Toothless Quad-suit Costume - Pep file download link

[indiefilmgeek]

Re: Toothless Quad-suit Halloween Costume WIP - Wing work updated!

Have the other kids decided what they want to do yet? I can see you 4 builds deep in short order! Hahaha

Oh, I'm looking to get off 'easy' with the other kids this year! :lol

Mikey is going to roll-up the sleeves of Tia's ghostbuster costume jumpsuit and I'm going to repair her $1-store-constructed proton pack so he can catch some ghosts this year!

Jakim (my 4yr old) wants to be spiderman, so I'm probably going to cheat and get him a store-bought costume and modify it a bit.

Lastly, the baby (2yrs old)... we'll, my wife is threatening to attempt her OWN costume build for little Ray-Ray. She wants to turn her into Slimer so she can get cute pictures of Mikey and his new sister in their themed costumes. :love

So, it looks like THIS is going to be the big build... and I don't have that much time left! :cry

*****

With that in mind, I finally pulled out the Toothless head and hardened the INSIDE of the pep with Smooth-cast. I just painted it in around the nose and eyes and then poured in small amounts along the top (where it will be suspended on the frame).

Here's a really bad picture of the inside of the head:

And here is a picture of Toothless crying plastic tears:

:behave

Anyway, the plan is to leave this 'shell' as is and get some VERY thin (1/4" thick) low-density foam. Glue that stuff on the outside of the head and then basically upholster the head with the same fabric I'll be using for the rest of the body.

The upside of this is that the 1/4" foam will allow the fabric to smooth out any of the harsh pep edges and I get to avoid bondo and sanding! :love

The down side is that I've never upholstered anything or used a sewing machine... so I'm totally outside my comfort zone.

I'm heading to D*Con in couple weeks, so I'll need to make the most of this weekend on moving this costume forward or it won't get done by Halloween! :confused

 

[indiefilmgeek]

Re: Toothless Quad-suit Halloween Costume WIP - Wing work updated!

Some updates...

First off, I cut away a cross-bar on the backpack that bothered Tia. Unlike most hikers, she will be bending her neck BACK pretty far when she's on all-fours, and this bar is RIGHT at the base of our head - preventing her from that nature movement.

Next I cleaned up ALL the fiberglass on the wing joints and connection points. And then used my heat gun to curve the long sections of the wings. Here's what they look like now...

And then I started to work on the hinging system for the head.

Before I show you what I came up with, let me first explain what I wanted to accomplish... In Monoyasha's build, she had to have someone outside the suit latch and un-latch the head depending on whether she was in all-four position or standing upright. I didn't want to have to do that (I'm lazy).

So, I plan to have gravity help me out here. IF I can get the head perfectly balanced in a horizontal position RIGHT at the hinge connected to the neck, then no matter WHAT angle the neck is at, the HEAD will always be horizontal - provided the hinge allows for easy and smooth motion.

I know the neck will be constructed from PVC piping and I've done everything I can to make the head as light, but durable as I can make it.

With that in mind, here is the quick sketch I drew this evening with some of the earliest parts I was making.

And here is all the parts. The bolt will go through the aluminium plate and into the nylon bushing. A matching nut will be sanded down and slid into the PVC pipe... and that will go into the aluminium pipe. Once the hole in the PVC pipe containing the nut is positioned in the cut-out 'track' I made in the aluminium pipe, the bolt assembly will be screwed into place.

Partial assembly of the pieces...

FULL assembly of the pieces (with the PVC 90 degree pieces added).

And here is a quick video of the hinge in motion...

 

[electraflier]

Re: Toothless Quad-suit Halloween Costume WIP - Wing and Head work update

LOve your progress so far!!! The wing struts are amazing!

 

[skylu3Design]

Re: Toothless Quad-suit Halloween Costume WIP - Wing and Head work update

Incredible work!!!

 

[omel]

Re: Toothless Quad-suit Halloween Costume WIP - Wing and Head work update

updates,updates,updates,updates.....hehehe

 

[indiefilmgeek]

Re: Toothless Quad-suit Halloween Costume WIP - Wing and Head work update

updates,updates,updates,updates.....hehehe

As you wish! :thumbsup

Here's a look at the frame and the one front leg that I've covered in foam already. The head is just roughly placed for this picture.

That's not much progress for that part...

The major project the last week or so has been working on the hardest element for me... covering the head with fabric. :unsure

I'm just not experienced in this at all, so I'm truly afraid this will suck. My initial plan was to cover the head with a layer of batting and then basically upholster the head with my 'dragon skin' fabric. I figured the batting would basically soften up the harsh edges of the hardened pepped shell... Right? How hard could this be?

We started out with a trip to the fabric store... Where I bought a bit of batting and 1.5 yards of a black leathery fabric.

Here's a picture Mikey (my 6yr old) took of me showing off my muscles as we bought the batting.

With batting in-hand, I started by just hot gluing it to the head. Here are some picture of the process...

It's an ELEPHANT!!!!

And here is the final batting-covered head! The back of the head is still loose, as I will be editing that area as I go.

From here I took some old (ugly) fabric I had and I started to wrap it around the head - in an attempt to create a pattern I could use to cut out the $20/yard 'dragon skin' fabric.

Here's the bottom...

This is what the main section of fabric (pattern) looks like... nice, eh? :confused

OHHH!!! I should probably show you what the dragon skin fabric looks like!!!

Here is the pattern traced onto the back of the 'skin' fabric.

So, I cut this out and wanted to start sewing it up... unfortunately, our sewing machine is not working. :cry

And that means (at least for now), I'm hand-stitching this piece. :confused

This is a rough fitting...

The only issue I'm having is that the pattern fabric is MUCH lighter and stretchy compared to the thick leathery 'skin' fabric. So, it's buckling a lot around the eyes and other curves much worse than the pattern fabric did.

It was also un-even (side-to-side). So, I'm re-cutting and sewing (by hand) this piece again.

We'll see if this works or not. Honestly, if it doesn't I'll just to have roll with it, as Halloween is coming up WAY to fast to redo it again. :unsure

I'll try to be better about updating the thread as I go... And if anyone lives in Knoxville, TN and would like to offer me some sewing assistance, please feel free to PM me! :lol

 

[sterling archer]

Re: Toothless Quad-suit Halloween Costume WIP - Dragon Skinning

You never cease to amaze me. Can't wait to see the rest of the kids finished costumes!

 

[booksandcorsets]

Re: Toothless Quad-suit Halloween Costume WIP - Dragon Skinning

Looking fantastic so far! What an ambitious Halloween costume--your daughter is going to be so tired after a few hours.

If you're still having problems with the fabric, you might want to just resort to a patterned 4-way spandex; from experience it's SO rough getting a thicker non-stretchy fabric to lie straight.

 

[G33k]

Re: Toothless Quad-suit Halloween Costume WIP - Dragon Skinning

Nice work man! Have you considered a counter balance for th head? Can the head tip down as she stands up (letting her rest upright might be a kindness...)

 

[Durkness]

Re: Toothless Quad-suit Halloween Costume WIP - Dragon Skinning

This is amazing!!!! I'm subscribing!!!

 

[The Ronin]

Re: Toothless Quad-suit Halloween Costume WIP - Dragon Skinning

How did I miss this earlier? :eek

Subscribed!

 

[indiefilmgeek]

Re: Toothless Quad-suit Halloween Costume WIP - Dragon Skinning

If you're still having problems with the fabric, you might want to just resort to a patterned 4-way spandex; from experience it's SO rough getting a thicker non-stretchy fabric to lie straight.

You're SO right. This leathery stuff is a very tough to work with. I will almost certainly go with something closer to spandex I think. :unsure

Nice work man! Have you considered a counter balance for th head? Can the head tip down as she stands up (letting her rest upright might be a kindness...)

Yep! That's the plan right now, although I'll also have to have a separate swing arm that will 'latch' on a hook connected to the head pivot when it's in the 'down' position. See, the balance plan works GREAT for just moving it up and down. But in the down position, IF the head it bumped, it will drop forward (to where it would be if she's upright). To fix this, she could just stand back up and repeat... but I think I've worked out a way to make a latch (on a separate weighted arm) that will swing into a 'locking' position ONLY when the head is in the down position. As she stands up, the 'locking' hook will swing away as the weighted arm rotates away from the head latch. At the same time, the head will begin moving as it should (no longer being hindered by the 'locking' arm.

That seems complicated in writing, but I have it half-built and think it will work well once assembled. :love

You never cease to amaze me. Can't wait to see the rest of the kids finished costumes!

Thanks, Sterling! :$

I'm actually pretty upset with myself. I had to finally break down and tell Tia that I won't be able to finish Toothless before Halloween. :cry

I'll definitely continue to work on it and plan to finish it, but it just isn't going to happen before Halloween.

Sooooo, Tia and I are working on alternative costumes for her to wear this year. With this limited amount of time, I'll have to cheat and use some store-bought stuff as bases for some of the costumes.

Jakim (4) wants to be Spiderman - and I have his heavily modded store-bought suit mostly done.

Mikey (6) decided this weekend he wanted to be Capt America... Which I could have BLOWN OUT if had more time. In this case, it's a store-bought base with modified parts and lots of extra pieces we're creating.

I will have very little time to post about this work, but I AM taking pictures so I can post about them after Halloween.


Sorry to everyone following the Toothless build. It's going to have to be on pause for a while... :confused

 

[Temperance]

Re: Toothless Quad-suit Halloween Costume WIP - Dragon Skinning

I would suggest instead of using fabric for drafting your pattern, use Duct tape. It's commonly used with mascot and fursuit makers to draft patterns. I use it all the time ^_^

 

[Mostly Fantasy]

Re: Toothless Quad-suit Halloween Costume WIP - Dragon Skinning

You could spray liquid vinyl over foam to make a skin- I'd texture the foam with a hot knife first, then spray the (colored) vinyl over it- just make sure you have ventilation, as it's pretty strong smelling, but only when wet/uncured.

 

[omel]

Re: Toothless Quad-suit Halloween Costume WIP - Dragon Skinning

gosh. it must have been heartbreaking to have to tell your kid that the awesome costume she's been so anxious to wear wont be ready....but....kudos to you for being a great dad to your kids despite this setback. still hoping you pull it off before halloween!

 

[firefly827347]

Re: Toothless Quad-suit Halloween Costume WIP - Dragon Skinning

Awesome build! Can't wait to see it finished

 

[Lord Magneto]

Re: Toothless Quad-suit Halloween Costume WIP - Dragon Skinning

Man you are such a great dad. I can't wait till my son is a little old so I can attempt doing some stuff like this.

 

[MaddMaxx82]

why don't you just try wrapping and gluing the faux leather down to the inside surface of the head? Along the edges of the nose inside the eye sockets and such. That way you can wrap it tighter and avoid the folds showing. I do something similar when replacing the material on my motorcycle seat.

Sent from my SGH-T959V using Tapatalk 2

 

[Monkeybark]

Re: Toothless Quad-suit Halloween Costume WIP - Dragon Skinning

So any new updates?

Also when working with non stretchy fabric, you can use paper towels to make a pattern.

 

[indiefilmgeek]

Re: Toothless Quad-suit Halloween Costume WIP - Dragon Skinning

Toothless is unfortunately on indefinite hold (storage). Sorry... :unsure


As a side note, my daughter decided that a Predator costume would work for Halloween 2012, so in about 4-5 weeks we created this for her:

That's detailed HERE (for anyone interested).

Next time I attempt something like Toothless it's STRETCHY fabric all the way! :love