Prologue:
Hello, Pumpkin Brigadiers! As teased in this article, This marks the first ever CarlThePumpkinMan…. Newsletter? Recap? Roadmap? Eh, who cares.
Basically, I’m planning on releasing a report at the beginning of every month where I detail what I managed to get done in the past month as well as go over what I plan on doing in the next month. And if I manage to keep consistent, I’ll be able to compare the previous month’s plan with what I actually got done, and potentially give some valuable insights that way. And who knows? Maybe if I’m super duper consistent, I’ll set up a mailing list or something…. But that’s getting ahead of myself. Anyway!Intro
It’s the first of the month, which means that I’m writing this up! The Pumpkin Jam 02 has come and gone, Halloween is another sweet memory, and…I’m tired, boss.
Luckily, I don’t think it’s anything systemic like burnout or exhaustion, but I’ve had quite a few things going on recently. Of course, the aforementioned Pumpkin Jam has brought loads of things that need doing, and I recently handmade a Halloween costume, participated in the Halloween Parade, and had to make a big self-introductory poster for the local festival going on this weekend.
And the work’s not done–while the festival will be fun, it’s still a thing to do, and I also have a business trip this Thursday (that I still haven’t secured travel arrangements for 😭), so I’ll still be gogogoing for the foreseeable future.
The bright side is that Monday is a national holiday (No work!), so today especially I’ve felt I’ve been able to take the time, chill out, and eventually write this up for y’all. So without further ado…
Ongoing Projects:
Pokemon TCG Pocket Coins:
I collect Pokemon Coins, but the Pokemon TCG Pocket app has a bunch of them that aren’t available to obtain in the real world. In order to rectify this, I’ve made a habit of adapting every single one of them in 3D printable form. And since it only takes about an hour to go from screenshot to ready-to-print 3mf, It’s pretty easy for me to slip them in between other, bigger projects. And they usually release most of them at the end of the month, so I can conveniently report on them here!
Now due to the Pumpkin Jam, my printers have been busy printing out submissions for the past while. Accordingly, this Greninja is my only creation this month:
Yes, it’s true! Everyone’s favorite water-type “First Partner Pokemon” from Kalos that also happens to be in Super Smash Bros is here.
However, two other coins were released in October–specifically Professor Oak, and Lillie Ver. 2. They have been sitting in my “To Upload” folder for quite a while now–they just need to be printed, photographed, described, etc, etc. Expect those up shortly–after all, the Professor is printing as I post this! Lillie should be following soon after.
As for future coins, recently Pokemon TCG Pocket has been celebrating its first anniversary! Can you believe it? One whole year of microtransactions, luck-based battling, and what my lawyer says I legally can’t describe as gambling. And with it, there are 4 new coins released in the past few days! Those should all be up by the end of the month as well.
From left to right: Mega Altaria, Mega Absol, Mega Blaziken, Special Set ver. 2.
The latest expansion pack is all about Mega Evolution, so I wouldn’t be surprised if more Megas will find their way into the app! I’ll be uploading them as well, should they come out. And the Special Set coin is quite striking–I wonder how I’ll handle the different shades, pattern, and unorthodox texture? The back is indeed black in game, so I need to decide how I want to make that look with the red pseudo-background. You’ll just have to follow and see how I do it when it comes out!
Pumpkin Jam:
Ok, so! 5 of the 6 entries have been officially printed as of today, and 3 of which have already been assembled, tested, and have had their evaluations written up. Once I find the time to get some good pics of them, I’ll be uploading their makes with my feedback, so to the entrants– watch out for that! The other two still need to be filmed and whatnot, so once those are done, then it’s off to filming, editing, making the thumbnail, writing the… Oh, you get the idea. It’s a lot of work, but it’s priority 1! Barring anything crazy happening, it should be out before the first Advent Calendars are cracked open.
The status of the final model is unfortunately in modeling limbo, and its situation will become apparent one way or another when the final video is uploaded.
Project Kurt:
I have an ongoing video series where I explain the history of every single Poke Ball that is used in the mainline series of Pokemon games. Each one is accompanied with a 3D printable Poke Ball that automatically opens when the button is pressed. The issue? I wasn’t really a fan of editing them all, so I kinda… stopped. However! I have struck a deal with an old friend of mine, and he’s agreed to edit the videos. He’s currently in the process of editing the Beast Ball video, and provided we’re on the same page with our standards, when he’s done with that, the Beast Ball will be all ready to upload.
Assuming everything works out, the plan moving forward is for me to prioritize Project Kurt and bust out the remaining 17 Poke Balls, scripts, and recordings. I should be able to do them faster than my editor can edit them, but that just means I’ll have a backlog that I can more or less immediately release when he gets a video done. In fact, the Strange Ball is half printed! …I managed to squeak it in before the Pumpkin Jam.
Obscure Items:
In another video series of mine, I like to talk about really random, really obscure items from games that I’m interested in. And of course… I just *have* to make a 3D printed version to accompany them, now don’t I? Generally speaking, it’s good 3D modeling practice to try and model preexisting things–it sometimes forces you to get outside your comfort zone and model shapes that you might have avoided otherwise. The Models Resource is a great site to use to find models to refine and make 3D printable.
You’re more than welcome to make suggestions, but I have relatively peculiar tastes in these models, so no guarantee I actually accept requests!
Currently though, I’ve got my eye on Durandal from the Fire Emblem Series. Despite it being the main weapon of the main character of a game, it doesn’t have an official 3D model as far as I know, so I thought it would be a fun challenge to try and scrape together an accurate 3D model solely from a bunch of 2D renders released across the ages.
Last Month’s accomplishments:
Three models this month! One is the above Greninja coin, and as for the other two:
The Spooky Sword
A lovely little Halloween Sword!
…Just in time for November. It’s a fancy sword with a Halloween motif, complete with a pumpkin pommel, batwing crossguard, and a bloodstained sheath. It even comes with a custom hanger you can use to mount it on your wall! Pretty cool, if I do say so myself. I made it within 48 hours for the Pumpkin Jam.
Swappable Swords
This model (or models, I guess? They’re all uploaded together, in any case) was made as a tutorial model for the Pumpkin Jam 02: Length. It’s a set of 4 simple swords, mostly to showcase how extremely sturdy models can be even when they’re only made from 3D-printed parts. You can definitely use it to print out your own custom sword, but I think they’re mostly useful for the information contained in the attached tutorial video.
What’s Planned for November?
Ok! So this time, I’ve already tipped my hand and said everything I want to do next, but here’s everything laid out clearly, in priority order.
Finish the Pumpkin Jam video. Absolutely want to get this done and out–everyone’s waiting on the results, of course!
Get ten of the remaining 17 Poke Balls done for Project Kurt. Given editing (at least for me) is the biggest chore, I think 10 in a month isn’t too crazy. I already have the base down, so I just need to add the specific details, whip up the 3mf, and then write/record the script.
As a stretch goal, getting all 17 remaining balls would be great! Dunno how realistic that is, though. Shoot for the clouds, land among the stars. In any case, be sure to comment on the videos to help persuade me which one I should do next!
If I’m absolutely cracked, then I’ll try and start on Durandal. Approximately 0 chance that gets finished, though.
~Final Thoughts~
First off, if you’re looking farther down and you’re curious why there’s a section *after* the final thoughts, it’s just a section where I post ideas of things I’m interested in doing. If you want to browse down there, chances are real that future projects will be pulled from there, so feel free to make any comments or requests about what I’ve got down there! Just be aware that at the end of the day, I get final say in what I do, of course.
Thanks for reading to the end! I’m well aware that I don’t have the following to really justify doing something as grandiose as this, but you should dress for the job you want, I suppose! If this stays a consistent thing, I might turn it into an email or something like that. Let me know what you think!
Oh, and uh follow me, print my stuff, and boost my models! Bye~
Bucket List
3D Modeling Poseable Models in Blender
I know Blender is more about animations and stuff, but I currently almost exclusively use it for importing one kind of filetype, and then exporting it as another. Since it certainly seems to be a powerful tool for handling meshes and stuff, I figure it’d be good to learn more about how it works, and to try and model some basic poseable figures in there. The prefecture I live in, Kagoshima, has a group of mascots that are all pigs–I think it’d be cool to create a base form for them, add bones onto it, pose it like they do in their promotional images, and then add their little accessories to make a cute little figurine set.
Gameripping and Crowdfunding
I’ve used The Models Resource to find models as reference material many times before, so I was considering repaying the favor and getting some models to add. The Magical Sword from Hyrule Warriors has always been in the back of my mind to make, but there are a couple problems.
No one ripped the sheath from the game. Both the sword and shield are there, but no sheath to put the blade in.
It would take a lot of filament. More than would be sustainable for a hobbyist such as myself.
For this challenge, I’d like to see if I can’t learn how to rip the model, so I can try and upload it myself. And to get the filament, I want to try out Maker World’s crowdfunding feature to see if I can’t scrape together enough to get the filament to properly test it and then print it out. It’s a pretty complicated model, as you can see here. It’d be a big undertaking by itself in order to try and adapt it.
Making Practical Mechanisms
So I have no idea what direction this would go, but have you ever worn a hard hat? You put it on, and there’s a knob in the back that tightens it down so it doesn’t fall off your noggin. I want to try making a headband that works like that, but has a mechanism in the front that lets you easily attach and detach a mask. How would that work out? Is PLA even bendy enough to make a reliable headband? I don’t know, but I found the patent for the ratchet, so…
Making More Rubber Band Hinges
Y’all remember Bakugan? I do. Really cool marble-like tools with a hidden magnet in ‘em which, when passed over a metal card, triggered the magnet which unlatched a bunch of springed hinges, transforming it into a little figure. Really crappy card game, super interesting concept. I wanna see if I can make one using rubber bands to power the hinges, similar to how my Poke Ball works.
Working with TPU
Fun fact: I’ve never printed in TPU. Ever. Sounds fun though. I’ve seen people make squeaky rubber duckies with TPU, and I want to try to do that myself. Except instead of a Duck, I want to make a Pig Ball, from the obscure PlayStation game Tomba! 2. This is the highest resolution photo I could find of it via a quick google search
What are those Suspended String Thingies Called?
I’ve seen some pretty cool models like the one in this image here. I have no clue (ok I have some clue) how they work, but I want to try one! I’m a fan of Naruto, and for some reason these prints remind me of a Sharingan floating in a tank. I’d like to make one, and swap out the design for every one seen so far in the series. Shouldn’t be that hard, right?
Trying out Some Cosplay
Really small goal, but I want to try and make Zero’s Buster from Mega Man X3. I’ve got an idea to try and use straps that might make it relatively ergonomic and solid, but I also want to think of a way to make it easy to take on and off.
Electronics and API, maybe?
A while back I made a video (or 2… or 3…) in which I attempted to make disco lights for my twitch stream. I kinda succeeded, but the end product was really finicky, unreliable, and hard to set up. Basically, the gist of the thing was that I wanted to make a spinning ball with holes in it that projected shapes from an internal light onto my walls, in order to spice up my twitch stream. I was toying around with trying to make one from the maker’s supply, and if that worked out, I want to try and sync it up with my twitch stream so that it changes color if I get a follow, raid, sub, or something like that. That’d be gnarly. I’ve had a couple people tentatively offer to help, and I feel bad that I haven’t followed through…
The old one had (technically) remote control, RGB capability, and variable spinning speed somehow, but it’d take a lot of learning to figure out how to do it effectively and reliably.