Atomic Submarine.
Those two words just bring along a whole lot of images ... the early days of (misunderstood) atomic energy when we thought that atomic powered vehicles were the future, that people would have atomic toasters, atomic ovens, atomic sedans and coupes, personal robots ... days when we thought that atomic energy would mutate insects and creatures into giant monsters yet give humans superpowers. Naive, blissful days.
I've always liked submarines ... Jules Verne's "Nautilus" was probably my first literary introduction to submarines and the real life American "Nautilus" was not only the first atomic powered submarine but one of the greatest naval achievements of all time. Before my time but if you've never read about the USS Nautilus then I suggest that you do so. One day I hope to take a tour of her ... just walking in all of that history would be enough to give me goose-bumps if not a full on patriotic chubby that you could hang a flag from.
Sci-fi is full of submarines and sea monsters ... shows like "Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea" and "Sea Quest" showed us submarines that were elegant and that captured our imagination. The Seaview and the Sea Quest were very different ... the Sea View could have been to the USS Nautilus what the refit starship Enterprise was to the TOS era Enterprise ... although I still wonder how the Sea View fired torpedoes since it has no torpedo tubes or none that I've ever been able to find. Years ago at Wonderfest I picked up the really big Mobius VTTBOTS "Sea View" but that's a project for another day.
I like shapes.
No, apparently I have some weird fetish for shapes because I can't stop collecting containers, bottles, etc.
I like shapes. I see things that no one else does. Case in point, this project uses a lot of discarded items to build something completely new. For those of you new to this concept, this is called "scratchbuilding" and I've been doing it for nearly 30 years now. I've been wanting to get back into the hobby for a while now and this is my entry back into the realm of scratchbuilding ... the Atomic Submarine.
Take one Pantene conditioner bottle, one Pantene shampoo bottle, one Moroccan argan oil bottle, two end caps from some dried up markers my wife discarded, two twist off tops from some Mondo berry flavored juice bottles and a coffee scoop from the dollar store and voila!
Atomic submarine.
I'm not sure what I'm going to paint it right now ... yellow and black in some Peter Elson scheme comes to mind but I could also go with a Elson-like red with black and white detailing. Here's the pic of items I'm going to use. There's going to be extra greebles and detailing added and maybe some to-scale figures. The background story, if any, is also up in the air.
Maybe I'll get some time to work on it this week ... hopefully.
