Portal gun but it’s a pistol!
Let me start by saying I LOVE the videogame “Portal”, in fact I like a lot of the games Valve make, but “Portal” is just so clever it’s actually kind of magical (to me). One of the iconic guns in the game is the Aperture Science Handheld Portal Device (ASHPD) aka the Portal Gun. Although the Portal gun is ‘hand-held’ it’s still fairly meaty, so I got to thinking about how awesome it would be to have a truly portable hand-held Portal gun, or rather, one-handed Portal Pistol.
A Nerf Switch Shot EX-3 was sitting on my workbench, a completed mod I never posted because frankly it was so awful it would be like looking into the eye of Cthulhu (that’s really bad for those not up on their Cthulhu Mythos). I kept it there as a reminder of how NOT to do a mod, but decided it needed a complete makeover Portal gun style! For those who wondered the original mod fail was based on The Joker from Batman… the theme really couldn’t have been more apt.
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It’s a Portal gun, but it’s a pistol
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Right, onto the ultra portable (one-handed) Portal pistol. First up I needed the prongs, I looked through my Nerf parts junk bin, nothing, then I was hanging out some laundry…. wait a minute! These pegs looks AWESOME! Portal gun prongs found! Next up the nice blue glowing glass tubes, I found an acrylic bottle that fit snuggly in the Nerf Switch-Shot, cut the cap area off on the scroll-saw, then used a small cylindrical tube inside that, so it’s a tube in a tube. The central tube I filled with a cut to size piece of blue tinged transparent rolled plastic (made with pva and blue ink), this gives the inner portal tube a blue color when the LED light is off and a bright blue when it’s turned on. To be honest I can’t believe how well all the parts came together, it was almost magical how everything fit… there’s that Valve Portal magic again.
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Needless to say I fit a slide-switch bright blue LED light into the top end of the Switch-Shot so it can easily be turned on and off, I also put an Aperture decal on the end so when you’re looking down the gun you see it on the back. I may go back and add in the Portal prong wires, but I couldn’t find anything that would look cool. When I add them I’ll update with an image.
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That’s it ultra portable one-handed Portal pistol complete. Hope you liked it and if you use this idea, please give me a little shout out as I know no one else has done it. It came out of my brain, to share with you so help a struggling artist out with a shoutout! Â
Post written for GirlyGamer.com.au and fired to Tumblr and other social networks via an Aperture Science portal pistol.
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Addendum: To those ‘modders’ who stole this idea and tried to pass it off as their own… shame on you. You know who you are.
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WHATTHE!
I WANT THIS & I MEAN NOW!
IT LOOKS LIKE A LICENSED PIECE< THAT IS SO COOL!!
KEEP UP THE GOOD WORK GG
looks insanely clean. awesome.
just a question, your graphic elements? decals or a stencil?
Either or, dependent on the gun. On this one it was specialized decals.
excellent work. i should look into making decals. looking at the community so far, it seems that other modders generally avoid the use of fine graphic details altogether.
I just love them, a few people have commented that I’m one of the few modders who does and that’s fine with me, I like the detail they add 🙂
GirlyGamer, this miniature Portal Gun build is absolutely incredible! It makes me want to make my own attempt at it.. I was curious, what did you use for the front cap of the Portal Gun barrel? It looks like perhaps a piece of a toy gun or something? I may end up drawing up my own design in some 3D modelling software and producing it, but if there is an already-available alternative I would take it first! Once again, great build!
Hey Aratake,
thanks for the kind words. The front circular part is actually the internal part of a Praxis ammo cylinder. Hope that helps you in some way.
xx
Ive been working on an “Aperture Soldier” costume for a while now, and this would go with it SOOO WELL! Would you be able to make me 1 (or 2?) for a price? i dont think i can make something as crazy good looking as you.
Hi Christian, the only problem with this particular model is I haven’t seen it for sale anywhere since I bought mine years ago when it came out. Stay tuned, I’m sensing other Portal guns in the future. If you want a commission email me the details (Nerfenstein@gmail.com) and we’ll see what we can work out.
Thanks for looking!
What kind of LEDs/Switches did you use for the gun? Looks very nice by the way.
Hi Phemeto,
thank for the positivity! This was a super bright blue LED with slide switch, mounted in the inner most tube at the very back of the gun. It takes 3 tiny batteries and came pre-wired so it was merely a matter of mounting it this time, rather than having to solder it in like I did last time. I think I got it in a store called JayCar, but could be wrong as it was some time ago now.
I really love this piece i nerdgasmed when i saw it. But if I may so boldly ask would I ever be able to purchase one?
I take commissions, but I’m all booked up at the moment. If you want to commission a blaster prices range from around $100-$220 and you can email me at Nerfenstein@gmail.com with an idea of what you want and I’ll add you to my list 🙂
I’m starting to sense a running theme here. You find a franchise that gamer nerds like, find random stuff, glue it to a nerf gun, paint it and print out some stickers related to the franchise, and call it a “$franchise Gun Pistol Nerf Gun Mod”
Let’s hope your fall back plan of this being a gamer blog is better, because your quality of audience on an ongoing basis will decline rapidly if this is all you have to offer. You don’t even show the guns used in certain shows that you’re allegedly recreating, you don’t show before and afters, in fact, what you do show is heavily corrupted and compressed tiny images with your username watermarked all over it.
Really lame dude, really, really lame.
Adam you are a complete joy aren’t you? Leaving negative comments on my site must be fun for you, your parents must be so proud. If that’s what you think I do, that’s your call. You are the only person I’ve had be a total tool about my art, so I guess the few thousand other people who follow my efforts various places must either just be extremely nice or you my friend are the odd one out.
I believe I bring a new twist to each and every blaster I commit to, if you don’t see that, perhaps you can show me what you do? Oh and for the record, the reason the images are all the same size is for ease of use, they fit all social media sites and my blog, there is no huge conspiracy. I believe you are merely sour that you have not found the WIP images you wished to find (as pointed out in your other less than stellar comment elsewhere) and you are therefore peeved.
I’m not a ‘dude’ and if you think I’m lame, then the feeling is mutual.
This is amazing! this is my first time seeing your work, but i doupt it’ll be the last! amazing!
Hey you, thanks very much!
Nerfenstein-
I know I’m late to the party, but I fell in love with this pistol. Genuinely, it’s almost perfect, to the point I actually managed to get one of the Switch Shot’s from a friend (in exchange for an old DS game I had!) with the sole intent of making my own version.
What were the black bits made of on the end? The stepped… emitter… thing and the black end cap to the tube?
Also, would you mind if I asked what sized tube/bottle you used for it?
(if you still have it or remember what the pieces were ^^; )
Thanks in advance,
~twinbladeArisen
Hi TwinBladeArisen, The black bits of the end are black clothes pegs (plastic). I’m a big believe in using what you have and these were a great shape. The barrel exit / end cap is actually the barrel exit from another blaster I had laying around (a Lanard I think). The tube was a clear irrigation tube from memory, just measure the space in the blaster and you’ll know 🙂
Hope that helps.
Ah, thankyou 😀
I don’t actually own any other guns, so I think I’ll look out for a cheap one in poundland or something. P:
I ended up finding a few bits lying around, it’s not exactly the same but I like the way it’s coming together! i61#tinypic#com/hurkp3#jpg (no idea how this site reacts to URLs, so replace #’s)