Mike Dachuk
New Member
After tonnes of lurking I have finally built something. My oldest son wanted to be Boba Fett for halloween this year. So I decided that I would build him the costume.
Please keep in mind, we did not go for screen accuracy. There was a lot I learned doing this, I cut a lot of corners too, there are things I would do differently too. Lets Journey...
Pic one is the main armor. I found an old shirt at Value Village and cut it into the vest. I got the patterns for the armor from the dented helmet. I was able to cut them out on the Floor Mat EVA foam. Here is where problem 1 began... So I didn't buy Plastidip which was $20 a can, instead I bought Rust-o-leum Flexi Dip as I was trying to cut costs. I found that it took way more coats than it said it would need. Also it peeled really easy too. Next was the paint. I don't know what I was doing wrong, but after 2 days of drying the paint was still tacky. This was alarming because I was under the gun. I ended up buying an acrylic clear coat to spray over top. That did the job. The shoulder bells were hand painted with yellow acrylic craft paint. Finally the battle damage was done with black acrylic and a silver sharpie.
The cod piece and the belt were kind of after thoughts. I did have all the pieces to make it complete, but since he was wearing it to school, I wanted him to be able to sit, so I just glued the front the vest. The belt was a ****tty last minute Duct tape and pink foam job. Could I have done better? Yes! At the time it was late and I was trying to get everything else done.
Oh the helmet... this was not as easy as the guy on youTube made it out to be. All in all I was happy with the results. The dome was made by taking a circle piece of foam, heating it up and then shoving it into a colander. As you can see my colander kind of flattens out at the top, next time I would find a better way. Also I clearly did not sand the edges enough, so there is a big gap that given more time I would have filled with spackle. The lack of the visor was a contentious one. My son wanted the visor, and I wanted him to see at night. I won. I was pretty pissed that my edges were white in the cheek area, but I didn't have time to go back and fix it. I had gauntlets to make and a backpack.
So here is where panic started in. I made some cheap gauntlets that he could easily take on and off if he wanted. I made them half sized so they did not completely go around his arm. Instead I took the sleeves to the shirt and glued it to the inside of the gauntlet. Then (not pictured here) I attached velcro straps to the underside to tighten them up.
With literally little time to spare. Just some 6 hours before the costume needed to be ready I took foam core, and made a shape that looked like the jetpack. I attached a Christmas paper roll tube in the middle of it, duct taped it in. Finished the out side of the backpack. Then I found Styrofoam coffee cups (big mistake I should have gone out and just bought 4 cups of coffee and used paper or plastic... you live and learn.) I attached 2 to the back as thrusters, and then I filled the other 2 with newpaper and ductaped the **** out of those for the pointy bit at the top. I hit it with silver paint lightly (It still melted), and then I greened the jetpack. No taping, just speed.
Overall I was happy with what I got done in 3 days. Given more time I would have not cut so many corners. I was pretty upset with the guantlets and the Jetpack for sure, but my son was thrilled beyond what I could have asked for. So that made up for it. Here he is in his costume.
Oh yeah I built him a blaster too.
Mike
Please keep in mind, we did not go for screen accuracy. There was a lot I learned doing this, I cut a lot of corners too, there are things I would do differently too. Lets Journey...
Pic one is the main armor. I found an old shirt at Value Village and cut it into the vest. I got the patterns for the armor from the dented helmet. I was able to cut them out on the Floor Mat EVA foam. Here is where problem 1 began... So I didn't buy Plastidip which was $20 a can, instead I bought Rust-o-leum Flexi Dip as I was trying to cut costs. I found that it took way more coats than it said it would need. Also it peeled really easy too. Next was the paint. I don't know what I was doing wrong, but after 2 days of drying the paint was still tacky. This was alarming because I was under the gun. I ended up buying an acrylic clear coat to spray over top. That did the job. The shoulder bells were hand painted with yellow acrylic craft paint. Finally the battle damage was done with black acrylic and a silver sharpie.
The cod piece and the belt were kind of after thoughts. I did have all the pieces to make it complete, but since he was wearing it to school, I wanted him to be able to sit, so I just glued the front the vest. The belt was a ****tty last minute Duct tape and pink foam job. Could I have done better? Yes! At the time it was late and I was trying to get everything else done.
Oh the helmet... this was not as easy as the guy on youTube made it out to be. All in all I was happy with the results. The dome was made by taking a circle piece of foam, heating it up and then shoving it into a colander. As you can see my colander kind of flattens out at the top, next time I would find a better way. Also I clearly did not sand the edges enough, so there is a big gap that given more time I would have filled with spackle. The lack of the visor was a contentious one. My son wanted the visor, and I wanted him to see at night. I won. I was pretty pissed that my edges were white in the cheek area, but I didn't have time to go back and fix it. I had gauntlets to make and a backpack.
So here is where panic started in. I made some cheap gauntlets that he could easily take on and off if he wanted. I made them half sized so they did not completely go around his arm. Instead I took the sleeves to the shirt and glued it to the inside of the gauntlet. Then (not pictured here) I attached velcro straps to the underside to tighten them up.
With literally little time to spare. Just some 6 hours before the costume needed to be ready I took foam core, and made a shape that looked like the jetpack. I attached a Christmas paper roll tube in the middle of it, duct taped it in. Finished the out side of the backpack. Then I found Styrofoam coffee cups (big mistake I should have gone out and just bought 4 cups of coffee and used paper or plastic... you live and learn.) I attached 2 to the back as thrusters, and then I filled the other 2 with newpaper and ductaped the **** out of those for the pointy bit at the top. I hit it with silver paint lightly (It still melted), and then I greened the jetpack. No taping, just speed.
Overall I was happy with what I got done in 3 days. Given more time I would have not cut so many corners. I was pretty upset with the guantlets and the Jetpack for sure, but my son was thrilled beyond what I could have asked for. So that made up for it. Here he is in his costume.
Oh yeah I built him a blaster too.
Mike
