Monday, April 15, 2013

A Real Wonder : The eFX Nautilus Replica


Two days ago i was able to finally open the box with the eFX Nautilus replica that arrived for me in Paris one year ago - and that i didn't open yet as i was not in France. 

Good lord, this four foot - 1m20 - long Nautilus replica is incredibly awesome! A pure masterpiece from Nautilus specialist Scott Brodeen! Unbelievable, really. The quality of details is beyond expectations and it includes miniature furniture in Nemo Grand Salon as well as everything inside the wheel house, both with lightings! 

Harper Goff and Tom Scherman would have been proud of Scott's work and i share with you below some pictures of this amazing wonder! Note that on some pictures the Nautilus hull color is a bit darker than the painting which is a beautiful dark bronze color. 
















The window on the left side has the lightings and you can see through it Nemo Grand Salon with miniature furniture wonderfully done.







The other window on the other side also has lighting with the famous "iris" closed.




Scott placed dozens of thousands of rivets - the famous Nautilus rivets - which in "reality" are supposed to be there to fix metal plaques. So Scott had the genius idea to also sculpt some fine separation lines to give the feeling of these metal plaques fixed one next to another. Also, as you will see on the next pictures all Nautilus details and elements are absolutely perfect.














Scott Brodeen also designed a beautiful stand in plexiglas inspired by the Nautilus style. We cannot thank enough Scott Brodeen and Bryan Ono, eFX CEO to have produced such a wonder, a real treasure for all Nautilus fans.



As i told you the replica has a beautiful dark bronze color but Jean-Marc Deschamps, a good friend of mine who is a huge Nautilus fan and a master model maker, wanted his copy to have the rusty aspect that the submarine had in 20000 Leagues under the sea. So he did customized his copy with real rust and you can see the result below - and more pictures before/after in the article HERE. Great work of aging, may be a little bit too rusty for me...



...even if the Nautilus in 20000 Leagues under the sea is really rusty too!



Bob Martin, another Nautilus fan also owner of this amazing replica also did some changes and here is the video in which he show his work.




This eFX Nautilus replica was a 300 copies limited edition sold $1799 and is now out of stock at eFX but those of you who would like to find one can still find some brand new on eBay at "reasonable" price HERE and HERE. But if you don't live in the U.S be prepared to pay a huge shipping cost as the box is too big to be sent through regular post office and sellers can't send it in another way than with Fedex or UPS.

Pictures: copyright Alain Littaye, Jean-Marc Deschamps