by Benham Sadr

This is the Viper X-1 Automadon, from Dark Empire 2 Graphic Novel. Brutal Rulers employ brutal armaments, and the Galactic Empire is no different. The newly resurrected Emperor has a shipment of the new Viper War Droids coming in. With this new series that make the AT-AT walkers look like children's toys, the Emperor will reign terror once again...or so he thinks. Read the novel for further detail!

I was intrigued by this design right from the start and when the contest came up, it was the perfect excuse to tackle this design. I first researched the subject and came up with mostly images from the novel, and 2 views from the guide to droids book. Upon closer look, I noticed that while the novel depicts the droid in one way, the guide book depicts it with certain details changed. So I did a mix and match, relying on the guide for my core design, then altered it based on the comic. Wherever I couldn't find details, I improvised. First I made a paper comp to see gauge what scale I wanted to do it. A medicine bottle with a cool design made up my mind. This is the piece on the model that has directional arrows on it. After a few late nights I was done with the core and then went to my parts boxes. I used parts from 1/100 and 1/144 scale Wing and X Gundam mechas, an old AT-AT model (used the neck mechanism, and used the core of its feet to build feet for my viper) Some keyboard keys, and as my own inside gag, parts from an old Dodge Viper model. Parts of this model can be spotted all over mine. A few other miscellaneous parts were used to complete the model. I used a part of a 2 liter soda bottle to biuld the cover for the tail.

The model was paited with Kraylon Gray Primer, and then partially weathered using diluted China Ink. For the visor part, a piece of edge-glo acrylic was trimmed, then drilled thru in the back but not all the way thru. A marker was used to darken the resulting holes, giving the impression there are instruments behind the red visor. For the ribbed leg and "chin ribs" I used pre-cut hematite stones, available at semi-precious stone dealers (my wife who saw them at her job suggested they would be good pieces for detailing models. Love ya honey!) these are metallic stones, very cheap, and come in variety on shapes. Can be used by themselves like I did, or can be used for casting to add detail to your model.

Well, there it is. I'm happy with it and had fun building it. Hope you enjoy looking at it also. Now I've gotta go and clean the huge mess I made in my shop...nuts!

Image: Front view

Image: Head detail

Image: Right side