lamay
New Member
I just finished a quick build of the creature costume for a friends college film project. I started with a borrowed mannequin, I used a 20 year old dive skin rash guard suit and drew the basic layout of the scale patterns on it.
Next came testing adhesives, since it would have to get wet at some point. The tests were, latex rubber both on the suit and on the EVA foam, failure. E6000 adhesive on the foam, better, but still failure to hold together after immersion. DAP contact cement, success, very smelly job but good adhesion even after soaking in water.
I then started cutting out the 3mm eva foam pieces and texturing them with a soldering iron.
I applied the contact cement to both surfaces and then glued them togeather after it became tacky. I started from the bottom and worked my way up the mannequin. The rash guard suit I had is a front zipper style, so I just worked around it, a rear zipper would be the best I think. I continued to add individually cut foam pieces one at a time until the suit was covered.
I added velcro attachments to secure the commercially made mask to the suit. At this point I painted liguid latex rubber over the entire suit with the hope that it would help hold all the pieces togeather as one piece.
Next came painting with acrylic paints. all done with a brush, air brush would probably be better.
Removing the suit from the saran wrapped mannequin was a 1 hour hellish endeavor, I don't know what would've made it easier, but the suit came off undamaged and intact after literally peeling it off the mannequin.
Next came testing adhesives, since it would have to get wet at some point. The tests were, latex rubber both on the suit and on the EVA foam, failure. E6000 adhesive on the foam, better, but still failure to hold together after immersion. DAP contact cement, success, very smelly job but good adhesion even after soaking in water.
I then started cutting out the 3mm eva foam pieces and texturing them with a soldering iron.
I applied the contact cement to both surfaces and then glued them togeather after it became tacky. I started from the bottom and worked my way up the mannequin. The rash guard suit I had is a front zipper style, so I just worked around it, a rear zipper would be the best I think. I continued to add individually cut foam pieces one at a time until the suit was covered.
I added velcro attachments to secure the commercially made mask to the suit. At this point I painted liguid latex rubber over the entire suit with the hope that it would help hold all the pieces togeather as one piece.
Next came painting with acrylic paints. all done with a brush, air brush would probably be better.
Removing the suit from the saran wrapped mannequin was a 1 hour hellish endeavor, I don't know what would've made it easier, but the suit came off undamaged and intact after literally peeling it off the mannequin.