penwiper
Well-Known Member
This past weekend I went to DragonCon. I wanted to make something nifty, challenging, and Doctor Who. I love the episode Blink, so despite being a little intimidated, I decided to give it a try.
(I don't know why to credit for this picture - my brother-in-law emailed it to me. If you recognize it, please let me know so I can credit!)
The following is a far-too-detailed breakdown of how I made the costume.
The Dress
Materials: Polyester suiting fabric, acrylic/fabric-medium paint, hula hoop, velcro
The dress is constructed from two layers. The first layer is an underdress that provides structure and support to the overdres. It is basically fitted, with a zip up the back, then flares out towards the bottom in a cone shape. A hula-hoop sewn into the bottom hem provides rigid support.
The fabric I used was a dark grey polyester suiting from the dollar bin. It's got a nice smooth finish (no woven texture) and has enough body to hold the folds well. The overdress is made from two full widths of fabric sewn into a giant tube and draped onto the underdress.
The down-side of sturdy fabric is that it doesn't drape very well. All those folds are held into place with dozens of individual stitches.
The back has a secret panel that will hide the center support of the wings.
And here it is painted. The paint used was basic acrylic craft paint, with fabric medium added to make it flexible and washable. To create the impression of stone, I used the old trick of highlights and lowlights. First the entire dress got a coat of the darkest grey paint. The I went back with the medium grey and painted most of it, leaving dark grey in the shadows and recesses. Finally I used the lightest grey paint to just hit the highlights.
The effect is pretty convincing - people kept coming up and asking to touch the dress so they could feel that it wasn't stone! For all those who asked me how flexible it is: here's a picture of it in a heap:
And on the inside, we have one of the most important parts of any costume - hidden pockets. Wallet and phone go in one, and a bottle of water went in the other.
From the back, you can see how the hidden wing panel blends right in.
And a little touch all my own. I figured any statue is going to end up with graffiti, right?
The Wings
Materials: Foamcore posterboard, craft foam, galvanized wire, foam, hot glue, acrylic paint, backpack strapping and buckles
Here's a peek at how I was using reference images:
Patterns were drawn on newspaper, then transferred to my wing base. The core of the wings is foamcore board. Normal sheets of foamcore were too small, but fortunately there are giant display boards designed for kids' science fairs. Those have folds in them, but by using two layers of foamcore and lining the folds up so that they wanted to fold in opposite directions, they cancelled each other out and remained sturdy.
Each wing has two pieces: front and back.
The pattern was cut apart into individual feathers, with enough extra added to each feather so that the pieces could overlap nicely. The feathers themselves are made from craft foam and glued to the foamcore.
The support structure for the wings runs between the layers of foamcore. The panel between the wings was made from two layers of a stiff upholstery-type foam. Sewn between the layers and extending out on both sides
was galvanized wire.
Fabric was draped over the whole structure and sewn on, then the excess fabric was cut away. The fabric gives the glue something to grip.
Massive amounts of glue were applied to the wing halves,
and the wire supports were sandwiched between them. I
was very lucky to have the perfect thing to weight them with while they dried - a marble-topped coffee table.
Once they were fully assembled, I draped a little extra fabric from the dress around the base of each wing, to help the base blend in with the dress.
Painting used the same highlight/lowlight technique as the dress, and the same paint, just minus the fabric medium. You can also see here how I cut notches into the foam feathers to make them look more real.
Finished wings:
Strap assembly. I'm going to redo this so that it's possible to get into the wings/dress without assistance.
The Mask
Materials: Paper-mache mask, paperclay, acrylic
paint, Elmer's glue, plastic gumball machine thingys,
pantyhose
For the masks, I started with pre-made paper maches masks, then sculpted onto them with paperclay. I hadn't
ever sculpted before, so that was a challenge!
The eyes are made by cutting lenses out of those plastic capsules you get from gumball machines. I covered them with grey pantyhose and hot-glued them into place. The inside of the mask is painted black to cut down on light reflection.
To give you some idea of the resulting visibility - here's a shot of my neighbor's car through one eye in broad daylight. The visibility was MUCH worse at night. But I could see enough to function.
The masks were painted using the same technique mentioned earlier, though I used a little more care since the face would get more attention. Note that I glued the lenses in AFTER they were painted.
The mask just goes on with an elastic strap. I plan on remaking the mask - it looks pretty decent on the mannequin, but it's just plain too small for my fat head.
The Wig
Materials: Pantyhose, yarn, acrylic paint/fabric-medium, fabric
I'm sorry I don't have any in-construction photos of the wig - I was getting pressed for time and forgot. Basically, I cut the legs off a pair of pantyhose and sewed the rest into a cap-shape, then stitched yarn down the center seam. The yarn was then styled and held in place with 2.5 bottles of fabric glue, and a fabric hairband added. Painted with acrylic paint w/ fabric medium.
>
A shot to show the internal construction:
I'm planning on remaking the wig. It ended up too small
for me and too inaccurate. I think I'll try sculpting a wig next time.
Arms, neck, feet
Materials: Opaque tights, acrylic paint/fabric-medium, nail polish, artificial nails, toe-socks, thrift-store sandals
I know I don't have any makeup skills, so I wanted some sort of gloves for the arms. I bought two different pairs of gloves before giving up and making my own.
First, I took a pair of ladies' opaque tights and cut out the crotch. This became the neck-hole. I pulled them on, one arm down each sleeve, then used pins to mark the divisions between my fingers.
I cut along the pins, then sewed the fingers together by hand using a whipstitch. After that, I took a little tuck in the wrist area of the gloves to smooth out some wrinkles.
As soon as you pull the gloves on after this, dab some nail polish along the seams - this will stabilize them and prevent the tights from running. Then turn the gloves inside-out so that the seams are on the inside (at this point, the right glove will become the left glove and vice-versa).
To increase the illusion of fingers, I glued artificial nails to the gloves. You have to do this while the gloves are on to get the correct placement - to prevent the glue from sticking to you, rub some oil or lotion into your fingertips/nails before you pull the gloves on.
Paint the gloves while you are wearing them and let them
dry on you, otherwise they will shrink. I used the same old acrylic paint/fabric medium mix. Before painting the gloves, I gave the nails several coats of silver nailpolish so that they wouldn't show pink if the paint scratched.
They look really freaky when you aren't wearing them.
But once on, the illusion is very convincing.
The neck area is covered by a sleeve made from another pair of tights. Again, use nailpolish to control running.
And in one of those touches no one will notice: just in case anyone caught a glimpse of my feet, I added some fake toenails to a pair of grey toe-socks. The sandals came from a thrift store and were given a coat of grey paint.
And that's pretty much it! Like I said, there are some bits I want to remake, but overall, considering I was really scrambling to finish it, I'm pretty pleased.
(I don't know why to credit for this picture - my brother-in-law emailed it to me. If you recognize it, please let me know so I can credit!)
The following is a far-too-detailed breakdown of how I made the costume.
The Dress
Materials: Polyester suiting fabric, acrylic/fabric-medium paint, hula hoop, velcro
The dress is constructed from two layers. The first layer is an underdress that provides structure and support to the overdres. It is basically fitted, with a zip up the back, then flares out towards the bottom in a cone shape. A hula-hoop sewn into the bottom hem provides rigid support.
The fabric I used was a dark grey polyester suiting from the dollar bin. It's got a nice smooth finish (no woven texture) and has enough body to hold the folds well. The overdress is made from two full widths of fabric sewn into a giant tube and draped onto the underdress.
The down-side of sturdy fabric is that it doesn't drape very well. All those folds are held into place with dozens of individual stitches.
The back has a secret panel that will hide the center support of the wings.
And here it is painted. The paint used was basic acrylic craft paint, with fabric medium added to make it flexible and washable. To create the impression of stone, I used the old trick of highlights and lowlights. First the entire dress got a coat of the darkest grey paint. The I went back with the medium grey and painted most of it, leaving dark grey in the shadows and recesses. Finally I used the lightest grey paint to just hit the highlights.
The effect is pretty convincing - people kept coming up and asking to touch the dress so they could feel that it wasn't stone! For all those who asked me how flexible it is: here's a picture of it in a heap:
And on the inside, we have one of the most important parts of any costume - hidden pockets. Wallet and phone go in one, and a bottle of water went in the other.
From the back, you can see how the hidden wing panel blends right in.
And a little touch all my own. I figured any statue is going to end up with graffiti, right?
The Wings
Materials: Foamcore posterboard, craft foam, galvanized wire, foam, hot glue, acrylic paint, backpack strapping and buckles
Here's a peek at how I was using reference images:
Patterns were drawn on newspaper, then transferred to my wing base. The core of the wings is foamcore board. Normal sheets of foamcore were too small, but fortunately there are giant display boards designed for kids' science fairs. Those have folds in them, but by using two layers of foamcore and lining the folds up so that they wanted to fold in opposite directions, they cancelled each other out and remained sturdy.
Each wing has two pieces: front and back.
The pattern was cut apart into individual feathers, with enough extra added to each feather so that the pieces could overlap nicely. The feathers themselves are made from craft foam and glued to the foamcore.
The support structure for the wings runs between the layers of foamcore. The panel between the wings was made from two layers of a stiff upholstery-type foam. Sewn between the layers and extending out on both sides
was galvanized wire.
Fabric was draped over the whole structure and sewn on, then the excess fabric was cut away. The fabric gives the glue something to grip.
Massive amounts of glue were applied to the wing halves,
and the wire supports were sandwiched between them. I
was very lucky to have the perfect thing to weight them with while they dried - a marble-topped coffee table.
Once they were fully assembled, I draped a little extra fabric from the dress around the base of each wing, to help the base blend in with the dress.
Painting used the same highlight/lowlight technique as the dress, and the same paint, just minus the fabric medium. You can also see here how I cut notches into the foam feathers to make them look more real.
Finished wings:
Strap assembly. I'm going to redo this so that it's possible to get into the wings/dress without assistance.
The Mask
Materials: Paper-mache mask, paperclay, acrylic
paint, Elmer's glue, plastic gumball machine thingys,
pantyhose
For the masks, I started with pre-made paper maches masks, then sculpted onto them with paperclay. I hadn't
ever sculpted before, so that was a challenge!
The eyes are made by cutting lenses out of those plastic capsules you get from gumball machines. I covered them with grey pantyhose and hot-glued them into place. The inside of the mask is painted black to cut down on light reflection.
To give you some idea of the resulting visibility - here's a shot of my neighbor's car through one eye in broad daylight. The visibility was MUCH worse at night. But I could see enough to function.
The masks were painted using the same technique mentioned earlier, though I used a little more care since the face would get more attention. Note that I glued the lenses in AFTER they were painted.
The mask just goes on with an elastic strap. I plan on remaking the mask - it looks pretty decent on the mannequin, but it's just plain too small for my fat head.
The Wig
Materials: Pantyhose, yarn, acrylic paint/fabric-medium, fabric
I'm sorry I don't have any in-construction photos of the wig - I was getting pressed for time and forgot. Basically, I cut the legs off a pair of pantyhose and sewed the rest into a cap-shape, then stitched yarn down the center seam. The yarn was then styled and held in place with 2.5 bottles of fabric glue, and a fabric hairband added. Painted with acrylic paint w/ fabric medium.
A shot to show the internal construction:
I'm planning on remaking the wig. It ended up too small
for me and too inaccurate. I think I'll try sculpting a wig next time.
Arms, neck, feet
Materials: Opaque tights, acrylic paint/fabric-medium, nail polish, artificial nails, toe-socks, thrift-store sandals
I know I don't have any makeup skills, so I wanted some sort of gloves for the arms. I bought two different pairs of gloves before giving up and making my own.
First, I took a pair of ladies' opaque tights and cut out the crotch. This became the neck-hole. I pulled them on, one arm down each sleeve, then used pins to mark the divisions between my fingers.
I cut along the pins, then sewed the fingers together by hand using a whipstitch. After that, I took a little tuck in the wrist area of the gloves to smooth out some wrinkles.
As soon as you pull the gloves on after this, dab some nail polish along the seams - this will stabilize them and prevent the tights from running. Then turn the gloves inside-out so that the seams are on the inside (at this point, the right glove will become the left glove and vice-versa).
To increase the illusion of fingers, I glued artificial nails to the gloves. You have to do this while the gloves are on to get the correct placement - to prevent the glue from sticking to you, rub some oil or lotion into your fingertips/nails before you pull the gloves on.
Paint the gloves while you are wearing them and let them
dry on you, otherwise they will shrink. I used the same old acrylic paint/fabric medium mix. Before painting the gloves, I gave the nails several coats of silver nailpolish so that they wouldn't show pink if the paint scratched.
They look really freaky when you aren't wearing them.
But once on, the illusion is very convincing.
The neck area is covered by a sleeve made from another pair of tights. Again, use nailpolish to control running.
And in one of those touches no one will notice: just in case anyone caught a glimpse of my feet, I added some fake toenails to a pair of grey toe-socks. The sandals came from a thrift store and were given a coat of grey paint.
And that's pretty much it! Like I said, there are some bits I want to remake, but overall, considering I was really scrambling to finish it, I'm pretty pleased.
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