It’s little over a week till Halloween and I’m starting out with my costume. And it begins as it always begins, me on the floor kneeling and crouching. Today I used my free time making patterns for a dress. When making costumes, I always start from basic patterns. I have two or three different sizes on my closet fit for me and Yoki. It’s quick to pull them out and start cutting and taping the wished forms from them. Personally, I hate going through piles of magazines in hopes of finding close enough patterns. Sometimes it might be quicker, but my short temper rarely bends on this matter.
Next to making rather easy patterns and cutting the pieces out, I sewed the bust and started to dye the sleeves and the hem for the dress. I’m not sure if my take on the dyeing process will work or not, or rather will the colour stay after first wash. What I’m using is antique grey Dylon dye intended for washing machines, which I found when going through my mixed supplies, but I’m not going to stick with the normal routine. I’m just messing the fabric with the dye free hand. Does anyone have any ideas how to make the dye stick? I might try ironing to attach the colour after the pieces have dried. But still, I’m not too convinced that the colour will stay; at least it will get lighter. Then again, it’s a Halloween costume. I don’t know will I ever use it in other circumstances. For future projects this could be taken as a learning process.
The mossy and decomposed dress in making belongs to a girl, who gave me few nightmares back in the days; Samara Morgan, “misunderstood” kid down the well. She is also typically associated to a ring type thing and a video tape. There are two western versions from two movies obviously. I chose the first one. I think I haven't even seen the second. According to Youtube the "second" Samara is more spider like, quick and evil thing.
If it’s not crazy cold, I’ve planned to take my little girl out for a stroll for local Zombie walk... even if she doesn't practically eat brains or any random body parts.
In order to make sanding less time consuming and muscle wrecking we purchased a sander Octo and a rotary tool Cotech. Yeaaahhh!
Octo is very handy when it comes to sanding bigger parts and creating shapes. And because of the small dust bag there is less candy blue powder flying around. It still exist, though. One of the downsides is that it tickles like hell when you're holding the piece which is being sanded, making it impossible to keep your grip and your po-po-po-poker face for long.
Then Cotech. It's a multitool like Dremel, only lighter version. It's bit smaller and significantly cheaper. It's very helpful when crafting holes, details and well... smaller things. Hiron might know more about the tool than I do, because it has become her best friend, even if the small blue waste is trying to po-po-po-poke her eyes when she's crafting.
Both of them came with instruction manuals. I thought to bring up few essential points from my point of view or in other words; how I interpret the instructions.
1.Do not operate power tools in explosive atmospheres.
-Anywhere near Hiron when she's in a certain state of mind: focused, frustrated and fierce, that's for sure. Or all of the previous combined.
2.Use safety equipment.
- Safety equipment? What are those? Does my scarf count as one, when I use it as a respirator? Just kidding.
We have real respirators, few weeks ago we got goggles and gloves we have used almost always. Less injuries, more bandage for binding.
3.Stay alert, watch what you are doing and use common sense when operating a power tool. Do not use a power tool while you are tired.
-Common sense was lost as we started cosplaying and we would never ever work while being tired, right.
4.Do not overreach. Keep proper footing and balance at all times.
-Yes, we're always standing on a roof top and trying to reach an object which is hanging in mid air at least two meters away from us, loose our balance and fall down. In some chases we're sitting on the floor in non-ergonomic positions. How can you overreach when you're holding Octo in your right hand and armor part in your left?
5.Dress properly. Do not wear loose clothing or jewelry. Keep your clothing and gloves away from moving parts.
-Next time I have to remember to wear my wetsuit, at least it's not loose, and buy one for Hiron too.
-yoki out
I have a story about my buckle search. Usually I would rip buckles out from old belts or bags or find ones from flee market, but because I needed two identical ones I thought to visit my favorite fabric store in town. At the moment I stepped in one of the clerks, a familiar one rushes to whisper me how small bugs have invaded their shop window. And she also informed me that our window suffers the same invasion. I promised to pay attention to that when at work. After she had showed me the insects and told me where they were located on our shop window, we started to go through small containers and jars searching two similar buckles. We found a rather nice looking pair. Wrong color though, but that would be easy for me to fix.
When I was paying my purchases, the clerk asked me what I was doing. I answered something like a case. She nodded approvingly and stated that it figured. I was like… Okay. How buying two buckles..? Well, I didn’t over think it, I was too happy about the discount of ten percentages!
From each pair there is un-weathered version for comparison on the left.
So I had some painting to do and while I was at it I painted the shoe buckles too. I chose the color to be the same in all of the buckles. Next to straps the case project made progress with travel stickers. They were just printed on photo paper and glued on. I slightly slipped from the reference pictures, which were not too coherent to begin with. Mystical stickers just popped up for few frames and then vanished. My sin was to determine which of the stickers were simply there and in some cases alter the shape of the stickers slightly.
I might finish the surface of the stickers with satin varnish. I tried hair spray for some peculiar reason, but it came out too glossy. I just need to first make a test run. I have no idea how varnish will react with printer ink.
After that the only thing left with the case is the attachment at the top. I actually tried something, wasn’t pleased with it and trashed it. The concept is still good, the execution just wasn’t. I think I was bit tired and my mood was too driving to succeed. But I think I will find a nice state of mind soon enough and finish this one case shortly.
Or at least our residences. We are now officially back with Snowtroopers, which materializes in sawing, sanding and gluing Styrofoam. Even if I had dark thoughts about working with Styrofoam again, I feel revived now. Maybe I was prejudice. Last time I had to hurry and almost be hasty when making molds for the armor, thus gathering tremendous amount of stress. Now I can take our time. Only thing that hasn’t change is my hate towards the waste; fine, static dust which can penetrate through socks, shirts and even jeans! Even if you vacuum the workspace thorough, it’s still there. Even if you try to vacuum your clothes, it's no help. That stuff will be everywhere.
Next to fixing the molds so that they could hold few more rounds with "vaccu" or vacuum forming if silly nicknames are forgotten, we are constructing the backpacks for our Troopers. I dropped the back piece from Yoki’s debut with the costume, because making it might have totally destroyed my nerves. I still think it was right decision, not only because my mental health but also because my understanding of making three dimensional objects from sheets of material has notably improved.
Also it’s a lot easier to work with the costumes now, thanks to our recently purchased power tools. Seriously, go get some power tools! Lighter versions of different tools can easily manage tasks of cosplayer's needs. Would you believe, that sanding is starting to be fun with little Octo! I’d love to share the experiences with our sanding and carving helpers, but Yoki will write about our new friends in near future.
I made a quick trial with fake leather or more commonly pleather while waiting my suitcase to “dry” the other day. And what do you know, the test run proved to be more than I expected. Go acrylics!
I painted thin layers on black, stretchy pleather. I made one test with paint where I had added Medium to just to figure out how I could use it in the future. The whole Medium thing is new for me, but I know it should add some flexibility to the paint. On the down side it will also make the color diluted. After I had let the paints to dry I really put them to test. I stretched the small piece of pleather as much as I could and for my surprise nothing happened. The paint endured the punishment really well. The were no cracks at all. And what’s the greatest thing, the texture of the pleather will remain visible! I will use acrylics on pleather on the accessories for Luminara and Barriss, so there won’t be strain on the pieces. I would love to try out how the paints would hold on shoes or larger areas.
Smaller details on the buckle and the larger area on the scrap piece are with Medium. Color used was copper.
The title seems to be the thought behind my current project. But gladly, when talking about cosplay cheap doesn’t always mean bad. For cosplay, cheap could be lined together with words like innovative, clever or challenging. Well, I don’t know, but for me it has worked well. All together I have spent something like thirty euros to my project. For that money I have managed to construct almost all of the small accessories and pants, bought shoes and acquired most of the materials for a jacket. That’s what I need to start next besides polishing and finishing the items I have already made progress with.
The prop I’ve been putting together is a suitcase. This far I have used cushion board from recycling stack from my work place, half a meter of black cotton, beige curtain fabric from discount, pieces of dark brown pleather, some black rubber band and twenty four studs with glue and acrylic paints. I still need to attach slings, travel stickers and buckles and it should be close to ready.
Making the suitcase has been surprisingly easy. With the measurements you need to be accurate and at times you need to wait glue to dry completely before you can go on, but next to those and using massive amount of tape, piece of cake. If I ever need to do similar prop, I think I will choose poster board instead of cushion board. Some of the inner edges came up little untidy because the board got pressed in. Good thing is that the areas are inside the case and don’t show much.
Now that I think of it, I don’t know why I made the suitcase as operating one… It has never been opened in the series… Damn. Well, for me suitcase is functional even if it’s drawn. And now I have place where to put my stuff at conventions.
Studs for corner pieces painted and weathered with acrylic.
The solution is making your own ribbon from scrap cotton and sewing it on the pants before putting them together. It sounds elaborate, but is well worth it. I made stripes which were 0,5 centimetres width. Wider stripes should be easier to pull off and narrower ones should also be possible. I will post later how to do them. I just need to make samples before that, because I didn’t took any pictures when I was working on the pants.
To fill my evenings I’ve been working on a single project and I thought to reveal how I’m planning to execute the look of colonial shoes by adding buckles to regular women's shoes. This is low budget one, because I had all the materials I needed to prepare the buckles. If you have glue gun, scrap poster board, something moldable and hair pins you are on the winning side.
First you need to pay attention to the shoes you are purchasing. In these types of women shoes there are two possibilities. Either the band on the top is solid part of the shoe or it’s attached from the side seams. For this project you need to buy shoes where the band is separate from the shoe to tuck the pin under it. I found my perfect pair from flee market for six euros.
When you have your shoes, it’s time to start with the buckle. Take measurements from the shoes, study your references and draw a frame on poster board. I made the inside of the frame just fem millimeters bigger that the height of the band. When you have cut out the frames, it’s time to bend them. Dampen the poster board a little, but not too much. It will start to fall apart if it's too wet. Then place it on a slightly curved surface. I put the wet frames inside a cylinder plastic container and placed a glass jar over them to prevent them to recover their original shape. Then it’s time to wait for the frames to dry.
For the attachment I used regular hair pins. First you need to shorten them to desired length. Make it so that the back of the pin is aligned with the inner height of the frame. This way it will sit on the band correctly. And use heavy duty pliers to cut the pins. You might ruin your scissors with them. To attach the pins hot glue the straight side to the frame. Use some help equipment and try to get the pin sealed inside the glue. I used my fingers when the glue was little cooled down. Use your own judgement with how you do it.
For making the buckles three dimensional I used the molding material, which I might have given bad reputation on my previous posts (I still hate the smell). First I made sausages out of the stuff and wet the surface of the poster board slightly to make it stick. Just a tiny bit of water is enough. You don’t want the frame to loose its shape. Pay attention to it while you smooth out the surface. Again water is a helpful aid. When you are satisfied, let the buckles to dry completely before going on.
To finish the buckles sand them with fine paper. Clean the surface from dust and you are ready to seal it. I used basic wood glue, which I applied with wet brush. Gesso might also work. Seal the back side around the pins too.
I gave the buckles a base color, but didn’t finish the paint job because I’m still going trough references to make a conclusion about the coloring. Acrylics would work well and miniature paints if you want to be waterproof. For finishing touches I would recommend weathering and perhaps coat of gloss.
Notes: For the pin attachment you could use some other glue, even epoxy. I used hot glue because I like the quickness of it. If you are working on a bigger buckle, you could seal the pin inside a piece of ribbon or fabric. It requires more space, but will be much firmer solution.When sketching the frames look at your shoes and see where the band is placed compared to the place where the shoe bends. This will affect the shape and size of your buckle, because it would not be comfortable for you or the buckle if it was on the way when you walk.
I thought that I’d open up how Joxter and Muddler photoshoot was planned and how everything turned up. We actually filmed all the material the same time with the photos I posted over a week ago. But because we had just uploaded a video on Youtube, we decided to publish Joxter and Muddler later.
For me the day started at 7.15 AM. After some breakfast I prepared base for the make-up and started with the eyes. I only did upper eye lid and without mascara, because I was going to put on the contact lenses at the destination. The nose I left also to be done later. There would have been nothing left after few sneezes. Then I smashed my hair under a wig cap (or the crotch part of tights) and slide my newly styled wig on. I don’t know was it the damp weather, lazy styling with only hair spray or my habit of getting sleepy in cars, but when we started to shoot there where zero flipped ends on the wig.
When I had packed my two cameras, medicine for my lovely flu and make-ups I headed to Yoki’s. When I got there I first put together the denial signs we were going to use as props. I was bit surprised that Yoki hadn’t done it. When I got in I ordered Yoki to do her base make-up and at that time she revealed that she had some problems with the wake up call. In other words the alarm never set off. Eila followed our routine with patience, which was nice, because it caught to me too. It was a blessing that we had gone trough everything the previous day. The costumes were on hangers and in good condition. We packed the car while Yoki was preparing herself and took off little past nine. Pretty well, we had scheduled the departure for nine.
After two turns I asked about our shoot script fromYoki and I think she answered with some mild curse word. It had never been printed. Eila was ready to turn the car around, but we decided to trust our memories. We had gone trough it few times, so it wasn’t a challenge for Yoki to write it down on a back of a trivial invitation we found from the car.
At ten we arrived at our destination. We unpacked the car and started to finish the make-ups. Yoki put on her contact lenses first and had to take them off right away. For some reason they weren’t comfortable to wear, so Yoki decided that she would go without them. Mine were alright, they didn’t bother me. We need to see if there are scrathes on the lenses if Yoki plans to wear them again.
My costume is really quick to put on, so I went outside before hand to map out the places where we could shoot. When Yoki was ready we changed the script the first time. The landlord of the neighbour farm was driving around with his tractor, so we had no choice than to first shoot the takes which could be muted. Then we moved on to the next bulk of takes, in which we needed the aid of Eila. Particularly on take, where the camera turns to follow Joxter and Muddler. It’s on purpose identical with one take on the Snufkin video. The order of the takes changed a bit and we were able to shoot some that we had planned for later.
Drunken style Moomin.
When we were eating lunch we ended up deleting one take from the script. It would have required much work compared of the importance of it. Actually the whole thing worked better with out it. We only had left two different situations and about six takes. Eila also got her chance in front of the camera! After the filming part was wrapped we moved on to photos. And after that I took photos from Yoki for her graduation thank-you cards. They surely are different from the assumed.
Before we took off the costumes we went to say hello to the neighbors. They hadn’t seen us even if we shooted only twenty meters away from their house. They were pleased that we paid them a visit and really exited about the costumes and the over all concept of performing. Here you can see the difference in attitudes towards cosplay between generations. Adults, well, older adults seem to be more open and appraising than you could think of. But then again they are not usually familiar with the scene good and bad included. They view cosplay as crafting and creativity of a person. The neighbours laughed at us, but that was because we looked funny, not because they wanted to downgrade us.
When we took our costumes off it was time to investigate how much damage was taken. There where slight pain on my toes. It was manageable, not as bad as after Tracon. Some make-up had worn out from my nose, because I forgot about it many times when I felt like sneezing. About my wig I already mentioned, so nothing more about that. Yoki’s whiskers had endured the shoot well. Thank you Mastix, you are great! The next time I need to focus on applying it, though. Yoki let out some bad words when she had to rip the scalp off, which I had glued on her hair. The biggest damage or the part that had suffered from the shoot the most has to be Yoki’s shoes/socks! They were black not only from the bottom put also from the top and soaking wet!
The only thing left was to pack and head back. We went to Yoki’s place for the editing and got it finished before the day ended. I think I got home at 11 PM. In all the day had went as expected. The shoot took little over five hours and editing about three with breaks. Oh, and Yoki got a flu. I don’t know was it because of me all the soggy wet socks. That can be counted in the casualties still.
Wow, it's been over a year of existence for our blog. Somehow it hit me when I thought back to my Bubblehead costume and posts I made last Halloween. Yoki was as puzzled as me about the matter, but she doubted that it was only a year. Well, maybe Yoki’s conception of time is different from mine, but all the less, one year… So dear readers, I dare you to comment, because a) I want you to, because we get way too few comments and b) you could tell how we could improve our blog on its second year. Is there any layout problems I haven't thought of? Or content ones? I know thanks to all mighty Analytics, that we have Finnish readers. Would you like to read the posts in Finnish?
Now back to the topic which is Halloween. I think I might be bit early with this one. Last year I started the costume a week before and didn’t have any problems with time. But I had a day off. What an excellent reason to mess yourself with bodypaint and toilet paper!
My head looks weird.
As you can see my theme for Halloween is again undeadness. I haven’t done zombie make-up before, so I went and tried it. What you need for this type of a result is glue, which is not harmful for your skin, like school glues and ones you could think children can safely play with. When you have applied glue on your skin you cover it with sheet of toilet paper, from which you have ripped off the straight edges. Crease the toilet paper a bit, apply more glue and stick it on your face well. More texture you get out of it the better. Then you let it dry, about 15-25 minutes, depending how much glue you have used.
After the glue has dried you can apply desired make-up. I used white and black water soluble bodypaints from Grimas and fake blood from the same company. Before I started with the gluing, I prepared my skin with heavy moisturiser, that being Bepanthen. I thought it would protect my sensitive skin. Well, good thinking, but it also made it impossible to put on any make-up on the particular areas, because it would not attach. So, which ever suits you better, both have downsides. But glue will still stick, that I promise.
The add-on is easy to take off with the help of water. Suitable glues for thi project are water soluble. Or you can rip it off without any assistance. It will sting, especially around the hair line. Use moisturiser afterwards and don’t be shy with it.
As a conclusion, with little tweaking I think I’ll have nice, undead look for Halloween. And cheap one too.
Joxter and Muddler are now viewable on Youtube. This was really nice project to work with, even if we had few bumps on the road. Again the music is from incompetech.com by Kevin McLeod. Great man, I must admit. Enjoy!
After this there will only be two more Joxter and Muddler themed posts. One will be an upload announcement and the second a report from the photoshoot. Once they are out, I feel like I can leave these characters to be. I’ve gone through and through with Joxter and Muddler, so it doesn’t bother to move on. I’m quite sure that we will cosplay as them again, because they are timeless and it would be neat to have a big Moomin group someday.
These photos were taken on our hotel room when were at Tracon. We imagined how the characters would act in a place like that. Muddler would naturally be curious about anything and Joxter would take advantage of all the “free” stuff.
I’ve been searching information about leather works for quite some time now. I’ve found some results in English and in Finnish, but the over all picture of how to actually do it is still little blurry. And somehow I don’t feel comfortable with the whole thing. I mean, that I’m not sure if I’m ready to learn it or invest in it. And the leather should be bought “new” if I’m not wrong and I really try to avoid using leather if it’s not recycled. But then again our next costumes include leather details and accessories. So I went and tried something.
This is the result of mixing book making methods with fake leather. In all the materials are cardboard, glue and pleather. I’m pleased with the first attempt. It doesn’t look horrible at all and with little upgrading the result should be fine.
The first piece is made from leftover pleather. I’ve purchased more suitable fabric for next try out, but before I move on to that I think I’ll try painting the first piece. I’ve hear that acrylics could work. If anyone has any information or knowledge about this I’d be grateful if you shared.
Back to the test lab then.
Yesterday evening we ended up talking about Luminara’s and Barriss’ capes via Skype. We haven’t yet found right fabrics for either one of them, mostly because we would like to buy close to right amount. The fabrics we have thought to use are not from the cheapest end. That is why we need to make the patterns and estimate the consumption of the materials. Barriss’ cape is rather easy task to figure out, but Luminara’s has taken more brain work.
We were going trough some references on our own when I started to think aloud how the sleeves on the cape are accomplished. Yoki was silent for a while and then she said, “I think it’s-“
“Shut up, you are confusing me!” was my friendly answer and I went on with my guesses how the cape was constructed.
In English from up: "There's the corner which has been lifted up. It forms such a nice small pocket."
After some minutes Yoki sent me a picture, stating, “See, this is what I meant.” I stared at Yoki’s draft and didn’t understand a thing. I got another picture and still no light bulb over my head. “I’ll show you”, Yoki turn on her webcam, grabbed her towel and started draping it on her. I was like, “Yeaaaaah! Now I get it… Actually, you are right about that!”
“Really..? Am I? Yeaaaah! I’m right about it!” was Yoki’s happy counter reaction.
"See?"
I gave Yoki few well earned compliments and said I’d try the idea out with bigger piece of fabric to come up with the whole pattern. But it should be easy; the sleeve construction was the part which bugged me.
I underestimated Yoki, because usually I’m the one doing patterns and layouts. But in this you see the great thing about cosplay, the development. You can get better at things not realizing it yourself. You only need some airhead, stuck on her ways to show to.
