Tactician V2 : Strikeback – Thrawn’s second saber

Hello Everybody, today I revisit an old design with my newest design and it features a very distinctive and famous strategist. That strategist is the member of the Chiss Ascendancy that joined the Imperial Naval Fleet and rose to fame as Grand Admiral Thrawn! So, as I sort of stated I have already honoured the Grand Admiral with a saber but it was long ago back when I used the “old software” I had at my disposal and had to use other people’s parts. I did however heavily modify those saber parts to create the saber Tactician. Here is a quick reminder of that hilt…

You may recall that Thrawn as he was referred to in the “core worlds” was born in the “Unknown Regions” and was called Mitth’raw’nuruodo. His birth name was Kivu’raw’nuru (Kivu being similar to an earth family surname). He later changed his name when he became an adult and joined the military of the Chiss Ascendency. It was whilst he was carrying out a mission to examine the “Known Regions” and it’s species that he allowed himself to be “captured” by an Imperial squadron of troops as he stowed away on their ship when they came to investigate the disturbances at their camp. Thrawn eventually worked his way into the Imperial Navy by enlisting after showing promise and that he may have something to offer, and finally attained the rank of Grand Admiral after catching The Emperor’s attention.

As you can see from the title images here, Thrawn was a distinctive looking character having blue skin and bright red eyes so when I came up with the first Tactician saber above I had to photo edit the preview pictures to add the blue paintwork (the company that provided the saber building software didn’t have powdercoat or custom paintwork on general offer back then). But I struggled and “painted” each image pixel by pixel but after all the hard work I knew I could do better….so here is Tactician V2: Strikeback….

This saber has the same sort of colouration but this time I didn’t have to paint the hilt pixel by pixel as Blender 3D applied the texture to the model when I built it! It is still the same deep “Chiss Blue” to represent the Chiss species and has nice contrasting brushed silver metal accents with the shroud (you may recognise this from my The Dark Republic saber!). This saber has a red lit activation switch to match the red blade and peek ever so closely to the third image and you might just see two spots of red “peeking” out. These are two windows that allow the light from the blade to shine through but they also pay tribute to my first Tactician hilt and to the Chiss’ red eyes…

How ’bout that? Three pairs of “eyes” spying on us from afar! I say from afar because at the end of the cartoon series Star Wars Rebels, Thrawn was involved in a possible final battle with the Rebels (Ezra, Hera, Kanan, Reb) on Lothal and during the fight his ship was attacked by some Purgil space creatures and we don’t yet know if he survived! But as I said earlier I wanted to improve on my first Tactician saber and when I saw the “eyes” I had created with the windows on the Dark Republic hilt I knew this would suit Thrawn also. And just as a final decorative touch I added two Chiss Ascendency logos made into 3D on the handgrip and on the pommel insert – though Thrawn would probably disapprove saying “decoration is not needed on a weapon of battle – all that matters is that it performs in time of need!”. Well it does work and I hope you all like the Strikeback version.

That just about brings me to the end of this week’s post, I do hope you liked it. I will have to do some thinking about my next few posts as the big “May the 4th” is coming up so I might need to show off something bigger…hm….Anyhoo, thank you so much for your support and visit today. It is really appreciated and I have noticed many new viewer figures coming from new locations around the globe and you’re all welcome. If you all enjoy what you see here please comment, like and maybe subscribe if you haven’t already. I still have much more to come in future posts so do call back…..Till next time…..

“Tactician V2:Strikeback” is a For Tyeth Editions design and was built and rendered in Blender 3D. The design and images are ©Copyright of For Tyeth/FTSabersite 2016-2021. “Grand Admiral Thrawn” first appeared in the books by Timothy Zhan and is a Trademark/©Copyright of Disney/Lucasfilm having appeared in “Star Wars: Rebels”.

Not-a-Nerf Saber Firestrike Edition…A For Tyeth “Mod”

Hello everybody and before I do anything else I’d like to say a big thanks to all of you for checking out my “Sabermarionation” saber for Gerry Anderson Day AND for supporting The Atomic Mage as he launched his new site. If you haven’t seen the post from Wednesday you can find it here: https://ftsabersite.wordpress.com/2021/04/14/sabermarionation-a-saber-for-gerry-anderson-day-with-the-atomic-mage/ And you can also check out The Atomic Mage’s new site with this link: https://theatomicmage.wordpress.com/ I’m sure you’ll find his posts captivating (especially his “Six Sentence Stories”).

Back to the galaxy of lightsabers and laser swords, I was very busy over the past week producing the “Sabermarionation” article and haven’t been able to compile a full gallery of pictures for this week’s design (my laptop is slow and can’t multi-task whilst rendering) but I do have a handful of images of a Blaster inspired saber design. The saber isn’t modelled or based off Star Wars canon weapons but rather the NERF dart blasters I have recently purchased and hope to modify into a Cosplay prop. So here is my latest design…Not-a-Nerf Saber….

The Not-a-Nerf saber is one of the hilts I mentioned earlier this month that has a removeable chassis that holds all the electronics, enabling the components to be switched between different hilts. The chassis (or core as they are sometimes called) has a powerful LED light to illuminate the polycarbonate blade and at the pommel there is a speaker for all the sound FX. There are two screw fittings next to the illuminated activation switch and the recharge socket for the battery. Unscrewing these allows the core to slide out the hilt ready to slot into another saber with matching holes for the switches and screws. The aesthetic details include a nice curved “choke point” gripping area at the emitter giving the hilt a secure location to grab hold but also allow you to do the fancy spinning tricks which require a “softer” grip. The remaining portion of handgrip features a nice set of slanted rings to assist grip and they mimic the curve detail seen in the NERF logo. And as you can see there is indeed a 3D modelled NERF logo embellishment.

DISCLAIMER! THIS SABER IS NOT A NERF PRODUCT!

Sorry ’bout that, I had to mention that this isn’t an official product or endorsed by Hasbro. But it is heavily inspired by their product, the Firestrike spring action dart blaster. I bought TWO of these blasters and they have a nice blue, orange and grey colour scheme which I replicated in the glossy paintjob on my design. I will insert a few pictures of the blaster below but first I have a funny story to tell.

A few weeks ago, my good friend Neil (from MakeroomMakeroom https://makeroommakeroom.wordpress.com/) commented that I should consider temporarily renaming my site to The Nerf Mod Workshop or something similar as I was getting more invested in Nerfing (<yes that is a word) and planning on doing customisations of blasters…well I also know Neil is a fan of the TV Sci-Fi comedy Red Dwarf and whilst watching series 11 I noticed something in the episode titled “Can of Worms”…see if you can spot what I saw…

I spy with my little eye….

In the image you can see three of the main characters(from left to right) Dave Lister, Kryten and Arnold Rimmer in what appears to be a Mexican Standoff. But they are all holding laser pistols and…look closely and you will see that they are modified Firestrike Nerf blasters…the same as mine!

As you can see from the zoomed in picture the lasers are Firestrike pistols painted black and they have what appears to be a Berol Magnum permanent marker pen attached to the top as a sort of gunsight and there is a mechanic’s ratchet socket adaptor fitted onto the barrel…but you can still see the row of “V” shaped decorations under the barrel and the roundel that has the NERF logo. It looks like I chose a good blaster to modify if the crew of Red Dwarf use them!

Anyhoo, I haven’t started modding just yet but when the shops re-open in the UK fully I will go out and get some paints and supplies/parts and set to work. This brings me to the end of this slightly different post, I should be back to a full normal offering next weekend so I hope you will all call back to see that. Thank you so much for the great support and whether a first time caller or a regular visitor to FTSabersite you’re much appreciated. Till next time….

“Not-a-Nerf Saber – Firestrike Edition” is a For Tyeth Editions design inspired by Hasbro/NERF’s Firestrike dart blaster. IT IS NOT endorsed by Hasbro nor is it an official product. The 3D models and renderings were created by For Tyeth and are ©Copyright of For Tyeth/FTSabersite 2016-2021. “NERF” and “Firestrike Elite” are Trademark/ ©Copyright of Hasbro Toys ltd. “Red Dwarf” and associated names and material are TM/©Copyright 1989-2021 BY GRANT NAYLOR PRODUCTIONS LTD.

“Sabermarionation” A Saber for Gerry Anderson Day (with The Atomic Mage)

Hello everybody….Stand By For Action, anything could happen in the next 30 minutes. Today is a big day for two reasons, firstly my good friend The Atomic Mage (The Vintage Toy Advertiser also formerly known as TVTA) is posting his first BIG post on his new blog (click here to visit : https://theatomicmage.wordpress.com/) and he has asked me to do a collaboration with him to celebrate another great talent…namely Gerry Anderson and his puppet television and live shows from the 1960’s to the 2020’s. So shall we begin?

The Atomic Mage informed me last week that April the 14th is International Gerry Anderson Day and asked if I could design/build something special for the event. I immediately set to work and in just over 24 hrs I had an idea and had sent an initial picture to his Mage. The design was inspired by one of Gerry Anderson’s most famous shows, Thunderbirds..but Mr Anderson had been in the TV industry since the 40’s as a producer/writer etc and had his first notable credit with “The Adventures of Twizzle”. Next up was a show named “Supercar” and was a puppet/animatronic based show that along with “Fireball XL5” set the basis for Thunderbirds. I won’t labour too much on the history of Mr Anderson’s work as I’m sure his Mage has much more detailed stories to tell, but it was Thunderbirds that I used as inspiration for this new design. I was a fan of Stingray, an aquatic themed puppet show with a super submarine but that didn’t lend itself to being converted into a saber…but there was a Thunderbird vehicle I thought fit the bill…Thunderbird 3!

I immediately saw some potential in this striking red ship and I began modelling to convert TB3 into “Sabermarionation”. I came up with the name after the name of the technique Mr Anderson gave to his style of puppetry which was “Supermarionation”. These were puppets which contained and used electronically controlled features for the face and mechanics of the vehicle models. Ok enough talking, I’m sure you want to see pictures and the first batch is a slide show of the modelling process I went through to build the 3D model…

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As you can see I started with a cylinder then modified the thickness along it’s length to mimic the fuselage body. I managed to add the “cooling fins” halfway up the ship. Then I added the outrigger struts which held the secondary engine nacelles. When I finished the nacelles and realised the model would work I added a bit of colour which helped me add detailing. Finally I added the texturing and lettering – all of which is firmly embossed onto the skin of the model and I added a belt clip attachment (the black wheel appendage known as a Covertech). It may not look like I did much to convert this but that was the beauty of picking TB3, I just needed to thicken the upper fuselage and nose cone to form a handgrip and the engine exhaust and nacelles formed a ready made emitter! To activate the saber all you have to do is twist the handgrip. Now again I think it is time to see this hilt in some Glamour Shots…

Hopefully these images show off the saber and all it’s details. I am particularly pleased with the lettering and the outrigger struts, because if you look closely at the struts you will see I even added the small black oval adornments that give Thunderbird 3 a sort of squid like profile. And the final image I was just feeling “arty” and wanted an atmospheric picture to show off Gerry Anderson’s creation best.

Thunderbirds 1 to 5 weren’t Mr Anderson’s only creations, he and his designers (including his then wife Sylvia) came up with many characters and vehicles for many more shows including “Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons”, “Joe 90”, the aforementioned “Stingray” and later in the 70’s the shows “UFO” and “Space 1999” with it’s famous Eagle starships. Long time followers of mine may recall I made an Eagle saber way back in Feb 2017!

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  Eagle One Reference

Some other creations included…

There was a pink Rolls Royce known as FAB 1, then the SHADO Moonbase Intercetor from UFO, Captain Scarlet’s Spectrum Pursuit vehicle and in the 1980’s the show Terrahawks featured characters such as Zelda, Cystar, and Yung Star – all cybernetic mystic aliens that try to invade Earth but are thwarted by the forces of The Earth Defence Squadron or Terrahawks as they are known due to the ships they fly. They also each had an army of droids, Zelda had an army of Cubes whilst the Terras had the Zeroids…..WAIT A MINUTE! I think Atomic Mage has been snooping in my workshop! Can you see the spherical shaped droid face in that last picture? That is Sgt Major Zero and he was going to be my “Special Mystery Guest”! I figured I hadn’t worked hard enough so I decided to model and refurbish the Sgt Major and give him a Blender 3D polish….oh well here is my Special Guest….Sgt Major Zero….

I will say first off that the Sgt Major’s panels are orientated differently, it is hard to find original Zeroid body panels nowadays 😁 but he is still a fully functioning droid and has made friends with my other robotic buddy “dROYd”! The body shell is made of a nice space alloy and features the rank markings of a Sgt Maj, as well as a gold rim around his eye socket housing. The adaptor sockets on the side of his dome are again firmly embossed 3D objects molded to follow his curved surface, just like the text on the saber above. Other details include articulated glowing eyes (I can animate them if needed), roundels on either side of his head, cooling ducts on the rear and a basic pedestal for him to sit atop when he isn’t rolling about. Sgt Maj Zero was a great character and may have influenced Lucasfilm into designing a rolling spherical droid known as BB-8!

Mr Gerry Anderson and some of his creations

Well I think that nearly brings me to the end of this tribute to Gerry Anderson and my first collaboration for Atomic Mage’s new blog. I hope you enjoyed it and if you haven’t seen any Anderson produced shows then check them out. You can also visit the official Gerry Anderson Website using this link: https://www.gerryanderson.co.uk/

Thank you for joining me and The Atomic Mage in celebrating Gerry Anderson Day. Thank you Atomic, for your challenge to me, I hope I passed the test and am ready for International Rescue. And my special guest Sgt Major Zero would like the last word, so from me For Tyeth stay safe and Till next time….take it away Sarge….

I couldn’t have put it better myself!

The Atomic Mage can be found at: https://theatomicmage.wordpress.com/

“Sabermarionation” is a For Tyeth Editions lightsaber design inspired by the work of Gerry Anderson and the tv show Thunderbirds. “Thunderbirds”, “Thunderbird 3”, “Stingray” and all other Anderson creations/shows, names, logos, images and related material are Trademark/©Copyright of Anderson Entertainment 1960-2021. All 3D models and renders were created by For Tyeth/FTSabersite and are ©Copyright of For Tyeth/FTSabersite 2016-2021.

For Tyeth News – A slight change in Schedule

Hello Everybody, today I have good and bad news (of a sort). Firstly my very good friend and “Challenger in Chief” – The Vintage Toy Advertiser (https://thevintagetoyadvertiser.org/2021/04/05/tvta-is-retiring/– )announced that after 10 stellar years of blogging about vintage toy advertisements and catalogues (as well as a lot of “pop culture” stuff for good measure too) he is closing down his office, so ending an era. But the good news is that TVTA has plans to start up a smaller, less time consuming blog in the future so he isn’t disappearing into the “Living Force” just yet! I mentioned that TVTA was my “Challenger in Chief”….well before he closes his current site he informed me that on April 14th is “Gerry Anderson Appreciation Day” – a day dedicated to the television genius that brought us shows like UFO, Stingray, Joe 90 and of course most famously….THUNDERBIRDS! To mark this day TVTA plans to post a tribute (either on his current site or as his first offering on his new site) and asked me if I could also come up with something for the day. I couldn’t turn down this request and I have been busy this past 3 days hammering out a design for a Gerry Anderson inspired saber, but this means that today I don’t have a regular post as I will be posting the Anderson saber on Wednesday 14th to co-ordinate with TVTA.

“BUT TYETH WHAT ABOUT US? We don’t have any eye candy today!”….Yes I am sorry but I hear you, which is why I have a few pictures of some up and coming designs I have in the FTSabersite pipeline. You didn’t really think I was going to neglect you all did you? Course not, so here is a sneak glimpse at my FTSaberCore Saber collection….

These are a set of sabers that if ever built would feature interchangeable electronics, so you could get a black and gold hilt along with a silver version and switch the internals between the two – meaning you would only need buy one electronics kit. I think these are pretty nice looking but there is more coming in future posts including more “High Republic” themed hilts (and a special Super Hero model with matching plinth!), a Frontier saber….and more Blaster inspired stuff! So plenty to look forward to (and maybe a costume!).

That brings me to the end of this slightly shorter/different post. I have to say a MASSIVE thank you to TVTA, you have become one of my best friends (not just online but in general life) and you have made me a better designer with all your “Toy Challenges”….I mean who would have thought I could create sabers based on Charlie’s Angels, Starsky and Hutch…..AND the Ghostbusters’ ECTO-1? I had to think well outside the box on those recommendations and I learnt so much. I also learnt about Chirashi pamphlets (Japanese/Asian cinema posters) the comic world of “Weird War Tales” and discovered a wealth of vintage furniture and homeware images from your catalogue collection (these helped me look at the art of design differently). As such I look forward to the launch of your new site and what that brings!

And I want to thank you viewers, for all the support you have shown me and TVTA, it is appreciated by both of us and I hope you will continue to call back to FTSabersite to see all the new stuff I have coming up AND keep supporting TVTA and his new site (I’ll post links when he sets everything up!). So remember Wednesday 14th I’ll have the Gerry Anderson Tribute and then I ‘ll return to my normal scheduled postings. Till next time….

“FTSaberCore Collection” are a set of sabers designed and modelled in Blender 3D by For Tyeth/FTSabersite and are ©Copyright of For Tyeth/FTSabersite 2016-2021.

The Dark Republic Saber – The High Republic’s darksider hilt

Hello Everybody and welcome to April! Today I have another hilt based on the High Republic themed saber I showcased a few weeks ago. This time it is for the Darkside users and I think is slightly elegant too. It is a variation but it will demonstrate how just a few small tweaks to the details can make a difference. You won’t believe how simple the modification was….here is the first batch of pictures – The Dark Republic….

So, instead of the splendid silver and gold scheme of the Lightside version I obviously changed the look to a monochrome black and silver – almost gunmetal colour. However you might think this is the same saber, but I rotated the hilt in such a way that the emitter shroud sweeps back and upward to almost form a scoop. This gives the hilt a more aggressive “thrusting” appearance as opposed to the flowing sweep to the rear on the lightside hilt. It also resulted in the Glass Eye window being on top of the hilt shining directly up making it more visible. I removed the Jedi emblem because of course what Sith would want that on their hilt?

Now I felt like I had only done a little work for this upgrade so I needed to put a bit more effort in and come up with a variation and so I worked on the emitter. I wanted to create a similar part and maybe add different materials to the ridges. So I made a duplicate as a back up which is always a good practice in case your mods don’t work – you have an original part to fall back on. But when I instructed Blender to make the duplicate the software automatically places the duplicate overlaid on top of the original. This meant I had to move the duplicate and when I did the thought occurred, “What if I rotate the second emitter 180 degrees to mirror the first, how would that look as a shroud?” So I proceeded and not only did the two parts form an interesting double curved shroud…it also had TWO holes for the Glass Eye feature! (As I am typing this I have just had an Idea for a new character themed version of this hilt to replace a previous design I built back around 2016! It too featured two red eyes…any guesses who it might be?) Anyhoo I had best post the second gallery with the version 2.5 of The Dark Republic…

Again a simple modification led to a neat new version. The double sized shroud now looks like some form of Sith armour plating while on the underside there lurks TWO red eyes! Not only that but the way the blade extends it appears as if there are two pointy ears (Ooh blimey another character idea just struck me! I’m designing stuff in real time now 😎). Ok, that just about wraps up this week’s design but I am going to be busy re-modding this hilt into the two new character hilts I just thought of…plus I have gone and done it again….

I found another bargain I couldn’t pass up on!

Yes! I have gone and bought another blaster for my collection (well two actually) and this one is called the “Stryfe” and it’s motorised so it fires “Pew! Pew! Pew! Pew! Pew! Pew!” Six shots in rapid fire instead of one dart at a time. I purchased this one expecting to get a blue, white and orange coloured version which was shown on the webstore page – but it did state I might end up with a different one…well I did, this is the Elite XD version or “OJ Orange Juice” as the Nerf community nicknamed it. This may be difficult to paint up as a Star Wars-y blaster prop so I purchased a second one and maybe it will be blue! If not I’ll still have two awesome blasters to play with 😎

Anyhoo that really does bring me to the end of this post. Thanks so much for getting this far and to all my readers/viewers thanks once more for your support. You keep calling back and help keep me designing and I sincerely hope you’ll continue to do so as I still have more sabers to show you (and it seems more still in my head!). Stay safe and well…Till next time….

“The Dark Republic” sabers are a For Tyeth Editions creation and are ©Copyright of For Tyeth/FTSabersite 2016-2021. The 3D model and renders were made in Blender 3D. “Star Wars: The High Republic” and all other names, logos, and related material are Trademark©Copyright of Disney/Lucasfilm.