Hey guys! Im new to this whole building you own costume thing. I discovered this site a couple days ago because i wanted a sweet iron man replica helmet! to say the least, i was AMAZED at the work done by some of the members, finhead, tmp, dark aslyum to name a few. I love making stuff so i figured what the heck, lets go for it. So i've been doing some research, ive read through a bunch of the iron man suit threads to see what the best options for me were. please correct me if im wrong, but the first step is making the model. Ive seen various methods, pepa, foam, clay, and i decided to do pepa. It looks the easiest especially for a newbie and it seems most cost efficient. And after seeing what could be done by finhead, i dont see there to be any disadvantages to using it. So i will be making the iron man helmet, probably the one that finhead provided on his thread. I believe the pep file was made by DF 
? Anyways I think thats the mark III version, and that is fine but I was wondering if anyone knew of an accurate mark V version? or at least mark IV? So the next step after i have it all pepa'd up, is making it hard? Ive seen fiberglass and bondo used. I have used bondo before bet never used fiberglass. I dont know where to buy it other than online. My question is which is better? Which is cheaper? which is stronger? which is lighter? i would assume that glass is lighter but im a newbie so i dont know. Right now im thinking bondo is what ill be using because its whats easiest to get, but if fiberglass is much stronger and lighter i would like to go with that? But im not sure if that even matters yet because after this alot of people go into molding..? This is where i get confused! How is a mold made? what is used to make the final product using the mold? do you just fill the mold up with a liquid and let it dry? Have no clue on this! dark aslyum uses vacform and that looks really awesome but i dont think i can get my hands on that stuff or that machinery. I also noticed alot of people resized their replicas because they didnt fit. Did you guys have to remake the model and everything!? or once you make a mold is there some shortcut to resizing the mold? o.o im so confused cuz that would take a lot of time remaking everytime! now after all this is done and i have the final mold ( i guess?) all that is left is cleaning up for it to be painted. I hope someone out there decided to read this loooong post and will clarify some things up! i plan to start making the pepa model this week. Ill probably get some card stock tomorrow
EDIT: Here are new pics, i have barely had time to work on this helmet since i started. THe helmet got pretty warped after the jelly instead of regular resin, and then to top that off the layer of fiberglass on the outside pretty much rounded off all the details. But here is my progress thus far, i thought about just restarting asi know it would go much more smoothly the second time, but i already put like 20$ of stuff into this helmet so might as well finish it. Tell me what you guys think, and if the details look generally right? are the edges in the back to low?
? Anyways I think thats the mark III version, and that is fine but I was wondering if anyone knew of an accurate mark V version? or at least mark IV? So the next step after i have it all pepa'd up, is making it hard? Ive seen fiberglass and bondo used. I have used bondo before bet never used fiberglass. I dont know where to buy it other than online. My question is which is better? Which is cheaper? which is stronger? which is lighter? i would assume that glass is lighter but im a newbie so i dont know. Right now im thinking bondo is what ill be using because its whats easiest to get, but if fiberglass is much stronger and lighter i would like to go with that? But im not sure if that even matters yet because after this alot of people go into molding..? This is where i get confused! How is a mold made? what is used to make the final product using the mold? do you just fill the mold up with a liquid and let it dry? Have no clue on this! dark aslyum uses vacform and that looks really awesome but i dont think i can get my hands on that stuff or that machinery. I also noticed alot of people resized their replicas because they didnt fit. Did you guys have to remake the model and everything!? or once you make a mold is there some shortcut to resizing the mold? o.o im so confused cuz that would take a lot of time remaking everytime! now after all this is done and i have the final mold ( i guess?) all that is left is cleaning up for it to be painted. I hope someone out there decided to read this loooong post and will clarify some things up! i plan to start making the pepa model this week. Ill probably get some card stock tomorrowEDIT: Here are new pics, i have barely had time to work on this helmet since i started. THe helmet got pretty warped after the jelly instead of regular resin, and then to top that off the layer of fiberglass on the outside pretty much rounded off all the details. But here is my progress thus far, i thought about just restarting asi know it would go much more smoothly the second time, but i already put like 20$ of stuff into this helmet so might as well finish it. Tell me what you guys think, and if the details look generally right? are the edges in the back to low?
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