Halo 3 ODST armor build

[Leviathan475]

Hello everyone,

This post should have been made around last October, but I procrastinated and never got around to posting it. Now I have decided to upgrade my ODST suit and thought that I might as well post about it.

This suit was made entirely out of foam and was rushed... and I mean really rushed. I started on September 1st and wanted the costume done by Halloween. I spent almost every hour I wasn't in school working on this thing, and in the end, I think it came out alright.

Now I do have a couple of problems with it.

First, the helmet is way too big and the visor doesn't look too good. I plan on redoing the entire helmet by 3d printing it as well as using N8TEBB's method of vacuum forming and dying the visor.

Second, the shoulder pieces are too small. I plan on resizing them. I'm not sure whether or not to 3d print them or use foam, but I am leaning towards foam.

Third, there is currently no decals on the armor, no blood type or nickname. I plan on adding these to make it more personal.

I plan to keep this thread updated with the changes I make to the armor.

I am currently working on the helmet and I am about to 3d print it. If anyone has any useful tips, I would be all ears.

 

[N8TEBB]

...I plan on redoing the entire helmet by 3d printing it as well as using N8TEBB's method...

 

[SalLyrisse]

Honestly really like the coloring and weathering on the original. Best of luck on the updates! Only advice I can offer right now is make sure whatever changes you make are still comfy to move around in and don't chafe.

 

[Leviathan475]

Honestly really like the coloring and weathering on the original. Best of luck on the updates! Only advice I can offer right now is make sure whatever changes you make are still comfy to move around in and don't chafe.

Thank for the tip! I glad you like the paint job, I will try to keep it consistent with the new pieces.

 

[Rock Lobbster]

Thats already a great build, especially when you only had a little under 2 months to work on it!
Looking forward to see the upgrades

 

[QueenBHartigan]

Hello everyone,

This post should have been made around last October, but I procrastinated and never got around to posting it. Now I have decided to upgrade my ODST suit and thought that I might as well post about it.

This suit was made entirely out of foam and was rushed... and I mean really rushed. I started on September 1st and wanted the costume done by Halloween. I spent almost every hour I wasn't in school working on this thing, and in the end, I think it came out alright.
View attachment 332645

Now I do have a couple of problems with it.

First, the helmet is way too big and the visor doesn't look too good. I plan on redoing the entire helmet by 3d printing it as well as using N8TEBB's method of vacuum forming and dying the visor.

Second, the shoulder pieces are too small. I plan on resizing them. I'm not sure whether or not to 3d print them or use foam, but I am leaning towards foam.

Third, there is currently no decals on the armor, no blood type or nickname. I plan on adding these to make it more personal.

I plan to keep this thread updated with the changes I make to the armor.

I am currently working on the helmet and I am about to 3d print it. If anyone has any useful tips, I would be all ears.

Don’t be overly critical of yourself. To start you had school which takes up a good 8 hours of your day (or at least here it does), leaving you a few hours in the afternoon, and weekends to work on it. That effectively gave you 18 full days, plus extra hours after school to work on it.

What you’ve come up with in that time is nothing short of outstanding.

It looks like you’ve got some realistic goals here too, small but frequent upgrades, like mine.

You can use dye on a visor, but it would also be worth looking at mirrored effect spray paints. I used one on my helmet and love it!

Skookum props has bundles for ODST print file sets, like Buck, Dare, Romeo etc. I initially used an Xcoser lid for my armour, it‘s good in terms of proportions, and is easy to repaint, that and it comes padded. You’ve got so many ways you can go about helmets now that there’s no real right or wrong way to do it.

With decals, I used a set of ABC stickers for my armour and just coated them with clear coat afterwards to keep them on. They’re available in most craft stores and supermarket stationery section. Just measure your gap allowance for the decals first, it’ll give you an idea of how big you need to buy.

Talking of decals, med ref was done by VinylVod on Etsy, just here: VinylVod - Etsy UK

You’re gonna go far with those skills!

 

[Med]

I wish I had the discipline to get a whole suit out in anywhere close to 2 months xD As far as tips... dont rush the sanding process. I would also highly recommend Armorsmith if you dont already have it, as it takes a lot of the worry out of scaling.

Many members here have videos on YouTube that really helped me while I made mine. It was my first big 3d print and I needed all the help I could get, and I think it turned out pretty good. If you're ever not super confident about something, there is surely a video to help you out with it

I'm sure you learned a lot from your first one, so if your next one is anything like it I'm sure it will be great!

 

[Leviathan475]

Don’t be overly critical of yourself. To start you had school which takes up a good 8 hours of your day (or at least here it does), leaving you a few hours in the afternoon, and weekends to work on it. That effectively gave you 18 full days, plus extra hours after school to work on it.

What you’ve come up with in that time is nothing short of outstanding.

It looks like you’ve got some realistic goals here too, small but frequent upgrades, like mine.

You can use dye on a visor, but it would also be worth looking at mirrored effect spray paints. I used one on my helmet and love it!

Skookum props has bundles for ODST print file sets, like Buck, Dare, Romeo etc. I initially used an Xcoser lid for my armour, it‘s good in terms of proportions, and is easy to repaint, that and it comes padded. You’ve got so many ways you can go about helmets now that there’s no real right or wrong way to do it.

With decals, I used a set of ABC stickers for my armour and just coated them with clear coat afterwards to keep them on. They’re available in most craft stores and supermarket stationery section. Just measure your gap allowance for the decals first, it’ll give you an idea of how big you need to buy.

Talking of decals, med ref was done by VinylVod on Etsy, just here: VinylVod - Etsy UK

You’re gonna go far with those skills!

Thanks for the words of encouragement!
I chose to go with MoeSizzlac's ODST helmet and I will definitely look into the a mirrored visor as I think it looks really nice on your helmet. Also thanks for the advice on the stickers, I don't have a whole lot of experience with them so every bit of information helps.

 

[Leviathan475]

I wish I had the discipline to get a whole suit out in anywhere close to 2 months xD As far as tips... dont rush the sanding process. I would also highly recommend Armorsmith if you dont already have it, as it takes a lot of the worry out of scaling.

Many members here have videos on YouTube that really helped me while I made mine. It was my first big 3d print and I needed all the help I could get, and I think it turned out pretty good. If you're ever not super confident about something, there is surely a video to help you out with it

I'm sure you learned a lot from your first one, so if your next one is anything like it I'm sure it will be great!

Thanks for the tips! I already have Armorsmith and it has been a big help with scaling. As for sanding, I have sanded a couple of 3d prints and think they look pretty good, I will definitely be sure to put in more time and effort into sanding the helmet compared to these prints.

 

[QueenBHartigan]

Thanks for the tips! I already have Armorsmith and it has been a big help with scaling. As for sanding, I have sanded a couple of 3d prints and think they look pretty good, I will definitely be sure to put in more time and effort into sanding the helmet compared to these prints.

View attachment 332829View attachment 332830

Everyone learns somewhere with prints. A great one to know is wet and dry sanding. You soak a piece of sandpaper, and go over a filler spot, then going over it with a dry piece. It’s a great way to get some really smooth bodywork. I’ve attached photos of a crack I had on my helmet, that I had to reinforce inside, then repeatedly fill and sand, using the technique to completely hide the crack. It goes bottom first, top last.


Your pistol looks fantastic by the way!

 

[Leviathan475]

Everyone learns somewhere with prints. A great one to know is wet and dry sanding. You soak a piece of sandpaper, and go over a filler spot, then going over it with a dry piece. It’s a great way to get some really smooth bodywork. I’ve attached photos of a crack I had on my helmet, that I had to reinforce inside, then repeatedly fill and sand, using the technique to completely hide the crack. It goes bottom first, top last.


Your pistol looks fantastic by the way!
View attachment 332839

Wow that helmet looks great! I had heard about wetsanding but I didn't know just how much of a difference it made.

 

[Leviathan475]

I have been working on trying to print the helmet and things have been moving very slowly. I got the filament about a 2 weeks ago and I have had a lot of trouble trying to get it to print. The first problem was that the spool was a 3kg spool, and thus was too big for my current 1 kg spool holder (big oversight on my part). I couldn't print a new holder because I only had a little bit of the previous filament left and there was no way I would be able to use that tiny amount to print anything. To solve this problem as fast as I could I decided to go to my local Lowes and see if I could cobble together a spool holder. Thankfully I found a paint roller and a steel mounting bracket at Lowes and with a couple of extra pieces of wood, some random screws, and some sanding of the paint roller, I built up with this very janky spool holder.

Now that the spool holder was done I ran into a second problem, the filament itself. This overture filament really didn't like my printer. First, it clogged my printer nozzle (as seen in the picture below). This clog took a while to diagnose because I thought the spool holder was the problem. Once I found out the nozzle was clogged, I replaced the nozzle and cleaned out the extruder. Second, it decided to not stick to my bed. Even with glue on the bed, I couldn't get past the first layer without the print failing. To fix this I put blue masking tape on the bed and on top of that put glue on the masking tape. This seems to have fixed the problem and the printer is currently printing a dropship from the movie aliens for my dad. This print should take about a day, so I will hopefully start to print the helmet very soon.

Here is a picture of the current print

 

[N8TEBB]

yeah ive been there. Sometimes those pesky printers just don't want to work. A few tips Ive found from experiencing the same problems as you:

• try boosting the nozzle temp +10 degrees and boosting the bed 5-10 degrees
• make sure there is no gap between the bowden tube and the nozzle. A little trick is to unscrew the nozzle by a quarter turn, push the bowden tube in all the way, and then tighten the nozzle again.
• as usual make sure that bed is flat and level
• sometimes it really is just the fillament, see if a different brand sticks better

Good luck!

 

[Leviathan475]

yeah ive been there. Sometimes those pesky printers just don't want to work. A few tips Ive found from experiencing the same problems as you:

• try boosting the nozzle temp +10 degrees and boosting the bed 5-10 degrees
• make sure there is no gap between the bowden tube and the nozzle. A little trick is to unscrew the nozzle by a quarter turn, push the bowden tube in all the way, and then tighten the nozzle again.
• as usual make sure that bed is flat and level
• sometimes it really is just the fillament, see if a different brand sticks better

Good luck!

Thanks for the Tips!

I have a feeling that the filament was definitely contributing to the failing print. I usually don't get overture for my 3d prints, instead I go with hatchbox, and their filament worked just fine. I hadn't tried to put the hatchbox filament back in so it could have been a printer problem, but the masking tape seems to have solved the problem and the dropship test print came out pretty well in the end.