being funded at 2000% for $1.2million).
Steve

Skunkape, Ghengis, Talae: Thanks!

sdavies2720: That's basically what I did--I set up a little self-hosted mini-Kickstarter thing on my blog so the folks who like my papercraft work could compete on an equal financial footing with the programming contracts that eat up my time, and it was all kind of a curiosity-driven test. I honestly didn't think it would amount to much, but I was pleasantly surprised by the response.

That thing is going to be HUGE!

Mel, I would love to have a go and build that monster, please hurry and bring forth.

Yep Grandkids do have more respect than Kids. Funny that.

Looking forward to seeing it the site.

I REALLY need to start reading your blog if you are doing stuff like this on there..

gimme gimme gimme gimme ... a gotta build after the BSG spinoffs and the LEV+Dropship combo

That looks so sweet! Very cool design, Chris!

Just groked the scale on that. That is huge! Really need to follow Mel's blog. Where has he hid it?

I thought that had been scrapped. I'll be buying one too. Dare I ask, How Much??

Well, you guys can follow the development of this model at this handy link: http://www.ebbles.com/tag/pinzgauer/

One of the most popular aspects of Ebbles Miniatures back when it was still a thing was the Workbench section of the forum, which was a start-to-finish, blow-by-blow development diary for my models that people could participate in. After I came here, I dusted off my Blogger site (Chez Ebbles, and yes the name was Matt's) and moved the Workbench there. Several months ago, I moved it again to a new Wordpress install on ebbles.com.

I also took some time today to add a tag cloud to the sidebar and recategorized/retagged a ton of older paper model posts so you guys can easily find the Workbench posts for a specific model. There are a few posts about the other models I've done here (the cars and Podtel) as well.

Okay, I think I've derailed mproteau's thread enough. Sorry about that, man.

Shoot. I only posted the pics to express my enthusiasm for the models, and to get other people interested, too! Mission accomplished!

At this point, when I type "w" in my browser's URL bar, it takes me to the WWG forums. When I type "e", it takes me to your blog. In fact, I think half the alphabet now takes me to specific papercrafting websites! lol.

I learned two new things today: aspara and haflinger. I <3 your ships, and really hope to see more in the future.

Mel I think I own All of your ships that you put out so far, and all but two have made appearances in one of my games.

Your fighters are just such perfect scale to flesh out any hanger bay scene.

Make as many and varied ships as you want (seriously the bigger the better as there are very few "transports/shuttles" out there), I'll gladly buy them all no matter what size they are.

A 42 page PDF file.
Please hurry with the beta testing so we can build ourselves.

mproteau: Considering how nicely the mini-crowdfunding approach worked out, I'm definitely going to be doing more models between programming contracts.

Ghengis:

Haydn: Working on it, working on it. For what it's worth, my deadline for everything being ready to go is tomorrow morning, and from there it shouldn't be more than a day or so until it's up for sale.

cheers mate, it shall be welcome.

As of right now the countdown is at two and a half hours.

It's mine, Precious!
Beautiful artwork Chris! Can't wait until I get it built and load up some Onagers for transport!
Have to create somesort of passenger seating module as well...

Are those four landing feet fixed in length or do they slide up and down to take up the weight? If they are fixed, I have an idea on how they could be made to move up and down like hydraulic rams by using a paper "spring".

Would love to hear your idea on that hydraulic paper string DougT. I have other future applications in mind... [Perhaps make a new seperate thread in Kitbash or Papercrafters?]

Greypilgrim: Thanks!

DougT: Landing gear are static elements for strength and so the thing doesn't collapse onto its belly if somebody pushes down on it, but a physical kitbash is straightforward enough with some layering and quick measuring/trimming.

Here is a quick rundown of the paper spring to look like hydraulic landing feet.

You start with two strips of stock


You position them at a right angle to each other


You then fold one over the other


Continue folding over each other, alternating strips until the spring is formed


You then insert the spring into the smaller diameter tube of the landing gear. Here is a test piece I did for another project a few years ago. the cardstock is 110 lb, the strips are 1 cm wide, the smaller tube is 15 mm OD, the larger tube is 17 mm ID


Here it is assembled with no compression


Here it is with 25 grams of weight

It compressed by 6 mm.

Here is a short vid of the action


You will need to experiment to find the length of spring needed and the width of the strips to fit in the tubes of the landing feet of the shuttle. Looks like if you could make four springs of the same length using the same cardstock that you could make a some what realistic hydraulic landing gear action.

Excellent tutorial DougT - thanks. The accompanying video certainly demonstrates its use well. It's worthy of a seperate posting under Papercraft Tips.

Thanks for the spring method.
Got the spacecraft and printed out the 'white' model.
Just got to set up the SD to cut then assemble... yea.....