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[Rayman]

As you may have noticed in the upcoming Clone Wars animation the Republic Gunship nose sport WWII-esque bomber art, which is very cool as it showcases another form of the growing indiviuality of the Clones under the command of Jedi. However I never knew that they could paint so well.

This is my first non-minifg MOC, and although it is not what I usually do I enjoyed drawing this, and I do plan on making more gunship art as they appear in the TV series.



The Aurek-Besh simply says Lucky Lekku 2 as I couldn't find out what this particular gunship was called. I'll change it when I find out. Otherwise she'll bear this name for now. The artwork is based on this gunship. I tried to caprture the style that LEGO used for their stickers so I was very liberal with the lineart making sure to retain weight variation throughout.

Here is the FULL STICKER SHEET.

Those with sharp eyes may have noticed that I have changed the colours on the Blue Twi'lek. The original Twi'lek wore a grey coloured clone suit which bothered me so I altered the colours on my version so that it is more true to Clone Trooper standards. The line weight and variations should correspond exactly with TLC's stickers. So if you are looking for some replacement stickers these should be as good as scan of the originals. I have also improved the contrast on the monkey lizard so that the colour of his beak stands out better against the outline. Other than that there are no changes. So if you are looking for some replacement stickers these should be as good as scan of the originals.

Please feel free to use these in anyway you wish, and give credit where appropriate-- I don't mind if you don't . Included are also a set of blank gunship nose stickers so that you too can design your own gunship art.


WWII and Star Wars rock!
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[blackninjatom]

Looks great, what program did you use? I made some also, but I used photoshop, and then I made them in the wrong size then I had to stretch them now they're all blurry and this is run on sentence. You did a great job replicating the TLG's style, it definitely belongs with the others.
Their quality is far from yours ( Should redo them), but still acklay ,nexu

Awesome job,
Blackninjatom
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[Captain Ausome]

I loove it! I wanted to do this same thing but i realized i would mess it up big time so i didn't and i didn't put any stickers on my gunship and im glad i didn't this is great!
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[Brick Fett]

I love it Rayman. Great job.

And I agree with changing the Twi's armor to white.

And blackninjatom all you need to do to match the size of something is messure it like a square "x" and creat a file that size before making the decal.

Then when you print it it should be the same size as the decal you're trying to match.
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[Clonecommando007]

Awesome work on this Rayman!
I'll definantly be printing this up soon and applying it to my gunship nose. Hope to see more twi'leks soon!
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[Rayman]

Thanks guys. Please post up some picks of the printed out stickers. I would LOVE to see what they'd look like on an actual gunship! I don't have one so help out a brother here : ) haha

That's the problem with photoshop, I used to draw all of my decals with the program, but have now moved onto using Adobe Illustrator (CS2 is the specific version I used). I imported the scanned sketch into the program and "vectorised" it. Its awesome because in Illustrator the image will not get blurry no matter how much you decide to stretch it.

Sketch

Blackninjatom your Acklay's got a pretty menacing pose. it's a shame the decals are a bit blurry. But they do look pretty awesome once you zoom out. The Nexu would have a stronger impact if there was a bolder black outline (like the Acklay). It'd look like its ready to jump out of the gunship!

I'll do more Twi'leks if I get more inspiration, but the general rule of thumb is whatever new gunship art that is revealed in the TV series I will make (you can bet your bottom dollar on that) : ). This sounds like a sub-project that I would very much like to complete.

I don't know why Lego gave the Twi'lek grey armour. This was the main reason why I started this project in the first place.
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[blackninjatom]

I had never realized there was a difference in art programs until, like, this week. I am downloading free trials, because I love the way these vector decals come out. Also I just got some extra wedge pieces so I will print them out, and get some pics. Once I got the vector or the size figured out I will redo the nexu and acklay. The sketch itself is great, and thanks for the information.
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[Rayman]

Haha I only found out at the begining of this year, which is when I changed from Photoshop to Illustrator. Commander Gree was my last figure created with photoshop.

But it doesn't really matter which program you use to make your decals. What IS important is the original resolution you draw them at. For example if you draw your torso decals on photoshop at 500x500 pixels. They will always look as good illustrator vector decals. It depends what program you are comfortable with. Personally I like photoshop better because it has a "free-hand" kind of feel to it. I use Illustrator when I need to be exact -- especially useful when tracing TLC company designs.
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[RF Aurora]

Im lovin all the nose art. where would I find the stciker sheets at a walmart doesnt have them?
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[Brick Fett]

Very nice art. It looks like your scanner scans nice and clean as well. I just recently got a large bed scanner and I've noticed it doesn't scan as clean as my old one which means a lot of prep work before I can color my art plus I feel my end art looks rougher now than my old stuff which makes me sad.

I'm definitely a Photoshop guy but I'm intrigued about illustrator now. I know a few people who use it so I may have to get that as well.
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Brick Fett

[Zombieknight56]

Will we be seeing more custom nose art in the future? I'd like to see what other interesting designs you can come up with.

A rancor or wampa design would look fantastic.
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[Rayman]

You bet that I'll be making more and more custom nose art. Maybe if there is enough interest in custom nose-art in the community we could pool up the the designs on a common thread. A Wampa would be a pretty interesting idea. Imagine horns painted on the side of a gunship.

The Scanner that I have is a Canoscan 1240U, its about 6-7 years old now. The scan resolution isn't that good. I'll admit I cheated a bit with some pre-photoshopping the sketch before I used it as the basis for my final artwork. I actually had to redraw the original artwork from the 7676 sticker sheet, as I used the catalogue image from bricklink.

I presume you can buy sticker sheets from places that sell printer cartridges and consumables. I know at least in Melbourne, there is an office supply chain called Officeworks that sells the sheets.

If I remember correctly there's an American seller that stocks inkjet sticker paper on ebay. So that'll be worth checking out.
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[blackninjatom]

Actually you don't need to imagine, wampa and rancor (sorta). I have almost redone the nexu at a larger size and resolution, and will post it when it's finished.

Blackninjatom

edit: finished


edit the gunship is called "bad kitty"
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[RocketSeason]

Thats a beauty. Thanks alot for this! Yet another reason for me to just give it up and go buy the Set.
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[gold_2]

This caught my eye, so I tried one. There are suprisingly few creatures in the SW universe to worry about. Maybe 5 people out there will recognize this one: Kitik Keed'kak.



Backstory: While many Clone Pilots choose to adorn more typically fiercesome creatures in the SW Universe on their craft, the pilot of this particular Gunship named his ship after a bar on some backwater desert planet. The pilot had a run-in with a particularly tenacious Yam'rii working as a bouncer in the pub in question. The pilot was especially fond of the raunchy and humurous bar's name, which is unfit to print here.

click here for Flickr and the full scan: http://www.flickr.com/photos/74424867@N00/2921707300/

Thanks to Rayman's excellent scans and a cool idea!
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[blackninjatom]

Awesome. What's its name? That is a great idea, a very interesting "animal" indeed.
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[RocketSeason]

Stupid question, How do I ensure that I am printing this at the proper size?

Thanks!
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[gold_2]

the print preview button will give you a good idea. I'm gonna check mine right now

Edit: I had to resize mine down to 38% of Rayman's original to fit it to the 7x8 slope pieces. The actual size is .846 inches wide x .316 inches tall using 500 pixles/inch scale (yes, it makes a very big difference)

I'm not sure how else to do it. Rayman prolly does though.
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[Brick Fett]

A lot of nice Decals guys.

Kudos
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[Rayman]

[blackninjatom]

.
I have redone the acklay Now I need to do something new.

didn't realize I forgot this, the gunship is called "don't be crabby"
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[DarkZombie]

These are looking great, guys, very creative. Can someone provide me with a blank template (without the creature, text, missle symbols, etc.) so I can give this a shot?
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[ZombieSolo]

[gold_2]

[Zombieknight56]

I know that mantis dude. He is in the Cantina scene in A New Hope. Everyone knows him!
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[The Master Zombie]

To gold_2: Who's had their head chopped off? Originally, I thought it was meant to be some CIS leader (thus sending a message to the enemy as the gunship flies over, very low) but now that I think about who the green dude is, I'm thinking the victim is a tusken raider?
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[gold_2]

hmmm, I hadn't really thought about who it was supposed to be. maybe I should have her standing over a ripped apart battle droid or something
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[Rayman]

Nice Acklay Tom! Also for those including aurebesh in their stickers, could you provide a translation for it? I can't read the alphabet, and I am dying to know what's written on the stickers!

Yeah just as gold_2 wrote, the blank template is part of the full sticker sheet that I have posted up on my brickshelf. It should be in the first post.

If you can be bothered scrolling up, here it is... THE FULL STICKER SHEET. The picture is quite large (777kb), so for those with a slower connection right click on the link above and choose "Save As."

Again to Gold_2 a crushed battle droid would look pretty cool. : ) I might include droids in my later works.
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[blackninjatom]

Added the names to all my gunships (well the two of them ).
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[RocketSeason]

Rayman,

Do you know what yours says? Did you just slap some characters on there?
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