Cortana Costume

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Kiotoko Solo

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Hey everyone! I've been a lurker of 405th sight for quite a while now, until I decided it was time for me to take a step forward and enter into the Halo cosplaying/costuming world. I've been making costumes for almost 10 years now with over 100 costumes ranging in various areas of video games, animes, fantasy, movies etc.

Let's get to it. I've always been a fan of Cortana because not only of her color scheme ranging from blue,purple and even green but as well as her face and body build not being the average video game babe. I decided to stretch out and try my hand at creating this costume.

I have Cortana 90% finished now BUT I won't spam everything on the first post. I'll start with the WIP of the makeup and wig.

At first, I wanted to do fiber optics in the hair, This was a test to see how they would work. Later on I decided to remove the fiber optics completely from the wig. This wig is partly cut, purple extensions added.

Second is the makeup test with fully cut wig, purple extensions added, only little bit of the sparkle added. I found these clips at a local 2nd hand store for around $1 a piece. I went back and grabbed more after I saw that I needed more bling.

Now this is the final wig product. I notice Cortana has a TON of binary flowing through her hair, so much that it distracted me whenever she has screen time. So that's exactly what I wanted to do. I added strips of binary sparkle along with a dash of glitter hairspray (which will fall out in time, so that's why it's uber shiney in the video as of now.)


I don't wanna overload on my first post so tell me what ya'll think so far?
 
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Just stumbled upon this and ive got to say, looking amazing so far, nice idea with the sparkely stuff for the binary code. Keep it up.
 
Tobuscus fan I see


Well, I think it looks great, you are a good fit for the costume choice :) Why did you decided to not use the fibre optics? It looked pretty rad, have you considered 'EL' Wire as an alternative? I can not wait to see more. For realz.
 
Thanks everyone for the feedback! I really appreciate it! :D

Tobuscus fan I see


Well, I think it looks great, you are a good fit for the costume choice :) Why did you decided to not use the fibre optics? It looked pretty rad, have you considered 'EL' Wire as an alternative? I can not wait to see more. For realz.

The reason I decided not to use the fiber optics was the fibers tend to distract from the color of the overall wig, and majority of the time I wasn't going to be in a dark enough setting to be able to see the glowing effect. The reason why I switched from fiber optics to tinsel was the color alternations looked like it was scrolling as it hit the light, and I Think will look better on stage lighting c:

That's a pretty good idea! I use EL wire but never thought to put in in the wig since I've only used single port battery packs, I'll definitely look into that for future alternations. :3
 
The wig looks fantastic. I love seeing unique costumes like this. Its refreshing to see another Cortana build. Keep up, we'll all be watching for more.
 
Thanks again for all the positive feedback guys and gals! It really helps the progress of the costume and keeps me motivated.Well I was going to wait a little while before my next post but I'll do it now since I'm traveling to pick supplies up and have nothing better to do while I'm on the road.

A head needs a body right? Well first I had to decide the color scheme I was going for. Being skilled in many forms of visual arts and also going to school for it as well, I decided to take my many years of color theory practice into good use. People are most likely to be attracted to a high value color scheme with low value details with fully saturated colors. People are also drawn to blue over purple by the fact it's more pleasing to the eyes and brings emotional calmness (no I'm not making this up lol) Cortana in Halo 3 is majority a middle value over all. Taking in consideration makeup, body size and wig style, a middle value was not going to cut it.

Now, once I had that decided I needed to find a zentai suit. Majority of ya'll should know what a zentai is since I've seen a lot of undersuits made from them. Well I went on a random website (NOT RECOMMENDED) since the price for it was $50 with custom fitting and no hood attatched. Biggest Mistake Of Life FML. When I received the zentai, It was the wrong size and had a hood on it. Just look at this piece of crap!
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O well I had to make it work cause I was pressed for time. So I COMPLETELY tore it apart and reconstructed it from scratch to fit my size. Sorry guy's my butt isn't actually that big, It's carved foam to look like a butt that's attached to some panties. Cortana has a very.. large backside so I tried to duplicate that effect. In the video I'm showing the suit isn't actually white, it's a tin white.

After sizing it I needed to dye it the correct color. It is possible to dye spandex, it just takes a little more effort than most fabrics. I dyed it with liquid Rite Dye in a bathtub full of hot water. First I presoaked it in normal water, next I let it soak for about 10min in the Rite Dye, stirring and squeezing occasionally to get the dye in it nice and strong. I rinsed the bodysuit of all the extra dye and washed it with color safe detergent. Here is the color that came out, except a shade lighter. It's still wet in the picture.
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There ya go :D next post will the the painstaking painting progress~
 
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OMG. I love your wig! That's fantastic! I can't wait to see the rest of this! :)

Thankies Bexi!! I wanna thank you for having such an awesome Cortana cosplay too cause I used your photos as majority of my references cause your patterns for the suit were the cleanest and the most appealing 8D
 
Looks great right now it's gunna be awesome when it's done. It's nice to see what other people are doing to make me want to finish my first project faster. Wow just saw the update painting that is going to be fun good luck.
 
Just a random update, my next post will be around Friday maybe Thursday due to the fact me and my boyfriend are taking a vacation along with some good friends. See ya'll in a couple days with an update! :3
 
Wow. I adore this costume already! Im inspired to go work on mine again :) The foam butt looks great! Major kudos on fixing the suit and dying it yourself. If you want more detailed pics of any of the designs on mine let me know. Good luck painting!
 
Hey guys! Sorry I'm a day late with my post. I was caught up making a Captain America costume and also Noble 6 undersuit.

Anyways, back on subject with Cortana. After the suit dried, it was time to draw on the designs. My best friend used a blue sharpie to trace all the designs on the suit while I was wearing it, so I could get an accurate reading on where to paint one the suit was off of me. She did a wonderful job, and many thanks to Bexi and Cortana (LiquidFire3 on other websites) for having such awesome Cortana cosplays and progress. We used their photos as reference majority of the time.
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Now it was time to paint. The painting took 10+ hours to finish. It was ALOT harder than it looked. First I stuffed the suit, because I already had the markings where needed, it didn't matter how big or little I stuffed the suit. Once stuffed, to paint. The paint I chose to use was Pedeo Setacolor in Colbalt Blue transparent 8.8 fl oz and Black shimmer 4.0 fl oz. I mixed them together and got a darker blue with a slight black shimmer. This paint isn't like normal paint, it acts like a dye instead so no flacking,cracking, or extreme stiffness to the suit. Best paint option for spandex in my opinion.
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I won't bore you with the entire process of painting so just gave you the base coat, front and back pretty much. Well once the base coat was finished, time to add the binary details. For the details I chose Createx airbrish paint in pearl, white and florescent purple. I didn't actually airbrush anything on, I used a normal paint brush and painted lines and dots for binary.First coat was the pearl all over.
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Next came purple to add depth to the costume, to make it seem not so flat with just blues and whites.(sorry no photo of just the purple) Finally at the last minute, I added white dots, which REALLY made the whole costume pop. It made it more dynamic and not so boring with just lines and dots.
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Well gents and ladies, that's all I have so far :3 What I have to do next is the shoes, the chest pieces (as suggested by Cortana) and minor alterations to the hands. Once I finished Im going to post a special shout out to the 405th community 8D Updates are going to be slow due to me working on other costumes but keep an eye out :3
 
Very very nice so far. You've taken the best parts of all the Cortana costumes out there and this is turning out very lovely. Are you going to construct your own chestpiece? Also, what type of foam did you use for the prosthetic booty? The colors you chose remind me very much of Ms. Valentine's Cortanas. (she's not on this site, but she does have her own website). Looks great! Keep us updated!
 
Very very nice so far. You've taken the best parts of all the Cortana costumes out there and this is turning out very lovely. Are you going to construct your own chestpiece? Also, what type of foam did you use for the prosthetic booty? The colors you chose remind me very much of Ms. Valentine's Cortanas. (she's not on this site, but she does have her own website). Looks great! Keep us updated!

I'm actually ordering the chest piece and gave them an alternate design of how I wanted it. It cost about $80, which took a big chunk out of my cosplay budget x.x and the booty piece was made from that green foam you can buy from Hancock fabrics c: I just glued and shaped a booty, spray adhesive and covered it with a skintoned stretch material to smooth out anything bumpy I had. And thankies! c:
 
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