Egon's Spider-man costume. NEW PHOTOS! Nov 2, 2014,

Re: Egon's Spider-man dye sub project, and some sewing advice for all.

I have to admit I haven't used a single one of those ballpoint needles I bought. :-/ Why? Because I just started sewing and never changed the needle out. Anyway... an update.
100_5853.jpg
Still work to be done on the leg, but the costume is coming along nicely. Had to take some leaps of faith on the foot section and just straight out sew part of it without any hand stitching and any pins. It worked out pretty well so far. This is, besides the mask, the only basically completed part of the costume I have together so far. I had to pull it up and hold the leg fabric with my hands to get it to look right. Had a little bit of the seam pop, but that's easily fixable.

So far with everything I've sewn on the costume I've done the following.

Draw out the seam lines on the backside of the fabric, using a light source under the fabric. This makes it easier to guide yourself when sewing.

I started out hand sewing everything but have now left that behind for now. It's especially useful for the mask. It will probably come in handy in the future too.

Zig zag stitch and straight stitch. Make sure you stretch the fabric a little bit while sewing the straight stitch.

I am not afraid to remove seams. Sometimes doing that damages the fabric a little bit, but not by much and it isn't really noticeable at all once the seams are sewn again.


If anyone has any questions about sewing one of these things please contact me at
https://www.facebook.com/creativeguycostuming

or pm me here. :)
 
Re: Egon's Spider-man dye sub project, and some sewing advice for all.

Probably such an easy thing, but I'm having a hard time with it. Can anyone please tell me or point me to advice on how to sew a crotch on a spandex suit that ONLY has a backside seam and inner leg seams? How do I get it to merge together properly? This is holding back my Spidey suit progress. :-/
 
Re: Egon's Spider-man dye sub project, and some sewing advice for all.

Probably such an easy thing, but I'm having a hard time with it. Can anyone please tell me or point me to advice on how to sew a crotch on a spandex suit that ONLY has a backside seam and inner leg seams? How do I get it to merge together properly? This is holding back my Spidey suit progress. :-/
Connect them along the rear seam first, then sew along the inner leg seams as if they are one smooth connected curve, stiching right over the perpendicular seam that the back side made. It should look like a simple T junction when you turn it right-side-out.
 
Re: Egon's Spider-man dye sub project, and some sewing advice for all.

Thank you Lunaman! You're my Spiderbro, or something. Ha ha. ;) Great advice!
 
Re: Egon's Spider-man dye sub project, and some sewing advice for all.

"I know that there are reference pictures pointing out how the pattern itself goes together" - would be great if those were re-posted or linked here too ... for us total n00bs ;)
 
Re: Egon's Spider-man dye sub project, and some sewing advice for all.

"I know that there are reference pictures pointing out how the pattern itself goes together" - would be great if those were re-posted or linked here too ... for us total n00bs ;)

No problem!

The topic these links are from is a good read. Check the whole thing out.
http://www.therpf.com/f24/need-refe...derman-costume-158274/index3.html#post2511940

http://www.therpf.com/f24/need-refe...derman-costume-158274/index3.html#post2714303
 
Re: Egon's Spider-man dye sub project, and some sewing advice for all.

I can't even begin to tell through words on here how completely frustrated I am when it comes to sewing the leg and butt seams together on this suit. I've hand sewn it, I've machine sewed it, I've taken seams out again and sewn again and removed them and tried more, but this thing is just plain ------
me off. I try to match up the inner legs top seams together with the tip of the ^ at the front, but it's always either slightly off, or too bulked up, or too puckered. I am determined to sew this thing myself, but what am I doing wrong? I have no idea.
 
Re: Egon's Spider-man dye sub project, and some sewing advice for all.

Well, after working on this issue for more than 9 hours total yesterday and some of today, and asking 2 others if they might be willing to fix this problem for me, I have finally come to a place where it will have to do for now. The seam isn't perfect but it works and unless someone is up close and personal with my crotch, they'll never notice. Now I just need to figure out a way to take in the legs a bit.
 
Re: Egon's Spider-man dye sub project, and some sewing advice for all.

Update! I couldn't let the out of wack crotch go. Wow, that sounds so wrong...

But seriously. I fixed it properly and it looks great! I kept trying to match up the black seam outlines that came on the print, but it never worked properly so I did what I thought would work, and it did! I flattened out both the front and back of the area and pinned it into place, using only ONE seam line on the back for placement.

Maybe this photo will explain better than I can with words.
100_5977b.jpg
The line where the stitching is is actually where the seam line runs on the face down side of the fabric.
I kept trying to line up the seam line the pencil is pointing at with the seam line mentioned above. It just would not work properly.

So I flatted the fabric and stitched it as you see it now. It worked out perfect!!

The costume is coming along well since I got past that snag.

Here is a full body update photo. Ignore the hair...

100_5990.jpg

The upper area is only pinned at the shoulders, which is why it isn't sitting properly. I'm also wearing shorts under it in this photo which causes the bumps on my thigh. I have since purchased a danceable. It works great!
 
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Re: Egon's Spider-man costume progress and advice thread- Updated on 8/23

Lookin good man! Keep it up
 
Re: Egon's Spider-man costume progress and advice thread- Updated on 8/23

Well, wow. What a mess. As I said from the start I wanted to sew this entire thing myself. So far I've really done a great job getting over obstacles that have come up, until now. Today I believe I have almost totally screwed one of the hands up. I don't know what I'm doing wrong. It seems like no matter how I sew the fingers they are too tight and end up strangely twisted where the fingers join the back of the hand/palm. I wrote fabric on demand to see if their color prints are consistent enough that I could just order a new hand/arm from them, but I really don't think the color would match the print I've already had made. I don't want one arm to come out looking good in person, but weird in photos, or both, or vice versa.

The main problem is to test the fingers after sewing I had to cut away some fabric. Well, now I'm worried I don't have enough material there to fix the problem, though it seems as if it could be fixable, even if it doesn't turn out looking 100% proper. I plan to use markers to repair any mismatched lines, etc...

I'm so upset over this..

I've contacted some people to see if they might be able to help me fix this. I hope they can. I don't dare try to fix this glove, or even sew the one that isn't ruined together anymore. I'm willing to commission someone to fix the one and finish up the other. Maybe even attach the arms at the shoulder and add the invisible zipper on the back. I've learned a lot from this and I'm far from being a pro at it, but I feel I gave it a great run and I don't want to ruin the costume I've already worked so hard on.

Here is a photo of the sad state the left hand hand sections are in. Crappy webcam images since I can't find my good camera right now.

mess_zpsa626c991.jpg

I don't know. Maybe it is possible to save it myself. I don't know.. Maybe since I do have really large hands with long fingers, extending the finger length and adding to the web line with no run artists markers, might somehow compensate a little for the really crappy cuts I made. Something like this gif image shows. Click to see animated example. Crudely drawn... Untitled-1.gif

Maybe with that and some hand stitching recommended by thenickfox, I might be able to save this and keep my streak of working on this myself going.



Oh, besides the crappy cuts... heres a problem I have. Why is it when I sew these gloves and then turn them inside out, the space where the between the fingers, the U area, kind of flips back onto itself and stitching is pinning it down? Why is it doing that? Is it because I sewed to a V shape at that point instead of more of a U when the fabric was inside out?
 
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Re: Egon's Spider-man costume progress and advice thread- Help needed!!!

This suit is looking AMAZING, Egon! No pun intended.

TBH the fingers dont look bad to me, youre probably being a lot harder on yourself because its for you and because any good costumer focuses in on the details. Most people arent even going to notice that, and especially not at a distance. My wife fusses at me all the time for throwing away work because I'm a perfectionist.

Glad to see youre finally getting your spidey suit.
 
Re: Egon's Spider-man costume progress and advice thread- Help needed!!!

Thanks, spydrwebz. I think I might be able to save the glove. Might try to whip stitch one of the worst cut areas back together and extend some of the other lines like I said. The more I look at it the more encouraged I am that I can fix it.
 
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Re: Egon's Spider-man costume progress and advice thread- Updated on 8/23

View attachment 226288

I don't know. Maybe it is possible to save it myself. I don't know.. Maybe since I do have really large hands with long fingers, extending the finger length and adding to the web line with no run artists markers, might somehow compensate a little for the really crappy cuts I made. Something like this gif image shows. Click to see animated example. Crudely drawn... View attachment 226297

Maybe with that and some hand stitching recommended by thenickfox, I might be able to save this and keep my streak of working on this myself going.



Oh, besides the crappy cuts... heres a problem I have. Why is it when I sew these gloves and then turn them inside out, the space where the between the fingers, the U area, kind of flips back onto itself and stitching is pinning it down? Why is it doing that? Is it because I sewed to a V shape at that point instead of more of a U when the fabric was inside out?

Sorry to hear about your glove woes.
You have to sew the space between the fingers ending in a little U shape instead of a sharp V to keep the stitches from pinning it down.

I think your glove is salvageable. You haven't removed any fabric yet, you've simply cut the line between the forefinger and middle finger a little too far, so why would all be lost? As you said, whip stitch that bit together, then re-do the seam lines around the fingers, but check the fit while it's still inside-out. Once you know all the finger seams fit around your fingers properly, you can turn it out to check the weblines lining up. Then (and only then) you can trim away most of the seam allowances.
Kind of paradoxically, the reason you were running into the fingers feeling too tight is that you hadn't done ENOUGH cutting away. You're meant to remove a good deal of the material once the seams are in place, otherwise your digits won't fit with all that excess left over twisting the fingers around and taking up space inside.
 
Re: Egon's Spider-man costume progress and advice thread- Help needed!!!

That's true Lunaman. I'm going to try to do a really fine whip stitch, with red thread, to repair the forefinger and middle finger. All seemed lost to me at first because well, I kind of panicked to be honest. Like I said though, the more I look at it the more I think I can fix it properly. You're right about the tightness being from the excess fabric, but I'm sure glad I have that fabric there.
I think I'm going to hand stitch the entire glove together first, before I machine sew it to finish it up. Really want to do this all myself...

Also, on the gloves, is there an actual seam line guide there? It seems as if there is but it's a bit hard to tell with the way it's all shaded. I think in my gif image I've come close to where it should be.
 
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Re: Egon's Spider-man costume progress and advice thread- Help needed!!!

Excellent news! I wrote fabric on demand about my situation. They said as long as I send them a cropped version of what I want printed (the arm and hand section) the print will come out the same color. I have already begun repairing the messed up cuts I made by whip stitching them, but I think I'm just going to go ahead and have the replacements printed out instead now. :D
 
Re: Egon's Spider-man costume progress and advice thread- Help needed!!!

awesome thread man, hope all is well on the sew progress, my own seamstress is running into problems too putting together prints for the first time.
 
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