Many New MattMobile Flaws Revealed

Mostly a pictorial update today, as it's kind of the same stuff you'll find in many other of my blog posts.

Painting on the primer revealed a lot of little flaws all over the place, and today I spent some time adressing some of the more obvious ones. I really just sort of pick a spot, look for problems, then attack. The types of things I'm working on now are what I'm referring to as "spider cracks", even though they are not cracks, nor are they made by spiders.

But they SORT OF look like spider webs. I think these were just flaws introduced into the molds, maybe due to cracked paint or something. Who knows.

Here's how the front looks now. I didn't do any sanding on the primer, but instead decided to fill the obvious holes that were revealed by the light color.

There was a lumpy imperfection right down at the bottom, behind the drivers side front wheel well. Sanding it fixed most of it, but there were some recesses which have since been puttied over. I'm beginning to depend a bit more on my mouse sander for knocking down stuff like that. I really don't like using mechanized sanders on the body, mainly due to a fear that I will knock down too much too fast. This has happened to me in the past on other projects.

I also got started on cutting out the headlight recesses. I used this drill bit to chew out big holes, which will be used as starting points for my jig saw. This thing goes through fiberglass like magic!

Here's a general look at how things currently sit on the drivers side. You can see where I've applied some VERY thin swipes of putty in order to fill in scratches and the like.

Another imperfection I noticed after I applied the primer was attended to here. Just a slight rise in the body along the ridge.

Lastly, here's my most significant accomplishment of the day. I took out the side air intake cover. I finished the job using my grinder, and then went in with a disk sander on my drill. The latter gives me more control and a more smoothness. Hard to tell in this photo, but it turned out really nicely.

Also, I'd like to take a moment to thank all of the folks who are following my blog, reading it, and even commenting on it. Your words of encouragement are really appreciated, as are your questions and comments. All are thought provoking, and many help me think of solutions that I had previously not considered. Please don't read this blog thinking I am an expert at making Batmobiles. I'm not. This is my first one, and It's ALL new to me. So if you see me doing something that looks wrong, or you know of a better way to do it, please don't hesitate to let me know!

MattMobile Shell Leveller and Captain Jack Harkness

Progress continues at a brisk pace!

Bo The Welder has ABSOLUTELY outdone himself with the creation of an amazing piece of engineering. BTW designed and built an adjustable wooden harness that fits inside the car, and allows him to position the shell at the EXACT location it needs to be on the frame. Once positioned, BTW will be able to take precise measurements and start building out the metal infrastructure which will be used not only to add stability to the shell, but more importantly to keep it in place. I'm absolutely thrilled with the brilliance Bo delivered on this task, and I could not be happier!

Meanwhile, I continue to contribute in the little ways that I can. lol. Just today I used my reciprocating saw to remove the flat part of the side air intake.

I also did a little bit of work cleaning up the flash on the intake, but I burned through my last sanding disk before I could finish.

I also spent about an hour working on the passenger side and gas cap area. This part is really coming together. It might not be entirely obvious from this photo, but you can sort of see all the different layers of putty and sanding that have gone into making this side the proper shape. Even more work has been done right where a drivers side door would be, if the car had that feature. The next coat of primer will cover up this area so I can figure out where else I need to work.

Lastly, with Gallifrey One nearly upon us, some friends of mine are putting together a little video that is a mashup of Doctor Who and The Big Lebowsky. They needed a Captain Jack Harkness to play the part of Jackie Treehorn (Noted pornographer and producer of fan favorite "Log Jammin'") and who better than me!

It's a bad photo, but you get the idea. As soon as the video is finished and on youtube, I'll be sure to post a link.

MattMobile Update: New Coat of Primer

It's been a strange mix lately of super productivity, and extreme lack thereof. The lack I speak of has been largely brought about by travel, which has taken me out of town. I spent ten days in southern Georgia working on Star Trek Continues, then just last weekend went to Toronto for four days for a bit of business. (not the funny kind, mind you)

But the work continues, nonetheless.

I have definitely gotten to understand the long-running problem faced by fellow batmobile builders, which is one of lack of progress. I think what happens (as I suspected) is that a project this daunting is just simply hard to stay motivated on. When you look ahead at the ocean of work you have ahead of you, and the tiny puddle of accomplishments behind you, it's easy to be dissuaded. It's almost a daily exercise of simply forcing myself out into the garage to do some work.

The upside is that once that mental threshold is crossed for the day, and I start in on the car, the time really flies. I actually really enjoy working on the car. I find it both relaxing and theraputic. And it's also pretty darn awesome knowing that I'm getting closer to having a finished batmobile. But alas, as mentioned, I understand the dilemma.

That said, today was pretty productive. If there's one thing I hate more than sanding, it's painting. Actually, the painting part is pretty fun. It's all of the prep and clean up that makes it no fun. My goal for today was to lay down a coat of buff primer. This is a thick, heavy, sandable primer whose goal is to not only fill in minor scrapes and pin holes, but also to reveal problem areas. And reveal it did!! I found about one million little areas that need attention.

The counter to this is that it also revealed just how much I've already accomplished. The front fenders are REALLY looking beautiful, and I'm super happy with how they have come together. These were the most obviously wonky part of the shell, and I thought it very important that the first thing you see when the car is coming at your face look symmetrical and smooth. I'm definitely getting there.

Here's how the drivers side looks. I've put in many hours working on this side, primarily on the side intake hole and the vents. Still a lot of micro-details to work on, but it's really taking shape. Not really sure if the pictures properly convey how far this has come... or how much more work there is to do.

A closeup view of the side intake. Looking really smooth!

And here are the side vents. Still a lot of work remaining here, and a little bit of symmetry I'll need to establish. I'll need to wrap my head around how to best approach that, as I currently don't know. For the record, many of the names for parts of the car are simply being made up by me as I go :D

Here's a bit of a wider view of the front fender, which shows the drivers side also.

Alas, our old friend the gas cap. It seems like ages ago that I first glassed this into place and started working on smoothing out the seam lines. I've learned so much since then, both through research and trial and error. The work I've done on the front fenders was all based on things I learned while doing this little feller.

You can see from this picture that I'm starting to work my way around to the passenger side. I've done a lot of work cleaning up the seam line that rolled over the front fender and down into the wheel well. It's come a VERY long way, and for the most part I'm happy. But the wheel well hole itself is not perfectly round... or even close. There's a big lump on one side that will need to be attended to. But one step at a time.

LOTS of work has been done on this fin. It's really looking good, and many of the problems have been attended to. I think the focus will now shift to cleaning up the seam line that runs down the back of it, and making sure the profile is nice.

That's about it for now! As you can see, much accomplished. Also much to go. Bo should be here tomorrow to do some more work on the frame, so that should be cool. And yes, there is more travel in my future, so stay tuned.

MattMobile Update - With Video

Maybe it's just a burst of January enthusiasm. I hope not, but there's been some progress lately on the MattMobile.

Today I spent a couple hours back on the sanding train, and the results are great. While it's not entirely obvious in these pictures that there's been a lot of progress made on the front end, I promise you there has.

Here's a better shot of the front intake. As I've stated in previous blog posts, EVERY SQUARE INCH of the shell will need attention of some sort. The front intake is no different. Lots of clean up work around the rim, lots of straightening out, filling in of gaps and holes. Stuff like that.

A particularly nasty customer was the seam line that ran around the front intake and across the fenders. Getting into this little crease right here in between those two has been a pain in the butt, but I'm at a point where it's ready for another blast of putty. The overall contours are looking solid.

Back to my old friend, the passenger side fender. Lots of work done on this already, and still a ways to go.

Still really nice to be back out in the garage, despite the fact that my right foot is in a cast right now. Well, it's an orthopeadic boot, but you know what I mean. The weather has been beautiful today, which is great for late January. Mid sixties, by my estimations.

Lastly, I made another episode of Rise of The Mattmobile just the other day, when Bo The Welder came over to help block out the shell. I am absolutely thrilled with the progress we made, as it really made the car seem "real" to me, seeing the shell in it's proper position. I previously had a series of worries about how it was going to fit together, and I just couldn't wrap my mind around how it was going to work. But with Bo at the helm, that step all came together really nicely.

Big thanks to Fon Davis of Fonco Creative Services for his introduction. Fon is an ACTUAL Hollywood professional, and does amazing work. I'm thrilled to have him appear in an episode. Please check out FonCo's website and facebook page:

Website: http://foncocreative.net/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/foncocreative

Materials, Time, Creativity

For most of my life, I’ve been engaged in one hobby or another whose central focus is people building things. I build things. I buy things too. In fact, I recently opened an etsy store where I sell Homestuck horns, of all things.

Would you accept two dollars for a set???

This has brought into sharp focus the topic at hand, and a few emails I’ve received have prompted me to write this essay. But don’t get me wrong, this is a long standing issue, and a prominent one among hobbyists and artists who attempt to turn their passions into a business.

An overwhelmingly common criticism of artisan made pieces is this:

"why does it cost so much?"

Da Fuq?

There are many variations on this theme, such as the following:
- Aren’t materials only about three bucks for that item?
- I could make that myself at about a third of the cost.
- I can afford to pay about half of that price. Can you work with me?
- Can I please see a breakdown of costs for this item?

Warning to potential consumers: all of these questions are not only rude, but will often be perceived as insulting. In this article, I hope to explain why. I believe that the core issue with these questions is that the buyer does not understand or appreciate all of the factors that go into the creation of an artisan item.

In particular the two that I’m labeling Time and Creativity. Just like when you go to purchase a car, or a bag of groceries, there are tons of hidden costs that make the item worth more than the sum total of its parts.

Cost of materials = none

The organic matter it takes to put together an apple has a street value of a fraction of a penny, but bringing that delicious, edible apple to your table is what you are paying for. Let’s break down these three categories into what I believe are the salient points.

Materials – This is the easiest one for people to wrap their heads around. These are the hard costs of the stuff used to make the thing you’re looking to purchase.

I got yer raw materials right here.

If it’s a car, you’re talking about some metal, some leather, some plastic, some fluids, etc. If it’s a resin casting of an item, you’re looking at a few ounces of liquid resin. THIS is usually what people base their assumptions about pricing on. So many times have I heard someone say “Why does your item cost 100 dollars when it only uses about 2 dollars in resin?” Read on, true believer, and I’ll attempt to answer.

The first club out of the bag in this discussion is related to the hidden costs of materials. When I purchase resin, I usually have to drive somewhere to get it. That takes gas. It also takes a car that I pay for. That car requires insurance payments. If I order it online, there are shipping costs. I have to pay for an internet connection in order to do it. There are those that would say “yeah, well those are things you’re already paying for anyway, so you can’t charge me for that”. Au contraire, mon frère. I can indeed. Just as when you go to Target to purchase a DVD, wrapped into that price is the cost of transportation, taxes, licensing, etc… you’re paying for it all.

Someone has got to pay this dude!

Even worse, there are extra costs involved in production of the item that are not direct materials costs. Things like plastic cups, rubber gloves, popsicle sticks, baby powder, etc or whatever things are needed to produce the item in question. You know… SUPPLIES! All of these things cost money out of pocket. Even more subtle is the cost of electricity for the workspace, gas for heating it during winter, etc.

You can see how there are not only hard, measurable costs that go directly into creating the product, but also a wide variety of hidden or uknown costs that are indirectly related to the total production cost of an item. Though not always simple, I believe it is far easier for a customer to comprehend these costs than those involved in the next category.

Time – Contrary to what you may believe or understand, the time of the artisan is worth something. Just as you would not do your job for free, it’s a bit short sighted to expect an artist to do their job for free.

When someone spends five hours working on that thing that you just ordered off etsy, that’s five hours of WORK that they did. You know, like at a job. That you would normally expect someone to get paid for. I don’t know why the value of time is so often dismissed by customers, but believe me, it’s important to the person doing the work. Just as you getting paid for putting in 8 hours a day at your job is important to you.

She gets paid for her time. So should you.

It’s up to the artist to decide how much their time is worth, and it’s then up to you to decide if you’re willing to pay it. This is just like at your job. When you went in for the interview at your current job, the person doing the talking probably said something like “This job pays so-and-so dollars per hour”. That was them telling you how much they think you’re worth. If you then say “that sounds great”, that’s you telling the hiring manager that you agree with their assessment. If you say “no thanks, I think I’m worth more than that” you then head on your merry way… but without a job. See how it works? If the price isn’t right, you end up with nothing. Same is true for artisans. If you don’t like their price, and they are set on their value but you disagree, then you end up with nothing.

But there’s more to it. The actual time it takes to manufacture an item for you may only be the tip of the iceburg in the total time investment the artisan makes. As mentioned above, they probably need to purchase supplies. Which takes time. Driving back and forth to buy supplies takes time. They probably put some time into developing the product also. A lot of the stuff I make includes making a master (using raw materials) molding it (using expensive silicone and related tools/supplies) and then casting it. This is a much bigger time commitment than is simply involved with producing a single casting of an item that I’m going to ship to you.

Creativity – And here we reach what I believe is the toughest pill for a potential customer to swallow. The idea that the product you are creating has some value all its own, independent of the materials and time used to create it.

Try buying this for cost of materials.

There are a few different topics that fall under this category. Things like talent, intellectual property, specialized skills, stuff like that. The basic idea is that I have created something that you did not, and that fact gives it value. I like to pick on the automotive industry as an example, as people seem to have a much better intuitive grasp of how that works.

There are many reasons cars cost more than their raw materials, and nobody seems to have a problem with that. Nobody walks into a car dealership and asks if they can have the car for the cost of materials. When you buy a car, you’re paying for the guy who designed it, the guy who assembled it, the guy who drove it to the lot, the guy who washes it every day, the guy who is going to sell it to you, the guy who owns the dealership, on and on and on.

Their ideas and creativity have a cash value.

The people in that scenario that are relevant to this discussion are the guy who designed it and the guy who assembled it. Nobody would argue that those people don’t deserve a fair days pay for designing or building your car, as we intuitively understand the value in it.

So why is it that this all falls apart when it comes to an artisan item? Do we not owe the creator and builder of the item a payment for their ability to design? To generate in their mind a vision of a real world item, and then through a series of creative miracles, bring it to three dimensional life? Does that skill, that process, not deserve financial recognition? Nearly every form of commerce we enjoy in the free world says yes, yet when it comes to artisan creations, people seem to think no.

Conclusion:
The real message here is that when someone puts a price on an item for sale, it is a combination of the costs of materials (hidden and hard), the value of their time, and the price for their creativity. As a customer, you are free to purchase their product or not at the price they are asking. Heck, you can even haggle or make an offer on a product. But to suggest that time or creativity have no value and should not be factored into the price of an item is insulting to the artisan. You are telling them that all of the hard work, effort, and specialized creativity that they put into bringing an item to you is worth nothing to you. You’re saying that creating that item must be child’s play, since it’s only worth the cost of materials.

And if all of that was true, why don’t you just make it yourself?

Dark Knight Costume from UD Replicas

This is my second purchase from UD Replicas, and I'm just as happy with this suit as I was with my DareDevil suit. Great work, as always David!

Since this type of suit has already been documented pretty heavily online, I won't really go into photographic detail too much. But it is pretty fantastic.

Zelda Rupee

I recently collaborated with a fellow costumer and bulder-of-things (who also happens to be my girlfriend!! Whoohoo!!!!) on a video game inspired item. Jackie is a huge fan of all things Zelda, so when I offered to re-master her rupee for her, she jumped at it.

I used her original design and specs to make the master, which came together in a little under an hour. A little molding and casting later, and Jackie produced the first prototype.

If you're interested in purchasing one, check out Jackie's etsy store, where she has them listed.

And no post about Jackie would be complete without a link to her work with Smosh on the Zelda Raps music video:

Fifth Element ZF-1 Parts Progress

There's been a small burst of productivity lately, and the ZF-1 project has benefitted. I think it may be due to the fact that I've been informed that two or three parts sets are in transit from Australia, which will bring me to a near complete set. Excite!

A while back, I sourced all of the model kits that are used for kit bashing on the ZF-1. There were three of them, from the Star Trek: Voyager model kit series. In total, the kits cost me over 100 bucks. I figured I would mold the kit pieces needed to build the ZF-1, not only so I wouldn't have to risk screwing up the original pieces for my build, but also to offer them to fellow builders at a fraction of the cost of purchasing all three kits.

The first side of a couple of two part molds that I poured up the other day when my friend Ewan came over. I had those little pieces clayed up for some time now, but just never got around to putting rubber on them. What you see below is the piece embedded in rubber, after I pulled away all the clay.

This is the one part mold, or "Dump mold" that I made for the big piece of one of the models that goes on the front of the ZF-1. The mold came out just beautifully.

Here is what casting done right looks like. This is an absolutely flawless cast. ZERO bubbles, nice flat back, all level and smooth.

This is another dump mold I made for two little pieces that go on the side of the ZF-1.

Here, I compare the original piece in grey, with some resin copies. Again, flawless. No bubbles, just beautiful castings.

Here's how I prep to pour the second half of the two part mold. I used a thin piece of styrene to make the wall around the bottom half of the mold, and hot glue gunned it to a piece of MDF. Next step is to spray it with mold release, then dump rubber on top.

That's all for now. I'm going to try to pour up the second halves of the two part molds tomorrow, which may ACTUALLY happen as I have some other stuff I need to mold too. I must confess I'm incredibly pleased with how well these pieces came out. If you need a set, please shoot me an email.

WiiU Short For Nintendo Is Complete and Online

A couple of weeks ago, some of my friends over at Wayside Creations called me in to help them shoot a short film that they were submitting as part of a contest for the new console from Nintendo, the WiiU.

Here's a cool little cast and crew photo, showing everyone who helped out.

I carted in my trusty Canon T3i and over the course of one day we shot it, with me acting as Director of Photography.

Here's how it turned out:

And here's a behind the scenes featurette I cut together to be released in conjunction with the short:

I'm super happy and proud to have been a part of this production, and I'm thrilled with how it turned out.