Hot off the molds in Thailand comes the latest masterpiece from the incredible mind of Narin – Spirit Blade.   Spirit Blade is a dominant pose Hunter in 1:6 scale and would make an excellent companion to your Alternative Hunter – check out the side by side photos in the Predator Stuff Shop.  The kit consists of 13 beautifully sculpted solid resin pieces and you can display the statue with or without the Bio-Helmet.  Here is a Predator Stuff exclusive first look:

You all know the quality of Narin’s work and if anything, he might have topped his best with this superb kit.  So here is the deal.  Narin is making the molds and will be casting only 15 pieces over the next three weeks.  So this is a pre-order and here is the very good news, the price is only $159 plus shipping.  I have put additional pictures in the shop but do not try to order from there.  If you are interested in ordering, please contact me for details.  And remember, there will only be 15 castings so this is a first-come-first-serve.

Rich

Okay kids, this is the one that everyone has been waiting for, the Legendary Scale Wolf Predator:

Sideshow posted the announcement a few weeks ago with great fanfare and an amazing set of pictures.  BUT, as soon as it was launched, the emails from the faithful started rolling in.  The photos look mighty bad-ass BUT, we have been down this road before.  Will the actual $2000 (that is not a misprint, it is two grand) statue look like the photos?  Count the problems within the photos so far (hint:  there are 5 – so far).  Please folks,  let us all pray to whatever higher source that you believe in that they don’t screw up the details!!  Personally, I am going to hold off until I see an actual finished product and then we will do a review.  PLEASE folks, if you going to slap down your hard earned cash for one of these statues, wait until we can actually see one.  I don’t want to be disappointed and I don’t want any of you folks to be screwed.  Stay tuned and if Sideshow coughs one up for review, we can all decide to move forward…or not.

-Rich

Since I have gotten a boat load of emails about this statue, I thought I had better respond before my IP throws me off.  A number of you have called into question a few things about the new Elder Predator from the Predator 2 movie that Sideshow launched a few weeks ago:

The major complaint was the lack of ring in the tooth, one of the true icons of the character.  I raised this issue with Sideshow and was told that the statue has already been updated and the final statue will correct oral-bling speaking.  Unfortunately, they have not updated the website photos yet so the “Inaccuracy Cloud” will linger.

Others felt that the head was too small and too high.  I have passed those comments on to Sideshow too and they have passed them to the production team.  The last one is something I don’t quite get, the Elder is wearing sandals while he doesn’t wear sandals in the movie.  So, I went back and watched the ending of P2 again and I’ll be damned if I can see his feet.  All of the characters in the ending are waist-deep in smoke/fog/whoknowswhat, no foot gear visible.  But, as I have certainly been wrong in the past, I let Sideshow know.

Rich

I have mentioned this upcoming model kit and statue fair in my newsletters but I really want to give it a bigger push to a larger audience so here goes.  This is going to be the largest and best kit/statue fair on the east coast this summer.  It has been put together by a great friend of Predator Stuff, Dave Tomarchio who started this show, are you ready for this, in his basement!  Then as the show increased in size, it spread into his garage as well.  Now that it has totally outgrown his house, it will be held at Rider University in Lawrenceville NJ (just outside of Princeton).  The JerseyFest Fair will be held August 3rd & 4th and it has a jam packed schedule.  Friday the 3rd will feature professional seminars and kit painting classes – still trying to get your flesh-tones right?  And Saturday will feature all sorts of demos and a huge vendor and artist room – come by the Predator Stuff table and bring plenty of money.  For more information about JerseyFest head on over to their website and keep watching this site for updates

You have probably noticed that below each post here on the site is a ‘Comments’ section.  And, if you have tried to leave a comment, you know that it doesn’t work.  Why?  For some reason, there are a bunch of wing nuts out there is cyber space who think it is a laugh riot to just spam the heck out of web sites and send you page after page of meaningless ASCII code or listings of hundreds of BS URL’s.  Before I had to shut down comments, I was getting 300-400 spam-mails daily.  Took several hours to weed through the junk and find the real emails.  So, we are working to upgrade our spam sieve function and hope to have this all resolved soon.  In the meantime, I really do want to hear from you so if you have a comment, please contact me.  Thanks!

There are very few things that bug the sh*t out of me, but one thing that gets under my skin is when people who claim to be Predator experts consistently use the wrong terminology.  Case in point is the much maligned ‘Mask’.  Here’s the deal folks, Predators do not wear masks (unless they are going to a Halloween party and I do not think that they are the type of folks who go door to door asking for candy).  They wear Bio-Helmets or in a pinch Enviro-Helmets.  The Bios are needed to provide them with a consistent air supply and allow them to utilize multi-spectrum visual enhancements.  Try getting an air supply or viewing your environment in ultraviolet light wearing a ‘mask‘.  So we shall all now repeat the mantra that our friends the yautja wear Bio or Enviro Helmets.  I feel better.

So that self-serving intro was actually intended to be an excuse to bring up and display the amazing Bios that we are featuring in the Predator Stuff Shop.  The bulk of these beauties are made by a very talented craftsman who uses the handle SkulptFX or SFX for short.   SFX is a very talented sculptor who does a great deal of special effects work for the folks out in Hollywood.  That would be his day job.  But his passion is hand making these 1:1 scale, full movie sized Bios and then custom painting them using his incredibly fertile imagination.  The beauty of this system is that since each Bio is hand painted, no two are 100% exactly the same.  Variations in colors and blending make each Bio an individual piece of art.  Now the question we always get, “are they for display or can I wear it?”  And the answer is “yes”.  No sarcasm here folks, these Bios can be worn (you provide your own straps or magnets) or they can be mounted on the Wall as I have them in my office:

So, here, for your viewing pleasure are but a sampling of the awesomeness turned out by our friend, the very talented SFX:

Left to right:  Ancient, Berserker, Boar

Left to right:  Celtic, Elder, Chopper

Left to right:  Narin, Red Samurai, Wolf

I will argue that no Predator collection is complete without a Bio, or two or if you a down-deep-inside sick person like me, 6.  Stop me before I buy again!!  For more information about these Bios, contact me.

Our friend and enormously talent artist from Thailand, Narin, is working his magic again.  He has passed these photos along to give you all a little taste of what’s up next.  The sculpt is titled “Spirit Blade” and appears to be the Hunter in a classic standing pose.  You can see, even in these less than perfect photos, the Narin touch for detail is all over the place.  I haven’t heard dimensions yet but it looks like a  1:6 scale and I’m guessing it will be about 12″ (30.5cm) high.  Do not know price yet but Predator Stuff will have an exclusive when it is finally launched so stand by and start putting those pennies away in your piggy bank.

Rich

As I have mentioned about a thousand times, I am a huge fan of both Narin and Randy Bowen.  Predator Stuff has enjoyed a long and wonderful relationship with Narin and now I am very pleased to announce that we will be working with Bowen Design as well.  My very first Predator kit was a Bowen designed Predator done under the auspices (I believe) of Dark Horse.  To be perfectly honest, the first one was actually a recast but once I found that out I searched high and low and eventually found an original which I promptly bought.  In preparation for this relationship, take a trip over to the Bowen Design web site and check out some of the amazing sculpts that Randy and his team crank out.  We will be featuring some of those sculpts in the Predator Stuff Shop later this week.

Rich