I'm a huge fan of the video game Fallout: New Vegas. It's a vast, open world game set in a retro-futuristic post-nuclear-holocaust Southwestern United States. The story is long and complicated to explain, but the crux of the matter is that while the world engaged in nuclear war, many survived by living in underground communities called vaults. Once the fallout settled, the survivors left the vaults to pick up the pieces and re-establish society. It's a great game in a great series and I strongly recommend it.
Why do I tell you this? Because I'm replicating some of the props from the game! The characters in the game use salvaged bottle caps as currency. The soda they get the caps from is called- get this- "Nuka-Cola".
So I am making Nuka-Cola bottle caps.
First, I needed bottle caps. They sell unpainted bottle caps on Amazon, but my budget calls for things to be on the cheap side of free. I spoke to the barman at the restaurant we were eating at one Saturday and he was more than pleased to offload his bottle caps.
I had to get them the right color before applying the Nuka-Cola logo. This meant stripping off the existing paint. I did this with my Dremel and, after a bit of experimentation, I found that grinding bits work best for this over sanding bits and wire brush bits.
After several minutes, I had a nice pile of raw bottle caps ready for paint. (The edges aren't as important to get stripped, as we will see later.)
Following a coat of paint (which I don't have photos of) I carefully cut out and glued Nuka-Cola logos (found here)
In order to keep the paper logos from absorbing paint I coated each label with two coats of polyurethane and let dry before I moved on to the weathering. Weathering is one of my favorite parts of making props but it is one of the easiest to do wrong. I took my time, doing a little bit at a time. the trick to it is to apply a bunch of paint, let it sit for a minute, and then wipe the whole thing down with a rag. a little color will stay behind. I do this over and over again until I get the look I want. I used black and burnt umber for the bottle caps.
And there's what I have done so far. A small pile of post-apocalyptic currency. Just in case.
I also decided I should have a Nuka-Cola bottle, for good measure.
Yeah, that's the grail from Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade in the background. It's nearing completion
Anyway, thus concludes my Nuka-Cola making from Fallout: New Vegas. Let me know what you think!
-J
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