Following this morning’s reveal, Hasbro designer Sam Smith has shared the behind-the scenes-story and turaround videos for Buzzworthy Studio Series N.E.S.T. Bonecrusher and Ratchet.
“This was a surprise drop for me this morning, so I am thrilled to share a little bit about this exclusive segment for the Buzzworthy Bumblebee Program. Inspired by our NEST Bumblebee Jeep from last year, this was a continued fictional expansion for Studio Series. Utilizing some existing characters and vehicle formats that could fit into the visual aesthetic for NEST, we set out to deliver some unique designs and color schemes.
Shown side by side here, Bonecrusher and Ratchet were designed simultaneously to ensure that the used the same color palettes, fonts, and iconography in order for them to feel like elite team members when next to one another. While there is no dedicated story that these characters follow, it was a fun opportunity to “SWAT” out the pair of bots and vehicles, and get the chance to work with some of this earlier tooling that I had not had the opportunity to contribute towards. Overall it was a very fun execution and I hope you all enjoy them as much as I enjoyed working on them! Find out a bit more about each character in their independent posts.”
Source: Instagram
“One of the best ways to kick off the weekend is with some new Transformers drops, especially when they come as a surprise for our team as well! I have a couple of items to share, but we’ll get started with N.E.S.T. BONCRUSHER.
Now you may be asking yourself, “Wait, Isn’t this guy a deception? didn’t he die in Movie 1? Before N.E.S.T. was established in Revenge of the Fallen?” You betcha! So why is he showing up as an autobot clad in NEST colors? Because he’s in disguise! At least that’s how this character was justified as we planned him out for this program. While Bonecrusher does get defeated in the highway battle with Optimus Prime in movie 1, his character reappears in the desert battle of Revenge of the Fallen, so in some form of continuity, he is still around during the inception of the NEST program. Bonecrushers vehicle form as a licensed Buffalo Mine Sweeper is a perfect troop transport, so while we were identifying alt modes that might lend them selves to work for this segment, Bonecrusher rose to the top.
While establishing the deco for this character, I did want to ensure that he remained a deception, but perhaps he was doing a reconnaissance mission for Megatron. His fictional serial number on the side of the vehicle translates to “ALL HAIL MEGATRON” and a deception logo that is hidden behind his spare tire gets revealed during transformation.
The color palette for this segment was a lot of fun to work in, and it relied heavily on varying shades of grays and blacks. It also provided the opportunity to revisit Bonecrushers vehicle mode, and highlight a lot of painted detail in places that were not utilized in the original release. You will find a lot more lights on this vehicle form, as well as some intricate mechanical detailing on the robot mode.
Overall I had a blast working on this guy, and it was a fun deviation to work some storytelling into the pack, even if its only intent was to assist me in creating the deco spec. I hope you all enjoy him as much as I do, but be sure to let me know your thoughts below!”
Source: Instagram
“Ratchet felt right at home when looking for characters in this program. As a service body Hummer H2, he already shared a lot of the same vehicle aesthetics as the Hummer HX concept and the H3T used in the films. With a color palette established on Bonecrusher, I set out to make the SWAT team version of Ratchet.
Armed with his DOTM blaster which seemed like a more fitting accessory for the pack, Ratchet is clad in all gray and black tones, with a lot of newly allocated deco to ensure that he felt different from his previous releases. similar to Bonecrusher, I tried to get a lot more of the vehicle lights to be illuminated with paint in this version, along with some nice mechanical detailing on the robot mode.
Along with the NEST insignia on the side of the service body, you will also find a familiar numerical badging in the serial number on his door. “FD681 SR43” which references to “Fire Department 681” “Search and Rescue E4” which were his identifying markings from his various vehicle liverys used in the first 3 films.
This program was a lot of fun to work on, and I hope there are opportunities for more fictional studio series expressions in the future. What do you think of these characters, and this NEST program overall? Lets discuss it in the comments below!”
Source: Instagram
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Source: The AllSpark
