Kai, Lloyd & Zane from Ninjago: child's costume thread

[Mojo_Turbo]

Ok, so 2 years ago I made my son a Buzzlightyear Costume, and then last year he was Jack Sparrow and so the wife and I have been on him to pick a costume this year so that "Daddy can spread out the cost."

So my son has finally landed on doing Kai from Ninjago. Which is ok, since I guess we let him totally pick his own person this year and he isn't being influenced by his parents. But now... of course I want to take this beyond a simple mock up - if he's going to be a Ninja - he's going to be a NINJA!

If you are not familiar, Kai is a lego guy, but we are not shooting for a lego copy, but rather a "If Kai were a real Ninja and became human" what would he look like.

Kai looks like this:

And to be fair there are at least 3 versions of outfits, and I think my son wants the "golden" outfit. But he's going to get the classic training costume instead, just because I think it will be more comfortable Halloween night and easier for me to make

My initial thoughts:

Ninja Hood will consist of 2 parts so that he can wear the hood only for trick or treating leaving his nose and mouth free


I will keep it updated as I go.

 

[Mojo_Turbo]

Re: Child's Costume: Kai from Ninjago

I "was" going to go with the "ZX" costume

But the hard parts were going to be a lot of work, plus I had no real ideas how to apply the gold crest to the hood.

It will be a long more work to do this version and in the long run,.... it will be just as cool so I am saving myself the anguish

 

[Mojo_Turbo]

Re: Child's Costume: Kai from Ninjago

First part purchased - and it fits great

Red Karate Gi from Amazon (size 000) made by BBS (Black Belt Shop) was only $20

 

[ozarkscout]

Re: Child's Costume: Kai from Ninjago

I'll be watching this thread with great interest, as I'm working on Zane (the white Lego ninja) for my 5 year-old.

I've started on some foam shurikens of ice and a pattern for the mask.

 

[Mojo_Turbo]

Re: Child's Costume: Kai from Ninjago

Thanks, normally I put a lot of time and money into these, but this year I have decided to take it slow and cheap.

In the end, it will still be cool - I mean, what is cooler than Ninjas?

Ok, Pirates... yea but he was a Pirate last year.

 

[Mole]

Re: Child's Costume: Kai from Ninjago / HELP with armor parts!!!!

I love Ninjago! But I had no idea there was cartoon.

As for the armour, how about the ubiquitous foamies? There's a good reference on how to make simple foam armour here - Craft Foam Armor Tutorial

 

[Hogosha]

Re: Child's Costume: Kai from Ninjago / HELP with armor parts!!!!

That red GI looks great! I would use foamies for the majority of the armor. As for the children's football pads, don't bother, requires too much modification. I would make a basic paper template for the chest And back and transfer that to a spackle bucket. Cut it out and shape to fit with a heat gun. This is how I did it on my daughters Gene Simmons armor. You now have something rigid to attach the foamie shoulder pieces. PM me if you need more info.

 

[Hogosha]

Re: Child's Costume: Kai from Ninjago / HELP with armor parts!!!!

Also it should be fairly simple to bang out a pep file for the head peice, and do it out of foam.

 

[Mojo_Turbo]

Re: Child's Costume: Kai from Ninjago / HELP with armor parts!!!!

wow, great advice. Do you have a link to the Gene Simmons build?

 

[Hogosha]

Re: Child's Costume: Kai from Ninjago / HELP with armor parts!!!!

wow, great advice. Do you have a link to the Gene Simmons build?

http://www.therpf.com/f24/8-yo-daughters-gene-simmons-costume-pic-100140/

 

[Mojo_Turbo]

Re: Child's Costume: Kai from Ninjago / HELP with armor parts!!!!

niiiice, I remember that one.

Yea, but like I said above, I am abandoning the armor build and going with an all soft build. I bought a few more parts and will update soon.

This is how I plan to tie the swords on:

http://youtu.be/xGW-A3rQaqM

And I plan to use long red flat shoelaces to do it.

 

[Dracosfire83]

Re: Child's Costume: Kai from Ninjago / HELP with armor parts!!!!

Head gear reminds me of Shredders helm from TMNT.

 

[Mojo_Turbo]

Re: Child's Costume: Kai from Ninjago / HELP with armor parts!!!!

totally..... and it is a show about 4 ninjas who are trained by their sensai almost unwillingly at first to fight an army of evil

it's power rangers meets TMNT meets Lego

 

[Mojo_Turbo]

Re: Child's Costume: Kai from Ninjago

Next, we bought the hood fabric and some extra greeblies:

Red fabric, thread and model magic from Hobby Lobby. The Gi pants are in the shot for reference, we got a pretty close color. My wife bought the model magic in case I wanted to make the lion head crest out of it. I've never used it before, so I am not really sure how that will go.

We bought cording from Joanne's for the chest ties.

I bought 2 Katanas from Amazon. These swords are hollow and super cheap "dollar store" quality.

 

[Mojo_Turbo]

Re: Child's Costume: Kai from Ninjago

somewhere along the way I was roped back into doing the X version

 

[padad]

Re: Child's Costume: Kai from Ninjago

This is a great idea! I'm looking at the same Karate uniform for my son. You said that you got the 000 size. Can I ask how tall your son is? Just trying to gauge which size I should get.

Thanks! I look forward to seeing your final design!

 

[cndnveggie]

Re: Child's Costume: Kai from Ninjago

I signed up to this forum just so I could comment on this thread! I am making my son a Lloyd/Green Ninja costume for Halloween, so I'm looking forward to seeing your Kai costume come together!

Here is the Green Ninja from Ninjago:

I've bought a white martial arts uniform and ordered some yellow and blue dye, so hopefully it will turn out a nice emerald green. I've bought some silver stars to sew onto the costume and material to make the headmask. I've found that using a plain hard plastic headband (that girls wear) will be useful inside the part of the mask that goes in front of the nose - it will give it a bit of structure and keep it away from my sons face a bit, so breathing is easier. I'm going to try adding small velcro pieces to hold the ends of the headband close to the ears. I'll make the mask out of two or three pieces - probably one that goes over the head and down in over the ears, another that goes across the forehead and ties in the back, and a third that goes in front of the nose/mouth (which is where the headband will be). I'll take some pics once I have it figured out.

Thanks to the tips in this thread, I tried making some of the armor last night using craft foram. I think it turned out pretty well - I cut out the separate pieces, glued it together with a hot glue gun, and covered it in duct tape. I'm going to try it again, but heat it before I put the duct tape on so I can shape it a bit more.

Now I have to tackle the shoulder armor - not exactly sure how to do that, but I think it'll be doable with the craft foam.

Oh, and Lloyd has a symbol on his back, I'm just going to use an iron-on transfer for that, should be straightforward:

 

[Mojo_Turbo]

Re: Child's Costume: Kai from Ninjago

wow! all great ideas!

My son is about 42 inches tall.

We cut a pattern out of a paper bag for the Ninja hood after looking at quite a few on the internet. We cut the pattern out of the red fabric, and this is how it turned out:

Next, we watched a video on youtube about how to tie a Ninja Sword (the "right" way) and that prompted me to buy red flat shoelaces - this is how one sword turned out.

 

[bummer6]

Re: Child's Costume: Kai from Ninjago

Those aren't real swords, are they? >__>

 

[Barbarella]

Re: Child's Costume: Kai from Ninjago

I'm so happy I found this thread!!! I am also making a Lloyd Garmedon costume for my lil ninja. So far I've bought a white gi. Dying it green with Dylon fabric dye (Amazon Green). For the armor, I'll be using these carboard shoe inserts that I got from a kids shoe store. I'll post a pic.... and going the t-shirt route for the headgear, SOOO EXCITED!!