For this installment of Dio in a Day, we’re taking a look at how you can build your very own Black Series Jabba the Hutt Dais. For first time readers, the focus of Dio in a Day is to scratch-build custom sets out of ordinary items for the purposes of photography or display and to have it completed in about a day’s time. As always, my goal is to get creative and have a good time. Things like film accuracy and durability… pssh. Who needs those?
On to the build!
As we all know, Jabba’s dais is the throne he lounges on when it’s party time at the palace. I’m sure it’s not helping his metabolism any, but having Jabba elevated above the crowd is absolutely essential to the character.
We want this:
Not this:
The core of this build (and it’s a 2 out of 10 on the simplicity scale) is the green dry foam used in artificial flower arrangements. They come in bricks and you’ll need four of them. The craft store I frequent sells a six-pack for just $4.99. One thing to note is that you do not want to purchase wet foam. Wet foam looks very similar to the dry kind that we are using and can easily be mistaken for it. Wet foam is intended to be used with live flowers, so the foam is designed to soak up water. Any attempts at painting will most likely be a horrible disaster — just ask my scratch-built Sarlaac puddle.
Besides cost, the other benefit to using the green foam is that the blocks are pretty much the perfect size scale-wise. You will need three full blocks and a fourth that will be cut to make the edges, as they are less than half the width of the full blocks.
The dais has some interesting angular cuts on the top surface, but as a 2-ton space slug covers most of it, I’m choosing to simplify things and leave the bricks mostly as-is. Once accessorized with blankets and Carrie Fisher, you’ll hardly be able to notice.
Using a hot glue gun (or ordinary white glue if you don’t mind the wait), assemble the three full-sized foam blocks and the two smaller segments so that you have one large rectangle.
When the glue is dried, make a diagonal slice down each corner. The dais has rounded edges so we want to mimic that. Green foam is very soft and porous, so you can use your fingers to simply round off the corners.
One reason to choose dry green foam is that it looks like rock once painted. You don’t have to spend much time with texturing. Jabba’s dais did have a few extra dings and dents in it, so before you apply your glue wash, you may want to take a pencil (or any pointy instrument) and give it s few extra marks so it’s not so uniform all the way through.
The next step is to create a glue wash using 2 parts water, 1 part white glue (like Elmer’s). We want to coat the entire throne with this wash besause it will not only strengthen the structure, but will also allow us to paint it without it soaking up too much paint.
Now comes the waiting…
The most time-consuming aspect of this build is the wait time. The construction takes no time at all, but you have to allow the glue to completely dry before you can begin painting, so be patient. I tend to do my washes right before I go to bed at night, that way I know it’s ready when I wake up in the morning.
Once the glue is dried, you can begin the fun part of painting. I cover the throne in a very light brown and then, once dried, add a wash of brown mixed with black to the entire surface. I generally like to do a few different washes as I hate things like this looking too uniform, so I add an even darker wash to areas that I feel will get more wear and tear.
And now wait some more…
Gargoyle heads
If you’re a stickler for accuracy, one of the more difficult things to duplicate is that of the six gargoyle heads on the sides of the throne. I found a few cheap dinosaur heads that may have worked, but as I needed six of them, it became a bit more than what I wanted to spend. Instead, I opted for a $2 pack of textured beads and a pack of plain rings found in the jewelry-making aisle. The beads already have holes that can accommodate the rings without any required drilling and the size is right. I know that this dais will be at the back of my display, so they won’t be noticed much at all.
Using a pair of needle-nose pliers, bend the wire rings to fit the bead holes. No glue should be required. Once attached, give them a quick spray with black spray paint. After the paint has dried, the beads can be glued to the throne with hot glue.
Optional railing
If you purchased the SDCC version of Jabba, then you’re lucky to already have the railing that sits behind him. I regretfully went the retail route and had to make my own.
Again, most of this won’t be seen, so I did it cheap and easy. I cut two pieces of scrap polystyrene foam to the overall shape of the rail and then used my soldering iron to cut out the various holes and markings. After I had a shape I was happy with, I hit it with some brown paint and the same brown/black wash that I applied to the throne.
And that’s it! You can accessorize with any scraps of cloth you have laying around.
This project only took about 2 hours of actual work time and cost me less than 10 bucks. I’d love to see an official release some day, but until then, this should do quite nicely in elevating Jabba above the other scum and villainy.
Thanks for reading!
