Hello Everybody, today I bring you yet another new saber! Back on the 18th February I showcased a design for Deadpool, well today I have the saber I designed for Wolverine. Long time viewers/friends of this site may recall I have already created a saber for Logan, aka Wolverine (you can view them here: https://ftsabersite.wordpress.com/tag/wolverinelogan/), but he is starring alongside Deadpool in the new movie Deadpool 3 releasing on November 8th 2024. Yes I’m a little early but the inspiration struck me so I had to model my idea while the metal was hot! I decided that Logan/Wolverine needed a Katana to match up with the one I built for Deadpool but one with a difference…and I think this Katana is a bit different. This is “Wolverine’s Claws Katana”…
This saber is modelled and coloured in the classic yellow and blue scheme seen in early comic books, back when Wolfie looked like this…
You will also notice that this is no usual Katana as it has not one, but three blades to mimic his Adanantium claws. This is capable of some serious damage but I know Logan can handle it. OK, enough chatter, I had better post the gallery of pics for you….
This saber is a real match for Deadpool’s and the triple blades also feature the Hamon Line inspired etching light effect on the sides. These secondary blades I imagine being used like the three pronged swords named Sai that the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle Raphael owns. The smaller blades could be used to trap or “bind” an opponent’s blade to control their sword before snapping it. The wrapping on the handgrip is just a classic Wolfie colour scheme as is the pommel. Now I mentioned that Wolverine is due to appear in Deadpool 3, well I decide to do a group photo of both superheroes’ sabers!
And just as a treat here is a quick picture of Wolverine holding a similar pose…
And that just about wraps up this post once again. I’d like to say a big thank you to everyone who has visited today to check this design out. All of your support is fantastic and has helped me out this past few weeks. Hopefully things at Tyeth Towers will return to normal soon and if you liked what you saw here then please call back for future posts. I have some new “robots in disguise”, more starfighters plus the final Puss in Boots variant . Till next time!…..
Hello Everybody, things are extremely hectic and stressful for me at the moment – the weather is terrible and I’m awaiting a vital parcel to be delivered to me. But in amongst al the upheaval and disruption to my normal routine I realised that I have met a famous mutant Anti-hero in the shape of Deadpool, at the comic con I attended last year but not done a Blender3D design for him . And Inow have a katana…but not a Deadpool themed katana….until now…
Lightsaber vs Katana? Not a fair fight really!
I discovered from my quick sparring session with Deadpool that a regular katana (or two as he uses a pair of blades) isn’t a match for my lightsaber so I felt bad and designed a set of hilts for him. These are Deadpool’s custom katana lightsabers…
I think the red, white and black colour scheme is very striking and I decided to include the Hamon inspired blade for this design. You will also see if you look closely that the pommel resembles the Deadpool logo complete with glowing white eyelets! And of course I had make a pair of sabers because DP uses two blades in a style similar to that of Ahsoka Tano (her Lightsaber Form or style is known as Jar Kai and uses a saber in each hand). It takes a lot of co-ordination to wield two sabers but after meeting DP I know he can cope!
So now I have rectified my oversight and bestowed my new friend with his sabers I’m afraid I will have to end this post early as I’m still waiting for the delivery I mentioned earlier and it is vital I get it. I will before I go say a big thank you to all of you who checked this saber out and for all the fantastic support, be it in the form of likes, comments or maybe even folks subscribing, it all means a lot and keeps me working. So whether you are new to FTSabersite or a regular….thank you! And next week I will be unveiling a completely original lightsaber for a special Jedi character….ME! I’ve finally designed one for myself, so I hope you’ll return to check it out! Till next time….
Hello Everybody, today I dive outside of the Star Wars universe again but into another that features a familiar face. The show that inspired today’s post is Marvel Studios’ “Moon Knight” – a show about a man with Dissociative Identity Disorder that is drawn into an ancient Egyptian mystery involving Egyptian gods, and uses his multiple personas to solve it….and it stars Oscar Isaac (who just happens to be Poe Dameron so this is a sort of Star Wars post too!). Now as with most new shows on Disney+ I haven’t seen it yet but from my little research I discovered Oscar Isaac plays the character named Marc Spector and his alter egos Moon Knight, Steven Grant and Mr Knight. To differentiate the various “alters” Oscar used different accents for each one and at first filmed all the scenes for Marc Spector in order then would record second takes as one of his alters characters, allowing himself time to “get into each character”. However as he became more comfortable with each character he was able to switch between them in one take. This level of acting reminds me of an actor who also took on multiple roles in one movie…that actor being the great Sir Alec Guinness…but Sir Alec just had EIGHT characters to portray! (In the movie “Kind Hearts and Coronets….check it out if you haven’t seen it already, it’s rather good 😎) Anyhoo….this post is about a saber I designed based on the Moon Knight show and I just had a few images and non spoiler reviews to go on so I set to work on modifying my Katana and used this picture as a guide….
Look out for that Crescent shaped object!
The pic above shows Oscar as Marc Spector and on the right as the character Moon Knight himself. Moon Knight has some mythical powers and weapons based on Egyptian mythology and wears a face covering made of bandages….pretty unique so enough talk…here is “Moonlight Katana”….
I took the basic katana model I had and again tweaked the colours and textures to recreate the look of Moon Knight, using the Tsuka Ito hilt wrappings to represent MK’s facial bandage wrapping. The costume designer on the show, Meghan Kasperlik, also went to town with the design of the hero’s costume using multiple fabrics to prevent him (and other characters) from appearing flat onscreen (due to stage lighting which can bleach out details). The materials included one that had a silvery Lame texturing…and in all the costume had 803 pieces to construct it. It also featured an emblem on the chest known as the “Symbol of Khonshu” the Egyptian God of the moon and it is this emblem from which Moon Knight empowers his “Crescent Darts”. These are a mixture of a martial arts Ninjitsu throwing star (called a Shuriken) and Xena Warrior Princess’ “Chakram” throwing ring weapon. However the Crescent Darts featured heavily in the promo images for the show and it’s logo so I had to incorporate one or two into this hilt. And to do this I added an illuminated Crescent to the pommel but I also added two more to the Tsuba handguard to make a set of claws (I used one complete dart and one half shaped dart to produce three claws – this left an opening for the blade to still be useable where the fourth claw would have been). Whilst coming up with interesting angles to take the Gallery pictures I had a “Happy Accident” and aligned the saber in such a way that the graphics I used for the background actually interacted with the hilt and created a neat effect, here are a few pictures to show you…
The background image is actually a picture of a temple amphitheatre taken at night and as I rotated the camera the moon in the graphics spun behind the emitter and claws and created this eclipse-like effect. The picture had an eclipse in it but then when positioned it formed a corona for the hilt! I gave this saber a blue glow but couldn’t decide if it looked best so I did a version with gold too….
I kinda like both! Anyhoo, I am drawing short on much more to say about this show as I haven’t ssen it…but I do have a few Trivia bits you might enjoy. During the filming of scenes where Oscar had to interact and talk to his other “alters” his brother Michael Benjamin Hernandez acted as his body double! And here is a little tidbit of info my friend Nancy of Graphic Novelty² will probably know….one of her favourite Canadian comic writers named Jeff Lemire worked on the Moon Knight comic series! You can read Nancy’s great blog at https://graphicnovelty2.com/.
Well, that just about brings this post to an end, I hope you enjoyed it despite my lack of knowledge on the show (I will eventually get to watch all of these new programs). I will just add that I am going to be busy for the first half of next week on Jedi business so may be late responding to any comments you might leave but I should be back home by Wednesday – I hope!
So as always thank you so much for checking out this design and post, it’s much appreciated. I still have a few more sabers to come and other prop models in future posts so I hope you’ll call back to see those. Till next time….
Hello Everybody, today I return to the comic book world of the G.I. Joes and to a story between two “brothers”. The brothers were Snake Eyes who I re-introduced you to a few posts back and the Ninja assassin named Storm Shadow. Both Snake and Shadow had originally served in the US military operating in southeast Asia. They were members of a LRRP or “Long Range Reconnaissance Patrol” with another team member who would later become the G.I. Joe named Stalker, You may recall I mentioned that Snake Eyes was rescued from the field of battle when he was injured, by a soldier of Japanese descent and that soldier turned out to be Thomas S. Arashikage or “Storm Shadow” – his Ninja clan name. After the war both men returned to normal life, Shadow to Japan and Snake to the US where he learnt his family had perished in an automobile accident. Having nothing to keep him in the US Snake travelled to stay with the one last person he considered family…Storm Shadow. Below are pictures of Hasbro’s “Storm Shadow ” action figure promo poster and my 2017 lightsaber Katana I created for Shadow,
However, things didn’t run smoothly as Snake became a member of the Arashikage clan and studied martial arts under Shadow’s uncle, the Hard Master. Snake excelled and surpassed Shadow becoming the clan leader elect causing tension. Then an assassination attempt on Snake’s life failed disastrously. The crime group Cobra and it’s leader Cobra Commander sent an assassin to kill Snake in revenge for Snake killing a member of the Commander’s family. Complicated? Well sadly the Hard Master died and was shot by an arrow that belonged to Storm Shadow and the assailant fled unseen escaping in a mini helicopter. Shadow was blamed and he fled also, later joining Cobra itself to try and discover the real killer. Whew! Ok enough talk, it’s about time I show you Gallery one of “Building Storm Katana”….
This is a no-nonsense lightsaber katana, just right for a silent, deadly Ninja assassin such as Storm Shadow. However even though Snake Eyes and Shadow seem to be on differing sides, this hilt is similar to that of his “brother” Snake’s Katana. Shadow is a traditional trained Ninja and as such would probably only use this weapon if it were to give him an edge in combat. Therefore I removed the Arashikage clan logo from the blade as this emits way too much light for it to be stealthy weapon. I did leave the logo on the pommel as this also acts as the on/off switch. The Tsuba handguard and pommel feature the same etching marks that resemble waves and currents – the elements of a storm. This katana also features a metal hilt body rather than a sword with a wooden core (called a Tang) in the handgrip – but the hilt is wrapped in a matching off white leather Tsuka Ito grip wrap that allows the alloy handle to show through. Ok then, again I am chatting too much so I had best showcase the detailed glamour shots in Gallery Two…
Just a few pictures to show off the details and in the last two shots you can see the Clan logo activation switch again but I also varied the angle the picture was taken from to show that the metallic hilt doesn’t stand out too much by shining, which is useful because Shadow can still use it to reflect light to distract an opponent – or sneakily momentarily blinding them! He is a Ninja after all.
Shadow and Snake obviously go their separate ways with Snake returning to the US and joining the special elite corps known as G.I.Joe, whilst Shadow (as I mention above) joined Cobra, the shadowy criminal organisation hoping to discover who killed his uncle and framed him. The two would eventually join forces when Shadow joins the Joes but it didn’t last long. As to what happened next depends on which movies or comic books you read as there are a few different strands of canon/lore (the Marvel comic timeline and the later reboot and G.I. Joe movies).
“Storm Shadow”
And that just about Tsuka Ito wraps up this saber offering (sorry bad pun but I’ve been holding off from saying it, honest!) Thank you so much for checking this one out and I hope you enjoyed it and the backstory, You will be pleased to know the next post will be planted firmly back in Star Wars territory with another “Starfighter Saber” inspired by a famous ship seen in the films. I still have a few more Power Rangers katanas but this past week I have worked on something I hope is really cool, when I saw what I had modelled I said…..”Hello there!”……that was a little hint.
Anyhoo, thanks for he support, be it from new visitors or my regular viewers it keeps me posting and please call back for upcoming posts. Till next time…..
Hello Everybody, today I bring you another Katana design inspired by a character from Hasbro’s toy line of G.I. Joe. Way back in the 80’s there was a comic book that chronicled the adventures oand missions of an elite force known as the G.I. Joes and one character in particular I took an interest in, That was the elite commando and Ninja known as Snake Eyes. Not a lot was known about this mysterious, silent (literally) covert operations expert, except that he served in the US military in south east Asia where he was injured in combat but saved by another soldier of Japanese descent. This soldier risked his life to retrieve and carry Snake Eyes back to a chopper and rescue despite being ordered to leave Snake on the battlefield. Upon returning to the US and recovering from his injuries Snake discovered that his family had perished in a car accident. So Snake travelled with the Japanese soldier that saved his life and joined the soldier’s family clan….the Arashikage….a Ninja clan!
The Arashikage clan symbol (see explanation of this below)
Snake Eyes went on to study the martial arts and became a black belt in 12…yes 12 martial arts along with his now adopted blood brother who became known as Storm Shadow. Storm Shadow and Snake Eyes would later fall out after Shadow was inadvertently framed for the murder of the clan master. The leader of a group named Cobra blamed Snake Eyes for the death of his brother and sent an assassin to kill Snake but that assassin killed the clan father by mistake using a stolen arrow belonging to Shadow. Shadow fled and Snake returned to the US and the military joining the elite squad G.I Joe.
Snake Eyes left, and Storm Shadow on the right.
Snake’s problems didn’t end here however, as during a mission he received serious facial injuries whilst saving a female soldier named Scarlett, an accident which scarred his face and severed his vocal cords leaving him mute. He somehow survived and completed the mission and afterwards donned a mask and mysterious black body suit. Storm Shadow on the other hand…ended up joining the secretive criminal group Cobra in a attempt to discover the identity of the killer that killed his clan master. As an expert in Ninjitsu, Snake Eyes used bladed weapons such as “Knuckleduster Knives” and the famous Ninja sword or Katana. Today I showcase my lightsaber Katana in honour of this mysterious warrior, here is “Snake-Eyed Saber”
I took my recent Katana design and elongated the handgrip and Tsuka Ito wrapping, recoloured the hilt to match Snake’s stealthy black and silver colour scheme and added a glowing Arashikage clan symbol (if you look cloely to the image of Snake above you can see a non illuminated version of this logo on his Katana blade too.) This saber was difficult to get right because as I’ve mentioned before, trying to have two objects that are the same colour (or black in this case) is hard to make them appear and stand apart. But I worked hard to get the leather texture of the hadngrip wrap just the right shade and I’m pleased with the result (the leather really has a 3D look to it). I also liked how the whole saber looked, but enough chatter again…here are a few more pics in Gallery Two….
I added a second Arashikage symbol on the pommel, replacing my initials from the original Katana model. The complete symbol is actually a pair of symbols from the I-Ching, a form of divination or fortune telling, stacked one atop the other . The two symbols are Lí (the lower three lines) meaning “Flame” and the upper three rows are the symbol Kǎn meaning “Water”….the equal and opposite in all things. And what else has an equal and opposite in Star Wars? The Force of course! Light and Dark.
And as with Star Wars, there was bound to be conflict and it would transpire that Snake Eyes and Storm Shadow’s paths would cross again but that is for a future post where I will showcase Storm Shadow’s tribute. But before I finish I do want to show you how far my designing has progressed since I started….some viewers/readers may recall waaay back that I did a tribute to these two G.I.Joe characters and created a hilt for them using the old software I had access to…if you don’t recall then here is a quick glimpse of an old design!
That just about wraps up this tribute to the silent Ninja Warrior, Snake Eyes and his new lightsaber Katana. Thank you so much for checking it out. If you liked this one and my old design please have a look round at some of my other content. I will, as mentioned return to showcase Storm Shadow in a future post along with a set of FIVE katana hilts for a colourful bunch of Ninja teenagers, plus I have some starfighter inspired saber designs too. Oh and I may post on May the Fourth….you know….Star Wars Day! Once again, thanks and till next time….
Hello Everybody and welcome to another new saber showcase. Not only do I have a new saber to show you all today but I can hint at some awesome news I have gotten this week…the sound of tiny feet may soon be echoing around For Tyeth Towers (aka my cave!). However it’s not quite what you might expect but more on that in possibly a week or two’s time when things are finalized. Back to today and I have a saber for a new character that has appeared in Marvel Comics by the name of Darth Krall. I haven’t been able to find much information about this guy except that he was one of the famous “Lost Twenty”, a group of fallen Jedi that turned to the Dark Side and are immortalised in statue form in the great Jedi Library on Coruscant. You might have seen their bronze bust sculptures in the background during Attack of the Clones when Obi-Wan visited the library looking for information about Kamino. Here is a picture from the comic book cover of Darth Krall…
As I mention I couldn’t find much info about this person and I don’t have the comic but I do know his former name when he was a Force Sensitive affiliated to the Jedi was Radaki. He believed that Jedi should be allowed to retain their wealth and family relationships upon passing their trials – but this was against the beliefs of the Jedi Order and code of having no attachments. He fell out of the Order and became a Sith follower. And as you can see from the picture he was intimidating and had a very ornate golden coloured lightsaber. It was this saber I tried to recreate so here is my design…. Krall….
I think this saber would class as being ostentatiously ornate – very much unlike the humble designs usually adopted by the Jedi. The hilt is probably made of Electrum, the same material that Master Mace Windu adorned his hilt with (which upset a lot of the sitting Jedi members at the time). This saber has a slanted and windowed emitter seated on a slender silver thin neck choke point section (which helps gripping the hilt). The handgrip features fluted ribs with ornate scrollwork etching at either end and followed by a slightly wider silver power pack section with a decorated pommel end cap. Time for a few close up detail pictures, onto Gallery Two!….
I again made use of the Blender3D function that allows me to replicate embossed/etched textures and applied a complex Celtic style border around the hilt grip and switch section which has an illuminated switch with a delicate bezel ring with a claw setting to hold the jewel button (I have been watching a lot of jewellery auction shows on television recently and am picking up design ideas from these jewellers). The emitter is circled by a ring of tiny but elegant windows that allow just enough of the red blade to shine through. Now finally I will showcase the pommel and it’s decoration….Gallery Three!….
The pommel cap is adorned with a centrally positioned Sith Order emblem and I placed further copies around the edges which formed a sort of web look. I made the metal of the cap appear darker as if it were some medallion that had been set into the pommel. The final image shows the Sith Order logo representing a “Black Sun”. Oh yes, and there is a D-Ring belt loop to hang the saber from Krall’s utility belt.
And once more that just about wraps this design up. It was fun trying to build a saber based off just that one single image I showed above, all I could see was an emitter and part of the pommel! I think I did ok.
I am now getting really excited about the new addition to the For Tyeth Family…hopefully I can let you all in on the joyous event in the very near future…but in the meantime I should have some more designs from The Mandalorian and I will be working on a new set of hilts from the newly released series of Star Wars cartoon/anime shows known as “Visions” which have been produced by several large Manga/Anime studios and give the Star Wars universe a whole new artistically gorgeous look. I hope you will return to check all this out in future posts. But as always thanks so much for visiting today it is much appreciated (and to the viewer from Hungary thank you for boosting my views on the 17th – you viewed over 100 items just by yourself!). Whether you are a regular viewer or a newcomer to FTSabersite….MTFBWY and Till next time….
“Droid memory go blank……Blank! Blank!”………Shhh! Not yet…..secret!
Hello Everybody, today I take you back to the Marvel Universe and the world of the Wolverine. Long time followers of my site may recall I created some designs based on Super Hero themes such as Panther’s Claw, The Flash, The Hulk, Aquaman and of course Logan/Wolverine. (These hilts were so good they inspired a custom saber manufacturer…probably – see HERE). While I liked those hilts I felt I could do better. However I never got round to improving on my designs as there were so many new unique For Tyeth and Star Wars hilts to build. But the other week I was chatting to a few friends of mine on Nothin Nerdy’s Discord server chat room. My friends, WinstonMaul and Emxc commented on my Mauled Staff CW7 and our chat turned to superheroes and Wolverine in particular. As most chats do it was suggested “Hey For, how about a Wolverine hilt? That’d be cool!” I replied I had done the ones I mention above but I could “redesign” a completely new version. So that is what I did…I decided to reforge the Adamantium and sculpt a new saber…this is Wolves’ Claw….
Wolves’ Claw 1
Wolves’ Claw 2
Wolves’ Claw 3
Wolves’ Claw 4
Wolves’ Claw 5
I didn’t go to town quite as much as I normally do and kept the design fairly clean and streamlined. I based the colours on Wolverine’s classic blue/black and yellow costume from the early Marvel comics and gave the hilt three claws just like Logan has.
Old Man Logan and Classic Wolverine
Logan/Wolverine in LOGAN. Photo Credit: Ben Rothstein.
The handgrip has a nice concave curvature to it which provides a very comfortable grip – and the flared ends prevents the saber slipping from your grasp. The pommel has an X-Men logo as the speaker vent cover. I also made a version in a reverse colour scheme…
Wolves’ Claw Reverse 1
Wolves’ Claw Reverse 2
Wolves’ Claw Reverse 3
Wolves’ Claw Reverse 4
Wolves’ Claw Reverse 5
I have an X-Men Academy version ready for next week. I have to do as much designing and work as I can while my laptop keeps working (I have to say it is less often it completely locks up but I still have to be wary). But there is some good news…
I have “re-discovered” an old website I used to watch cartoons on. It shut down it’s original site but I recently found the new one and it has ALL of the Star Wars Clone Wars seasons on it….including the latest one, season 7! So I am binge watching Clone Wars and have a new CW inspired hilt for a later post.
This brings me to the end of this post but I’d like to thank WinstonMaul and Emxc for challenging me to design this. I’d also like to thank all of you my viewers, followers and friends for all your support in these strange difficult times. It means a lot that you take time out to check my site. I sincerely hope you and your folks all stay safe and well and please be sure to call back and see future posts. Till next time….
Hellooooo Everybodies! Today I am looking back to a Halloween when I got dressed up as my favourite superhero…Spider-Man! I was a youngling at school and one year we had a Halloween Fancy Dress Disco. I got my dark blue jogging suit, a pair of bright red football socks, an old red T-shirt, a red balaclava, some sunglasses and a big black marker pen then set to work making my costume. I cut out different shapes from the t-shirt which I stitched onto the jogging suit to represent the torso pieces of Spidey’s outfit and I drew a web pattern on them with the marker pen. I did the same to the socks and balaclava. I used to wear spectacles as a kid and had clip-on sunglasses so I used those to make the mask lenses. I even had paper party streamers to recreate Spidey’s web shooting trick! I came second in the competition! But Spidey has always stuck with me and this Halloween I figured I’d brush the cobwebs off a saber dedicated to our favourite wall climber and here it is…
Spidey Saber work in progress
Spidey Saber added switch
Spidey Saber added Web Shroud
Spidey Saber pommel wed detail
Spidey Saber darkened background
Ooh what’s that living in the emitter?…SPIDER!
I have attempted a Spider-Man themed hilt before when I used the old software I had access to but I always felt I could do better and hopefully with this hilt I have. I modeled it in the classic Spidey red and blue colour scheme with nice silver accents and webbing. And the webbing is particularly interesting on this model as it isn’t just a graphic representation, it is actually 3D modeled! If you zoom in on the pictures you will see the web is actually raised ribs. This I achieved by making a wireframe as you can see with the emitter shroud then I thickened the wires that made up the frame. This made the wires look solid. I also added a few webs located in the pommel and the emitter. Both the pommel and the protective Blade Plug decoration have a web with a Spidey logo seated in the middle, again all 3D modeled. I wasn’t sure which looked better, the hilt with the emitter shroud or without so I posted both as the saber without the shroud was part of the development of the design (but could be a stand-alone design). And you may recall I mentioned I was a fan of things being balanced? Light and Dark, day and night, Good and Evil? Well Spidey had a run in with an evil “clone” of himself in the form of a parasitic alien that enveloped him. Peter Parker managed to escape from the alien but the creature found a new host in a guy named Eddie Brock and became known as “VENOM”! Well…as it’s Halloween here is a taste of Venom!….
“Venom Saber” without shroud
“Venom Saber” with shroud
Venom had the look of Spider-Man but was black and silver in colour and had big eyes and sharp pointed teeth, he was also sort of elastic and could stretch and change shape as if made of liquid rubber. So I gave the Venom version of this hilt a glossy black base colour and silver webbing accents. To really make the “Venom”stand out from the “Spidey” version I gave it a toxic green blade.
Now, you remember I mentioned “brushing off the cobwebs” above? I wasn’t kidding, take a peek at this image I made and have a look at the cobwebs clinging to the backdrop and the saber…I modeled those too!
Those webs get everywhere, are very sticky and took me forever to sweep them away 😀 ! But I think I have tidied this design up nicely and that just about brings me to the end of this Halloween special. I’d like to thank you all for checking out this design and for supporting me and my site. And especially to the kind viewers from Spain who have dropped in recently (I noticed your visits!) Thank you so much it’s much appreciated, whether this is your first visit or if you are a regular visitor. Till next…….WAIT! This is Halloween and you really need a fright so I ‘ll leave you with an old picture I posted three years ago….It’s ME!…Happy Halloween Nightmares!….
P.S. As I am posting this earlier than normal I think I will have a rest over a long weekend so there won’t be a post this Saturday but rest assured I’ll be back next weekend for more saber shenanigans. Till next time….
Hello Everybody, I cannot contain my excitement for todays offering… It is one of my favourite (if not the favourite) hilts I have built. And I have sort of built it twice! Twice! Let me explain…way back in January you may recall I teased a hilt for Thor, where I described it as a “crossguard” design. This first design sat on my computer system for a while as I had a backlog of other hilts I had to post first but I was straining not to post it straight away. Unfortunately I should have because whilst producing some images for this post my laptop and external memory card glitched and because the folder where the saber files were saved was open, the glitch erased that folder! All my work vanished as if it fell through the Bifrost Bridge when Thor destroyed the bridge in the movie. My original design looked a little like this as seen in the teaser images I had uploaded to WordPress…
The saber in a lump of rock.
I even made a poster featuring it.
The first was a picture of the saber embedded in a lump of rock to mirror the events of the film where Thor’s hammer, Mjölnir, fell to Earth and landed in a piece of rock in New Mexico. The saber landed in the field outside my cave workshop 😀 The second was an edit of a screenshot showing Thor holding my saber. But alas this saber died when my laptop crashed. However I wanted to test myself and see if I was a worthy saber designer and attempted to recreate it, or even dare I say make it better. Here are a few work in progress pictures..(not many as I didn’t want to risk losing these too)…
“New Asguard Saber” in the studio.
“New Asguard Saber” texture test 1
“New Asguard Saber” texture test 2
Viewers with a keen eye will spot this new saber is again a “crossguard” but it is now a little more streamlined as the first iteration was a fraction large. But Thor is big so I didn’t reduce the dimensions too much. As this was a saber for the son of a God I had to make it special so this hilt was to feature an etching to give it a regal decoration befitting his stature and position. And this etching pattern can be seen in the second and third test pictures where I tried the textures out. The pattern caused me all sorts of problems getting the design to line up with parts of the hilt. But worse was trying to find the right image to print into the handle…I spent many hours looking through wallpaper patterns on many home décor websites to find a Damask wallpaper. So much was the effort I developed Migraines for while afterwards! I then added gold accent parts around the emitters, the body of the hilt and on the pommel. These were to represent the architecture of the world of Asgard, Thor’s homeworld. A Celtic Asgardian Knot is used as the activation switch and is modelled in a matching gold. Phew! Enough talk, how about some Glamour shots? Here you go..
“New Asguard Saber” hilt 1
“New Asguard Saber” hilt 2
“New Asguard Saber” hilt 3
“New Asguard Saber” hilt ignited.
“New Asguard Saber” hilt pommel end!
“New Asguard Saber” hilt business end!
From these pictures you can see the etching covers about 85% of the hilt and my eyes really hurt when I finally finished lining all of it up, but it was worth it. But I haven’t finished yet…OH there’s more to this design yet! Being late giving a God a gift would normally be a bad thing so I needed to make up for the delay…so I didn’t just give Thor one hilt…I have a second complementary hilt to make a matching pair. And here is the matching hilt…
“New Asguard Saber Shoto”
“New Asguard Saber Shoto” 2
“New Asguard Saber Shoto” 3
“New Asguard Saber Shoto” 4
“New Asguard Saber and Shoto”
“New Asguard Saber and Shoto” ignited.
A Shoto is a smaller saber held in the warrior’s non dominant (or weaker) hand and is used primarily for defence, so you would block an attack with the Shoto while using your main weapon to attack your opponent in reply. But having two sabers mean you can have a nice pair of weapons which hopefully look beautiful. I hope I have appeased Thor and built something really beautiful. I will let Thor and you my loyal readers/viewers/followers decide.
Thor is about to star in the final instalment of the Avengers series of films, the film is called “Avengers: Endgame” and is released on the 25th April in the UK and around the globe soon after. The film also features Iron Man!
WOW! That was a very heavy,long post, sorry! But I really hope you liked the design. I learnt a lot in creating this hilt and I won’t make the same mistakes of forgetting to back up my data again. I need to thank you all for checking this hilt out and for your support, you kept me going when I was feeling down when I lost the original saber. I hope you will return to FTSabersite for future posts where I will be returning to the world of Star Wars and go space mining with Red Dwarf! Till next time…
“Tyeth! Before you go…Thank you my friend!” – Image Copyright Marvel – edit by For Tyeth
Hello Everybody, well this is strange posting on a Wednesday but I have BIG things lined up for this weekend with my new Thor inspired hilt I have battled to bring you. However first I have to post this third and final design inspired by Marvel’s character Iron Man, or rather in this case the War Machine variant known as Iron Patriot. In previous posts I briefly explained how Tony Stark the billionaire businessman was critically injured in the jungles of Southeast Asia and had to build an iron suit to help save his life. The suit was later modified and rebuilt in many variations and Tony even built a second suit for his close friend James “Rhodey” Rhodes, who wore the suit and became known as War Machine. In the comics and films the two histories are slightly different but in the Marvel movies War Machine was created to help Stark battle against a horde of automated drone battle suits and a villain known as “The Mandarin”. Due to circumstances Rhodes “stole” the War Machine suit and it was repainted in a rather “patriotic” red, white and blue colour scheme and renamed…”Iron Patriot”. This is my Mark For-T (40) Saber saber in Iron Patriot colours….
Iron Patriot Saber 1
Iron Patriot Saber 2
Iron Patriot Saber 3 Lit
Iron Patriot Saber 4 Lit
Iron Patriot Saber Faceplate
Iron Patriot Saber pommel
Iron Patriot Saber emitter and blade plug
You can definitely see this is my Iron Man hilt but the colours just make it look so much different! Luckily I didn’t have to change the colour of the switch, blade or the blade plug in the emitter as they worked quite well with the blue and white. Some folk may think this scheme is a bit gaudy and looks like a big top circus tent but it is based on the suit as you can see with this colourful picture…
I did miss out the military markings but I hadn’t learnt to use transparent textures when I built this model, however I think it resembles the big iron clad guy quite well even without the marks!
You may recall I said that Iron Man and War Machine made a formidable team, almost unstoppable? Image if all three armoured heroes got together and formed a Marvel Tag Team…it might just look a little like this….
All three in one place! Iron Man, Iron Patriot and War Machine side by side in my collection. Phew, that was a lot of metal to manhandle into position but I think I have just about covered this series of characters and hilts, I hope I have done them justice.
So…next up is my long promised Thor inspired hilt and it just happens that Marvel are releasing the last Avengers move named Avengers: Endgame on April 25th, in which Iron Man and Thor star so I couldn’t have timed it better. I hope you will return to see this new hilt as I am really excited about it. For now I have to say a big thank you again to all my viewers and followers, new and regulars for all your support. It means a lot to me. Till next time…..
FTSabersite 