A Simple Blast Effect
 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AlrpZQJS2Es

CO2 cartridge and valving?

Pretty damn cool Gary.

I think this is more important than any other feature a tank could have! Better than a flash, better than any battle system. :cool:




Jeff

Gas or diverted smoker?

Oh thats so cool! I would love to do that to my pz3. Did you use little 12 gram co2 cartriges?

Must know what it is!!

Remember the key words in the title, "simple" and "effect". The video has been edited. This weekend I'll do a video showing how it's done and then you'll say, "Wow, that's pretty simple. I can't believe I didn't think of that myself!" :cool:

Remember the balloon trick I did? This is another trick.

I'll take two.! This is something that I have been bouncing around in my head for a bit. Can't wait for video.

Pp.

I have to agree with Jeff I think this is more important than any other feature a tank could have! Better than a flash, better than any battle system. I'm looking forward for the how to video, GREAT job Gary!!!!! thanks for sharing.

Nice.

Here's my guess: Since the camera shakes after every blast, I assume you're turning it off between reloads. That leads me to believe you are either filling the barrel or BB reserve with smoke or a fine powder, but lean towards smoke since it doesn't seem to drop like pigment would.

So, I say you are manually feeding smoke from a smoker unit outside the tank into the barrel and letting the BB push it out.

Dont even need a BB, the air from the piston dropping (that normally fires the BB) should be enough if you tape it up from the gravity tray

could probably divert a smoker to the gun that way and have those every time you fire

Don't forget, it's a trick. This was a quickie, and the radio will be a give-away. You'll see it. And even if you have to go to YouTube to watch it, click for full screen. The little window sucks. And for some reason the PzIII doesn't show up well against the yellow background. Watch for dispersion of the smoke cloud. I think it looks pretty good the way it fades out. If I could just get fake flame!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Y8cyR9NNXU This is how it's done.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ttrdKQXOPc Ausf, I thought for sure you'd have seen this, so it was pretty cool to be able to show you something. You're one of the guys we all learn from so showing you something new is always good for a warm fuzzy of accomplishment, can ya dig it? ;)

I haven't tried it yet, but I'm thinking this would combine well with the Q-tip/balloon trick.

The second part of the trick is Windows Live Movie Maker. It's ridiculously easy to use and it should be on most PCs with Windows 7 or 10. If a Gomer like me can figger it out it can't be that freakin' difficult, eh? Hey! You didn't have to agree with that statement so damned quickly! Anyway, Ausf taught me about how if you zoom in first and don't move the camera or the tank it will stay zoomed, no matter what range you go to (no idea of the proper lingo for that one. Range? Distance? Zoom level?). Same thing for editing this. I just did it in one long take and clipped out the reloads. If anyone wants to see the original video, before I cut out the reloads, I suppose I could post it. I just prefer not to appear on camera, ya know?

:cool:;):p

I was going to say you made a compressed talcum powder BB.
Boo on movie magic... :(

Gary, you can somewhat achieve this same effect for a artillery shell hitting in the ground. Grab a small funnel, hook up some nitro fuel line to the small end and add talc the open end (wont need much), cover loosely with saran wrap or foil. Bury the funnel just to cover the up end (saran wrapped) and attach the other end of the fuel line with some compressed air. Voila, smoke and dirt go a flying. Only conern with this is getting all that junk in your IR tube and apple if your battling and some goof decides to set it off while your tank is literally right next to it. Could make for a nice effect on one of your next videos. Here's the funnel size you'd be looking at. Maybe you'd have something like it at work but it's kinda small.

http://store.rc4wd.com/Hydraulic-Oil-Funnel_p_2973.html

That's similar to what the effects industry has been doing in films for years. They call 'em air cannons and are used when they don't want flames from a pyrotechnic effect. Every one here has seen them in use, any of the mortar hits where someone went flying in SPR, Band Of Brothers or The Pacific is a huge air cannon. They place them in the ground, back fill with debris, set a mini trampoline in front of it and the stunt dude pops onto the tramp sending him in the air as the cannon blows all the foam rock bits.

My son and I did some tests last year using a small plastic chamber, 91% alcohol and a grill igniter. We carved out a styrene insulation panel to look like a destroyed building with shell hits, laid it flat and covered it with ash from the grill to look like concrete. Set the JS-2 up in front of it (on it's side) and rotated the turret while firing the igniter. It blasted out a nice cloud (I thought I posted it here), but in the end, it's too fast to look good on video as is.

The big thing for explosion effects with miniatures is to be able to over crank the film. Film travels at 24 frames a second, if you over crank the speed while filming to a higher rate, when played at 24 frames, it gives a nice feeling of weight and size. Puppets, X wing fighters, etc are all done that way.

You got it Jeff. I always knew of them as "pot" effects, though I'd be damned if some bozo grabbed my copper Mauviel to make some shoot'em up movie.

i still like to know Strmnd54's effect

https://youtu.be/CzPPS66rVTk

Think that is a fan blowing smoke from diverted smoke unit when cannon is triggered.

I just got a new Iwata compressor, which frees an extra pressure tank I have. If I put a ball valve on it for quick release, I can probably get a good 80-90 PSI blast. I guess I know what the next project will be.

We were having fun testing the igniter/alc chambers, then I used aluminum foil over the opening and the report was so loud it echoed throughout the neighborhood like a .45 or something, so we put it away.

I'm pretty sure Strmnd54 made a bellows that filled up with smoke, but was compressed by the recoil. It's brilliant, but doesn't push with enough force to look convincing as fire, it looks more like after fire smoking.

could try a gas airsoft system instead as the base like perry's old one

or could we just feed some powder into the chamber each time it goes to fire?


I remember once messing with a friend's pershing we shot an old roll of paper that was quite dusty; the bb hit at an offset and richochet, but brought up a large dust cloud from the impact- seeing the yellow "shell" hit the ground and ricochet with a sizable cloud of dust was quite an awesome effect

looks cool but cant it damage the barrel? bbs could get jammed from all the buildup.

What an amazing effect, great job! The video of how to do it made me sad though hah, should've kept us thinking outside the box!!!

I think just reading over these comments about Co2 and valving through the tank is very creative, along with every other assumption. I may just have to try to invent those ideas.

Excellent. You're going to be a valuable asset to the forum. If I can be of help just let me know. I'll be very interested to see what you come up with. I'm not so sure about using CO2 but if you could come up with a way to inject a bit of talcum into the barrel somehow it would eliminate the reload, and then you'd really have something. But I hope you'll play with the videos, too. That was part of the point, to get guys thinking about what you can do in editing to make stuff look cool. I do love a well made RC Tank video so the more guys making them the more I get to watch.

This isn't something I'll use all that often so I'm not overly concerned about doing any damage. But, just to be safe, I do wipe out the barrel with one of those long cotton swabs like they have at the doctor's, but I don't see build-up being a problem.