GET YOUR BRIGADOR PEWTER MINIS NOW

Steam post image The latest addition to our merchandise store is three pewter minis of vehicles from Brigador: the Canmore, the Broadsword and the signature Touro at 1:144 scale. They were made by one of our community members, who makes minis as part of their day job at Mindworm Games, and ran us through the creation process that you can read below.

As this is a first run, the miniatures are being sold at introductory prices, which are:

Prices are not the same for all three miniatures due to the different amounts of pewter required. In addition, if you add all three to your cart, you'll get the whole set for 55.00 USD.

Please note that this introductory period will last until Monday July 31st, after which they will go up to their intended value. The sums indicated above also do not account for shipping.

=== UPDATE 12/07/2023: PLEASE READ THIS POST IN THE COMMENTS UPDATE 30/06/2023: DUE TO HIGH DEMAND RECENT ORDERS FOR PEWTER MINIATURES WILL BE DELAYED BY AT LEAST A WEEK. PLEASE GET IN TOUCH WITH US VIA TEAM(AT)STELLARJOCKEYS(DOT)COM IF YOU HAVE ANY CONCERNS ABOUT YOUR ORDER. WE THANK YOU ALL IN ADVANCE FOR YOUR PATIENCE AND UNDERSTANDING. SORRY ABOUT THE ALL CAPS. UPDATE 11/08/2023: Delays over miniature orders should no longer be an issue and the store should be operating normally now - please get in touch via our team email if you have any concerns about your order. ===

If you’d like to buy a pewter mini right now - head on over to our store. Otherwise, please enjoy the rest of the article.

FROM 3D MODEL TO 3D PRINT

[Editor’s note: Our community member was provided with the original 3D vehicle model files from Brigador - they did not reproduce the entire original model themselves from scratch. In other words - what you see in these minis is pretty much what they should look like in game, no longer bound to a fixed isometric perspective. We say “pretty much” because there are things we can get away with in a video game where the laws of physics don’t apply so some alterations have been made in order to be printed. Mostly this is filling in gaps inside the model the player would never see in-game.]

“ When I first get the model it's made of a bunch of individual overlapping parts. Here’s the Canmore turret split in half.”

[Ed: This screenshot is from Blender.]

“ As you can see, it’s not in one solid piece. I have to take all this and boolean join everything in Blender into a single mesh so that print software will slice it correctly instead of making internal voids where parts overlap. After I join everything together and add the cutouts and tabs and stuff it looks like this. ”

“ The turret is now one continuous mesh instead of a bunch of separate pieces. After that all the parts get printed out on the 3D printer into masters, which are put into a black rubber mold.”

[Ed: We’re not going to show a boring timelapse of the 3D print process - if you’ve never seen one in action, here’s that scene from season 4 episode 5 of Mr. Robot where Darlene and Elliot create a 3D print of a security guard’s fingerprint.]

VULCANIZATION

“ The mold comes in two halves. I position everything in the can like in the image above, then put the second half of the mold on top, and put it in the vulcanizer. The vulcanizer heats it up to the appropriate temp while it's under pressure to make the rubber soften and flow all around the masters to make impressions of the small details. The uncured rubber has a texture similar to bubble gum, but once it's vulcanized it's like a new tire. Here's that same mold can in the vulcanizer. ”

“ This is the small one I have at home in my shop that doesn't