Nerdism at its best

September 12, 2015

What’s a Miniature

I have been asked what are miniatures a lot here recently since I have been posing my work I have been doing on Facebook and around the internet. I am no pro when is comes to painting these things. Maybe you don’t even own any miniatures maybe you do. Maybe you know what they are but are too afraid to start or not sure where to start. so they just sit there collecting dust in a box somewhere. First of all, they’ve come a long way from the old pewter days on unpainted sculpts used almost exclusively for Dungeons and Dragons. Modern manufacturing methods are creating some fantastically detailed sculpts from an ridiculous array of genres, and from a variety of new plastics and resins.

There’s a tiny little world out there. It even makes me want to get a 3D printer and create my own. Part of my impetus for giving this a shot was that I needed something to get me away from my computer screen that was also very relaxing and fun. It was very intimidating at first because noting i seemed to do was turning out good, but through a little research plus trial and error I have started to get better at it.

Again, I am a complete novice at this, so I was hesitant to invest much money into it, but I’m really glad that I did. But I have spent most of my time trying to find a brush that I like I have a pile of brushes now, but only a few do I really like. the two brushes I have enjoyed using thus far are a 10/0 loew-cornell 7300 shader and a 12/0 Master’s Touch Mini Kolinsablon Round Brush.

I use primarily Reaper Paints and Vallejo paints that I get from hobby lobby. I prefer Reaper’s. there are other I have use like Citadel paints but I do not like them at all. Some people will swear by them. I have not used them but i am told that you can also use the cheaper tubes of acrylic paints just fine so long as you thin them up first.

Painting miniatures is relaxing and enjoyable. In a way, it’s a nerd’s version of meditation. I turned on my desk lamp, played some music quietly in the background, and had a really peaceful time painting my figures. I made the mistake of looking online at miniatures painted by pros. (Never compare your beginning with someone else’s middle.) Mine aren’t even in the same league, but I’m pretty pleased with my first effort and I’ve had a GLORIOUS time doing it.

March 1, 2015

LEGO update and Nintendo woes

An online friend of mine sent me some items to add to my Lego collection. A LEGO computer and keyboard! I have known this block to exist, but it is hard to find. I welcome it into my collection and now I just need a minifig that will compliment it. I also updated my Hero minifig I took away his axe and gave him a crystal mace. I found this to be more fitting for a paladin role I have been snatching up parts and pieces to create an adventurers group. So far you have seen my barbarian, warrior woman, dwarf and my paladin all I am missing is a ranger/thief.

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I have been playing a lot of Animal Crossing New Leaf on my 3DS. I decided to see how I could back up my save data. Well you cannot. That is if you bought AC:NL from the Nintendo e-shop. I am starting to really consider going back to only buying hard copies of all my games now if I am not able to back up my save data!

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Nintendo has been all about control since basically forever. Matt over at bgwillers.com reminded me today of this “Since they put the 10NES chips on the carts back in the NES days. Which caused flashing screens on millions of people’s NES’s and much blowing in carts.”

Every time the AC:NL saves it changes the NAND id number in the savefiles. According to Nintendo this prevents you from having multiple towns with one copy by using multiple SD cards and to prevent loading of old data save to prevent changes you are not happy with. AC has always been a game about permanency. This game is also a game that has no end to it really. Back in Animal Crossing Wild World you could get around some things by time traveling. Back then I had my DS set 12 hours behind because I worked most of the day and could only play at night missing all of the store items. The store was always closed.

Time traveling does not work any longer. Nintendo changed the way the unit knows what time it should be and the way the game saves. If I want to buy a NEW 3DS I will not be able to transfer this game and save. So I will have to rely on that my 3DS will continue to run for the rest of my life. This is also why I follow the homebrew community so tightly. Not because I want access to pirated software which is what homebrew enables most of the time. But I feel I should be able to assure my data is safe from corruption and having to start over. For now I guess ill just buy hard copies and no more e-shop copies.

February 25, 2015

Warriors and Mutants!

My first customized minifig. I found some armor that was custom painted and went looking for a shield and weapons for him. I am still deciding the best way to paint the torso, arms and legs, or if I should look for a chainmail type for each.

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The head came from and extra king minifig I had and it work well with this setup. I also received two of what is quickly becoming my two favorite minifigs; the barbarian and warrior woman. The barbarian has two swords and a battle axe. I have to find a sword sheath for him so I can store his swords on his back and then he can carry the battle axe. the warrior woman has a spear, sword, and shield. There is a hip sheath I can get for her so she can carry her sword, but for now she just has the spear.

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Last but not least my ninja turtles arrived! They are from china. They are not the LEGO brand, but for rejects they are not that bad quality wise. Shedder was also not that bad. However splinter, the foot soldier, and krang on the other hand are quite poor. the arms do not stay attached to the torsos and the hands don’t stay either so I elected to not assemble them.

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head over to the Minifig page for a complete gallery

February 22, 2015

The Nerd Corner

Welcome to my Nerd corner. When I moved in I opted to have my roommate leave this desk and over the last year I have been turning it into my little section of all things geek. There really is not much organization to it. Also before any one can say anything about the macbook it is the only laptop I had the would fit reasonably well on the desk. All my pc laptops are too big. And this macbook was collecting dust.

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Also it very hard to type and do stuff on my bed I also needed a spot that I can do my hobby stuff normally I would do that on my computer desk downstairs but I needed a better lit area. Particularly if I wanted to take better pictures of my latest hobby; collecting LEGO Minfigs. I don’t know what it is about these. However eventually I want to start doing minifig customization. I have started the long process of looking at what is needed to customize a minifig. One good thing is I can use the same paints and tools as I use for my tabletop miniatures to do my customization of the minifigs.

Knowing I had the tools I already need it was time to start hunting for the parts. As I have been doing the research amassing parts can be the hardest part of what I need to do so I have been watching some stuff on ebay. Come spring and summer I will have to hit up some yard sales.

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Most of these minifigs are from LEGO’s collectable series 13. I was not aware they were doing these collectable series until just recently. They are a blind bag so you don’t really know what you are getting until you open them up.

First one of my favorites is the fencer he is just a cool figure

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then a dwarf he is from series 5

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next you have a female figure, I am hoping that when LEGO finally realizes that you add the proper wig we get a female gendered minifig. there will not need to be a segregation of LEGO products. Target is finally putting the all the sets into the same aisle. Another favorite from the latest series; this female paleontologist

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last but not least the space marine I have actually gotten three of these little guys but they are still a favorite.

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so there you have it my nerd corner and my latest hobby.

July 17, 2014

Jar Lantern upgrade

If you remember my previous post here you will note I have been working on this project for quite some time. I had this idea and it’s not a new idea nor is it the first time someone has done something like this. I had originally started out on this venture to have a side project to do to try and make a bit of pocket change on the side. Well time becomes a factor for me and I really do not have the time to sit down and just dedicate the time to building these in bulk.

So it has turned into a project i use when I need to get my mind off of the daily happening from work and sometimes life itself so instead of just mass producing I just spend my time tinkering with it.

I have recently removed the blue LED. The blue was not bright enough. I happened upon a push button LED light. Looks a lot like an electronic Tea light only it was meant to be hung in a closet wall. Once I took it apart I knew this was what I was looking for. It had the AAA battery holder and a small enough circuit board. Now the problem was how to get it to work for me.

Pictured here is the finished upgrade. Now this is very sloppy. I need a smaller soldering iron to be more precise in my soldering my soldering gun is not ideal for this but I made it work.

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After it was all completed and put together it is much closer to what I had envisioned for this project. And it is a beauty. Not sure what I’m going to do once this is done.

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February 7, 2014

Jar Lanterns

I have been working on a project for quite some time now. A jar lantern. I was looking for a project to do that required some soldering and i was souring the internet and I kept coming across the temporary LED jar lantern where you tape an LED to a coin battery and then attach it to the jar lid. this is great if you don’t ever want to turn them off and let the battery burn out so i have set to add a switch and make a better lantern. here was my first attempt:

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that was my first version. I didn’t like the color so I replaced it with a blue LED. The problem I had was that the LEDs were not diffuse and only lit up where the LED was pointing. so I put the project on hold until I could figure out my problem. Couple of weeks ago I came across a Diffused LED. as you see here in version 2.0

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in Version 2.0 I switched out the rocker switch for a push button and a larger jar and so far I like this version better.