Overwatch has such a wide selection of cool weapons and gear, with numerous pieces on the list of props I’d like to make. I’ve spent plenty of time trying to figure out the mechanics of Widowmaker’s collapsible sniper rifle and visor, inspecting the finish of Reaper’s armour, studying the construction of McCree’s revolver. Last year, I took a break from prop making to focus on other hobbies, after having spent so long on my Witcher Swords build. While doing some game development, I wanted to practice making high quality 3D models, and this seemed like a great opportunity to do some digital prop work without having to commit to building a physical item. Tracer is one of my favourite characters, and her Pulse Pistols were the perfect choice for this project – small enough to 3D model relatively quickly, with a really cool futuristic aesthetic and interesting curved surfaces for some challenge. After a few days of modelling in Blender, I found myself scaling and printing blueprints, and now over a year later I have finally finished one of the more complex prop-making projects I have worked on.

With the blueprints correctly scaled, I fabricated the master with my usual process of layering MDF and styrene. I spent some time figuring out how to split the piece into multiple parts, so they would be practical for molding and assembly. For the curved surfaces, I cut a stepped gradient in the MDF, then shaped the curve with Apoxie Sculpt. Detail was added with styrene, particularly on the grip, which had numerous insets and bevels. The large discs on each side of the gun were cut from styrene and the raised surface built up with Apoxie.

For the upper shell, I cut the curved cross-section out of several pieces of styrene, and used them to hold the flat MDF surfaces together while I sculpted the curve. Once it was assembled, I cut out the excess styrene to give me a hollow upper shell that slotted over the main body of the gun. The sights were added using styrene, while the barrel was a modified casting from a previous project, and the shroud started as a piece of pipe built up with styrene and Apoxie.

Getting the master complete and ready for molding was the fastest turn-around I’ve had on any prop-making project, and mold-making was relatively straightforward. As usual, I used Smooth-On’s Mold Max 40, making 2-part block molds. I had to fill the hollow for the trigger mechanism to prevent the piece getting trapped, and the upper shell took a little bit of creative clay work, but once the pieces had been clayed up, covered in rubber, flipped, released and the second halves poured, I was ready for casting.

With most projects, by the time I’ve gotten useable castings, the majority of the work has been done – it’s just a matter of clean-up, assembly, painting and finishing. However, for Tracer’s pistols, once I had a pair of viable casts, the project had really just begun. Tracer is a time-jumping sci-fi test pilot, and this is reflected in the construction of her gear. Capturing this futuristic look meant going on a deep-dive into materials, finishes and electronics, which provided plenty of challenge and new skills learned.

The first dilemma was what the black parts of the pistols are made of. In all the reference and in-game observations, it is clear that these surfaces have a pattern or texture. I compared it with other characters, like Reaper who clearly has gloss carbon fibre armour, and while this didn’t match 100%, I felt that matt carbon fibre would give a suitable finish, and it certainly fits the futuristic style. I had previously worked with carbon fibre to make the shells for the Witcher Sword scabbards, but they had been purely structural, so this was my first time attempting to finish a carbon fibre surface to a high standard.

What followed was months of time-consuming work. Usually, whole pieces are skinned with carbon fibre, but I needed to skin parts of surfaces that would also have different finishes. In hindsight, I should have designed the carbon fibre parts as separate pieces, then joined them with the other pieces during final assembly. I ended up having to mask off the surfaces before applying the carbon fibre – using painter’s tape overlaid with aluminium tape, so neither the aluminium tape nor the epoxy would stick – removing and reapplying before each new epoxy coat. I initially tried sticking the carbon fibre to the smallest part by painting on a layer of epoxy and letting it cure to a tack before applying the carbon fibre, but the cloth lifted and I had to sand it off after it had cured. I settled on using Super 77 spray adhesive, which works well as long as it isn’t applied so thick as to soak through the cloth.

For the curved surfaces, I had to cut several pieces of cloth, fold them around the parts and blend them together at hard edges to hide the joins. I found that tracing the pattern onto greaseproof paper, sticking it to the carbon fibre cloth with a light mist of Super 77, then cutting out the shape with textile scissors worked well - preventing the cloth from fraying while transferring it, and helping when aligning the cloth to the surface. I left the adhesive dry fully before carefully removing the greaseproof paper, and ensured there was none visible on the carbon fibre before painting on the first coat of epoxy.

After working through several coats on the grips, I found that the epoxy was clouding, either because it had been sitting on my shelf for a while, or there was some moisture trapped when wet sanding between coats. I ordered some new epoxy, and switched to using surgical spirits to wipe sanding dust, and started again. I had also applied a first coat to the large front sections using this old batch of epoxy, and this showed some curing inhibition. It would have been a lot of additional work and materials to restart these parts, but luckily after a few days, a wipe of mineral spirits and a bit of sanding, these parts were stable enough to accept fresh epoxy.

Following a lot of trial and experimentation, here is the process I used for the carbon fibre surfaces:

1. Undercoat the parts in black spray paint in case there are any gaps in the carbon fibre.
2. Mask off the parts using painters tape and aluminium tape so that only the surfaces to be skinned with carbon fibre are exposed.
3. Stick the pattern onto a sheet of greaseproof paper, then stick the greaseproof paper to the carbon fibre cloth with a light mist of spray adhesive.
4. Cut out the cloth, leaving a reasonable amount of excess.
5. Stick the cloth to the surface using spray adhesive, cutting darts to help fold the carbon fibre around curves.
6. Where the shape is too complex to cover with a single piece of cloth, cut additional pieces and overlap at a hard edge or somewhere the join isn’t too noticeable.
7. Trim away some, but not all, of the excess. There can still be some movement of the cloth until the first coat of epoxy has cured, so it’s better to leave some margin for error at this point.
8. Allow the adhesive to cure, then remove the greaseproof paper.
9. Apply the first coat of epoxy and leave to fully cure.
10. Trim the excess carbon fibre to its final surface shape.
11. Remove and reapply masking.
12. Starting at 120 grit, sand the surfaces, taking care not to sand into the cloth (no black dust), wipe clean with surgical spirits, apply the next coat of epoxy.
13. Repeat step 12 through 240, 400, 600, 800, 1200 grit, replacing the masking every few coats to remove the build-up of excess epoxy.
14. Finish with a few fine coats of matt varnish to give a nice clear sheen.

When I got as far as 800 grit, I masked off the carbon fibre and spent some time on the adjoining surfaces, which had gotten damaged during the process. After lots of sanding, filling, masking and priming, I had these surfaces to a finish I was happy with, and went back to applying the final few coats of epoxy on the carbon fibre.

On my previous Mass Effect gun projects, I have used textured paints as a base for the grips. Tracer’s Pistols have no such texture on the grips, but appear to have a rubberized surface in the reference. After some research, I found that PlastiDip was a good option to get a suitable finish. I did plenty of testing on scrap pieces before committing to painting the final piece, to ensure I could get the surface exactly the way I wanted it – smooth, with no spatter or grain. As an aside, I discovered that blasting PlastiDip with a hairdryer as it dries creates an interesting cracked effect; not applicable for this project, but could be useful in the future.

With the grip sub-assemblies glued together, I masked off their carbon fibre insets one final time. The key to smooth PlastiDip application, as with any rattle can paint, is to leave it in a bucket of warm water before starting to spray. Put it back in the bucket if the can starts going cold, or if it stops spraying in a fine mist. Start spraying away from the piece, and move in smooth, even strokes, with a slight overlap between the lines of applied paint. I applied 5 or 6 thin layers of PlastiDip to the grips, allowing it to cure between coats. I had a slight accident after the final coat had cured, dropping one of the grips and leaving a small dent in the finish. With some careful masking and another coat or two of PlastiDip, the surface was returned to its correct finish. Before removing the masking tape, I scored along the edges with a scalpel, so that the PlastiDip wouldn’t lift when I peeled off the tape.

* * *

There are a number of transparent pieces on the guns, most being covers for lights - on the sights, along the sides, in the barrel and on the discs. These were straightforward to make – cut the shape out of clear acrylic, sand the inner surfaces to diffuse the LEDs and glue into position. However, at the rear of the gun, above the grip, is a curved translucent blue piece that presented more of a challenge. The normal approach to making such a piece would be to vacuum degas the rubber before making the mold, casting the piece in clear resin (like Smooth-On’s SmoothCast 325), and putting the mold in a pressure chamber while the resin cures.

However, I don’t have access to a vacuum chamber or pressure pot, so I had to look into other options. I considered forming thin PETG plastic over a buck, but I wanted a solid piece rather than a shell, so I started looking at viable plastics. I tried SmoothCast 325, but without a pressure pot, it cures too cloudy and full of bubbles. I bought some slow-cure crystal clear polyurethane, which required platinum-cure silicone molds (the Mold Max 40 that I use is tin-cure, so I had to pick up a separate pot of silicone). This showed promise, but my casts had too much curing inhibition to be useable. Eventually, after a day of working on carbon fibre, I poured some excess epoxy into the mold, and once cured, I was pleased with the result, with few bubbles and good translucency. The epoxy cures slightly yellow, so by mixing a drop of blue dye into a cup of uncured epoxy, I was able to get the correct cyan/turquoise tint. I kept the dyed epoxy in a separate cup, then mixed several batches of it with the catalyst and poured it into the mold to get a consistent colour across a series of castings. The epoxy burnt out the mold fairly quickly, but I was able to get a good pair of mostly bubble-free castings, with a few spares and colour variations.

After some sanding and reshaping to correct the fit, the final pieces were sanded with 600 grit sandpaper and sprayed with a coat of gloss varnish before being attached to the guns.

* * *

Once the guns had been assembled, all of the carbon fibre and PlastiDipped pieces were masked off and I gave everything a final clean-up with 600 grit sandpaper before basecoating with black spray paint. For the white parts, I sprayed on a few coats of khaki and cream acrylics as an undercoat, since white painted directly onto black can come out greyish, and I wanted a warmer, bright white finish. I airbrushed on the white, leaving it slightly uneven in places to act as the initial layer of weathering. The distinctive burn and weathering patterns were airbrushed on with browns and creams. In-game, the white surfaces have a shiny, reflective finish. I tested spray polyurethane varnish, but wasn’t happy with the results – curing wasn’t consistent, and its slight yellow tint was noticeable against the white. Eventually, I settled on Windsor & Newton’s gloss varnish for oils and acrylics. This went on in a nice fine mist when heated in warm water, and cured quickly and evenly.

The back of each gun has some stencilled detail – the number 39 and a series of chevrons. I drew up the stencils in Illustrator and scaled them to my blueprints. However, actually getting the stencils made proved to be a bit of an ordeal. None of the local print shops would run the stencils for me, claiming the pieces were too small (even though they had done smaller ones for my Carnifex a few years ago). I got the same response from a number of places I tried online, except for one store that quoted me over €30 for an A4 sheet’s worth of stencils. I tried tests painting the patterns freehand, but it didn’t look right. A colleague with a 3D printer came to my aid, printing off the stencils quickly and hassle-free. The chevrons didn’t print perfectly, but I was able to clean the details and fill the bridges that held the centre parts by hand after spraying on the design.

In my prop-making projects, I have tended to avoid metallic paints, opting instead to cold cast metal finishes. However, Tracer’s Pistols have chrome, reflective metals, and while you can polish cold casts to a shine, it doesn’t quite give the stylised look that metals in Overwatch have. Alclad airbrush metallics are popular, so I ordered a few pots, as well as their primer, gloss undercoat, and gloss varnish. Making sure the surface was clean and smooth, I airbrushed on the Alcald Microfiller and Primer, followed by a coat of gloss black. When this had dried I sprayed on a very fine coat of the Chrome for Plastics, and sealed it with a coat or two of Alclad Gloss Varnish. I weathered the barrel and shroud with Alclad Jet Exhaust to simulate heat discolouration. I found that going too heavy on the metal coat clouded the surface, with areas of white possibly caused by moisture in the air line.

I was very impressed with the finish of the Alclad metals, and it was exactly what I was looking for. I did encounter some issues though. Once the paint and varnish had fully cured, it had a tendency to dent and scuff. The denting may have been caused by too thick a layer of microfiller or gloss undercoat, and I had to strip and redo multiple parts. I have heard good things about the Alclad varnish, but even 2 or 3 coats wasn’t preventing scuffing or blemishes from handling. I guess it’s just something I’m going to have to live with on the finished piece – and it does actually add a bit of suitable weathering and wear to the finish.

The other issue was with masking the metal parts. After spraying some of the metallics, I masked them off to paint other parts. Removing the masking tape, I found that the Alclad varnish had picked up a frosted pattern – this also happened when resting the piece on a textured surface, such as cloth or foam. I had to revaluate my painting strategy, redoing the metals so that they were the last thing painted. Even still, some of the metal pieces have picked up some texture from the foam the guns rest on for display, weeks after the varnish has cured.

Once everything had been painted and assembled, I did a final pass of weathering with black and brown acrylics, adding some grease to the grips, and getting in to the corners so all the finishes sat together.

I started figuring out the electronics early in the project, and it was an ongoing process that I revised and solved alongside the fabrication of the guns. Initially, I was just going to use the same approach I had taken with my Mass Effect guns: ON switch for the LEDs, and a push button in the trigger to light up the barrel. But as with the rest of the project, I kept increasing the complexity to try to get as high quality a replica as possible.

The initial challenge was finding the correct LEDs. Standard blue LEDs are primary blue, while Tracer’s guns have a lighter, neon blue glow. I ordered several batches of “turquoise” and “cyan” LEDs that ended up being too green or too blue before finding the correct colour “Ice Blue” LEDs from Rapid Electronics. There are 23 of these LEDs in each gun that light up when the guns are switched on. In game, when the guns fire, they flash with the same blue light, with a core of white. To replicate this, each barrel has a central white LED surrounded by 3 ice blue LEDs, covered in a sanded piece of acrylic to act as a diffuser.

Tracer’s pistols are automatic, which means the barrels should flash rapidly when the trigger is held. I did some research into pulsing LEDs and found this circuit using a 555 timer. I tested this on breadboard and spent some time figuring how to balance this with the always-on LEDs when driven by a 9V battery. The resistors I had either had too high resistance, which caused the LEDs to dim, or got too hot for the confined space they would be in. I ordered some high heat capacity resistors, and in the finished piece mounted them in the most open part of the interior, with clips so I can remove them if there are any issues.

With this circuit ready to go, I decided that incorporating rumble motors might be a cool addition, giving some feedback when the triggers are pulled. The motors needed their own dedicated power source, so after plenty more research and testing, I settled on using a relay on the trigger circuit, which closes and powers the motor with a AA battery when the trigger is pressed.

Throughout the build process, I took into account what components would need to fit into the guns, and figured out where they would be mounted. I hollowed out a section of the front body to hold most of the electronics, with the majority of the space occupied by the drawer for the 9v battery. This battery, as well as the ON switch, is accessed by removing the plate in front of the trigger, which is held in place by neodymium magnets. There is just enough space for the battery drawer to clear the trigger and the grip – maybe 1mm either side.

The electronic components were grouped in sub-assemblies, which were wired into the central board. The rumble motor was mounted above the grip, and some excess material was removed from the upper body to give enough clearance for it to spin. I kept the spaghetti of wires to a minimum by grouping wires with heat-shrink tubing and gluing them in place, leaving excess at the ends so I had a bit of play when soldering and mounting parts. The timer, capacitators and resistors were soldered to the board, along with the wiring for the 3 parallel circuits – stable on LEDs, flashing trigger LEDs, and trigger to relay for the motor.

The AA battery for the motor was mounted in the main body of the gun, along with a switch for the relay in case I decided I didn’t want to use the rumble feature. Access to these and the board is through the mounting holes for the discs. These are held in place with magnets, and have pin connectors on their wiring, so the whole disc assembly can be removed if necessary. With everything soldered, I was able to glue the guns together, taking care to mask the electronics and lighting before painting and finishing.

Thanks for reading,

Terry