Finished: Project I/19

Soundwave

"Laserbeak - prepare for flight. Course heading: northeast. Operation: observation."
 

 If you remembered just about nothing about the Transformers or Soundwave, his voice ought to have stuck. With his Condor minion perched on his shoulder Soundwave looked like he was sending Laserbeak to spy on the baddies, a target or whaverer he wanted observed.

"Megatron, Laserbeak has returned. He has found a source of energy."

Silliness

Now that I had a larger and pretty damn poseable large version of the character portrayed by the metallic status, why wouldn't I have taken some silly photos of them together? Of course this led me to want a Masterpiece Megatron to go with my MEM Megatron... Well, I've wanted an MP-36 since I heard of it, but now I wanted it even more!

Final subcomponents

Head, shoulders, ...

Now that Laserbeak was completed, what was left was the last few steps of the instructions, covering about six pieces worth of activity. Soundwave's head utilized four of them. An Optimus Prime -like mouthpiece and a sunshade piece were installed on the faceplate itself.

Speaking of Optimus Prime, this head looked pretty much 1:1 like his or maybe my memory has been badly corrupted. I would have to check someday.

After installing those two pieces the bucket was twisted more or less into a U-shape and the top/back of the head was shaped into something like a fishhook and then used to lock the head in shape. This operation was loads easier and quicker than what I had thought and what it most likely sounds like.

Laser Cannon, the

The AA-batterylike laser cannon had to be rolled into a cylinder, but so that the rectangular attachment point was still attachable into its own counterpart. The shape went, predictably, only partially like supposed to, but at least it stayed intact. This thingamagick was then to be installed onto Soundwave's right shoulderblade and the backplate into his back. Only the lower right attachment point needed any force, otherwise it was all quick and swearless.

So he was finished as well. Next time I'd share the wrapping up pics and maybe causing some Kif Kroker -imitations here and there.

A minion for the forearm

Laserbeak!

Soundwave was now mostly completed, now I was strangely enough, instructed to work on one of his minions before his head or the shoulder-mounted Laser Cannon. The colourless bird could've been named either way, I decided to default to Laserbeak.

The top half consisted mostly of the torso plate, head and those engine-gun bits on the back. Lots of tiny bends were to be made but it turned out very recognizeable very quickly.

Finishing Laserbeak up was decently simple a task. Connect the legs to the belly part: check; belly part's edges up: check. Then connecting that piece to the top half was otherwise very easy but the backmost attachment piece came out so tactically close to every other subassembly that my poor eyes gave me a hard time seeing what went where and what was I actually supposed to twist and bend for proper tightness.

Below: a completed Laserbeak on the back of my hand. It wasn't large by any measure, even though you might not be able to get a clear sense of scale from this silly pic.

Next I installed Soundwave's missing arm on its place before proceeding. The instructions wanted the left arm to be pointing forward but I had gone and mirrored the other arm, not noticing the tiny difference in the booklet.

So, Laserbeak didn't quite fit sitting as it was supposed to be, on the forearm, but there was always going to be space on the shoulders of his master. Maybe with some gentle violence I could make him sit on the arm, too.

Another arm

A very short report

Thanks to the everyday busyness just building the left arm was all I managed for this post during a single sitting. Being an unarmed arm it was a tiny bit quicker to assemble, but that didn't help me that much in the end. I also didn't attach this arm onto the torso yet, as I thought that this'd make the next stepset a bit easier. Or not, we'd see.