My Crafty Things: Riddick Spaceship Node Backpack (2014)

For this years Elf Fantasy Fair I wanted to dress like Dahl from the movie Riddick. She was 2nd in command of the help troops.

With such an outfit you always need a suiting backpack to store your stuff. I decided to make the Spaceship Node (Battery) that were stolen in the movie and taken on their backs near the end of the movie when they retrieved them.

Movie Node

My Replica Node

I started with a 3D drawing, which I converted to a 2D AutoCAD drawing. With this drawing I was able to make templates used to saw out.
There were quite the number of pieces, because I had to work with a lot of different depths and rounded curves.

The many pieces; top, front, bottom, sides.

How it looks when everything is glued into place

Node after sanding.

The original node is glowing a bit. I wasn't able to work with perspex and lights, therefor I choose to paint it white and the borders would be turned grey to give it a bit of an illusion of light.

After the glueing I had a lot of work sanding everything to get a smooth surface. I used filler to fill up small gaps and differences. This again was sanded.

The Node after the first layer of primer

2 different colors of primer are used. I used white primer for the white parts and grey for everything that wouldn't become white.

I used a water based paint to finish it; this dries easier, therefor it's possible to do 2 layers of paint on a day off.
This round I've done several coats and a full layer of filler to achieve the flat surface I wanted.

1 of many coats of paint.

The backpack also needed a lid. I was lucky enough there was an oval shape on the top. I used this shape to make a lid:

Lid

On the lid were some glowing "Buttons". I used furniture decoration nails which I painted white. I cut off the nail part and glued them in drilled holes in the lid.