The Dread Eye's Phantom Conversion WIP part 6

As I mentioned in the last weekly update I was able to get some of the missing parts, as seen below. But, I still need to get a cannon to replicate for the six gun ports.

Well, I have decided to continue doing as much as possible...and I have new parts to paint. First, one of the mast pieces is bendable so it will have to be super glued to prevent that from happening.

So, after the glue dries I will paint them the same way as the rest of the ship.

Next on the list is to add a little bit of detail, time to pain the cannon ports and the other ghostly parts on the hull. I mixed a custom color for the parts on the hull, using a teal, blue, and black. Here is a picture of one of the parts without the new paint and one with:

Here is a picture showing the cannon ports and the ghostly part of the hull.

The color I painted on the hull is a bit lighter then the rubber cannon ports, but I like the way it looks. Next, it is time for a little dry-brushing on the cannon ports and the ghostly parts. This will really help bring out the hidden detail. I used a very light teal to do this. Here is how it turned out:

Time to work on the lights. The lights are activated 2 ways; first, there is a button that sites on the floor of the lower deck when the cannons would sit and second by a pushing on part of the shoot from the skeletal/bone hole found near the stern. Because, I plan on having much smaller cannons that are much more realistic to Heroscape scale and not having the main deck removable the buttons on the lower deck really won't be functional. So, I will have to modify the button found in the shoot.

Here is a picture of the shoot with a hole drilled through it. Instead of having the lights activate by pushing on this part of the shoot, which is near the bottom of the ship I am going to extend the wires and place the button so it is easy to press and so that nothing can fall down that shoot.

Besides drilling the hole for the wires to go through I super glued that part in place and then finished painting the inside of the shoot black.

Now, I cut the wires and strip the ends so that I can extend them. Be very careful doing this as wires are very small.

Then pull through the hole, and add the extensions. 

Time to test the lights to make sure the button is working.
 

Sorry for the blurry picture but as you can see the lights work.

Note that the shoot has a lower and upper part, as it is part of the hull that is also 2 pieces. The hole for the wires is in the lower part of the shoot. For the upper portion the plan is to cover it and attach the button to the cover, making it easy to activate the lights. To do this I cut a square piece of left over plastic card from the for sale signs used for the base of the decks. Here it is uncovered and covered:

Then I cut a hole for the button.

Before putting the hull together I need to finish the preparations of the lower deck for the installment of the cannons. Because I am cheap and the lower deck and cannons really won't be seen there is no reason to have complete cannons sitting inside. I plan on making a mold and casting replicas of a cannon. I will only be using the barrels of the cannons for this ship and I will be gluing them in place on a styrene (plastic) sheet. The sheets that I use will be thicker and cost more then the $1 plastic for sale signs used earlier.

Now take a few measurements and cut out the rectangular pieces.

Next, I painted them a gloss black and glued them in place one at a time to the lower deck.

Now it is finally time to put the lower and upper hull pieces back together! Here is what the inside should look like:

Don't forget to make sure the wires are extending through the upper portion of the shoot. Once the two pieces of the hull are back together it is time to glue the button/switch for the lights in place on the bottom of the plastic card cut earlier, and then glue the plastic card in place on top of the shoot. I also gave it a gloss black paint job.

Once  that is done it is time to put the completed upper stern back into place. Here is a picture of the bone/skeletal hole that now has the switch for the lights.

And here is a picture of the ship put back together.

That's all for now...things still on the to do list to complete:
1. Replicate a cannon and glue in place
2. Modify ladder rungs for stairs
3. Finish painting masts
4. Make sails
5. Make/buy/modify a steering wheel and anchor