BR85 Build Skills, Episode 2
New video is live! Yay!
The idea of this series is to focus on a handful of specific, fairly self-contained parts of the build that can easily transfer to other prop builds, kit assemblies, whatever. To look at some of the more “functional” aspects of a prop build that can be used to improve a project beyond good assembly and paint. Check it out:
This one even manages to be about 35% shorter than my usual running time! ??
One idea I also had was to make an L-shaped slot so that the handle has a point to catch for an empty/missing magazine, and then could be flipped forward after “reloading”. Since the BR85 seems to have a closed-bolt firing position or a floating bolt assembly- it gets fully racked back-and-forth after replacing the mag in the game- this wasn’t really relevant to this build, but there may be some other weapons (particularly pistol slides) that operate that way in-universe.
For a pistol, you’d need a separate lever that could flip the lever (connected to the slide) back up into the main guideway. Alternatively, a spring-loaded crossbow-style wedge, that allows you to rack the slide back, and then pops up into the main cylinder in front of the returning piston head. The wedge itself would be directly connected to the release lever that would allow you to depress it back out of the cylinder. May be easier that way, since you wouldn’t need to allow a floating, rotating bolt to connect to a linear slide. Anyway, random ideas aside…
Meta Stuff
If all goes according to plan, the rest of the series will be up by the end of December. More likely, knowing me, it’ll spread out until around February. Having Premiere and After Effects to use now rather than Photoshop and copying over voiceover from Camtasia cuts the post production time by about 80%, though!
I checked my pile of pre-recorded intros (I don’t have the two builds any more, of course), and the publishing schedule isn’t quite what I thought at the end of this video. It looks like this:
Ammo Counter
Charging Lever
Scope (may be relatively short, but a couple of relevant differences from the ammo counter)
Stock and Magazine
Safety Selector (how it should work, anyway…)
Surface Prep, Assembly and Paint
And of course, somewhere in there, the general spring-making video I mentioned. By the time I get all of those put together and published, I’ll probably have the streaming setup ready to roll down in the shop!
[Editor's 2019 note: turns out, streaming and metalwork don't really get along, so, that never happened. Nor did most of those video ideas seem purposeful, so they didn’t happen either. Instead, I started the laser project!]
All for now!
~Rob