Bodysuit recommendations

[IshidaRyusei]

Hi guys,
I was hoping some of you guys could give me a hand in finding a good morphsuit or bodysuit that I could use as the base for my Halo 5 Cortana. I'm hoping to try and match the light blue of her attire as closely as possible.

I've included my references as well to aide:


The majority of the 'armour' on her will be crafted using a combination of EVA and craft foam and worbla (if I'm lucky enough to get my hands on some of the stuff.) i'm also curious to know what some of you would recommend to create some of the 'floating' pieces of her suit ie. the piece around the collar or the emblem of the mantle, and creating the light up or holographic effects on the darker regions of her suit as these are hypothetically supposed to be made from hard-light so I wanted to try and convey that as well. any of the other parts that are actually lit up such as some of the finer details of her armour will be done using thin el wire and fibre optics (if possible... I hope I'm thinking of the right stuff).

 

[Reclaimara]

I'd recommend a blue morphsuit then.

You could always use Transparent Worbla too.

 

[IshidaRyusei]

I'd recommend a blue morphsuit then.

You could always use Transparent Worbla too.

I'm hoping to use a blue morphsuit and remove the hands, feet and head from it if it has those. The problem I'm having is finding a blue suit to match that light blue shade that she has in the image. a lot of the ones I have found so far would be great to make a James Cameron's Avatar cosplay but nothing that's really a light blue like this one.

 

[peterthethinker]

zentai-zentai has all the colors you may want and If you ask then they can do some tweaks to the hands and feet and face ect.

And no morphsuit logo on the rear!

 

[IshidaRyusei]

zentai-zentai has all the colors you may want and If you ask then they can do some tweaks to the hands and feet and face ect.

And no morphsuit logo on the rear!

Thanks, man! I'm giving a quick scan of the site and it looks like they won't cost an arm and a leg either.

 

[Reclaimara]

You can always paint it - recently someone posted here a Cortana build they made for a con and they painted the pattern on the undersuit.

 

[IshidaRyusei]

You can always paint it - recently someone posted here a Cortana build they made for a con and they painted the pattern on the undersuit.

I plan to get a plain suit that matches the colours of the pale blue she has for the base of the costume and then build up onto it accordingly. I checked out Zentai-Zentai and found the following suits that seem to be a close match:



Now I just need help selecting which one looks closest in appearance to the blue she has on her suit and compare the price of the three. They're quite affordable might I add and all have the option to have no feet, hands or hood without any extra charges. I may keep the feet though as it'll make my job easier in creating the 'boots' for lack of better description. If there are portions that need to be painted onto the piece I'll definitely be doing so.

 

[BroodierGoose1]

Welcome to 405th! I think either the middle one or one on the right would best. Probably the middle one.

 

[IshidaRyusei]

Welcome to 405th! I think either the middle one or one on the right would best. Probably the middle one.

Thanks it's a pleasure to be here and watching everyone plug away at their suits. Really gives me the drive to make my own hopefully sooner rather than later at that lol.

I'm considering the one on the left as well as the middle as it seems to have a little more of a sheen in the finish while the middle seems to be particularly sheer and more matte in comparison.

 

[Dirtdives2424]

Thanks, man! I'm giving a quick scan of the site and it looks like they won't cost an arm and a leg either.

Just the feet and the hands..........right........

 

[IshidaRyusei]

Just the feet and the hands..........right........

lol, sure. We'll go with that. It wouldn't be too bad if the CAD were so awful right now but in light of that it's still a pretty good price.

 

[IshidaRyusei]

Okay, so I've decided to go with the suit on the right and have saved the link to purchase once the funds come in. My next steps now are to research different paints for the fabric. Does anyone happen to know a good brand of rubberized fabric paints? Even alternatives are good at this particular moment in time. I want something that will give it that plastic sheen and looks almost rubbery *badumtss* like the skintight dark blue areas that are fairly present on what would be the morphsuit "layer" of the costume. So far I've counted and noted approximately 4 separate layers on the suit not including the dark blue ( I want to say it's somewhere between navy and royal blue with maybe the faintest hint of purple tones) hard light armours that cover the chest/back or torso, shoulders, biceps, thighs, elbows and calves of her suit. Based on the research I've done to this point it seems like liquid latex might not be a bad option and should be able to give the desired effect if used correctly.

EDIT: Liquid latex does not ship outside the US and has extremely limited colours so this causes an issue.
EDIT of the EDIT: Good news is that there are sellers who can ship outside of the US and the latex us mixable so I could potentially make the necessary colours. Bad news is that it can get really expensive really fast. It's almost $30 for a 4 ounce jar. I'm hoping I can find it cheaper elsewhere as I'll need more than 4 oz more likely than not and I'll need to buy a few different colours to properly mix the right colour otherwise, it's back to the drawing board and seeing if I can either find something similar or using an alternative method.

 

[IshidaRyusei]

Update! I found liquid latex body paint for approximately $9-15 CAD for the 4oz jars on Amazon.ca so that resolves this issue of overall cost for the stuff and I can resort to purchasing as needed instead. Current affairs with the costume now are determining how I plan to do the skin tone and what brands are good for body paint as that is really the only feasible option to get blue skin XD. Also, what are some good makeup sealing sprays? I won't be using bodypaint without properly sealing it.

Hair wise I have two options; get my hair cut to match Cortana's (something I plan to do already as I like her hair style and it's a good change of pace from my usual Gumi/Sinon cut- Vocaloid Gumi for those who have no clue) and then dye it- I'm iffy on this as I don't feel comfortable bleaching my whole head, just the bottom half, but I may be able to simply overlay the colour on my already dark brown almost black hair and get away with it, while option two is to go the usual wig route which is a good option if I select it and I can probably find an affordable wig to match on ebay as bob cut wigs or 20cm as they're referred to tend to run from $10-15 for one of decent quality. The wig one is what I'll probably be selecting knowing myself.

Eyes, my eyes are a fairly dark brown, almost chestnutty. Cortana has these bright electric blue eyes that are almost impossible to get unless you have them naturally. This leaves an issue for me as this means using contacts. I have minimal luck at best with inserting contacts and my first pair reacted poorly with my eyes, though this was likely because the brand I picked is known to have not so kind lenses for newbies- it's either that or my eyes just don't take to contacts well. So for the eyes what would you guys recommend? I have perfect sight so I would be a plano. What are some of the good brands for lenses? I hear Korean brands are generally the best and the pair of lavender lenses I have seem to work well from the one I was able to get in... I struggled for an hour to get that one in and then gave up on the other out of frustration. Do you all have any good tips for inserting the lenses? Removing is easy but putting them in is hard as heck.

For the remainder of the suit, now that I have a morphsuit selected for the base and the Dark blue regions on the base figured out I need to study the rest of it and the overlaid portions. If anyone can help me to obtain good screenshots of the suit in-game I'd be more than appreciative of it. I'm trying to study how it's affected by light and what the different areas are made of theoretically speaking so I can try to emulate this as closely as possible in real life. I'm also in need of the shots to figure out how the different parts move with the rest of the suit and her, especially the knee region as it appears to be one piece in the references but from a mobility standpoint this hardly seems practical. I'm also in the process of figuring out the scaling of different portions and what is what haha but this is basically where I'm at. I'll probably start sketching things soon so I'll be transfering this to a proper build post and post those there. This post will probably be making its way into that too but I'm looking forward to making this. I don't have a set timeline as I am currently on hiatus from any major conventions for at least a few years due to college but it's one that I really feel passionate about doing and want to bring to fruition.

 

[Reclaimara]

Wouldn't you rather do these parts out of foam and then glue them on?

I mean, it may be hard to get latex evenly smooth and without leaking onto the further parts of the morphsuit - even if you seal it with tape, it's material - the latex might travel further because of the material.

Other idea - use some foam for padding, sew more material on it or underneath to seal it and then paint latex on it?

 

[IshidaRyusei]

Wouldn't you rather do these parts out of foam and then glue them on?

I mean, it may be hard to get latex evenly smooth and without leaking onto the further parts of the morphsuit - even if you seal it with tape, it's material - the latex might travel further because of the material.

Other idea - use some foam for padding, sew more material on it or underneath to seal it and then paint latex on it?

Foaming those regions would be easier but because they're on portions where it should be skintight but have that gloss finish it's more accurate to use the latex method. There's always the chance of the paint going out of its designated region but with a proper resist it should be okay.I'm most familiar with fabrics as I sew and create designs regularly. There's multiple methods to sealing and painting on fabrics so what I'll likely be doing is using a tape and newspaper resist on the edges where I don't want it exceeding and then painting in sections. I'll try creating a diagram of each of the different layers shortly but so far I seem to have identified between 3-4 layers from the base to the top layer of armour.

Side note: Am I the only one who spells armour like this or am I just being very Canadian?

 

[BroodierGoose1]

Side note: Am I the only one who spells armour like this or am I just being very Canadian?

I have seen a few others spell it like that Also if you go with the hair cut option one costume stores sell hair dye in a bunch of different colors. They also wash off with some moderate scrubbing in the shower or bath or whatever.:facepalm For contacts I can't tell you the slightest bit of info as my eyes are perfect.:cool

 

[Chernobyl]

Side note: Am I the only one who spells armour like this or am I just being very Canadian?

No. You're spelling it the correct way, and all of these American pigs should take note


The undersuit painting plan sounds pretty complex, and I don't have an awful lot of experience with it - but it sounds like it could go well. You'll have to publish your results for others to learn from, this sounds like it could be an invaluable technique to use for all undersuit projects.

Also, whipping you up a little something you'll need for your project. I'll send you the model when it's done.

 

[Dirtdives2424]

American Pigs?......excuse me?

 

[peterthethinker]

use resist to block the seepage..Good Idea!

many moons ago I worked on CATS and was a HUGE fan. Us fans paint on lycra alll the time and can do some really high detail with bottle bush and needle brush.
2 mm lines are easy once you master it. also Latex should be a snap. its FAR more viscous then the paints we used... Dy Na Flow..

Peter

 

[Reclaimara]

American pigs

American Pigs?......excuse me?

Chernobyl? I never thought I'd see YOU write something like that... You, who is always noting if anyone swears or uses improper words... to name american people as 'American pigs'... wow...