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Scout-class Autobot Depthcharge

Comments

23 comments posted
The design of this toy from

The design of this toy from the waist up reminds me of some of those Armored Core mecha. Pretty cool all in all. :)

BraveMSW's picture
Posted by BraveMSW on 2 February, 2010 - 10:20
You said it...

This guy would probably be a more interesting toy if it was larger Voyager Class. He wears a funny hat.

Lizardspock's picture
Posted by Lizardspock on 2 February, 2010 - 14:24
I would also have liked to

I would also have liked to see him in a bigger class so he would have had a more interesting transformation and better joints. Voyager-class might be pushing it, but definitely Deluxe-class.
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EVA_Unit_4A's picture
Posted by EVA_Unit_4A on 2 February, 2010 - 14:29
Or Front Mission

The big shoulders and big calves with tiny little body and limbs is a FM thing.

RobotBastard's picture
Posted by RobotBastard on 3 February, 2010 - 01:32
I liked this guy a lot when

I liked this guy a lot when I first saw him, although I never noticed his oddly cheeky grin before...

Dkun's picture
Posted by Dkun on 2 February, 2010 - 10:29
Oh, I can't tell you how

Oh, I can't tell you how frustrating it was to make any attempt at shooting his head! The dammed this is pea-sized, I kid you not, and I couldn't get either close enough for detail or focus clearly on it. I had to play around with the contrast and brightness setting in the display program and distort it a lot to get what what you see up there.

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EVA_Unit_4A's picture
Posted by EVA_Unit_4A on 2 February, 2010 - 14:33
I don't think the RotF

I don't think the RotF designers really understand how boats work...

http://prometheusrising.wordpress.com

Prometheum5's picture
Posted by Prometheum5 on 2 February, 2010 - 11:02
Leave the concept artists

Leave the concept artists alone... It's the director who has the final say.

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CollectionDX Staff

EVA_Unit_4A's picture
Posted by EVA_Unit_4A on 2 February, 2010 - 14:34
You're saying that Michael

You're saying that Michael Bay, alone, designed the final look of all the transformers in those movies?

--
Sanjeev

Sanjeev's picture
Posted by Sanjeev on 2 February, 2010 - 15:28
...what happens if I say

...what happens if I say "Yes"?

The director of any movie has final say (constraints of budget and timing notwithstanding), not just Michael Bay.
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EVA_Unit_4A's picture
Posted by EVA_Unit_4A on 2 February, 2010 - 16:11
Captain Nemo

It reminds me of the old Convertors series of boats, Captain Nemo in particular.

duke togo's picture
Posted by duke togo on 2 February, 2010 - 12:52
Is that a TF brand? Never

Is that a TF brand? Never heard of it.

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CollectionDX Staff

EVA_Unit_4A's picture
Posted by EVA_Unit_4A on 2 February, 2010 - 14:35
Select

Convertors was a cheapy toy line in the US from the company Select. Much of their product were toys from Japanese manufacturer Mark, which was affiliated with Takatoku. Mark handled cheapy versions of Takatoku's deluxe toys. They had cheapy versions of the Macross Valkyries, the robots from Dorvack, et cetera. These were released in the US (sometimes in weird color schemes) in the Convertors line and sold at places like K-Mart.

Ginrai's picture
Posted by Ginrai on 2 February, 2010 - 15:44
Hmm- that sounds strangely

Hmm- that sounds strangely familiar, though I'm not sure where... :-/

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CollectionDX Staff

EVA_Unit_4A's picture
Posted by EVA_Unit_4A on 2 February, 2010 - 16:13
An overview of most of the

An overview of most of the Convertors:

http://www.toyarchive.com/Convertors/Convertors.html

Some of the info there is a little off, and some figures are missing from the line up (there was a accurite Orguss figure along with the remolded one shown, for example) It was an interesting line filled with some original figures as well as simplified cheapie UFO Catcher/train station versions of other Takatoku toy lines...Macross, Dorvack, Beetra, Orguss, Sasurainger, and Galvion.

BraveMSW's picture
Posted by BraveMSW on 2 February, 2010 - 17:12
I really don't think Micheal

I really don't think Micheal Bay has any say over robots that don't even appear in the movie,but whatever. It is funny that internet fans seem to blame him and him alone for every fault of the films.

counter-x.net has some Convertors info,plus more non-TF transforming toy information.

kidnicky's picture
Posted by kidnicky on 2 February, 2010 - 20:49
"It is funny that internet

"It is funny that internet fans seem to blame him and him alone for every fault of the films. "

I blame the writers for Simmons, Judy Witwicky (she damn-well better get that Razzie!), Mikaela (likewise "..."!), robots who lack personality and/or presence (Jolt, Arcee & Co., The Fallen, Constructicons other than Demolishor, etc.), bad potty humor, and a few other things.

But here's the thing: as director, Bay and the editors under him let all that on film, so yes I do lay him with the majority of blame.
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CollectionDX Staff

EVA_Unit_4A's picture
Posted by EVA_Unit_4A on 2 February, 2010 - 22:35
They start developing the

They start developing the toys not long after the concept art is in development. And as someone whom has been on the concept art side of things, its a collaborative process, but the boss calls the shots. Some more so than others.

BraveMSW's picture
Posted by BraveMSW on 2 February, 2010 - 21:59
(*looks at those who dispute

(*looks at those who dispute him*) See-!

;P

. . .

Really? You've been a concept artist? =)
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EVA_Unit_4A's picture
Posted by EVA_Unit_4A on 2 February, 2010 - 22:42
Yes, but not in the

Yes, but not in the strickest sense. Late 80's early 90s I worked for a video production company. Did lots of production art, title graphics, animation, props and the like. Mostly we made TV commercials and industrial films, dull stuff honestly. But we did have a number of interesting projects and clients. Especialy during the early days of CD-ROM development. Some of that involved concept design.

I recall two clients looking to get into game development that I did a lot of concept design work for, one was a arcade game distributor out of Chicago. They wanted to do some epic space shooter thingy and I did a ton of work on that. They wern't the most imaginative though and pretty much wanted everything to resemble Star Wars. "Make it look more like an X-Wing." They would say, which sucked as my anime influanced style landed me the job to begin with :P

Other one was a futureistic submarine game that became Hydrosub: 2021 for the Action Max VCR game system. Less said the better :P

BraveMSW's picture
Posted by BraveMSW on 2 February, 2010 - 23:52
Tribute to BW?

Is this guy a tribue to the Beast wars era maximal DepthCharge?

"Awww man, that's one ugly zord..." Tommy about BA Drivemax Megazord.

Christopher Andre's picture
Posted by Christopher Andre on 2 February, 2010 - 23:54
Being a BW fan, that was my

Being a BW fan, that was my first thought too. But consider than smaller ships actually can drop depth charges, so that might be part of it.

Now, a tribute to the character? Doubtful.. BW Depth Charge was a scarred, vengeful guy who'd lost everything except his revenge against Rampage.

Of course, Scalpel is a tribute to Tarantulus (I could see that... sorta), and Megatron supposedly had moments of BW Megs when he said "Yes..." when agree with The Fallen inside the Nemesis (that wasn't my first thought in the theater!).
(To the writers of Bayformers: just because a Megatron says "Yes"/"No" does NOT mean we will immediately associate him with BW Megs, you dolts! BW Megs had many things aside from Yes/No that made him memorable.)
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EVA_Unit_4A's picture
Posted by EVA_Unit_4A on 3 February, 2010 - 00:16
Usually anyone besides the

Usually anyone besides the main characters in any given TF series who share names with prior TFs are just name reuses. I mean,no doubt,they were looking through their list for nautical sounding names and saw Depthcharge,but I don't think they had that character in mind when designing or writing the bio for this one. IIRC there were a bunch of guys in A/E/C that had similar names to past robots but nothing else.
I don't know if you guys watched "TF Robots in Disguise" but in that show most of the "homage named" robots weren't even named that way until the English dub,so they definately aren't intended to be a version of the same character.

kidnicky's picture
Posted by kidnicky on 3 February, 2010 - 09:51