Starting a thread on Giant Size Hero Characters. Curious to know how many there are of them. Doesn't matter who it's made by as long as it's a vintage hero, although I think most were made by Bandai or Bullmark? Pics are always nice in threads like this so I'll start with the one I have Bandai Giant Sized Thundermask (don't have the mask though):




I know of Redman, Iron King, Silver Mask, Fireman, Barom One, Kamen Rider. Is Giant sized classified as 36-38cm (14-15 inches)?

Nice start to an interesting thread.

This list can get pretty long.

I will try and chime in as I unpack.
That said you have multiple Kamen Riders, 6 Kamen Rider villains, Mirrorman, Henshin Ninja Arashi Villain, etc.

I have a jumbo ultraman back home. Its super beat up and I think its a bootleg.

This thread is going to be fun to look at. Jumbos were always my favorite toys when I was a kid. My xmen figs would always fight them as sentinels.

Well I was trying to narrow it down to heroes actually. We have a Jumbo Villains thread:

viewtopic.php?f=30&t=11748&hilit=+jumbo+villains+

and a Jumbo Talkers thread:

viewtopic.php?f=30&t=40224&hilit=jumbo+talkers

Also I've been informed that the size I started this thread on is actually called GIANT SIZED (around 38cm) mostly made by Bullmark or Bandai, probably some bootlegs. NOT JUMBO- that's more the 60cm Jumbo Machiner size.

Here are a couple of mine, these are both Bullmark.

Mirrorman


Hideki Goh from Return of Ultraman

keep'em coming!

Thanks for posting Jonathan. Man it's like tumbleweeds in the vintage forum lately. Come on guys post some pics!

Well it is crossover from the other thread, but I picked up this Kamen Rider v1 jumbo recently. He's a bit scuffed up, and doesn't have the mask, but still holds a great spot in the collection. Oh, Bandai naturally.

Giant size Ninja Arashi. Keep those posts coming.

Don't own it but here is the Kamen Rider V3 I posted in the KR thread:





And two more online pics I found:

Barom One and Silver Mask. I'm assuming all Bandai as well since they have the same head. I know Mark K has that Barom One maybe he can post a better pic?




Here is another saved pic of the Kamen Rider ultrakaiju (only it's V2 I think) posted from auction with mask:




Here's what my guy should look like with mask:

I just L-O-V-E love these figures VV
Just outstanding pieces

Vintage Godman I picked up recently. Adding this to my collection of giant sized Bullmarks without their masks! :

Nice! Not having the mask really bugs me. I already have a Giant Thundermask without one, now I'm going to be adding Giant Ultra Ace without a mask as well. I'd be willing to shell out money to people that own the masks to have them reproduced with a 3D printer. Don't know how to go about that though....

Thanks Lixx. It is very strange how all the giant sized guys seem to be lacking their masks much more often. If anything you would think since they were larger, they would be less likely to be lost. Maybe there was some production flaw with them that cause them to tear more, but that seems like a stretch - even the smaller removeable mask guys are torn occasionally.

As for prototyping replacements, the 3D printers right now still make fairly stiff polymers, which would not work too well on these. There is an added difficulty that with the smaller 'home' systems, you need to have/convert the the part into a 3D sketch, which is the main cost associated with the commercial rapid-prototyping. I have access to a printer, and can try some parts, but the technology is not at the stage yet I could produce some missing vinyl pieces.

In laymen terms you're just telling me I'm too ahead of the times right? LOL

So as soon as we have the capability of softer vinyl and get an accurate 3D sketch we're golden? My g/f knows Sketch and some CAD, but it was mainly for architectural layouts, so I guess that wouldn't help.

I don't want to derail too much, but I am not sure it will reach into soft vinyl, well not to the extent we know it. There are a few different polymer formulations available right now, but since the technology was developed to quickly manufacture parts, most of them are geared towards high impact/durable plastics. There would be a lot of issue with bonding the soft vinyl and incorporating the plasticizers. I won't say it isn't possible.

I just saw Makerbot will be coming out with their own digitizer, which will be a huge help. We may get a scanner here too, so if we do I will gladly try some things. I was thinking I could at least produce some accessories, like the Ninja Arashi or Leafman swords most folks are missing.

At the risk of continuing Steve's derail, I gotta step in--this IS what I do, after all. What Chris is proposing is totally do-able...though perhaps not the perfect one-to-one translation you might imagine. First, 3D scanning an existing head is trivial; there are tons of shops that scan shit for you. And home scanners are getting cheaper and cheaper (no more $3k pricetags on these stupid things). But even without all that shit, you could *easily* CAD up your typical tokusatsu hero helmet in an afternoon.

Then, it's only a matter of time before web-based print services like ponoko, i.materialise, or Shapeways start offering Objet Connex 500 synthetic rubber-printing. I'm actually kinda surprised these services don't already offer rubber. But in lieu of that, you could always just design a rigid helmet in two clamshell halves that peg together.

Yes, I've thought about this.

Booooooo!!!! Get out of here with your self-promotion.

Thanks Sanjeev, a bunch of us should get together on this maybe, and see what we can do. I know some folks out there have made repro parts in the past (e.g. for jumbos), but I am not sure what other methods are being used. Someone had cast Leafman swords too at one point as I recall.

More derail, what is this guy Sanjeev? I had one from when I was a kid, but never identified him in 'adulthood' searches.



EDIT: Nevermind, even though I re-read it twice to see, somehow on the fourth reading I finally see that it is a Diaclone guy.

Anyways, now that that is settled, open an online shop already dammit. More Brown glory for us all!

There is no such thing as a derailment in the vintage section, well yeah there can be , but for the most part it's pretty much the only place here that doesn't turn into a full on pissing contest or cheerleader festival. Information is always welcome and hell it applies! WE need these damn Giant sized helmets. My heroes feel powerless without them. This thread hasn't had that much action so the debate is welcome.

So Sanjeev this is a do-able scenario? Would I need to find out the exact dimensions from someone who owns a helmeted Giant sized toy or could the software just make the adjustments based on the doll head size? I have pictures of the helmets, would that aid in the 3d rendering?I know nothing of the software so that's why I'm asking- since this is what you do. I like your idea that if the vinyl was not soft enough using the 2 halve peg system.

I think if we got a hold of one mask, and made the electronic model of it, it wouldn't be that difficult to do the surface changes for the rest. And I agree the two-piece model is a nice way to try it out.

I really want to see a project like this develop. The leaps and bounds that 3D printing has been making in the past 2 years is amazing. With all the Kickstarter projects and prices coming down its just a few years till everyone who wants one can afford it.

Yeah, borrowing an actual mask is obviously the easiest thing...but honestly, if you don't have access to a scanner--whether you have the thing in-hand or not--you're gonna have to CAD model it, right? Well, if that's the case, then you don't even *really* need to borrow one. Just get perfectly orthogonal photographs of the direct front, back, sides (just one side if it's symmetrical), and maybe the top. With some sort of dimension reference, you should be able to scale the images to exact real-life dimensions and either read the images into your CAD program, or just wing it from there. That's all I do for 99% of the reverse-engineering toy projects I'm involved it. Pretty simple (as long as you have access to CAD in the first place, of course).

Jordan, you're totally right about how commonplace 3D printing and whatnot is becoming. It's a great time for a leisure-CAD-guy/toy-enthusiast like me. Not sure where you want Kickstarter to get involved in the process, but once the CAD model has been made, even folks without printers can get shit made via Shapeways and the like. Remember that Nitto Karakasa stand I posted about before?
http://www.shapeways.com/model/506077/n ... Box-search

Boy! DO I feel left out!! I need a giant size hero with no helmet.