What's up with Hydraxon's chest plate part?

[Distorted]

In official media (including the Toa Mahri CGI movie and the actual box/instructions art) Hydraxon's silver chest armour piece is depicted as a slightly different mold to the existing Piraka foot part which is used for his feet. It's a little more curved and smooth at the edge. Of course, inside the set itself is just a regular silver Piraka foot. 

I'm curious as to whether this new mold was ever planned for actual production, or if it was just an odd quirk of Hydraxon's set prototype that somehow made it into official media. (It's interesting that the Hordika foot got a slightly new mold that year too, for Maxilos' chest piece...)

Does anyone know the story behind this weird 'lil situation?

[Xboxtravis]

Obviously there is some sort of rendering error there. Unreleased piece? Or just an oddity of the 3D model that was not on the final set? I have no clue, Bionicle has some pretty bad render goofs in the early years anyways so its not entirely surprising. Lots of clipped geometry etc. that would be impossible to recreate in real life (not to mention the bending knees on the Toa Mata and Toa Nuva in their product renders that was impossible on the real sets or downright cheats such as glowing eyes on Matoran sets that lacked actual eye stalks). For example:

Or one of my favorites the 2003 Matoran that had glowing eyes in set art where the real set had no glowing eyes, and often the glowing eyes were placed in the wrong place and not covering the actual eyes of the old Tohunga head piece! (Something about the Matoran from 2003 makes me think they were digitally enhanced photos of the real sets though since they have mold markings and other details the CGI renders failed to capture, but its still funny to think that somebody on Photoshop had to go in and give them eyes where they lacked on the real sets) 

BTW the modified Hordika foot made its first appearance on Kalmah in the Barraki wave. 

Edited October 5, 2020 by Xboxtravis

[Master Inika]

I have noticed this before,  and it must either be an error or possibly prototype.

Hydraxon's is more interesting than the other IMO, because the others still display the parts themselves correctly, just not lining up right. This is the only time I know of the part itself looks noticable different.

[Xboxtravis]

11 hours ago, Master Inika said:

I have noticed this before,  and it must either be an error or possibly prototype.

Hydraxon's is more interesting than the other IMO, because the others still display the parts themselves correctly, just not lining up right. This is the only time I know of the part itself looks noticable different.

Its not the only time a weird piece shows up in official set images that is not in the actual set, Nidhiki's disk launcher in promo photos is a different mold than the one used in the final set. What is interesting is Nidhiki's official images were taken as photos of the real Nidhiki set, not renders like later titans were (the tells are lots of details like molding lines, injector pin marks, small Lego lettering are all visible on the official art which most of the rendered sets lack). So it means Lego had created this part, photographed it; then changed it before final set release. 

Official Art: (note the extra mandibles on top of the disc launcher)

Actual released set:

[Distorted]

@Xboxtravis  Pretty entertaining that the '03 Matoran's eye glow didn't line up with their actual eyes - I'd never noticed that!

I think this being an accidental rendering error seems less likely, because both his feet appear as the standard Piraka foot - surely a rendering problem would affect all three parts? This is the case for both his glossy box/instructions art and his alternative render. Plus, I can't help feeling the new smooth, rounded shape gives off the same 'high tech submarine' vibe that some of the Mahri's parts also had (particularly Jaller's mask and chest armour, Nuparu's shield, Matoro's shoulders etc) which suggests the design is intentional?

As a side note, I'd also argue the examples in your first post don't seem to be accidental rendering errors, but deliberate marketing artistic licence to make the sets look more appealing. Of course, it's also possible that this part is artistic licence too and was never really intended for production - but if this was the case, you'd assume similar 'fake' parts would be showing up on set box art more often?

It's fascinating to see the slightly different launcher mold on Nidhiki's box art - another thing I've never noticed. It does seem more likely that Hydraxon's renders are based on his set's prototype (which I don't think has ever been leaked, right?). (Turns out there are Hydraxon prototype photos out there, but the only ones I could find use the standard Piraka foot. Hmm...)

But still, it's not totally unexpected for a slightly different prototype of a brand new part to make its way into set art/photos, especially one that serves a launcher function like this - the designers had to work out the kinks. It's a little more unexpected to see a slightly different prototype of an existing part, no? And it seems even more unusual for that set to feature both the existing part and the new alternate version?

My hunch: they wanted to include the new alternate version of the part in the set, but creating a new mold for a part that basically already existed wasn't feasible for Lego's budget. Perhaps they decided they could only afford to produce one modified mold for the new Hordika foot rather than two. We do know that bonkle in 2007 got some cuts to story and sets (hence why we only got 4 small box sets that year) so maybe this mysterious prototype was another casuality of that whole sitch. I'd love to know the actual reason, though!

A few lil observations:

• The alternative part also shows up in the Mahri CGI movie, although it's hard to tell if his feet are still the standard Piraka foot too
• The comics drawn by Stuart Sayger seem to show the standard part as the chest armour (hard to tell with Sayger's art style)  but the Hydraxon's Tale bonus comic drawn by Christian Zanier shows the alternative part. Which begs the question; was each artist using the actual set, the renders or possibly the prototype set as a reference?
• I forgot Kalmah used the part first; but I believe each year's sets are all designed around the same time, right? So, it could be they designed the part for Kalmah and then reused it for Maxilos; or they designed it for Maxilos and reused it for Kalmah. (Interestingly, two different Kalmah prototypes (including one with dope Pakari shoulders) use standard Hordika feet.)

 

Edited October 6, 2020 by Distorted

[Master Inika]

I never actually noticed the Nidhiki thing. That's pretty cool. But nevertheless, it is possible it's just a prototype of the original piece that was changed for the Vahki art but not Nidhiki's.

Distorted makes a good point--the Hydraxon chest armor looks similar to his helmet, so they might have wanted at some point to create a new version to look more aquatic for him.