Alternate suggestions Re: Light up hallmark spaceships????

I can make some suggestions that were brought up long ago and far away.

One of the things I thought about but never tried seriously in gaming was
using blacklites. If you find the day glo or florescent modelling enamel, you
can make ships' parts that will glow interestingly under blacklite, even with
moderate ambient normal lights. One problem is, on a black table top, dust
will ususally glow, likewise. Also, there are some florescent fish lines (I
don't know why not ALL such) that glow brightly, and would make neat 'lay of
shot' strings between ships.

I've put dots on what would be portholes, and always thought
drybrushed-over-black would be the way to make engine nozzles look
right.

Another trick I've thought about, but never even gave a try was light guides,
either fibre optics or plastic cylinders. Got the idea from a McDonald toy
that had a light guide that took a sharp bend from the top of it's head to the
center of it's canine 'face'. With the right overhead light, the eyes glowed
wickedly.

Natch, if you go with electrics, putting a small bulb in the center of the
fig, and using light guides to distribute the light to the surface would
probably be the best idea. Shouldn't be impossible. I'd think the biggest NSL
would be the place to start.

Me, I'd look for a toy spaceship with LED's and just try to snaz it up for
the tabletop... ;->=

I don't necessarily have the scratchbuilding skills to construct such a thing,
though your ideas are interesting. I was wondering if the already existing and
available electric star trek ships (I use Federation ships from Star Trek in
Full Thrust games) could be made to do their thing on batteries rather than
plugged into the wall by a light string.

I doubt it's as easy as this, but could you cut the wire that goes to the
light string, and solder them to a couple of batteries taped to the stand and
have a lighted ship on the table?

> --- devans@uneb.edu wrote:

***
I doubt it's as easy as this, but could you cut the wire that goes to the
light string, and solder them to a couple of batteries taped to the stand and
have a lighted ship on the table?
***

Sorry, the prices on some of the Hallmarks would seriously daunt me, though
I've picked up some on after-Xmas sales at costs not out-of-line with
prepainted ships.

I'll have to look; if they have separate little transformers, no problem. If
they use AC power, then problem.

I just have never used any on trees yet. Wanted enough to do a whole
Sci-Fi
tree. ;->=

The_Beast