Sith Acolyte (SWTOR) and Darth Nihilus Masks

(Update: finished Sith Acolyte V3 and Darth Nihilus masks. See below for production photos)

Avolyte V3 (current)










Acolyte V2 (older):







Acolyte V1 (oldest):



Darth Nihilus from Knights of the Old Republic game:

LEFT: official game art - RIGHT, my finished vacuum formed mask





Original Post with production info begins below:
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Here is the mold skulpted out of Bondo. I used a resin thinner to thin out Bondo to make it more liquid (to cut down on the amount of sanding).



The second project is a Sith Acolyte mask from Star Wars The Old Republic game (left), which is still in its initial rough stage! This one I will not be able to vacuum form as there will be too many sharp angles and tiny details (which will not come out well, unless I use an exremely thin plastic). I'll keep you posted!

Darth Nihilus Version 1. I got the middle ridge wrong, and am reworking the mold to make it more accurate. I decided to hastily paint this one anyway to have an idea of what the final product will look like.

Progress on the Sith Acolyte mask. Basically, the whole thing is sculpted out of bondo over my custom original bounty hunter mask mold (shown in another post on this forum, which is also made out of Bondo). The mouth and nose pieces are shaped with scrap HIPS strips, and bondoed over.

Right now the process is sand (using both orbital and oscillating sanders with 60 grit paper), apply more bondo diluted with an acetone thinner, more sanding, rinse and repeat. Starting to take shape nicely, I think.

Going to build up the edges to give a few degrees of a rise for when I get to the vacuum forming stage (if I end up vacuum forming, that is).

Progress:

Reworked mold to a more accurate head shape:







Vacuum formed test mask (.08 HIPS)







Im going to use 0.06 guage styrene for the final mask, to have more of the detail come through. I'm also going vacform directly over the mask itself (with the original mold underneath that for structural support) to form a slightly larger mask. Out of that second mask, I will cut out the "tiger stripes" and glue the two masks together to give it that sharp "carved" tiger stripe look as seen in this picture.



Last step will be to do the diamond and middle ridge above the nose out of separate pieces of plastic and glue them down.

Here is the second version of Darth Nihilus with accurate middle ridge, formed out of 0.06 HIPS next to my ANH Alternate/Hero Hand Guards that I also molded from scratch.



One last thing to modify on the Nihilus mold - the top "ribon" crown thing, and the mold will finally be done!

A pile of work all this is; easy this is not!

Acolyte mask nearing completion:

Formed the mask on the right first, and then formed the one on the left directly over it so that they fit on top of one another perfectly.





Here are the two masks fit together. Like a glove!



Now, did a rough sketch of the patterns using a sharpie on the bigger mask.



Once I cut them out, I will superimpose the two masks and end up with a nice "carved" look...... In theory lol. I tried copying as much detail as I could see in the trailer screen shot, and imagined the rest. The guy from mywickedarmor has done this mask too, but i did not want to copy his detailing for obvious reasons.

Taking forever because I'm doing 5 projects at the same time.

So here is the mask with 90% of the detailing completed.





Going to add middle forehead ridge next, and fix up the joints where some of the detailing pieces connect together.

Added the forehead ridge, trimmed the edges and used plastic putty to smooth out the detail transitions. After it's dry, will sand the putty.

Mask completed! Changed the color
Scheme to dark grey/metallic silver. The reason for this is that after the last post's pictures were taken, I used a clear sealer on the mask that for some strange reason ended up darkening the colors significantly. Didn't like this at all, so repainted the whole thing.









Painted and sealed the inside of the mask as well to make everything look clean and fresh, and put black mesh material behind the eyes (not nylon) which works better than nylon.



So there you have it! Since I have the mold too, I can replicate this mask any time I wish - which means I can make myself an army of Sith Acolytes; the shape and size would be the same, but the detail patterns would all be different since they would be all done by hand.

Tarchinoko said:

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looking pretty good! by the mould do you mean youll use your current one as a buck for more pulls?

I have the original mold I made out of Bondo to pull over (pics in an earlier post), so any subsequent masks will also be made from using that as a buck.

The mask is made of two layers: the first is pulled over the bondo mold, and the second is pulled directly over the first pull to create a slightly larger mask. This second larger pull is what I draw patterns on, and cut the detailing out of. It makes is easier to glue to the mask, as the plastic naturally conforms to the mask shape.

I could technically do the detailing out of poster board; it's more flexible than HIPS, and would still achieve that "carved" look, but the carving would not be as deep (and sharp) after painting as using my method of double layering.

Here is the beginning of another mask