Kopaka, Toa of Ice

[venort]

Finally got the last of the parts for this guy. Kopaka was always my favourite toa as a kid, and his mata form remains one of my top 3 bionicle sets of all time.

As you can see the build sticks loosely to the colour scheme and proportions of the original, but with a much denser build that adds knees, elbows, a surprising range of neck movement, a lot more articulation at the hips, and an ab crunch. His weapons are all stored right now, so let’s get to them:

The shield slides easily onto either the fake gear assembly on the back or the open axle on the left arm, and the sword stores on the hip.

And before anyone asks, if you remove the nuva weapons, then yes he absolutely can:

Now, let’s get to that nuva stuff. Y’all have probably noticed the familiar extra parts on the feet by now, so I’m just gonna go ahead and show off everything at once.

As for why his nuva weapons are present at all, it’s because my goal with this MOC (and the other 5 I have renders of) to recreate the toa mata in this body type, while at the same time referencing the assorted other forms they’ve taken over the years. (Gali gets a couple of the orange pieces from her uniter form, onua gets some CCBS parts and bulkier, G2-style shoulders, tahu gets his stars sword and armour, lewa gets a phantoka jetpack, and pohatu gets a kohlii stick to acknowledge the movies).

Sooner or later I’m hopefully gonna pick up the parts for the whole team, but the other 5 are gonna be a long time coming, so for now the island of mata nui will have to make do with only one guardian.

If anyone wants the stud.io files for this or the others, by all means ask. (And if anyone is curious I can post the renders of the other 5 to give y’all an idea of what they’ll eventually look like).

EDIT: new-ish user here. How do I fix the images??

EDIT 2: think I got it.

[SonicBionicleMaster]

Take the pictures horizontally

[venort]

Given that the build here is fairly tall and thin, that would just result in a ton of dead space on either side of the figure. Any better alternatives?

[KAI_BORG]

I you’re using a phone/related, just give the pics a small edit and re-upload them, should realign 'em.

Also, holy heck! Love his design mate!

[venort]

@KAI_BORG Cheers! I managed to figure it out, although your solution was likely a little quicker.

And thanks for the kind words!! It lacks the torso articulation and sheer solidity of CallanLOF’s design and the spectacular toy accuracy (right down to the gear function, which still blows my mind) of Tributron’s, but on the whole I’m really proud of how this turned out.

Especially considering its pretty much my first non-system MOC in roughly a decade. (You can actually see bits of a couple recent builds in the background-- updated versions of the old X-pod sets.)

[Leoxander]

I love it, but the red pins kill my eyes

/s

[venort]

@Leoxander They were cheaper than black pins from the BL sellers I was using, plus I’ve honestly never minded them. They’ve always sorta just added to the tech-y feel for me.

[EmperorDuckie]

This looks awesome!

[venort]

Thanks! I’ve rejigged the torso (and… moved half way across the world) since these photos were taken, but a good chunk of his design stayed the same.

Actually here’s a render of his current self compared to his OG body, seeing as all my photos of him are on my phone:

[Ohgodrun09]

By any chance could i have the stud io file for one of your Toa
Mata? (I don’t care which)

[venort]

@Ohgodrun09 all of them have slightly different builds, but Kopaka served as a template for all 6, so have a kopak

[Ohgodrun09]

Thank you