Arming My Self

The armor for Reina is coming along swimmingly, with very few bumps *frantic attacking of trees and tables and any other knocking-on-wood surfaces within reach*
A temporary update on how it looks not on body yet (from about 3 weeks ago):


And here are pictures of the gauntlet templates:





Once the arm is glued up and dried I will do an up to date full body test with pictures.

Thou Shalt Not Stain Thine Cosplay

It's like a second Christmas today! I got my fabric packages within minuets of each other.






I left my breastplate under a stack of books last night to dry, with a scrapped together puzzle of extra foam jig to stretch the vinyl around the raised "ab" area.






Only thing is... There was some sharpie... And... TwT *sniffle*






Well here's the back:





At least the technique worked PERFECTLY. If I can't get the stain out or work around it when I airbrush highlights, I have lots of extra fabric and can make a new one.
I am become 'ze proud papa!

Sticky situation

So I got started with gluing the foam and the vinyl together. First I used the weldwood cement to laminate three layers of foam together to get the thickness I wanted. Then I used my paper templates to cut out the armor pieces in foam.



(sorry its sideways)

Then fit check:



This is a basic idea of what it will look like. Also very basically this is what the gluing process looks like (if you are interested in the process itself, go to Goldy's tutorial page. I have a link to it on the right):



And this is what it will look like!



EDIT: I forgot to mention! That DAP Weldwood cement stuff is NOXIOUS. I got a massive headache from it even though I have plenty of ventilation. It's hard to avoid smelling it when you are doing teeny tiny cuts and your face is 6" from it, so I highly suggest putting on a respirator! I just grabbed the 3M one with fume cartridges that I use for sculpture...

Very Little Armor

Separately, I am working on a Reina cos from Queen's Blade for Otakon this year. I am using the vinyl-over-foam technique to make the armor. A list of great sites with tutorials on how to do it are:

Goldy's Tutorial

Cosplay.com's Forum

And a great step-by-step with pictures

Here is my progress so far with making a plastic wrap body-double of my legs, and the paper template of the chest piece:

I have a feeling that there will be a big learning curve with the glue and the foam.

Zooming towards Zenkaikon at DBZ speed

I had only intended to make these cosplays for Charlie and Art for Otakon, but because a few friends expressed interest in Zenkaikon, I decided to fast-track them and get them done in time for that! Then, I can work out any kinks really early rather than have a mid-August disaster. So today I ordered the orange and blue fabrics for Charlie (Goku)'s costume, and Art (Vegeta)'s navy spandex. My wig will come from my next paycheck and I will be going as Bad Launch. It will be my first time styling a heat-resistant wig on my own, so I will update my misadventures on that when it gets here.

Charlie and Art are PERFECT for Goku and Vegeta! Art is 5'3" and Charlie is 5'11" (just a little taller than Goku's 5'7") which are the perfect heights for this:

Also, they are both extremely talented martial artists so maybe a display of male prowess is in store?

I personally picked Launch over Bulma because she is done so little. I really like her and her badas

s self!

The wig I am planning on using is this one, plus alot of Farah Fawcett flipped out curls and wig hairspray.

Kotaku

I'm on Kotaku!

http://kotaku.com/5602048//gallery/gallery/

Good Gawd, Gundam!?

I am officially nuts...

Otakon is only two days old and I am already thinking of my next outfit that I want to make. I just found out that NY Anime Fest and NY Comicon have merged and will be held together on October 8th and I want to have something new done by then. And it just so happens to be...

A Gundam Musume version of G Gundam's "Shining Gundam".

I already know what I am making it out of and have a few ideas on how I am going to make it the best Gundam Girl EVER.

I am using a modified respirator with LEDs in the vents for the face, this crazy makeup tutorial for the eyes, the fingertips of the gloves will have LEDs in them for the Shining Finger attack. And I am trying to convince my friend to go as Domon in a black stretch vinyl bodysuit... Haha, thats probably going to be the hardest part!