Hathaway's Catwoman fabric research

[Annisse]

Does any one out there have a clue what Hathaway's Catwoman costume from the upcoming movie Dark Knight Rises is made out of? Matte vinyl? Neoprene? perhaps. It has to be a 4-way stretch spandex fabric.

It looks like it acts quite rubber like in the way it moves and there is a subtle texture to it.

Here is the best shot I have found of her while searching online to see the fabric of her suit.

Any ideas? Some friends of mine as well as myself are interested in recreating this costume.

 

[aliensarchive]

I filmed her double crashing into the IMAX camera last year. Can't tell you what the material is but I would expect the costume to pop up in interviews over the next few months.

Photo of Jolene Van Vugt as Selina Kyle:

DKR Friday August 5th 2011, Day 52 of 119 « Razzi: Photo Sharing

 

[TheLadyNerd]

Has there been any more word as to Hathaway's fabric? I haven't been able to find any myself.

 

[abaker1381]

my wife has been looking into this as a possible project so def let us know if you figure it out!

 

[Haywire]

Should definately start a 'definative tdkr catwoman suit' thread like they did for bane and joker. It would be great to see someone put this together

 

[Annisse]

I still a lead on what fabric was used to make Hataway's Catwoman suit.... anyone, anyone???

 

[Tigerblood]

I still a lead on what fabric was used to make Hataway's Catwoman suit.... anyone, anyone???

I believe Lindy Hemming talked about it in the Dark Knight Trilogy book. From what I heard from her other interview was she screenprinted the pattern on a fabric then laid silk over it.

 

[faille]

Annisse, check out the thread Aelynn00 started: http://www.therpf.com/f24/tdkr-catwoman-build-costume-study-pic-heavy-155364/

There is information there about what Lindy Hemming has said about the suit, as well as our attempts to match it. I've been experimenting with Puff Paint and some matte vinyl spandex that I got from Spandex House, and think I might be close to something that looks close to screen accurate. gvmaraio has also found a really great fabric that gives the same look.

 

[aelynn000]

To sum it up, it's a custom made, multi layered, screen printed PUL!

*shakes fist at those custom made textured fabrics*

 

[TheNickFox]

As I've said before, it can be "reasonably replicated" by printing trompe l'oeil style "pills" onto a wet-look spandex. (or even PU fabric)

The actual fabric is actually textured, it appears, but just like Spidey Suits with printed elements replicating raised elements. It's never perfect, but the final effect can look pretty durn good.

If I had the bandwidth, I'd experiment on it myself...especially since my girlfriend wants to do the costume. So, I hope someone can run with it.

-Nick

 

[Annisse]

As I've said before, it can be "reasonably replicated" by printing trompe l'oeil style "pills" onto a wet-look spandex. (or even PU fabric)

The actual fabric is actually textured, it appears, but just like Spidey Suits with printed elements replicating raised elements. It's never perfect, but the final effect can look pretty durn good.

If I had the bandwidth, I'd experiment on it myself...especially since my girlfriend wants to do the costume. So, I hope someone can run with it.

-Nick

Thanks for your input everyone :thumbsup now you say here, printing trompe l'oeil style "pills" onto a wet-look spandex, I get what you mean but, how would you go about doing the actual printing of that to get the embossed 3D raised look?

I just recently heard about screw printing? Anyone familiar with that concept?

From what I am understanding about the print part about it is to get a raised textured similar design as Hataway's suit "pill" and literally "screw" push, like stamp it into the fabric. Right?

Man, if you do that and only have one of the "pill" looking stamps to do this, that is going to take a LONG damn time! :confused

 

[TheNickFox]

My idea was to just simulate the raised effect through the design of the printed pattern, but I'm sure there must be ways to take it that extra step forward and actually emboss it as well.

The question to ask is: What does PU fabric respond to? Heat? Water? Etc?

It's likely you'll need some agent like those in order to help shape the fabric. (my money is on heat) Hell! Maybe there's some way to use some modification of vacuforming in order to emboss the fabric.

Most of the light research I've done all says heat+tons of pressure is the best way to emboss that type of fabric. So, it would be great if someone with access to a vacuformer could run an experiment or two for us to see if it might present an economical method of reproducing that effect.

What I was thinking was: get a piece of MDF laser cut with the pill shape cut out all over the surface. Place this down on top of the vacuforming platen so that the air will only be pulled through those pill-shaped holes. Then heat the vinyl/polyurethane fabric (And how much heat and time it needs is a mystery) and drop it down, with the right side of the fabric pointed down, vacuuming out the air...In my mind that would work, but it needs someone with the right access to equipment to try it out. As far as I know it's never been tried before by a hobbyist.

...the only downside is that you'd be limited by the size of the vacuformer.

This is a costume that is going to require a LOT of research, so hopefully the right people with the right tools will get interested.

-Nick