David Hingtgen

While Graham's apparently perusing the thread: Does it incorporate a variation of the Retppu's "gullet" transformation for the chest undersides, or the Hasegawa's "neck" transformation to shorten the nose by moving the cockpit up and aft? Still trying to figure out all the panel lines/joints, and that's the best I can come up with so far. (Though the presence of a Tab B-like structure doesn't fit with Hasegawa-style torso formation) Basically---does the torso transform like the old one, or did they really change it? And any comments on the VF-0 with Ghost shown at Wonderfest, seems awfully grey compared to the VF-0A low-vis pics so far:

My first thought for SS was "Waspinator". Heck, Waspinator as an F-22 would be cool. If the movie needs comic relief, that'd be my choice.

Tiny pic, can't quite tell--is this a Yamato VF-0 with Ghost?

Forgot to mention: It's also clear the inner wall of the legs folds down near the calves, for the bicep/elbow to go into. Not quite SHE, but for a single-piece and single-hinge design, it gets 90% of the effect.

The canards certainly move, as it's part of the transformation.

Heavy and constant bitching about the movie/designs/fandom is fine, but I have very little tolerance for personal attacks. Watch it.

::puts new pics on front page:: I am SO going to do a detailed CAD vs final product comparison when I get mine---unless Graham does it first. As for the neck cover--I meant it seems so much smaller and recessed--the original really "covered" the neck and made the whole area flush with the rest of the plane. The new version is just a "covers the mechanism" bit, not really blending it in. Doesn't seem as good as the original one was. Though I think it's more important the head actually lays DOWN in the new one--the old one had it raised like 35 degrees, really made it obvious. That's a big improvement. PS--ha! Looks like Tab B is back--look right behind the head of this pic: http://ga.sbcr.jp/g-toys/c3-2006/02/11.html And based on this: http://ga.sbcr.jp/g-toys/c3-2006/02/04.html it looks like the trailing edge of the wingroot slots into the legs. And from this: http://ga.sbcr.jp/g-toys/c3-2006/02/10.html it's pretty clear we have a "line-art accurate" codpiece transformation. I'm still wondering about the "Z-cut" behind and below the canards--wondered about that since the CAD, still no clue why/how.

http://fantofan.jp/news/event/charahobby2006/rSANY0035.jpg is the best of the new pics---that's the one I was referencing last night for the wing transformation. SS looks a lot more kibbly than I thought---he's got a LOT hanging off his back at all angles.

Yeah, I saw the stacks after looking a while. Now for the other 80% of the truck...

It goes along with my (and many other's) main complaint: The vehicles are so incredibly broken-up in robot mode, you have no idea what's what, or even what it turns into. Where are Prime's stacks? Grill? Headlights? Horns? Fuel tanks? Fenders? Hood? Cab? Fifth wheel? There's some tires, but that's about it. All the sheet metal seems to have broken up into one-inch long bits. Just about every TF ever---you could definitely tell what it turned into based on robot mode. These--you can't, there's just random bits of metal hanging off the skeleton. Could be a tank, train, plane, car, or mechanical parrot.

Question for Graham if he knows/can tell us: Any Fold Booster details? Light up? Clear green casing with many layers of intricate detail visible below, or just a chunk of green plastic? Any chance of opening leg armor? (we clearly see it open up to launch a missile in the anime---the leg armor seems to carry a single large missile, rather than micro missiles) And a question---why was the "rubber collar" disposed of for this version? I always thought it really smoothed over the neck in fighter mode very well. Yes it was incredibly annoying to tranform, but it sure helped fighter mode. (Though I was always annoyed Yamato molded it in the wrong color--such a big obvious part that should be pure black---and you can't paint rubber)

Yellow isn't the problem, PALE yellow is the problem. Did you see my Roy's valk comment? The Jolly Rogers do not have a cheap-looking yellow. Nor do the Blue Angels. Nor Sunstreaker. Even McDonald's. It is quite possible to just have normal, rich yellow. But most toy companies don't seem to have it. Yamato's about the only one it seems (and even theirs is still too pale). But for some reason, Hasbro especially, toy companies seem to only ever use the most pale, sickly-looking yellow money can buy. And it looks bad on everything, regardless of context. (I do believe its a cost issue--ever since lead was banned from paint, white and yellow have had problems---the only good yellow pigment is lead chromate, and it was cheap--now that it's gone, getting a decent yellow costs more. Probably add .008 cents to the cost of the average toy. When I say "cheap yellow" I'm being quite literal) FYI, the yellow used by the Jolly Rogers, and thus Roy in a way, is specified that it should always match lead-pigmented yellow. No "cheap pale yellow" on the commander's plane... Also, amber isn't at all too close to red. Go look at MP Prime. Amber works, because he's a truck, and trucks have amber lights all over. Depending on how many runnning lights, it can run into the hundreds. When's the last time you saw a vehicle with pastel yellow turn signals or marker lamps? Amber=accent color of every vehicle on the planet, regardless of what side of the road it drives on. Plenty of amber on G1 toys that I can remember. Not much pale yellow, besides stickers and Prime's eyes, ironically. (Sunstreaker is a DEEP yellow) (Though my collection was about 95% Decepticon, so I didn't have that many cars--lots of planes though) And if amber/red doesn't work for kid's toys, what about the zillion "flame" toys? Almost every single line has a "fire/flaming" character or version of the main character. Many similar shades of yellow/orange/red. PS--anyone else sorta annoyed that there's a bunch of new shots of MP Starscream already from Chara Hobby, but we're still scrounging for YF-19 shots? "Wow, 20 news shots of MP SS from the exact same angles and pose we've already seen". Though I did notice the it looks like the wing transformation is quite different than I thought. It almost seems like the root flips 180, but then the rest of the wing angles out from the root on a sliding hinge.

I don't think the Ghost nor Fold Booster are intended to remain attached in battroid mode---they're "fighter only" devices I think. They're like the opposite of GBP armor.

Yellow has replaced silver/chrome as the accent color of choice on TF's lately. Especially Prime. You know, amber works well on Prime due to all the bullet lights, turn signals, etc in truck mode. And it's not nearly as garish. But when they use bright yellow instead of amber: A. It looks bad/unrealistic/cheap. Vehicles have amber lights, not yellow. And "cheap yellow paint" is the #1 way to identify knockoffs of a lot of toys. B. It encourages them to use that paint as accents everywhere. PS--that is the worst yellow I've ever seen on a toy, period. There are shades of yellow out there asides from "pale, ugly, nigh-pastel" for giant robots. See Roy's VF's! Deep yellow can look really good, pale yellow doesn't look good on anything, ever. It just screams "cheap toy" since that's the only thing in the world pale yellow is ever used on.

I think I might have just figured out a way for it to work. Ok, on the prototype pics, the grey part right ahead of the canopy. That should move with the clear parts--it's the main part of the problem. You can also see there's a hinge at the front of the windscreen. If that hinge is actually for the grey part to rotate downwards 90 degrees in battroid mode and not the canopy's own hinge, I think it could work. If the hinge for the canopy to move is inside the grey section, and the grey section isn't attached to the nosecone but rather is attached via that hinge to the cockpit, then you can fold the nosecone down 90 degrees---but leaving the grey section with the cockpit. Then, you can fold the grey part down 90 degrees so the chest can still fit over the cockpit. Though I still have to figure out a canopy hinge that will allow it to move up in fighter, yet still allow the grey piece to fold down along ITS hinge. We still get into the "have to separate the hinge itself" problem... Maybe if the transformation involves connecting and disconnecting the canopy from its hinge every time---but it'd have to be really easy to not get annoying. Plus that's already a historically fragile part, be even worse if you had to mess with it all the time.

sithlord---GERWALK's out there, go check the first post. As for magnets--I'd be the leg-mounted FAST packs. A YF-19's are very similar to the VF-0's. Never did like the "clip over the ventral fin" they did for the VF-11. As for the canopy hinge--I'm betting it's not the right way due to transformation. Anyone who's had the original knows how the nose folds down 90 degrees right at the end of the canopy's front, and has to be transformed part-way to even get the canopy to open or close. I can't really think of a way to get the canopy to hinge open to the front while maintaining the transformation. The nosecone has to be horizontal, and the canopy has to be vertical, in battroid mode. You'd need the hinge itself to split in half, as it goes right over the separation line.

Ok, this time I actually have the upper intake move like the SHE kit--the previous pic merely had it as a separate, yet fixed piece. No fancy hinges, it simply slides straight down just a bit--yet makes a big difference visually.

I'm pretty sure it's too late as I sent drawings/explanation of this to Graham the day the CAD was first posted, and he said it was too late then. Still--the SHE VF-19S did a variation of this and it helps a lot, don't know why Yamato seems unaware of it. Now, the SHE YF-19 didn't do this, and it suffers from "overly square hips" as a result. I'm guessing Yamato only knows the SHE YF-19 for reference, not the improved-transformation VF-19S model. The SHE VF-19S actually splits it front/back instead of top/bottom--I think so they can re-use some YF-19 parts or not have to mess with thr transformation. But starting from scratch like Yamato did, you should be able to do the better top/bottom split. Here's the SHE--the hip is actually "multiple angles" instead of round--but it's still a lot better than the new YF-19. Also look at the upper right pic--that's a rear view showing what would be the "upper" half of the intake, as a separate piece mounted behind the hips and slid down on a hinge. Also it allows a shorter torso, so the battroid isn't so tall and skinny--with the upper edges of the intake moved down behind the hips, you can move the torso lower and still have room.

I edited the first post of the thread to include the best pics of the protoype, so people won't have to hunt around. I'll try to keep up and edit it when needed so there's always a "easy to find" source of pics--if it's ok with wolfx.

Another of my infamous "how I'd do it pics". As usual, left one side alone, changed the other. See the top of the hip/intake? See how it's rounded and shortened like the battroid line art? And the large triangular piece behind it? That triangular piece above and behind the hip, visible from the front actually is correct to the REAR line-art--it magically disappears in frontal views. Pure anime magic--that piece HAS to go somewhere, and that's where it is. That's part of the reason there's such a discrepency between battroid and fighter modes there---Kawamori has that entire piece just go away so he can draw a short, round hip. BUT---if you go by the way the animators did it, and Kawamori's own REAR views of the battroid--it works fine. You get the sharp, angled look when looking at the fighter from above, and the round hip in battroid. Just have two different angles. Yamato did a SLIGHT change, but probably didn't do like I did because there's not "supposed" to be any visible pieces around the hip--even though it has to be there and should be there. It's far worse than a nosecone changing length---for the official battroid front view, that piece just disappears. Well, in 3D world it has to be there--thus it SHOULD be visible. But people don't expect it (since it's not in the art) so the compromise is to have a wrongly-shaped hip in battroid---wrong shape is better than "shape that shouldn't be there at all according to the magic lineart" apparently. But you can fix that too! Just separate the two pieces. Have the "large triangular part" above/ behind the hip slide downwards, behind the hip. It totally works, and that's what the SHE VF-19S kit does. You can have the battroid hip be round, have the angular intakes in fighter mode, and hide the angular intake from battroid mode, all with a simple hinge allowing the piece to slide down behind the hip--so long as you separate the pieces. heh heh--we've come full circle now. From the intake/hip separation, to the wings, and now back to the intake/hips.

Re: Macross design works page 83. I was just looking at that recently, and comparing to fighter mode pics, I get the impression that the gunpod on the shield is more along the lines of "gunpod still attached to the arm, behind the shield". Basically, transform from fighter to battroid, but don't remove the gunpod from the fighter mode mount/position---and it'll end up like in the drawing. I think. Re: battroid mode hips. Currently gets a big "WTF" from me based on how it's sculpted. It's MOLDED like it separates like I think it should (and how it does in all rear-view line art), but it doesn't. They gave the upper intake and the hips separate angles and don't have them as a single smooth piece, but the difference is so slight it doesn't matter. The whole point of separating the two is to make much smaller/rounder intakes in battroid mode, while having the long angular ones in fighter mode. They came SO close to doing it--but didn't. Though that makes it even easier for me to think about modifying it, now that there's a "cut here" line molded in... PS---looking at the CAD drawings, it is there. But again--it's so subtle it's not "how it should be" IMHO so I missed it. There's always the possibilit it does separate, but I doubt it's mis-transformed---unlike a Transformer, valks tend to "not work at all" if you screw up. Also Graham said it was way too far along to change anything like that when I mentioned it, and I think he would have said if it already did it.

What I thought, but wasn't sure. (Not owning a VF-0 and all---still waiting for either a D model, or a different scheme---I kinda like ANIME low-vis, but not Kawamori's ret-con of it--which isn't low-vis at all IMHO---more like a Heater-Ferris scheme--which tend to be the highest-vis schemes of all, based on visual detection range)

I'm much more interested in the news than the pics at this point. 1. Fold booster! But does it light up...? And I see no way to mount it on the prototype. I don't think there's any clear drawing/animation of the mounts, but from the scene when Isamu ejects it you can get a pretty good idea of where it connects. 4 struts, just inside the shoulders/arms. Basically at the "corners" of the shield. Possibly it connects to the shield itself with clips? 2. VF-0 Ghost. Hmmn--add on, or a new release? Anyone see a way to attach a Ghost to the current VF-0 mold? Will it just use the dorsal conformal tank mounts somehow? Someone needs to ask about the VF-0D.

Yes, from "insane" to "much higher than before". Mass oil company conspiracy theory: 2.00 gas isn't profitable enough. Reduce supply so that people get used to paying 3.00 for a little while. Then bring down to 2.50. 2.50 is such a "relief" from 3.00 that people are happy to pay 2.50 now and forever.

I doubt they spent that much time and money just as diversions... PS--remember the much-maligned "techno-gorilla" Starscream drawing? Then Bay said "that's just some early concept art, the real things aren't like that, don't worry". Well, that concept art looks more like the real thing than anything else so far.