Thorssoli's MkVI Costume Buildup

[thorssoli]

Alright. Let me apologize up front for being late with this update. I said it would be 24 hours. I took these pictures yesterday afternoon. Later, when I planned to post them, I made the mistake of sitting down for a few minutes and, exhausted, fell fast asleep. I am ashamed.



Here's the left thigh smoothed out, detailed, and primed:

The last thing I allowed myself to add were these little bits at the back of the knees:

Once that was attached, I told myself that I have to stop looking at the reference images or I'd never actually produce any castings of these parts. Once I'd primed them I made myself busy on a few other projects for a while before test fitting:

I plan on making the castings rigid, so it's important that there's enough of a gap at the knee to be able to kneel, sit, run, dance, do jumping jacks, or whatever. I used to not mind giving up comfort or mobility to make a costume look right, but I was spoiled by my last Spartan costume. Now they have to look right and be comfortable.



They'll fit great for anyone taller than me (I'm 5'7" tall) since this just means a bigger gap at the knees and hips. Once I've started pulling castings out of the molds, I might need to shave half an inch off the top of my pair in order to optimize the fit.



Of course I couldn't be sure until I tried them both on:

And verified my ability to strike iconic poses:

The inner thighs (which I still haven't prototyped yet) will be made of the same foam rubber and fabric combination as the rest of the undersuit. Hopefully they'll help to keep the thighs in place and prevent them from rolling around. I'm still working out the strapping system that will hold them to the belt.



Stay tuned...

 

[kupokitty]

We crossed the Pacific via a great circle route from Yokohama, Japan to Southern California. That route took us almost as far North as the Aleutians before we arced back down to the West Coast. There were a lot of low pressure systems rolling across the Pacific and all of them would've hammered right into Oregon, Washington, and Canuckistan. If I'm reading your profile right, you're on some little Navy ship, so it was probably miserable for you.

Actually, I'm on an aircraft carrier (which happened to explode in a certain movie...). The waves were bad enough to cause unsecured books to fly off the angle irons and roll my chair (and me) away from my console.



I like those little Cthulhus!

 

[aranath]

I have been watching this thread for almost a year and a half now and it was actually the one that inspired me to make my own suite instead of buying one. Your armor looks amazing and I may just end up purchasing the casts from you off of ebay for a full suite when you have everything completed just so I can have an awesome looking suite and then hopefully a mediocre looking suite that I made myself. Again just amazing work if mine looks even half as good as yours I will be super pleased.

 

[thorssoli]

I like those little Cthulhus!

Those little Cthulhus can be yours while supplies last on my ebay account.

...amazing work if mine looks even half as good as yours I will be super pleased.

Thank you for the compliments. Kind words like these are fuel for projects like this.



MINOR UPDATE:



I've finally gotten around to coming up with a way to attach the front and back half of the torso armor together. It's not especially ingenious, but I've had enough people ask me how to do it that I figured I should post it here. First, I've fitted dowels and picture hangers to the back armor:

The same sort of arrangement is installed at the bottom ends as well (the parts that will sit under the arms).



Then I drilled holes in the chest armor so that the dowels protruding from the back piece can slot into the chest piece. Then I fitted some picture hanger hooks to the chest piece and used a small length of bungee cord tied to the back and hooked to the front. At each of the four attachment points it looks like so:

Now it stays together:

In other news, I prepped the thigh armor for molding:

The cardboard is added on to build a sort of flange that will make the jacket mold a bit bigger than the thigh armor itself. The little pegs are added at this stage so that when the rubber jacket mold is layered on there will be holes in it. Then, once the rubber has cured, the pegs are pulled out and the mother mold is built. The voids left behind by the pegs will be filled in with the mothermold material, creating convenient hold-downs to keep everything lined up once the master is removed from the mold.



After plenty of mixing, brushing, troweling and so on; I have finished building up the jacket molds:

Today I plan to finish building the mother mold and, unless something goes horribly wrong, pull the first couple of castings.



Hopefully I won't let any of my shiny new toys distract me, such as this Marine Concept Helm I just received from Privateer:

I've also just started tinkering with the prototypes for the inner thigh.



Stay tuned...

 

[Steffenator]

Yo thorssoli,

You have an awesome setup there. I'm dying to see how you made those visors. I've searched everywhere and can't find a good compound curve on a motorcycle visor. I actually ordered a re-pop of an old 'bubble visor' that snaps on to those old open face jobs, but they don't make them properly mirrored. So yea, I'd love to see how you metalize yours.



You're the man, man.



PS: I saw you had a version of the thigh armor with the inner-thigh plates. I can't find those anywhere, can you point me in the right direction? Thanks again, dude.

 

[Nicktendo]

Then I drilled holes in the chest armor so that the dowels protruding from the back piece can slot into the chest piece.

So the pieces are pulled together AND won't shift around... Not especially ingenious, eh? Ingenious enough to inspire me!



I usually just kind of hold back and admire with work like this, but if your project fuel really is kind words, well, it'd just be selfish to do that...



Keep up the amazing work. You continue to inspire!

 

[Loess]

Dowels and Bungie cords... Brilliant!



And those leg masters are so sexy.

I remember from way back at the start you were going to armor multiple people, of various sizes; any plans for legs that will fit people of a more 'Dwarven' build? (Wide shoulders, and short legs )

 

[thorssoli]

I saw you had a version of the thigh armor with the inner-thigh plates. I can't find those anywhere, can you point me in the right direction?

I thought I downloaded my thigh models from the HALO costuming wiki, but looking back there now I can't seem to find them anymore. These were the "medium detail" models by crackhead09. I don't know where you'll find them now.

So the pieces are pulled together AND won't shift around... Not especially ingenious, eh? Ingenious enough to inspire me!

My aim was to make the torso armor act like one rigid piece but still be able to open up to get in and out of it. When I finish my larger-sized torso armor and rework my medium-sized version, the pegs and holes will be built into the masters so that each cast will come out of the mold with this system already in place. That'll save a bit of guesswork when it comes time to put them together. At this point I feel kinda stupid for not including it in the original the first time around. Oh well.

...any plans for legs that will fit people of a more 'Dwarven' build? (Wide shoulders, and short legs )

I'm just about the shortest member of the group I'm dressing up, so I won't be making shorter legs. That said, these will probably work for you if you're anything over 5'6" tall. At worst, you can get away with shaving a bit of material off of the tops and bottoms to make them a tiny bit shorter.



UPDATE: I made some progress on the mother molds for the thighs:

At this point, it started to get cold and I got sick of playing with plasti-paste. Since the shop still isn't heated, the weather gets to decide when I'm done for the day.



While I was tinkering with those, I also finished the mothermold for my new and improved ab plate. Before I decided I was too chilly to keep working, I made my first pull from the mold:

The idea behind the ab plate is to have a sort of one-size version that will work for the next size up in torso armor (which I'm slowly working on):

The same ab plate will also work with the medium-size torso armor:

In this shot you can also see one of my new and improved undersuit parts. This is one of several cloth-backed, custom cast, foam rubber detail pieces that will be attached to the undersuit. I had been experimenting with urethane rubber for these parts, but the castings were too stiff and prone to tearing. So far I've been pretty pleased with the results using foam rubber.



I'll try to get better pictures of these parts tomorrow. Today I didn't have anyone to snap pictures for me while I was in the shop.



Stay tuned...

 

[Thunder]

Absolutely fantastic work. My internet's been down for just two weeks and you have amazed me with your work. Your really work fast when you have time!

 

[Napthali]

Looks really good man, I especially like your setup in your shop/boat!

 

[Steffenator]

I totally dig those little thinker aliens too, man... Where can I get one?

Can you make one look like a grunt, that would be cool.

 

[Cadet]

I totally dig those little thinker aliens too, man... Where can I get one?

He mentioned on the previous page, they are available from him on eBay:

http://shop.ebay.com/thorconsignments/m.html?_nkw=&_armrs=1&_from=&_ipg=

 

[Darth Favre]

Grabbed one of these Helmets. Can't wait to get it. Thanks for the dedication and great looking work man!

 

[Steffenator]

He mentioned on the previous page, they are available from him on eBay:

http://shop.ebay.com/thorconsignments/m.html?_nkw=&_armrs=1&_from=&_ipg=

Thanks, dude.

 

[thorssoli]

I've been wanting to get a few more pics of me wearing the parts I've made so far. Unfortunately I've been alone in the shop most nights while I've been working on these things. Then the other night my sister made the mistake of stopping by the workshop to visit. That's when I shanghaied her into taking these:

Here I'm wearing the torso armor with the new ab plate and one of the pulls from my undersuit molds. It's a bit snug, but I think it looks pretty good:

Speaking of snug, I'm really glad I decided to separate the front and back halves. Getting it on and off while they're attached is a bit painful:

Since she was there, I also coaxed the sister into trying the rig on as well:

She's around 5'2" tall so she's a bit too small for this outfit:

I guess it makes sense that she looks a bit wrong since I'm a good four or five inches taller and it's almost too small for me:

In other news, the thigh molds are done:

I've only poured two pairs of thigh armor so far, but I had to take a few shots of me wearing them:

I'm holding them in place with black duct tape for now. When I finish the flexible inner thigh armor, that should hold them much better. That plus a worthwhile strapping system should make it possible for me to avoid the pooped pants pose:

Fortunately, I can still strike iconic poses:

Stay tuned...

 

[Drakku]

Oh Thor, it seems like being a fly on the wall in your workshop would be loads of fun. :]



Took me a while to sift through all these updates since last I browsed your topic, but it's looking awesome! Those thigh molds look suh-weeeet.

 

[Steffenator]

That's exciting, man. Your armor is almost done.

 

[Spartan 051]

haha thors got alittle bit of captain in him

 

[thorssoli]

MINOR UPDATE:

I'm still making slow progress on the larger sized torso prototype. Here's a shot of my friend Sam wearing it:

Sam is 6'7" tall with an average build. The torso armor in this shot is the larger prototype and all of the other armor parts he's wearing are the same size as the ones I'm wearing in earlier pictures. At this point, it really looks like I'll be able to fit everyone with two sizes of torso and one size of everything else. Once I get the prototype finished I'll be starting a pre-order thread in the classified section so folks can buy copies to help me pay for the moldmaking materials. Keep an eye out for that.



MAJOR UPDATE:

I've picked up a new machine to help me out in the shop. It's called a Craftsman Carvewright and it does a handful of carving and shaping processes without much supervision. Here's a shot of me with the first plank I ran through the machine:

For the first armor part, I made the prototypes for the soft rubber parts on the inside of the thighs:

Pretty soon I'll be painting them to smooth out the surface texture and then I'll make molds so I can pull copies in foam rubber. What's really great about the machine is that the software can import 3D files (in .stl format) and then let me slice them up to be carved out of whatever sheet goods I decide to use. It's not the fastest thing in the world, but it beats the hell out of spending a couple of nights cutting and folding pep files, then a week worth of smoothing, detailing, and prep work before I make a mold. With that in mind, if anyone needs a 3D model made in real life, shoot me a PM and we can work something out.



For now I'm looking for some solid, high-res models of weapons to crank out.



Stay tuned...

 

[Steffenator]

Dude, is that a CNC machine for wood? :eek