BrazenBell
New Member
Hey everyone, apologies for the lack of detail photowise in this thread, but the build was a relatively simple one and i will try to recount the processes that are not pictured.
As Sly is animated, and older low poly etc, i decided that a rigid interpretation of the costume was probably inapropriate, so i decided to work towards a 'gritty reboot' type look, without a mask or tail or anything.
The proportions of the cane head and shaft, however were taken from concept art such as that above, rather than game models which tended to be a little fluid (in that the sizing would change mid-animation etc.) as such the head of the cane is about twice the height of a human head, and the cane in total is around 130 cm long. (As stated earlier, the purpose was not to replicate the can exactly, rather to create something that gave the same feeling.)
Following some rough proportion sketching on paper, a form was worked out of a urethane tooling foam for the head of the cane, to be honest the first form didn’t turn out correcty, being a little small and not having the right ‘feel’.
(this is the second attempt, which was used int the build)
I really like working with urethane foam, over either epl or xpl polystyrenes as it is easy to shape with a hacksaw blade, followed by a sanding block, not ‘clumping’ like either polystyrene type. In addition, urethane foam does not react to solvent based paints ( at least not in my experience) which is useful if any areas miss a coating, or do not need anything covering them. The one major disadvantage of urethane foam is that it is not as stiff as xpl, and absolutely needs a supporting covering. Rondo is okay in small areas with little or no loading, but for semi-functional geometry like the cane head a fibreglass layer is necessary.
Forgive me for having no photos of this process, but fibreglassing is a sticky process, and I’m super lazy when it comes to gloves (in the most counterproductive manner in the world). Safe to say that it was a fairly routine process, I applied one layer of fibre to each side, with a couple of coats of polyester (standard fibreglassing) resin to each side to even the surface a bit.
Following this, a few dust coats of primer and a bunch of sanding were applied until the form was satisfactory.
A basic cane was formed using some clear pine and a bench sander, just to get the taper, and then smoothed by hand, before a couple of coats of diluted English mahogany stain were applied, with a day in between each coat. Following this, a couple of coats of a wipe-on polyurethane varnish were applied to give a bit of gloss, sortof a well- used smoothness.
The paint on the cane head was a relatively simple rattlecan job, with a flat black basecoat, followed by a light coat of aluminium, followed by repeated light coats of gold.
I use an aluminium base for my gold in this case, as the gold that I have is particularly transparent, and the more tenacious silver aluminium helps to give a deeper colour.
To finish, the cane head was weathered with a ragged coat of thinned black enamel, and a spray on/wipe off of thinned brown poster paint acrylic. The neck joint was resolved with a rag wrapped around it stiffened with PVA glue and drybrushed with a cream/bone acrylic.
Thanks for checking out my first build writeup/thread, I get some good knowledge from this community and felt I should be giving some back. Again apologies for the lack of pictures, but if you have any questions about details of the build don’t hesitate to ask.
As Sly is animated, and older low poly etc, i decided that a rigid interpretation of the costume was probably inapropriate, so i decided to work towards a 'gritty reboot' type look, without a mask or tail or anything.
The proportions of the cane head and shaft, however were taken from concept art such as that above, rather than game models which tended to be a little fluid (in that the sizing would change mid-animation etc.) as such the head of the cane is about twice the height of a human head, and the cane in total is around 130 cm long. (As stated earlier, the purpose was not to replicate the can exactly, rather to create something that gave the same feeling.)
Following some rough proportion sketching on paper, a form was worked out of a urethane tooling foam for the head of the cane, to be honest the first form didn’t turn out correcty, being a little small and not having the right ‘feel’.
(this is the second attempt, which was used int the build)
I really like working with urethane foam, over either epl or xpl polystyrenes as it is easy to shape with a hacksaw blade, followed by a sanding block, not ‘clumping’ like either polystyrene type. In addition, urethane foam does not react to solvent based paints ( at least not in my experience) which is useful if any areas miss a coating, or do not need anything covering them. The one major disadvantage of urethane foam is that it is not as stiff as xpl, and absolutely needs a supporting covering. Rondo is okay in small areas with little or no loading, but for semi-functional geometry like the cane head a fibreglass layer is necessary.
Forgive me for having no photos of this process, but fibreglassing is a sticky process, and I’m super lazy when it comes to gloves (in the most counterproductive manner in the world). Safe to say that it was a fairly routine process, I applied one layer of fibre to each side, with a couple of coats of polyester (standard fibreglassing) resin to each side to even the surface a bit.
Following this, a few dust coats of primer and a bunch of sanding were applied until the form was satisfactory.
A basic cane was formed using some clear pine and a bench sander, just to get the taper, and then smoothed by hand, before a couple of coats of diluted English mahogany stain were applied, with a day in between each coat. Following this, a couple of coats of a wipe-on polyurethane varnish were applied to give a bit of gloss, sortof a well- used smoothness.
The paint on the cane head was a relatively simple rattlecan job, with a flat black basecoat, followed by a light coat of aluminium, followed by repeated light coats of gold.
I use an aluminium base for my gold in this case, as the gold that I have is particularly transparent, and the more tenacious silver aluminium helps to give a deeper colour.
To finish, the cane head was weathered with a ragged coat of thinned black enamel, and a spray on/wipe off of thinned brown poster paint acrylic. The neck joint was resolved with a rag wrapped around it stiffened with PVA glue and drybrushed with a cream/bone acrylic.
Thanks for checking out my first build writeup/thread, I get some good knowledge from this community and felt I should be giving some back. Again apologies for the lack of pictures, but if you have any questions about details of the build don’t hesitate to ask.
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