Cyborg Ninja Grey Fox metal gear helmet

[killerrock]

Hello everyone, I'm sorta new at this whole thing and well after going to many cons and seeing so many people building amazing pieces of armor and dressing up as my favorite characters I've pushed myself to make a nice suit of armor. after lurking around a bit i found a couple threads of builds that where to good for words to describe. So without further adue i am starting one of my favorite characters from my favorite series Grey Fox from Metal gear!

 

[SFX]

This is my first attempt at pepakura as well as my first post on the RPF. I also liked the Grey Fox costume, so I went ahead and put the helmet together. I just finished glassing with Smooth-On Epoxamite. I'm finishing up spot puttying my Mass Effect Terminus helmet before I go further with the GF. -

 

[SFX]

 

[killerrock]

Wow, SFX thats going pretty well as for myself i started this thread after i had glassed the helmet and well it really didnt come out to well but there is a real learning curve i found in the whole thing you know. I like paying extreme attention to detail so the more intricate stuff the more i fuss over it but im in the prosses of making the second and scrapping the first but i have taken a crazy amount of pictures and i will be uploading them shortly and hopefully you will see what im talking about. pictures dont do it enough justice but if you could see it. moving on it seems you used a different model than i did. ive seen so many of the older looking model for grey fox and im using the one that they just came out with for Metal Gear Rising. anyway i will start doing my updates of the pictures.

 

[killerrock]

Alright everyone its time for an update and i have tons of photos yay.
ok so let me start of with the folding and then putting together processes now let me tell you this. I didnt expect this pep file to be the perfect fit for me without re sizing but it was fortunately. i did freak out about halfway through because i didnt think it would fit. moving on i made two no no's. first i used a 65lb card stock and a iron oxide based toner for printing and materials. Second was i used some old clear scotch tape. now ive found after a few days of work wasted because of it and well during the glassing prosses it sort of not only sank and warped a bit but the tape and iron oxide toner sort of melted. it wasnt a huge deal and didnt notice right away but it got pretty bad but let me show you from the beginning.
this was it about halfway done

this was it when it was completely put together i was too exited i had to put it on

i then started the glassing process so lets start with a before and after

so that was before and here is after with the resin i used. as a side note i didnt use fiberglass sheets or anything we just used foam brushes which unfortunately melt also with the resin as well. also we found that 8 oz. of resin has much less of a working time than we thought and half of it became part of the cup.

sorry for the bad photos on that one but that's the best i could do at the time. i then moved on to bondo so you can then see how it got a wierd shape to it and it didnt look all that right.

 

[killerrock]

sorry for the photo rotation i found that the site did it to itself anyway moving on with a few more of the bondo

after a few coats of primer

at that point i was kinda fed up and didnt want to deal with the fact that it didnt really retain its shape and was also warped and had to make a new one this time i feel it souldnt have had the holes in it and well i used a better toner and glue and 110lb card stock and well i have to say it came out amazing so far so this is when i abandoned the first one and started the second and i have a few comparason pictures. i forgot to get pictures of the whole beginning so i start the new one off after the glassing stage so here goes.






alright, so thats where i leave off right now i will be starting the bondo process very soon. if anyone has any good tips or anything i am here to learn i hope it will come out good so i can get a good mold of it soon and then start the cutting and moterization portion of it and also putting in the lense and led's of course. so once again i will see you soon and thanks for the support and any other tips and other things.

 

[SFX]

Very nice! Instead of going the bondo route on the next one, you should look into a sculpting putty or clay that cures on its own. I used Free Form Air putty for my ME Terminus helmet. That helmet has a lot of sharp angles and I found the putty allowed me to fine-tune areas and exaggerate certain angles. It also doubles as a fiberglass agent and is highly malleable for several hours after application so there is no need to mess around with FG. Plus, it doesn't give off the fumes bondo does and you can apply it indoors. They also make another called Free Form Earth, which is more dense than the Air version, and I think you might have a better outcome using it for your mask since it is round. Of course it will require a little more application time as opposed to just slapping on bondo, but you won't have a problem sanding it down like you would with bondo. If you do decide to stick with bondo, I'd suggest using the pro Gold series because it is easier to sand than the original. Keep us updated. I love what you have so far.

 

[killerrock]

ah i see the funny thing is that the second i posted i went off and bondoed the helmet and i got a good 2 coats in before i turned in for the day. as for bondo im using the original kind in about a paint can sized container cuz its cheap i didnt think there was a big difference. um and well i am having a bit of trouble with the fine tuning in sanding. me and my friend are having a bit of trouble making the depressions at the top of the head symmetrical. i dont know if you have had to deal with anything sort of like it but one just seems to get a bit smaller and a bit misshapen whereas the other somehow comes out perfect. whats even odder is that it always seems to be the left side. anyway minus that little part i feel its coming out nicely hopefully this weekend me and my friend can finalize it and then get it into the molding process. i will get more pictures when i go back over (hes keeping it at his house to let it set and he said he may do a bit of fixing in the meantime)

 

[SFX]

Yeah, the original bondo is pretty tough to hand-sand, but it's doable. As for the dents, spray a coat of primer over the mask to bring out the low spots and spot putty/glaze the areas that need it. With the helmet being so round you'll inevitably have overlapping, but spot putty is really easy to sand. I'd go ahead and glaze the entire sides/back/top/forehead and it should be able to round out easier than the bondo. You can build up layers but you need to make sure to not lay it down too thick and allow it to dry between layers (~30 min). I'll be heading to the FX store this week to buy some of the putty I was telling you about and give that a go. Keep us posted on your progress. I'll be doing the same.

 

[killerrock]

Alright I feel its time for an update because I've been super busy with work and such so anyway I want to thank you SFX that putty stuff is amazing. It just made everything so much easier. I was able to get a great smooth surface. I then made mold but messed it up unfortunately but had some left over plastic to just get a simple cast to actually test it out and see the inside size of the helmet and well it turned out way too small so I scaled up the helmet in pepekura and I'm trying again hopefully this time it will be the right size but I have no idea how the scale works so I went and made the whole helmet auto scale to hopefully about 3/4 inch bigger hopefully this time it will be an adequate fit before I mold

 

[charlie88]

wow man i love this helmet. am currently cutting the pieces right now. make sure too keep us posted , you got a new fan here. 1+sub. by the way sfx, do you have pics of the brand of the putty you were talking about??? and once resin and the putty thing has been applied, do you then primer and paint or that doesnt work like that??? you have to cast and mold?? i want to ise something difrent than bondo for that particular reason. i hate sanding circular surfaces.