Female Toa of Fire MOC - Toa Kar

[MasterJedi2014]

##GENERAL INFORMATION:
I made this MOC because I wanted to recreate a friend of mine in a BIONICLE style. She likes the Fire Elemental power, likely because her favorite colors are red and black (I never asked for the real reason why, now that I think about it…), which is why this is a female Toa of Fire MOC with a red and black color scheme. I tried my best to actually recreate my friend’s body in as accurate a manner as I could in LDD, but I feel like it still is a little off. I feel I could have made a better torso if LDD had all on Generation 1’s parts, but unfortunately for me, it does not.

The model itself is based off of a particular photo I have of her, wherein she is wearing jeans, leading to the design choice of slightly bulky legs for the MOC. The pieces of armor I chose to use for the torso were chosen to best represent the clothing she was wearing in the photo. The torso itself took the most time to design out of the entire MOC, as I didn’t want to misrepresent how my friend’s body is built, but also had to make a completely custom torso that wouldn’t fall apart if it were made of real plastic and put under stress. I did try out the concept of hands with fingers, but I feel like the hands themselves ended up being too big for the rest of the MOC. As I will not post the original picture I primarily based the MOC on, there is no way for you all to evaluate how close I came to remaking my friend with this MOC. However, I would like to know how the MOC looks in general as a female Toa MOC.

The MOC would stand about 224 mm tall if it were a real model. It is made of a whopping 298 pieces, about 46% of which are in the torso alone. The colors used in order of most to least used (Surface Area wise) are Dark Red, Bright Red, and Black, using Metalized Silver in the weapons.

##CHARACTER INFO:
NAME: Kar (Pronounced car)

TOA TEAM: N/A

ELEMENT: Fire

EQUIPMENT:
–1 large Knife in each hand (I know my friend has at least one pocket knife, which is why the MOC has knives as weapons); The end of the handle/hilt (I don’t know which fits, given the size of Kar’s knives) of each knife can be used as a bludgeoning weapon if so desired.

PERSONALITY: (Kar’s personality is going to be based on my friend’s personality, and is not supposed to be identical to her’s) Enjoys having fun; Generally keeps to herself around people she’s not friends with, but is more open and nice around friends; Can be a little sarcastic at times; Kar can have a fiery temper if ticked off; Can sometimes blame herself if things go wrong, and doesn’t always believe in herself; Can encourage others who are doubtful of themselves, though.

KANOHI: Given that I used the same HF helmet for Kar that I used for Kova, I am going to say that Kar has the same Kanohi as Kova, that being the Great Mask of Reprogramming.

##PICTURES:

EDIT: PLEASE HEAD DOWN TO A FEW POSTS TO SEE A BETTER VERSION OF THE TORSO.

I have included a lot to help give everyone a better chance at seeing how Kar looks from many different angles.

Front view:

Kar’s calves are custom-built, by the way.

Aerial front right view:

Right view:

Back view:

Top view:

Pose 1:

Pose 1 right view:

Pose 1 left view:

Pose 1 aerial left view:

Pose 2:

Pose 2 front right view:

Pose 2 right view:

Pose 2 back view:

Pose 2 left view:

Running pose right view:

Running pose front view:

Rendering engine used is BlueRender. You can find it here.
Any and all constructive criticism/feedback is welcome.

[Omega_Tahu]

The chest is really bulky…

[MasterJedi2014]

As I stated, this is built to look as much like my friend as I could get it. I feel the torso should be about half of a pin hole taller, but I couldn’t achieve that with satisfactory results for the rest of the torso. The torso armor should protrude from the front of her half of a pin hole less than it does, but that wasn’t possible to achieve, either.

[BlueCel]

Oh boy, female or male that torso is too round for a Moc with such tiny limbs and head.

[Ned_Flanders]

The torso is an oval…

Everything is pretty good but I really just don’t like the torso design.

[Payinku]

There’s a lack of finess, causing the appearance of the moc to suffer.

The tiny head doesn’t fit the build at all,
The arms are too basic,
The colors bleed together into a red mass,
The limb connections with the torso are too thin(frankly speaking, those hips ain’t alright), causing the limbs to feel tacked on, as well as cause them to appear smaller than they are,
Also the textures clash,
As well I’m not fond of the torso build,
And the weapons are rather underwhelming.

[Saxton]

The legs are kind of cool, but the rest is really meh. The torso is, especially.

Overall, the MOC has no specific shape or texturing, making her look like a pile of red parts. (She also NEEDS good color layering IMO)

But, most importantly, the MOC, after reading the description, I assume is female, so try and go for a feminine shape. The MOC is way too wide/ bulky to appear female.

4/10, Average work here IMO.

[MasterJedi2014]

That all makes sense. I’m in the process of revising the torso, but I might have to completely redesign it. I most certainly wasn’t even thinking of texture consistency when building the torso, though. Thank you for bringing that to my attention, as I can clearly see how that detracts from the appearance now. All of the rest of the criticism has been helpful, too.

However, in regards to how simple the arms are, I prefer the simple nature of them because they look more like the original photo. I prefer using parts like what I used in the arms anyway because I prefer how they look over a custom arm at this scale.

In regards to the head, I honestly can’t think of anything to replace the current one with that won’t look even more out of place than the current one. Any suggestions would be helpful.

[Sciencegiraffe]

The head and arms aren’t scaled well to the rest of the MOC.

[JonBlueFire]

It looks good; as you’ve said with the picture thing, we really have no right to judge how accurate it looks!

That said, however, the torso does look to wide for my liking. In my opinion the two red parts directly underneath the visor pieces should be switched to some thing else. Also the leg connection to the torso, I feel, should be more closer together.

The custom calves look good, and the rest of the MOC works for me.
Overall it looks well put together and planned out. Nice work!

[MasterJedi2014]

I managed to come up with a torso that actually looks better, is structurally sound, and a little more accurate. Again, thank you all for your feedback, as I feel new set of eyes helped me see inaccuracies in the MOC that I didn’t see when making it initially. Alright, so the torso is now 1 pin hole taller, and no longer looks as much like a brick. I have also recolored some pieces here and there on the entirety of the MOC, getting rid of all traces of Bright Red except in the 2M Axles. Most of the torso from the breastplates up hasn’t really changed too much, but most of the rest has either been moved around or replaced. I have also tried to make the textures a bit more consistent, but if I still haven’t succeeded, then let me know.

I’ll now address the primary critiques. A lot the critiques fall under the ones I’ve replied to here as far as I can tell, so that’s why these ones are here.

@Saxton

try and go for a feminine shape

I don’t pay too terribly much attention to body shape with my friends, as I’m not friends with them for that reason, but I did go and try to determine how inaccurate the initial torso was. Turns out my friend has a slight hourglass figure, slight enough to not cause me to think the initial torso design was too off, especially since she was wearing somewhat loose clothing in the picture I was referencing. I have tried to add a slight hourglass figure to the new torso, but not too much of one. I have also kept the torso armor from being form fitting, meaning that from the front, the MOC doesn’t have an obviously feminine shape to it.

@Sciencegiraffe

The head and arms aren’t scaled well to the rest of the MOC.

The arms are proportioned better lengthwise now that the torso is a more accurate height and now that I have done away with the articulated hands.

@Payinku

The arms are too basic

There just isn’t enough bulk in my friend’s arms to warrant custom arms that will just end up looking worse at this scale than the ones I’m already using. The upper arms are ever so slightly too bulky, actually, but they don’t look too inaccurate, so I’m fine with them.

@Payinku

The limb connections with the torso are too thin(frankly speaking, those hips ain’t alright), causing the limbs to feel tacked on,

I tried to remedy this a little by adding some parts onto the tops of the inner thighs, but that’s the best I could do for right now. I don’t like it either, so I’ll keep thinking of different ways of fixing the hips, as my current solution slightly hinders mobility. In regards to the shoulders, though, they’re thinly connected because a bulky connection is too inaccurate.

@Payinku

And the weapons are rather underwhelming

Sorry, but those are here to stay. They are more accurate to my friend without asking her for input. I didn’t ask her what weapons she wanted her BIONICLE form to have, as this was made simply because I happened to be thinking of her at the time I started construction. That’s not to say that she doesn’t know that this thing exists, as I have showed her a version of the MOC with the initial torso design and a color scheme that matched the clothing that she was wearing in the picture I used as a reference when making the MOC.

@JonBlueFire

Also the leg connection to the torso, I feel, should be more closer together.

I would like to change the hip design, but if they were closer together, that would look too inaccurate, so I’m stuck trying to make the hips look better while not changing their width or hindering the range of motion of the hip joints themselves.

@Payinku

The tiny head doesn’t fit the build at all,

I can’t think of a solution to this that looks good. I agree, the MOC needs a slightly bigger head, but I can’t find a way to make a good looking replacement for the head. If you or anyone else has any ideas or suggestions for one, I’d be happy to hear them.

Onto a couple of pictures of the new torso:

Default Pose:

Pose 1 (Posed according to another picture of my friend):

[Lugztina]

Hey, you never know guys. It’s pretty accurate for a fat chick !!

But yeah, anyways, good job on slimming her down (weight loss). In all honesty, she doesn’t really look like a model at all. She actually looks like to me an average woman. Which is fine I guess for a citizen or something. For a warrior, I think she needs to be slimmed down a bit further in some areas.

All and all, it’s average. 6/10. At least it’s not a stick but I think she can use some more trimming down.

EDIT: Didn’t mean to call your friend fat and all.

[MasterJedi2014]

This has definitely been going more for an armed citizen look than a warrior look, so I’m glad to hear that it looks like that.

[Xevins]

@MasterJedi2014

her favorite colors are red and black

You have cool friends.

---

The MOC is kinda blocky but it is still better than what I can make.

[MasterJedi2014]

With the original torso, the new torso, or both?

[MasterJedi2014]

Huh. I’m not seeing it with the new torso, but okay.

[Mrblackpants]

The torso kinda looks like a big box