forgotten_aria

The Blitzo costume is done. I'm not unhappy with it, though I am having some self-shaming body issues with it.

It all started innocently, as I was making the additions to my Alastor costume, I decided to hand make Blitzo's necklace. Simple magic model project. But that was enough to get the idea in my head. I 3d modeled the thing on the back of his gloves, ordered a red shirt with the high ruffle collar. Then I started modeling the horns. Because the normal PLA would put someone's eye out, I started to experiment with flexible PLA, but then that needed me to learn to use my .6 nozzle (which luckily I bought when I got my .2) I struggled with getting the flexible PLA to print, but eventually got it to work.

I think I was a still in a little bit of denial when I decided to print and paint his gun (mostly someone else's STL that I bought for $6 with two small tweaks.) I learned how to use blender to augment an file from someone else.

I printed the horns at their cartoonish proportions and loved them.

I worked a little on Alastor's wig, but wig craft is not a skill I have yet.

Then I did something I knew I could do. I made the tail. A lot of people have tutorials on complex tail making methods, but I get a lot of milage out of "stick a wire in it," though my stuffing technique makes for too many lumps.

I bought a black tail coat, but then decided Navy blue was more actuate, and bought one a size down.

I finished up the necklace that started it all. I made some comically large buttons.

The Weeaboo-boo short came out and I HAD to make the knife. I love the prop making because they can sometimes look perfect, where as most characters will never look right on this body. I did the model from scratch. I printed the knife out of F-PLA and PLA and had a lot of fun painting it. It is one of my favorite props.

I lined the coat, made the holes and tears, added HTV vinyl to the collar, shortened the front opening, and added the back spikes.

I used a wig because the Blitzo cosplays that go bald, while more actuate, look funny and it was easier to hide the horn support under the wig. It took a bit to get the horns mounted with some worbla under the wig, but I made it work. To all the tutorials that recommended magnets, they didn't work for me at all. I waffled on the extra spikes and decided, in the long run to keep them. They're mostly not very noticeable.

I added some boot covers to some cheap cowboy boots. I should have made them with more slack, because they wrinkle, but it's not a big concern.

I had a first pass at the gloves by buying some superhero gloves earlier, but decided Blitzo's lack of wrists was an important feature and redesigned them to have a flexible PLA frame, a sewn cover, paint, and some PLA claws. I also did several iterations of the back thing to try to get it curved enough and in a color I liked.

I'm not great with the makeup, but I'm good enough. I used the Cricut to cut a stencil for the forehead tattoo.

I tried to make some teeth, but nothing quite looked right, so I think I'll just wear some fangs. Since Blitzo is inhuman there's a lot of balance between him and what looks good on a human.

I took a first round of photoshoot. I'm not happy with my lighting set up. I'll try to get some better photos later.

https://youtube.com/shorts/YNznY6jqIG4?si=e3sT5iER2tMXlyAW

Sorry if I repeat myself, I forget how much I posted here, but I wanted to summarize this years costume efforts.

This year I wanted to make a costume, even though my only chance of wearing it was at CrossFit (and I was pretty sure that wouldn't work out and it didn't.) So part of the goal was to pick something I could move in. I wasn't too excited about anything, but liked Sylvie from Loki enough and it looked like something I could move it. Once I started making it I realized it was clear that I wouldn't be able to do a whole lot without risking scraping to stretching the fake leather. I was also hitting a bunch of stumbling blocks (which I did talk about already.)

I then realized that I had really loved playing Gloomhaven and in particular my Nightshroud character. There is very few Gloomhaven costumes out there, so I decided to switch. I had a lot of fun, including getting to play with my dragonfly glaze and some other cool paints I hadn't gotten a chance to use yet, and really loved the progress I made, but again, it was evident what I was making was not going to be something I could workout in. So I switched again to GLaDOS with the idea that I would paint a shirt for the breast plate and then have a mask that I could take on and off easily. This was also the costume I didn't know I needed and I should have done long ago. GLaDOS is my gaming computer background, she's my cell phone case image, portal sounds are in my mp3 collection and for a while I even had them as my computer error noises. I also filmed making the head and will eventually post it on youtube as a how-to. I wasn't 100% happy with the foam chest piece, but it's good enough and only took me a day to make.

I do hope to finish the Nightshroud before the end of the year. There's not much more work left in him, unless I do the second sword. But I really love the foam carving part of costume making. The bridge I need to make might take precedent.

I hope to finish Sylvie eventually, especially if I can figure out the stumbling blocks. My mom got to wear the horns to answer the door for trick or treaters. The horns are also the same ones worn as Loki in the "Agent of Asgard" comic series which handled his gender fluidity and self-love arc much much better that the series did, so I might do an AoA costume at some point too.

I don't mind that I switched so much, since this year it was ALL about the process and almost nothing about the final product, though it felt good to finish something.

Oh, and I bought two pieces of green clothing and added zipper stops to it for a Loki Dark World cage costume (which I posted about here as well.) I also played with his black suit. I don't think I can quite pull that off as Loki, but I look very good in the black suit, enough that I got some boys dress shoes in case I ever have a chance to wear a black suit somewhere.

I think I will plan to make an all Lycra (not that I'm good at sewing Lycra) Chun Li for working out in next year. I've always wanted a good version of her original costume and I've always felt comfortable wearing her. If it's stretchy, then I don't have to worry about busting a seam while moving.

( pictures of the stuff I made this year, some of them are WIP (works in progress) )

I am impressed by my own obsession. It feels weird to kind of be watching it while it's happening and be living it. Apparently "easy" doesn't happen when I am compelled to get every detail right. (Not because anyone else would notice, I would.) The problem is when I can't figure out a detail.

But I can't figure out. Is Slyvie's armor black or very dark green? I've found photos kind of showing both. Black is easier to make because there is a lot more black fake leather out there than dark green, but I feel green is the color it should be. But no, it's black. I can see that now, and suddenly all the screenshots where I swear it was so clearly dark green are so clearly black. Kind of like seeing both sides of an optical illusion.

Mostly just posting this because it's how my brain works and when the costume is finished, I won't necessarily remember the the insanity to get to the end.

Except for Zayra, I kind of do remember printing out every angle of ever detail, noticing something I didn't before and having to include it. So maybe I will remember.

I got to wear my Barbarian Zayra costume yesterday. I hadn't worn the whole thing and I was doing the photography check and completely was blown away by how it looked. I took some green screen photos in hopes I could put it on a background for the game, but the chromakey around fur is still something that's apparently not easy to do (which I don't quite understand why "find green, make it not green is so hard" in this day an age. So I am a little disappointed with not really being able to get rid of the green halos around the images, so I haven't processed all of them.

I had a lot of velcro failure. In hindsight I think this was that I forgot to sew cloth to the vecro. If I ever have a chance to wear this again, I will have to do some major velcro resticking. hopefully I can make it a little better to walk in, since people said the image was lost when I had to start shuffling around slowly. I loved how cartoonish in the photos I look.

I'm really glad I enjoyed the process, because that was a lot of work for a few hours of self-destructing costume wearing. But the process was wonderful. That being said, I am glad I have my life back again. Glad I did it, let's not do something quite so difficult next time. :)

I also love how flattering this is. Other than I'm too short, my body type and the characters matches closely enough that I looked very close to the original. I'll add a reference to the photos below.

( A few of the images I've processed )

my costume for this year is a lot of new learning. I'm start to get the hang of using the dremel on the foam, but I'm not perfect. The wood burner was an excellent choice, but I'm also still trying to figure out how to clean detailing with that. I think I finally have a tip that will do it, but the technique is still lacking. Also, I still don't feel like I'm using the plastidip spray quite right. For this costume, I think the slight rumpled texture is about right for the metal, but if I do this again, I think the last layers has to be modpodge for smoothness.

I am horrible at cutting two pieces the same and I'm still not good at turning shapes into multipiece cutouts. There's a program, armor smith, that's supposed to help you with this, but I think building the models in the program might take just as long.

I don't honestly know if I'll make my target date, but it's been a lot of fun and very satisfying.

I got a cheap "rotary tool" before getting a dremel, which was nice to learn that yes, that tool is very useful. It's speed regulator burned out a little, so now instead of slow to fast, it's fast to OMG!

I love how if i don't get the two matching shapes quite right (for instance, horns) I can heat it up and alter the shape a little.

I have some worbla coming in the mail (yeesh that stuff is expensive) and hopefully it will do the small pieces I want to do.

I super love my comfy dust mask, even if it is a little too large for me and I should take it in a bit.

I am struggling, as I always do, with how to make the part that goes over my boobs and properly hide some support.

The game I'm taking the costume from added a replay mode and that has been instrumental in zooming in for details and shapes.

this year I started work on an ambitious costume, but didn't want to get myself into the trouble I did last year, where the last week before the party I was working non-stop and still didn't quite finish. So I took two days and threw together a quickie costume. Sadly, this took most of the pressure off the other costume, so I didn't get much progress. Regardless, may I present Dr. Eleanor Abernathy MD JD. ( cut for photos )

I recently fell in love with liberty puzzle's 100% whimsy all wooden puzzles, but new the puzzles are ~$100. In particular the one that I both liked the image and the cut was $125 + shipping. So I bought one used off ebay. Because it was an ebay auction I counted all the piece. 535 when the box and the website said 545. I emailed the company to make sure there wasn't a type they knew about. They said, no, 545, and that I had liked been ripped off. They can replace one or two missing pieces (for a fee since it was used) but not 10. I emailed the ebay seller to make sure they hadn't found any missing pieces. He was friendly and helpful and assured me it was complete when I sent it. I said I would do the puzzle and make sure. It took G and me a few days, and I was trying to enjoy it, but there was the worry hovering over it.

I would have enjoyed it more if I'm not also coming up against the deadline for my Halloween costume. So I spent most of the last few days doing a lot of sewing and a lot of puzzle doing.

And tomorrow is the black belt physical, which there is one event I'm not sure I can pass. The rest I think I can with a few tries.

I will do a longer post about making the costume soon.