Transformers Selects Wish List

    I'm sure this has been talked to death, but we haven't really seen enough about TF Selects yet for BW. Transmutate is great, but where're the Blackarachnia reuses? We've never seen her in silver, or the unreleased Halloween colors. I'm still hoping for a Transmetal 2 mold or repaint, but I can't see that happening. As for the other molds, I still need an excuse to get Megatron and Primal. I've heard there's a T-Wrecks rumored, but what about Primal? Here's hoping for an Apelinq in the near future, since god knows I can't find the Transmetal release.

Who do you want to see produced?

Transformers Minimates?

    Certainly, the biggest Transformers news of the week is Transmutate. Putting aside the absolutely surreal reality of that figure (I have never preordered something that quickly), I'm more interested in the long-term implications of the Minimates shown off.

    Minimates is sort of a dying brand, they only really do animated Marvel stuff anymore, alongside one-off box sets of new movies. Even Avengers: Endgame only had one 4-pack to cover the entire team with different head sculpts, if I'm not mistaken. Transformers is known for novelty mini figures, however, and these start off with four of the most recognizable characters in the franchise. The sculpts are a bit wonky, as they always are, but these'll hopefully revitalize the series a bit. My hope is they start covering some of the niches that don't have many toys, like Beast Wars. This could draw in the people who don't want another Optimus Prime.

Who would you like to see?

(image pulled from BBTS)

Remember not to draw your camera close to your toys!

 I see this a lot so I want to write a quick post on it; don't get too close to your figures! Most camera lenses (cell phones included) cannot handle focusing on something so close, so draw your camera back and zoom in or use a macro lens if you want any close up pictures.

Homages

    Homages are tricky. If you're not aware, those are the Glyos figures that are painted exactly like some of your favorite (or least favorite) 80's franchises. The opinions I see are always mixed; they seem to either hit really well or the general consensus is they weren't very good. Battle Tribes tends to use most of its releases to reference some other popular or obscure franchise, but this extends to other lines like Marty's Kabuto Mushi. What are your opinions?

    I swear I always see complaining about the mere existence of homages, but then they tend to be by far the most valuable releases on the secondary market. Is that just because they hit home for a group that might not buy them otherwise? I know I wouldn't be buying into the SMC Tron wave if I wasn't a diehard Tron fan (which, by the way, I'm still looking for the Grid Enforcer and Grid Overlord, if you're willing to sell).

(image pulled from the wiki)

Photographing Cancerous Plastic

Some of my friends have had issues with photographing GTID plastic, so I figured I’d write a short thing on this. The trick is not to decrease shutter speed or open the aperture further; it’s to increase the ISO. Changing the former two will only bring more light into the environment, which isn’t what you want. Ideally, the glow will be brighter and the surroundings darker. Some cameras have pretty low ISO thresholds, but here’s a sample of mine at around 51k ISO. I’m sure you could get it lower if you had a tripod and slightly better light.

If you have the guts to handle such a toxic (not really, it just smells bad) plastic, try and photograph it!

Assembly Required

    This is a quick one, just a reminder to check out Assembly Required’s designer toy show tomorrow! It’s looking pretty cool, and it’s the only chance to get Man Or Monster Studio’s new Valkyrie figure in printed resin before she goes up on Kickstarter. I’m not sure how much it’ll cost, but the figure will probably end up around $16 like Clawbber and Bog Nar when she (hopefully) reaches production.

www.assembly-required.net

vinylposting

     I’ve raised this in private conversations a million times, so I may as well write about it (by the way, expect more frequent posts for a while). 

    Toys are made of plastic. Surprising, I know. However, the kind of plastic matters and is something I always feel is lost in the discussion. Surely, you toy enthusiasts know about ABS and PVC. ABS is a hard, easily painted plastic that has decent rigidity for large pieces and can hold great detail. PVC is super flexible, and very durable for building toys like Glyos or for sharp pointy things like those MSIA v-fins that would surely snap otherwise.

    However, there are others; PC, PS, and POM. PC is just good for transparent parts, and should only ever be used for detail. POM is super durable, similar to nylon. It has a rigidity more like ABS but can handle being cast in very thin pieces, and in my opinion is widely neglected as a good material, usually only being used in Kotobukiya model kits, MSIA (which shocked me to learn), and some main-line Transformers. Ironically, it’s not common on the $300 Masterpiece releases.

    PS is the outlier, because it’s truly useless. Why? It sucks. It has every property of ABS, except it isn’t durable at all. Despite this, it’s used in just about every model kit brand under the sun save for Flame Toys. It has some advantages, it’s lighter and cheaper, but this mostly just benefits the manufacturer. This is why I avoid most model kits, and only buy ones with either an ABS frame or full ABS construction. It’s a real shame, too, because it leads to great designs and engineering being pulled down by a soft and fragile material that simply isn’t designed to handle that kind of stress. It should have stayed back in the 80s, when models didn’t have to move.

Hopefully you’ve gained something from this, and have learned why I hate Bandai!