thenextavenger's 2012 Halloween Costume Contest Entry

thenextavenger

New Member
Okay, to start off I would like to say I am 14, male, and this is my first "big" costume. Last year I made a Captain America shield, but nothing amazing. I would also like to say I am VERY PROUD to say……..I DID THIS BY MYSELF! Yeah I know I am amazing doing this without anyone else's help. This year I took on an ambitious project-- doing Commander Shepard from Mass Effect video games.

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First I took templates from Blog | julianbeek and did a little modifying (taking out some pieces). I started with the chest/back piece. *everything is made out of matt, rolled, and craft foam*

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This involved A LOT of cutting templates, tracing, then cutting using a hot knife, hot glue, and then black and grayish silver spray paint. If you want to know how long it took a 14 year old to do this by himself, the answer is a month and half, using only weekends pretty much.

Next came the helmet-- same process: templates from that website, cut, trace, cut blah blah blah. I decided to start from top of the head, down the side, to faceplate.

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Trust me, I don’t understand how it can stand up by itself either. Next came the rest of the helmet, minus the ear puck. Now the back is a bunch of hills and valleys. For anyone who's trying to make this helmet, STAY PATIENT, that stuff is hard.

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Next up…the ear pucks. I found these weird black puck things laying around

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I then used my oscillating tool and cut off the very top (while trying to melt it as little as possible).

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After a few minutes of filing, I got this:

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Then I stuck it on the helmet.
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I finished putting on the foam:

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and it was time for some shape sealing. I used Elmer's multi-purpose All Glue. I can’t even count how many coats I applied, but I took some pictures of it right after:

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Make sure to glue everything. Applying the glue not only sealed it, but also made it so smooth that if you felt it you wouldn't know it was foam.

I spray painted a matt black undercoat, followed by a marble grey (turned out to be silver pretty much) and then a VERY light black overcoat, with black spots throughout, giving it a darker look.
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To make that N7 logo, I just cut all of it out of thin foam and hot glued it. Then I just glued it on the helmet.

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To get the red on the top of the helmet, I taped off (around the hot glue so that it would be painted red) and put newspaper around it:

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Then I sprayed red:

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Now I did end up having to re-spray paint my helmet because before I did my N7 logo in foam, I tried spray painting it (not a good idea; oh well ) and some spray paint went everywhere. So, I taped off the red and re sprayed (Like I said before, be patient!).

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I did add in a visor-- a see through black plastic folder I cut up. I then glued magnets on the inside of the helmet on the visor, so I can take the visor in and out at will.

And know what? I had time! So I made a casual version of the costume for school: I took a black shirt and put down two strips of white duct tape, then one red stripe overlapping both white pieces, making sure each strip folded into the arm hole and the collar. I then cut out an N7 in tape attached that and I had a great looking causal costume for under my armor and for school!

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Don't worry, I know that it looks wrinkled, but that because the shirt is to big for me. And the tape does allow for full mobility and is comfortable.

I hope this helps for whoever tries to make this costume! Feel free to ask questions!
 
Last edited:
Hot Damn. 14 years old? yep you get my vote. you keep this up and in a couple years you'll OWN this forum! now go recruit all your friends to vote for you!
 
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