Help! Foam costume questions

Hi all

I'm working on a War Machine suit for halloween but I'm having a lot of trouble cutting the foam pieces where it has to be 45 degrees to adjoin other pieces (as instructed by Stealth). They come out quite jagged making the final product, when hot glue together, look like there's gaps in the seams. Does anyone have any cutting tips they can recommend? Or is there some sort of filler material I'll be able to use after wards to make the seal the seams?

Much appreciated!

Good luck. I've been asking that question for nearly a month now, and I can't get an answer that is useful.

So far, I've been told:

1) Use a longer blade
2) Use sharp blades ( duh )
3) Use a $20 45 degree foam cutter ( USELESS, don't bother )
4) Use scissors ( you think your cuts were jagged to begin with? LOL )
5) Use a box cutter
6) Use your teeth
7) Use magic

I'd love to know how ALLLLL these people cut their foam so perfectly. I've tried everything myself, and have wasted far too foam. Halloween is fast approaching, and I've got nothing done on my Iron Man costume. =(

All people can tell you is what works for them, you do not need to be rude about it, be thankfull you have had people try to help.
Not you will probably find this usefull because either you can do it or you cant, but all I do is score the line you are wsanting to cut lightly with your knife then simply hold the knife at an angle and cut again 2 or three times, each time a little harder, doing it this way I can 45 degree cut I have also been able to get 60-70 degree cuts aswell. I would gladly video myself making a cut like this if you want. This way you will see you don't need any fancing cutters just simply the one knife.

1. Depending on how thick is your foam too.
Cutter is good for 10mm foam, X-acto is good for 6mm. For 8, sometimes I use smaller cutter blade.
2. Practice, practice, practice (on scrap foam, don't waste it)
3. I enjoy angle cutting using scissors now. As for jagged edge, try not to snip it, instead slide when it is almost the end of "snip". Jagged edge normally happen on curved angle. Burn technique might help to clean it up (see my tips thread).
4. Helagak's tip on marking the angle cut will also help in giving the distance between actual cut line and the actual outline, so it can be a guidance on the blade angle while cutting.
5. While writing this, I saw familyman already post his comment just before I hit submit. He also got a nice tip on cleaner join (which is the goal of angle cut too).
6. If you're using bondo, don't worry about making it perfect. It'll be perfected by bondo/filler anyway.

I am working on an Iron Man as well. What I did was use scissors to make a rough 45 degree angle cut then used my dremel, with a polishing stone bit, to smooth that edge and sometimes make it even more defined depeing on the part.

This is my first time as well and didnt think to use the dremel until into a few peices so will probably start over. It did waste some foam but considering I can get a large roll of it at Big Lots for pretty cheap I wasnt too upset. Practice makes perfect and dont be afraid to try different things. If all else fails cut out the peice again and have another go at it.

familyman said:

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All people can tell you is what works for them, you do not need to be rude about it, be thankfull you have had people try to help.
Not you will probably find this usefull because either you can do it or you cant, but all I do is score the line you are wsanting to cut lightly with your knife then simply hold the knife at an angle and cut again 2 or three times, each time a little harder, doing it this way I can 45 degree cut I have also been able to get 60-70 degree cuts aswell. I would gladly video myself making a cut like this if you want. This way you will see you don't need any fancing cutters just simply the one knife.

I think one of the issues is, this is one of those techniques that must be passed on visually. And there really isn't very much in the way of foam building on Youtube. Or noone really expands on the tricks etc in those videos. They kind of just assume everyone knows how to do it properly and breeze over it.

I just barely did my first foam pep project, and although I definitely am not an expert, I ran into the same problem. For me the solution is to always be using a sharp blade. A really sharp one. Either get a new blade once the edges become jagged, or sharpen your old one (I use some 1500 grit sandpaper to sharpen mine. 3 passes and it cuts like butter--but only for a few inches. So when I'm doing careful angle work, I re-sharpen every 10 seconds or so).

Triton said:

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I think one of the issues is, this is one of those techniques that must be passed on visually. And there really isn't very much in the way of foam building on Youtube. Or noone really expands on the tricks etc in those videos. They kind of just assume everyone knows how to do it properly and breeze over it.

It's called trial-and-error . . .

Do you honestly think that everyone simply picked up a piece of foam and did it perfectly the very first time ?? While there may be a small handful of people of whom this may apply, the VAST MAJORITY took the time - and utilized patience - in working through the process until they arrived at what worked best for them.

This is exactly what YOU have to do - that is, if your intend is to build your own costume. Otherwise, I am sure you can find someone who might be willing to help build pieces for you - for a price.



Either way ... learn to communicate with a bit more respect and work on your patience level.

you could watch Laams video on making iron man's shin and slow down the video while she's building it to see how she did it?

Thanks for all the responses everyone. I appreciate all the tips and I guess the one thing I wanted to be sure of was that I wasn't alone in my frustration. I guess I've watched all these amazing youtube videos of people cutting foam with ease that I thought I must've been doing something wrong ha ha.

Right now, I'm currently sharpening my scissors every few cuts or so (with aluminum foil). That seems to be doing the trick for now. Maybe I'll pick up some sandpaper when i run out of foil lol

Hopefully when I seal / paint it will hide some of the imperfections. If my costume doesn't turn out too crap maybe I'll even post some pics of later on.

Thanks again

STEALTH said:

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like I said, you need look at yourself. The fact you don't see how rude you are is beyond comprehension.

if you're that picky, then it's you.

don't blame the advice people have given you. You come off so unappreciative

Look how many people have completed suits. There are tons of them.

Cutting foam is not rocket science.
You're extremely overcomplicating something so simple that even beginners have been able to pull off.
Just use some common sense.

I don't need to take any of my own advice because I've never acted like a spoiled brat who needed spoon feeding like yourself.

Im also new at this foam costume making. But what i do is i trace my pep files on the foam then i put some line marking or dots on the side that needs to be on 45 degrees. then i cut it directly on the foam. If it still doesn't fit well,i sand it a little bit with a sand paper or use a dremel sander. I hope this can help you. I want to post my works here but i still don't know how to post some pics here. hehe. Good luck. :-)

Ericqueen said:

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Im also new at this foam costume making. But what i do is i trace my pep files on the foam then i put some line marking or dots on the side that needs to be on 45 degrees. then i cut it directly on the foam. If it still doesn't fit well,i sand it a little bit with a sand paper or use a dremel sander. I hope this can help you. I want to post my works here but i still don't know how to post some pics here. hehe. Good luck. :-)

Yah I'm doing this too now. Between this and the super sharp scissors there's a vast improvement. I think I can start working on the helmet now without making it look too badly ha ha

Just a tip from my own experience too. Make the helmet last. Your foam skills will be twice as good by the time youve made the whole thing, and the helmet is the thing people look at the most. Start with the simple and less obvious pieces. The forearms, hand shields, boots etc.

Hey all, thought I would pop in with my 2 cents on the subject. It's really fascinating to me how something I take for granted can be so hard to explain or articulate. I guess I will have to make that tutorial after all...

Bevel cutting, or 45 degree cutting is something I have been doing for nearly 15 years now. When I was taught the technique it was still fairly unknown because foam fabrication itself wasn't regarded with the seriousness it's given today. Essentially there are 5 things that give you the cleanest cuts and the best results:

1 - The sharpest blade, or newest blade. Don't use a blade you've been cutting with for a while, get a new one, it will help tremendously.
2 - make sure your cutting on a surface that you can cut deeply into, this will help you to ensure you get clean cuts because you're not doing multiple passes to complete the cut.
3 - Take your time! Relax, take breaths, and be fluid! This one is harder then it seems, ever notice how you have a tendency to hold your breath when you're concentrating? Breathe...being fluid, or cutting in one motion is what helps the line be clean. If you start and stop, each time that edge will have a little jagged cut point, so try to cut the line in one continuous cut. I know it's harder then it looks.
4 - Practice! Practice! Practice! I can't stress this enough. I spent more then 6 months on this subject alone when I first started cutting, but even today I find new techniques from reading about the trials and errors of members here. If you think bevel cutting is heard, wait till you get into "v" cutting or creating lines in foam with blades, now that's hard!
5 - Finally, and this is really important, have fun! I know how impatient you can get to see the finished piece, but if you aren't enjoying yourself, then all this stress to get the cleanest lines will make you give up before you even start! Trust me on this, the more relaxed and enjoyable your cutting environment is, the more likely you will get cleaner cuts.

Oh there are some other little tips too, Cut away excess foam from around the piece your cutting, give yourself some room to rotate the piece as your cutting, instead of you rotating. Start and end your cuts beyond your lines, (about an 1/2" or more from the actual line your going to cut) and then cut off the edge completely, the more you clear foam away from what your cutting, the easier it gets to start and end clean cuts. There is literally hundreds of tips I could talk about, but lets not overwhelm the newbies.

I promise I will make a video to demonstrate all this, but I have to get some guns out first. Is anyone in the LA area? I've done foam workshops before, maybe I need to do one on just cutting alone. Would anyone be down for this? Ok I'll get off my soapbox now...

Scissors worked fine for me as well, I guess you got the trick after practising a bit

Some pretty good video tutorials, so that you can actually see how it should be done:

Foam Technique Tutorials
(youtube links at the thread)