Dragonfiend
New Member
I turned 30 recently and for my birthday I planned to have a heroes and villains fancy dress party. I quickly decided that I wanted something cool and unique so went off in search of a Predator costume. As most of you probably already know they are few and far between and the ones readily available quite simply are not very good and that's what brought me to the Predatorium. This is my first attempt at anything like this but I definitely see the appeal after doing it, it was a lot of work (around 4 months) but I really enjoyed it, a labour of love for definite. Here I will show a few pictures and give a brief description of what I did and what I used, I didn't take as many pictures as I wanted to but most of the time I just forgot as I was also busy with work etc and was rushing around to get everything finished in time for the party. I actually only finished this costume the afternoon of my party so it was a close call.
First of all credit where credit is due, I based all this costume around the files posted by JFcustoms here: http://www.therpf.com/f24/jfcustoms-foam-files-148889/ without them I wouldn't have got anywhere with this project. I modified things as I went along just to personalise the costume a little but the ground work was all done with those files.
The head was bought from Ebay, I have heard people call this the Rubies Mask but I'm guessing that is a US name for it as I got it off Ebay from a UK store. The mask is huge and needed to be filled in with upholstery foam to stop it being so loose on my head, visibility is also a huge issue with this mask and that is why in the future this is the first thing I am planning on replacing.
I made all the dreadlocks out of foam backer rod that I also got off Ebay, there are around 40 in total cut to 20cm lengths and 20mm diameter (apart from the shorter ones at the front which are 10cm long). The beads are made from 2cm pieces of 22mm copper pipe which I cut by hand which took forever to complete.
The gun actually rotated from left to right as it detected movement. Housed inside the base of the gun is a dummy security camera that I found quite cheap on Ebay. I cut the camera lens off and covered it with foam and basically just stuck my gun on top of it, I had to drill a hole in the front of the foam so that light from outside could enter through it and set off the motion sensor built into the camera. I also fitted a laser sight into the gun itself just so it looked cooler
All the armour was built using EVA foam mats as that is what everyone seems to use and they really work great. All the detailing was done using foamies for the raised details and googley eyes for all the rivets. The blade gauntlet was modified slightly to house an Assassins Creed hidden blade mechanism which allowed the blades to extend if I flex my forearm which triggered the button hidden inside (it could also be fired by pushing on the top of the gauntlet). The left hand gauntlet I modified to hold my IPhone 6 plus which I put a video of the bomb countdown on, I also used the phone to play sound effects through a Bluetooth speaker which was housed in the chin of the mask.
The leather was from a big sheet of faux leather I bought online, I cut it to shape for the cod and butt pieces and cut it into strips to go on the belt and cover all the straps. The skin was compression clothing I bought from Sports Direct, I originally bought a morphsuit with the idea of painting it but I just didn't have the time to get around to it. The feet are old work boots I had lying around which I stuck the armour on to and also cut toes from an extra pair of the werewolf gloves that I used for the hands. I painted the palms of the hands using citadel miniatures paints and then covering it in a lacquer spray I had. It worked surprisingly well and didn't rub off or anything which was good. Below is a before and after pic of the hands. The feet were another problem area for this costume as the party wore on they started to fall apart all in all I lost 4 toes and 3 armour spikes but considering I had to walk to the venue and spent the whole night stood up or walking around they took a bit of a battering.
To paint the actual armour I first spray painted it metallic silver (I didn't use plasti dip or anything like that first, it was just too expensive to get here in the UK) which was very bright so I then used black poster paint to paint on the armour and then dab most of it off just to darken the whole thing. I then repeated the same process with brown poster paint to give it more of a rusted look. I then sprayed the metallic paint onto a tea towel wrapped around my finger and used my finger to highlight all the edges of the armour as well as the rivets, I also lightly rubbed my finger over the main bits of the armour just to highlight them slightly and leave the darker colours in the recesses. After all that was fully dry I spayed the whole thing with the lacquer spray to give it some protection and a little bit of a sheen look. I was surprised at how much an effect the lacquer spray had on the armour, below is a before and after pic of the bicep plate I made.
I think that's about everything, any questions please let me know and I would love some feedback from you guys. As I said earlier this is the first time I have ever worked with EVA foam or attempted to make a costume, it was definitely a learning experience and I am planning on making improvements to it in the future. I need to replace the mask, the feet and make something that looks like predator skin but for a first attempt I'm actually quite pleased with the results. The party was great and my costume was certainly a talking point below is my favourite pic from the party - Super gran vs The predator. Predator stood no chance
First of all credit where credit is due, I based all this costume around the files posted by JFcustoms here: http://www.therpf.com/f24/jfcustoms-foam-files-148889/ without them I wouldn't have got anywhere with this project. I modified things as I went along just to personalise the costume a little but the ground work was all done with those files.
The head was bought from Ebay, I have heard people call this the Rubies Mask but I'm guessing that is a US name for it as I got it off Ebay from a UK store. The mask is huge and needed to be filled in with upholstery foam to stop it being so loose on my head, visibility is also a huge issue with this mask and that is why in the future this is the first thing I am planning on replacing.
I made all the dreadlocks out of foam backer rod that I also got off Ebay, there are around 40 in total cut to 20cm lengths and 20mm diameter (apart from the shorter ones at the front which are 10cm long). The beads are made from 2cm pieces of 22mm copper pipe which I cut by hand which took forever to complete.
The gun actually rotated from left to right as it detected movement. Housed inside the base of the gun is a dummy security camera that I found quite cheap on Ebay. I cut the camera lens off and covered it with foam and basically just stuck my gun on top of it, I had to drill a hole in the front of the foam so that light from outside could enter through it and set off the motion sensor built into the camera. I also fitted a laser sight into the gun itself just so it looked cooler
All the armour was built using EVA foam mats as that is what everyone seems to use and they really work great. All the detailing was done using foamies for the raised details and googley eyes for all the rivets. The blade gauntlet was modified slightly to house an Assassins Creed hidden blade mechanism which allowed the blades to extend if I flex my forearm which triggered the button hidden inside (it could also be fired by pushing on the top of the gauntlet). The left hand gauntlet I modified to hold my IPhone 6 plus which I put a video of the bomb countdown on, I also used the phone to play sound effects through a Bluetooth speaker which was housed in the chin of the mask.
