I just saw the Transformers movie...any kits available?

Frankyto Jr. wrote:

I've been loking for any models on the movie, but no succes. I hope anyone knows and spread the news!! Meanwhile, lets keep on looking for them!!

There are no models from the new movie.  There have been models of Transformers previously (I have one from a Japanese series- Super Mode "Grand Convoy"/ Optimus from Takara, a very simplified kit) but I doubt that there will be any from the movie.  Even though there's a long & loved history of the 'bots, I don't think any company would "take the risk" producing them.  If they did, you know they'd be prepainted snaps, which is fine with me because I'd just glue & primer them anyway.

I just also googled & found out a Grand Scourge (evil Optimus clone) and Grand (Ultra) Magnus also was made.

You can buy Grand Scourge here, but he's on backorder.

Oh well. Thanks for the answers, and the Optimus Prime clone looks pretty cool. The manufacturers even use the correct symbols for the Autobots and Decepticons. :D

Regards,

Lufbery wrote:

Oh well. Thanks for the answers, and the Optimus Prime clone looks pretty cool.

He's the same mold as Optimus, just a repaint.  The seperate vehicles come molded in their respective colors, but are literally halves that you glue together.  That's it.  Optimus/Scourge has a few more parts.  With a lot of care, it could turn into a neat little build.

SprueOne wrote:

I'm sure there will be a lot of mechandise toys first.

You havn't walked down a toy asile lately, have you?

Lufbery wrote:

Oh well. Thanks for the answers, and the Optimus Prime clone looks pretty cool. The manufacturers even use the correct symbols for the Autobots and Decepticons. :D Regards,

 doubt they'd make that easy mistake, since...it's Takara.  If you look at the bottom of a 1982 G1 optimus toy trailer, yup you will read Takara.

I remember when I was younger, they had snapfit kits for the gen1 constructicons.  You can always just build some 1/24, 1/25 cars in the same paint scheme, especially now that AMT made the new Camaro concept this year.  Or a porshce 935 for the original jazz, F-15/F-22 for starscream, thundercracker, n skywarp, etc.  A lot of the gen1 transformer actually already have scale kits for their real life counterparts.

AFAIK, the original designs are japanese but never got beyond the toy stage.

The americans decided to make it into a TV-series(under licence) and the rest is history. 

After that the Japanese kinda "re-imported" it and made it into a major series.

Yes, there were some japanese kits of the original designs but very crude and cheap. 

Hi all,

I saw the movie again this past Friday, this time with my wife. She really liked the flick too.

I can see a sequel set 10 years in the future where Sam and Mikela are married, have two kids, and Bumblebee is a minivan.  

In any event, the number and range of models available for the Transformers seems pretty limited. I'll bet that with a DVD of the film for reference, a kit of the car that makes the alternate mode, and a lot of time, one could scratch build a good representation of Bumblebee, Ironhide, or the other Autobots. 

Regards, 

Lufbery wrote:

In any event, the number and range of models available for the Transformers seems pretty limited. I'll bet that with a DVD of the film for reference, a kit of the car that makes the alternate mode, and a lot of time, one could scratch build a good representation of Bumblebee, Ironhide, or the other Autobots.

Ha! I don't often quote myself, but I found a web site where somebody had done just what I described, but for the original transformers: http://www.marksprojects.com/

Check out Bumblebee and Ironhide (part way down the page).

Prince of Styrene II wrote:

Interesting.  The Bumblebee is the best one, IMO.   Some of those others look like he took multiple Alternator parts & kitbashed them into each other.

Agreed.

I think  he added the new VW body onto the "Classic" Bumblebee figure.  It looks like he did a similar thing with Ironhide.

What is the "Alternators" stuff that I keep reading about? Is that one of the offshoot toy lines?

EDIT:  I did a quick search and discovered that the"Alternators" is a line of relatively newly released Transformers still for sale. My last real involvement with transformers was when I was 10 to 12 or 13 years old in 1984-86 or so. I guess a lot has happened since then.

Regards,

Lufbery wrote:

What is the "Alternators" stuff that I keep reading about? Is that one of the offshoot toy lines? EDIT:  I did a quick search and discovered that the"Alternators" is a line of relatively newly released Transformers still for sale. My last real involvement with transformers was when I was 10 to 12 or 13 years old in 1984-86 or so. I guess a lot has happened since then.

Indeed, a lot has happened since the first movie!  The G-1 series continued with the CGI "Beast Wars" series in the mid-90's.  Excellent writing with a nice, continous, storyline that ties in with the G-1 series & a character that actaully died!  (I do suggest watching Beast Wars!  Even though the CG is a bit cheesy in the first season, it does improve as the series progresses.)  That rolled over into "Beast Machines", not as good, but watchable.  The G-1 series also continued into about 4 or 5 series in Japan- Victory, Master Force, Headmasters, (cell animated) Beast Wars, Energon.  The annual convention BotCon helped the franchise to never really die.  The toys had a brief pause, but have been back for several years now.  Some think that the Alternators line are pretty much the pinnacle of the toy line- very realistic cars that transform into really good looking robots.  A far cry from the old Ratchet & Ironhide!

I have thought about taking the life versions of some of the kits, and then painting them up as their TF counterparts.  Like an F15 in Starscream, and Thundercracker colorschemes.  If I can remember, then for a blast from the past, I will take some pics of the original Gen1 Transformers I have I have and post them up.  I have a couple of Aerial bots, Thundercracker, and Buzzsaw.  Plus somewhere I have pics of the original Megatron and Optimus that I repaired for a friend last year.

Michael

Michael,

Working with and modifying the toys seems like it would be a neat intermediate step between simply playing with them and building models of them.

Still, it would be neat to actually have kits of the Autobots and Decepticons to build. It would be even neater if they were in a constant scale and could actually transform.

Failing that, it would be neat to make the robots by starting with a kit, cutting it up, and making the robot parts -- sort of semi-scratchbuilding the robot figures.

I wouldn't mide taking it a step further and making up new figures based on some vehicles that haven't been done yet. For example, I think an Autobot that transformed into a Cessna 182 would be pretty cool.

Regards, 

Lufbery wrote:

Failing that, it would be neat to make the robots by starting with a kit, cutting it up, and making the robot parts -- sort of semi-scratchbuilding the robot figures

Like this?

I started with the standard Revell Beetle kit to make Goldbug, Bumblebee's second form, but I wanted to make him transform more like Jazz & Prowl instead of his regular method.

And here's the parts all cut up.  The chassis bottom still needs a bit of cutting, but I thought I'd include it in the pic.

While cutting the windows out, I cracked the passenger side, so I thought I'd include some battle damage!

And here's a quick shot of the foot parts.  The tire will be recessed upward into the foot so that it sits level.  You can see the interior cut in the wheel well in the "parts" shot.  The rear window half will be hinged at the bottom & the top will rest against the leg.

Prince of Styrene II wrote:

Lufbery wrote: Failing that, it would be neat to make the robots by starting with a kit, cutting it up, and making the robot parts -- sort of semi-scratchbuilding the robot figures Like this? I started with the standard Revell Beetle kit to make Goldbug, Bumblebee's second form, but I wanted to make him transform more like Jazz & Prowl instead of his regular method.

That looks pretty darned good so far. How are you going to fill in Bumblebee's robot anatomy?

Regards, 

Lufbery wrote:

That looks pretty darned good so far. How are you going to fill in Bumblebee's robot anatomy?

I'm mostly going to scratch it, & with the G-1 bots being mostly squares & rectangles it shoudn't be too hard.  I also have some Gundam kits that I can use for the hands & I might even use the joints in him as well.  His face would have to be scratched, but I could start from a Gundam base head.

I think at this point I might need a pair of digital calipers to make sure he's symetrical!

None currently, though I am working on a little (read huge) project at home...

I know a couple of people at ILM, and was able to get my hands on (private) copies of the actual models used in the movie.  So now I'm sculpting every single tiny piece on the characters in 1/24 scale, so that when I'm done I'll have exact replicas of the movie characters to display.  And no, I will not be making kits of these, due to several things: One, I will get my butt in huge legal trouble for it; two, I won't even be done with Bumblebee before the end of the year (and he's the least complex); and three, I honestly don't think any of you want to assemble a kit with almost ten thousand pieces in it (the Cell Phone transformer, finished him, I'll have pics up eventually).  But as far as I know, that's the only project underway.

How big are the models you're working from?  Certainly you don't have the full sized props, like the Bumblebee they used when he was captured in the movie.  Just the thought of storage space is astounding!

Also, I think I speak for everyone when I say please post as many pics as you can!!  In-progress pics are welcome, too!

Prince of Styrene II wrote:

Also, I think I speak for everyone when I say please post as many pics as you can!!  In-progress pics are welcome, too!

Agreed! We'd love to see some photos.

Oh, and tell your friends they did a great job on the movie. [: )]

Regards,

No Kits I am aware of but do you like action figure/ statues?

I was in KMart this morning and see they have released a Bumble Bee in Hasbro's once proud Unleashed line. If you are familiar with the Unleashed Star Wars figures from several years ago then you know these are very nice 8"-12" Statue like display "action" figures. Very dramatically posed on a diorama type base. Nowadays anything in the Unleashed line is Micro Machine size.

The figure itself looks like this. Bumble Bee has one arm streched upward holding something I couldn't make out. He is standing atop a wrecked car as if he just won a fight. I did not think to look closer at the car to see if it was the Police Mustang.  The only thing that stopped me from buying it was the price. 31.99!!!

When Hasbro was doing the Star Wars Unleashed line they were 14.99. When they did a Wal Mart Exclusive TIE Fighter Pilot about 6 months ago they had gone up to 19.99. I don't think they will sell many at 31.99 to anyone other than very dedicated fanboys.

Max Bryant  

Hi folks.

Here I go adding to this thread again, but you have to check out this Bumblebee model made from paper! Paper models  can be fantastic, and I've seen some truly wonderful ones on the 'net, but this one pretty much takes the cake.

Regards,

Hey Prince of Syrene II,

How's your Bumblebee build coming along?

Regards,

Lufbery wrote:

Hey Prince of Syrene II, How's your Bumblebee build coming along?

He's stalled, & yes the pun is intended.  I'm trying to get a couple comissions finished first.  Ever time I sit down to build something, I feel guilty if I'm not working on them.  But I will get started on him somewhat soon.  I want to get him done for WonderFest, which is in July in Kentucky next year.

I will start a thread on him when I restart the build.  Thanks for the thought & wondering how the build was going, though!

Prince of Styrene II wrote:

Lufbery wrote: Hey Prince of Syrene II, How's your Bumblebee build coming along? He's stalled, & yes the pun is intended.

*Grin* 

I'm trying to get a couple comissions finished first.  Ever time I sit down to build something, I feel guilty if I'm not working on them.  But I will get started on him somewhat soon.  I want to get him done for WonderFest, which is in July in Kentucky next year.  I will start a thread on him when I restart the build.  Thanks for the thought & wondering how the build was going, though!

I'm looking forward to seeing the thread when you start it.

Regards, 

Hi all,

I noticed a week or so ago at my local hobby shop that Revell has a pretty nice-looking Revell 2009 concept Camaro in 1/25th scale. It's a Snaptite model.

I'm thinking that it would be a good basis for scratchbuilding the movie Bumblebee. [:) ]

Regards,