So, I tend be a pretty linear person on projects - working on each piece until it's done and then layering them all up - until I get to the accessories. Then, I just start jumping around and am all over the map - a bit here and bob there. So, it may be a weird ride from here on out.
Anyway, on with it..
The gloves that I'll be using arrived and here's a quick look at them together with the gauntlets at this point. These will be color corrected and have hand guards that cover them (similar to the latest MCU suits). I said earlier on that I was going to build the gloves but that was when I was planning to do everything in red and blue to match. Since I'm going with the brown, I decided to save myself a bit of time and worry and source the gloves instead.
Having had some other supplies delivered along with the gloves, I decided to take a break from the gauntlets to test out the shoulder emblem and get the helmet going.
The emblem for the shoulders is going to be the Avengers "A" emblem at a larger scale the the ones I've made for the AoU suits. As it happens, one of my regular suppliers included an Avengers ornament in a recent shipment and it was the perfect size for this project. He was nice enough to give me permission to do a one-time recast of his piece for this project.
Here is a picture of the two molds side by side for scale.
I'm using Amazing Casting Resin for these. It's a craft-quality resin but I like it for small widgets like this for two main reasons:
- It's very lightweight and doesn't weigh down garment pieces or flop around
- I can pull it before it's completely cured and get complex curves out of the pieces
The latter is what I've done for these. I poured the resin, let it cure about 90% and then carefully de-molded it and taped it down to the shoulder of a mannequin arm to harden. When it was fully cured, it retained the curve of the shoulder.
It just needs to be cleaned up, sanded and painted. Here's what the raw piece looks like against the shoulder.
The helmet is being built out of 6mm craft foam. I checked out a few Pepakura templates, but opted to create my own pattern from scratch rather than try to adapt an existing template.
I turned to my trusty Ed Head to help me out. I covered him in plastic wrap and then masking tape.
Here's a tip when working with something that needs to get into small details - like the brows and bridge of the nose: it's easy to really get into those areas if you lightly spray your head form with spray adhesive and then press the plastic down onto it. This way, the plastic adheres to the form and keeps the shape while applying the tape.
Once he was covered. I drew on the basic shapes for the helmet.
I then cut the tape apart and transferred the pieces to poster board.
These were then cut from foam and assembled. I pre-formed the sides and top pieces with a heat gun and then, working from the sides to the middle, glued the pieces together with contact cement.
Once the base of the helmet was assembled, I used the heat gun to add some subtle shaping to the brows and temples and added the nose piece.
Next, I'll be cutting all of the rest of the details out of 6mm and 2mm foam and adding them to the base before Plasti-Dip, filler and finishing.
Stay tuned!
