Another Captain America TFA Costume thread? You bet!! (NEW PICS!)

Another day, another Cap TFA costume thread on the RPF.

I'm pretty new here (started lurking about a month ago) and have enjoyed discovering this awesome community. By manner of introduction, my name is Don and I have started the process of assembling the necessary items to put together a Captain America TFA costume.

All of the information on this site has been extremely helpful in formulating my plan. I have been in contact with several members who have and are getting me some of the custom items I need.

I'm not doing anything really groundbreaking or revolutionary - just taking bits and pieces of information to aid in my plan.

I've decided to go the HelloCosplay base costume route with the intent of plussing it up with rubber stars, real leather accoutrements, etc. I'm sorry I missed Finhead's helmet run, but it looks like there are other options out there.

I'll post some of my progress - like I said, it won't be anything extra special, but just maybe something I do can inspire someone else like I've been inspired by so many others here.

Re: Another Captain America TFA Costume thread? You bet!!

My intent is to go screen accurate (up to a point). I'm picking and choosing the items I'm going to drop money on and what I want to take on myself. I am definitely working with a budget.

I'll start with the HelloCosply costume I ordered. I had read in previous threads where members were able to get the back of the costume customized to be more like screen costume. I went for that option but unfortunately, they screwed it up. For whatever reason, they made the under tunic/padded abdomen piece in gray material (I asked for the back to be blue and the front and sleeves to remain white). They are taking care of the problem. But the costume is a pretty quality piece for the price in my opinion.

For the shield, as much as I love all the aluminum ones I have seen here and other places, I've opted for a plastic Disguise shield (unfortunately, I discovered the Airsoft shield too late). It really just comes down to my budget. And I wanted to take on the challenge to see if I could customize the shield look metal and be battle damaged. I really dig the look of the battle damaged shields and I'm going to take mine even further than the screen prop.

Since the plastic shield is flimsy, I made a bracket system (where I will eventually attach leather straps) to make the shield more rigid. I used the styling cues of the metal shields brackets but had to make some modifications to make sure the shield stayed rigid. I sanded the plastic shield with 400 grit sandpaper. I did both sides. I then primed the shield with a dark gray primer with a couple of good thick coats. After that was dry, I wet sanded the primer coat with 1200 grit sandpaper until the primer was glass smooth (I'm a car guy so all of my car painting knowledge is handy).

I used Rub & Buff on the primed shield - took me a few minutes to figure it out but once I did, I was happy with the results.

I definitely wanted that machined look that the aluminum shields have so I did a bunch of tests of what would work best with the Rub & Buff. The challenge was to keep the shine while having the machined "lines". Sandpaper, steel wool, and paint pads dulled the Rub & Buff too much. I settled on using a mini hacksaw blade - the teeth of the blade etched very shallow grooves in the Rub & Buff where the dark primer would just start to show through. This allowed for the machined look while keeping a nice shiny surface. I thought results turned out pretty good. The wide pic of the shield is before I did the machined effect that is the closer pic.

Re: Another Captain America TFA Costume thread? You bet!!

Impressive.

Sorry but you already contradicted yourself.
The spin effect using a hacksaw blade.... think that qualifies as both new and revolutionary.

Re: Another Captain America TFA Costume thread? You bet!!

nice looking shield but be careful when painting, i used rub n buff on my airsoft sheild and the paint didnt stick to it, it all lifted up with the masking tape. dont know if this was because maybe the tape was too strong (it was only normal masking tape) or because the rub n buff didnt fully set or because the primer didnt fully adhere to the rub n buff. i ended up putting a metallic silver undercoat under the red and blue areas and then once the red and blue were painted on i added the rub n buff to the exposed silver areas, looks good but doesnt have the same effect in the red and blue areas as i would have liked. i had thought of trying to colour the rub n buff in some way to make it metallic red and metallic blue but i dont know if this would work

Re: Another Captain America TFA Costume thread? You bet!!

Lol - I didn't think the mini hacksaw blade was that special - I figured someone had probably tried it already.

On the paint - I experimented with Krylon chrome colored paint. The finish is really fragile plus the Rub & Buff look is more aluminum-like. I tested the Duplicolor paints over the Rub & Buff on some plastic that is not the shield. You right, masking tape could be an issue but I tried painters tape with several coats of color and that seems to have minimized the peeling issues. Problems seem to occur when the color is too thin. And since I'll be doing battle damage effects, that should take the curse off of imperfections.

Re: Another Captain America TFA Costume thread? You bet!!

never thought of using more coats, i laid down about 2 myself. didnt want to put down too many incase i lost the desired effect. maybe take the tape off with water? im gonna experiment with trying to colour rub n buff. think it would be the only way to give it the same look as the aluminium shields. i look forward to seeing how your shield comes out, might have to redo mine if you succeed painting over the rub n buff.

i though of doing the battle damage too, had some areas masked off for bullet hits etc but i couldnt get a look i was happy with. looked too artificial, figured if the paint ever chipped on the finished shield i would leave it like that, real battle damage. there is an art to battle damage i think, the dented helmet has some great tutorials on weathering up fett armour. and there is a great video on youtube on sintra armour for a fett costume and how to weather rub n buff

Re: Another Captain America TFA Costume thread? You bet!!

I painted the red bands last night and took the tape off this morning. Had a few small issues peeling it up but nothing nearly as bad as you it seems. But I don't mind some of those imperfections - I was planning on distressing the painted edges on each side of the red bands and on the blue circle where the star is to give it a much more weathered look, like it's been well used.

On the battle damage - I agree, it's not as easy as it looks and masking places off looks too artificial. I did, however, try something on my test surface - I scored the paint with a knife in the shape of a bullet hit and used some extra sticky masking tape to carefully pull it. The scoring helped guide picking up the paint but it still came up in an erratic fashion, but not outside the score lines. Then I took just a few drops of paint thinner to clog up the edges of the bullet hit. Not sure if that would work on the actual shield but looks pretty good. Just need to add a few powder burns.

Re: Another Captain America TFA Costume thread? You bet!! (WIP)

Here is the shield painted w/ some battle damage and distressing. I'll be taking this even further giving the shield a much more, well used look.

The distressing around the edges of the painted areas was done on purpose by me (with the exception of 2 or 3 spots on the inner red band that the masking tape pulled up). Overall, putting a couple of good, thick coats of the Duplicator paint seemed to help in that regard. I actually hard a really hard time trying to distress the blue paint because it adhered so well.

I scored and pulled up the paint to to do the gunshot look - probably could have been better, but it's fine for now.

For doing this on a budget, I'm pretty happy with the result. Here is what I approximately spent:

Disguise shield - $32.00
Balsa wood for rigidity support - $3.00
Glue - $6.00
Primer - $6.50
Rub & Buff - $7.00
Duplicator paints - $15.00
Sandpaper - $5.00
Masking Tape - $4.00
Leather belt from thrift store for rear straps - $3.00
Mini hack saw blades for spun effect - $5.00
Total cost - about $85.00

I'll post more pictures when add I more weathering to it.

Re: Another Captain America TFA Costume thread? You bet!!

It has been a little bit since I've gotten to work on my TFA project (work and making a living is always getting in the way) but I managed to get a few things done over the last couple of days.

I finished the back of my shield with leather straps to hold the shield and a couple of of other detachable straps so I can wear it on my back - yeah, I know none of it accurate to anything but it works for what I wanted to do. And the framing pieces I put in give the plastic shield pretty good rigidity.

I also started a scratch build on the belt buckle based on a 2 inch wide belt. The leather ammo pouches I got would only fit on a 2 inch belt, so I adjusted. I still need to make and put on the side pieces where the belt fastens to it. It's made from balsa wood and plastic sheeting - should look pretty good once it's all painted up and slightly distressed.

I have experimented with trying to fade the Hello Cosplay suit I'm basing this build on. It's not really possible due to the synthetic fabric they use. Using the RIT fading system turns the blue fabric brown. I'll probably just gunk it up a bit in keeping my well-used look I'm going for. More updates coming soon.

Re: Another Captain America TFA Costume thread? You bet!!

Good start so far!

Re: Another Captain America TFA Costume thread? You bet!!

Thanks, man. Your build is amazing.

I saw you did your shield with the same plastic shield I used - I looked through your thread but didn't see a clear answer to this question - what did you use exactly for the "aluminum" parts of your shield?

Re: Another Captain America TFA Costume thread? You bet!!

I made some progress over the last couple of days.

Other than a little more sanding and paint, my belt buckle is done. I'm very please with the way it turned out - especially since the only power tool I have is a drill. Everything is hand cut.

I replaced the D rings with more screen accurate items.

Attached the rubber stars.

Re: Another Captain America TFA Costume thread? You bet!! NEW PICS

Here is a pic of the pretty close to final belt buckle.

I worked on a scratch build of the rear star buckle today - hardest part was laying it out. Getting the proportions right was really a big challenge. I used plastic sheeting, all hand cut.

I'm very happy with the end result.

Re: Another Captain America TFA Costume thread? You bet!!

Looks great! I tried the rub n buff method on an airsoft shield. After a week (literally) of buffing it was looking really good until I made the mistake of trying to seal it. I used polycrylic because someone sold me on it being comparable to varathane, recommended by the folks at rub n buff, and anyway it completely ruined the luster.
I've been slowly trying to work on a TFA project myself. It started as a budget affair and somehow I seem to keep getting deeper and deeper in the hole.:lol
I'm actually starting to think I should have spent the $1300 on the entire UD suit. But what fun would there be in that?

Re: Another Captain America TFA Costume thread? You bet!!

The UD leather TFA suit is cool but I've been reading where a lot of people who ordered it are complaining about the fit. But one part of it I would have ordered if I didn't see it too late would have been the gloves and maybe the belt.

Speaking of TFA gloves, I've had to compromise on what I'm doing for my build. I've read most of the threads where people have either made the gloves from scratch or altered some existing gloves - I really know nothing about working with leather (willing to learn at some point). I'll be using a base long leather glove with some leather gauntlets to go over them - the look is really cool actually but little in common with the screen version. I'll post some pics in my next update.

Re: Another Captain America TFA Costume thread? You bet!!

Looking good man!

Re: Another Captain America TFA Costume thread? You bet!!

BoogieBear said:

I'm actually starting to think I should have spent the $1300 on the entire UD suit. But what fun would there be in that?

Click to expand...

A great excuse to then buy a motorcycle and build a sturdy enough helmet.

Re: Another Captain America TFA Costume thread? You bet!!

A little more progress since Saturday.

I finished up the rear buckles - I hope they don't fall apart!

I also put the main star on the chest.

I received a holster and thigh strap from JM Leather today - fantastic work as always.

Hello Cosplay let me know today that they finally shipped the correct under tunic/padded abdomen so I should have that by Wednesday or Thursday.

Looks like I'me getting close to the home stretch!

Re: Another Captain America TFA Costume thread? You bet!!

Damn, your build is kicking my build's ass! Well done. That's a fantastic looking rear buckle, how are you holding it together? I abandoned all hope of the rear buckles myself in exchange for actual parachute rigging. Didn't think I could make them sturdy enough.

Re: Another Captain America TFA Costume thread? You bet!!

The top rear buckle is made of plastic. It's very strong. The bottom buckle is metal and plastic - the round post with hole in it is metal, the rest is plastic. Other than just glue, the 2 rivets are holding the plastic pieces together and it's pretty sturdy - the weak area is the metal post. I have pretty it well reinforced on the back and attached solidly, but I'm sure one swift jerk will break it. If I have time, I might remake it all as one piece and sacrifice some detail for strength.