Dagger06
Well-Known Member
Well, my thread was lost in the forum, so here's a new one.
First off a tribute to my ODST. The first suit I made. I have a soft spot for Marines, and Marines the jump out of spaceships definitely are badass in my book, even if they're not real.
Here's what it looked like when I first showed it at AX:
The helmet took about 2 weeks to pep, because I probably have ADD. It's very rough, so the best lesson I can give to everyone is that a good paint job can make or break a suit. A lot of people have said that the roughness was well disguised as battle damage...lucky me. I followed the painting tutorial right here on the 405th and it worked great. Also, a flashy red stripe helps distract everything. A few of the details I did in cardboard, because I hadn't discovered foamies or other thigns yet. I would not recommend doing that again..cardboard likes to disintegrate after a while.
The visor was a cut up sun visor. I liked the look and the fact that it was tinted...however it kept falling apart. In fact the entirety of AX 09 my motto was that the suit was held together by dreams and duct tape..lots of duct tape. I had a roll strapped on my belt.
Detail of the sun visor so you can see what it was supposed to look like until it fell apart.
I also have a lot more WIP pictures if you want, but I think people have seen enough pictures of bondo and resin to last a lifetime.
Flickr Gallery
After the helmet (yeah, I like to do the helmet first. =P) I did everything else in 3 days, starting with the chest piece. I'm not a fan of most of the ODST chest pieces that were out, since they were based off concept art and lacked the "curve". Much love to the modelers, but it just bugged me. So I ended up pretty much destroying my piece with too much rondo trying to reshape it. It weighed a ton, it was hideous, it was messy, but I loved the superintendent face so much I left it on my Mickey suit. The little strap details are two marine corps MCMAP belts folded up (didn't want to cut them apart).
The only other piece I had pepped in time for AX was the stomach piece. For the side plates I used two ammo pouches I spray painted gray. They just needed to fill in empty space, but they worked really well. The belt buckle is a cardboard housing that is continually falling to pieces and held together by duct tape. The codpiece is cardboard or foam board wrapped in fabric with little straps glued on. I used a russian RD-54 harness painted black to add additional detail, with padding from straps used to bulk up the shoulder straps. I used my camera bag as a butt pack.
The shoulders were cut out from cardboard, resined, bondoed, and painted. Ghetto, but they worked for short notice! The grenades are water bottles with spray paint caps glued on. Still need to repalce them. The leggings are catcher's greaves with random pouches strapped onto them. Still using them today since I suck at making shins.
The forearms are painted kiddie shin guards. Apparently a child's leg is the size of my forearm. Score! I found foamies by this point and used them to make it appear to wrap around my entire arm.
So that was the AX debut.
Next timeline was a rush job to get everything done for the Gamestop tour. I pepped shoulders (including a CQB shoulder), hip plates, butt plate, knees, stomach pieces, a new chest piece...and some really lame thighs. I suck with fiberglass. Luckily on a really fun trip out to Texas to Ithica's (so sad I haven't gone again!) Savvytank let me cast up one of his amazing chest pieces and it's so great I'm still using it today. Oh yeah, I also velcroed a flashlight on and got a link visor.
ODST gamestop tour.
And then...next deadline: PAX! Yeah, I always rush things. But BUNGIE..come on, gotta show off to Bungie.
I think they like it.
Okay, so for this one, I pepped a comm pack to complete the Mickey look...so rough. I really need to spend time finishing things more. I also did up a Dare costume for my sister. The new shoulder straps were made from MOLLE 2 backpack straps, and I cast up a rough flashlight mount. For the ONI operative, I let my sister use my RD54 harness to give her a little different look since the ONI suit had different straps/packs. I used a recon helmet cast by Ithica with a different forehead piece he was kind enough to give to me in Texas, and thankfully someone came out with a Dare stomach pep a few days before PAX. I took an old ODST stomach and modified it a bit to be more like Dare's piece:
I redid the top part and used foamies to add additional details. Rondoed it up to give it a the boxier look.
After PAX there were no real changes aside from getting a set of Savvy's awesome gauntlets. I used the WETA ODST shouldrs to make the little part that comes out over the elbow.
Went to the midnight launch in costume..the antenna broke off as it's prone to doing. Oh yeah, and Halloween. Got very drunk in this thing and hopped some fences in it, but I won $100 prize costume contest as well! And lost to Ms Piggy in another contest, which we won't speak of.
So what's next for the ODST? Well it's going back to AX this weekend! Entered into the cosplay.com costume contest and I'm in the finalists..so here's hoping I win some monies.
I did the bondo thing a little bit to make the visor fit a little tighter, spend a little time smoothing out a few things, and I integrated a flashlight into it better. Added the UNSC logo to the chest piece. The shoulder straps were repainted black with fabric paint, then I ended up spray painting them gray. I got those kevlar protective thighs that NewSpartanCreator and SavvyTank used, just because my thighs didn't look good anyways and these were easy improvements. I painted a simple camo pattern on the thighs and forearms. Here's hoping I don't need the duct tape as much this time around!
=====
Okay, so the ODST was a rush job to get it doen for AX..then the gamestop tour..then PAX. And I'm pretty happy with how it got pulled off. Now it's rush time for another game release! Even sooner than release actually... because I know bungie will be at PAX, so I need to finish before Sep1. >_< So I've been working in overdrive.
My little workshop area. I still need to pep boot pieces, a thigh, and the helmet attachment. Most of the stuff has been rondoed for strength. I plan on making casting these in plastic for the most part, so long term strength isn't a huge concern for me. They just need to be strong enough to support a mold.
These need to be reinforced before I can resin them. I am terrible with getting things resined without warping, so I'm kind of nervous. The belt I'm trying to decide how I want to approach it. I'm thinking about chopping it up and doing it in sections, plus that will let it be fitted to more people.
Playing around with molds at night because power tools are a no-no after 10pm. I'm pretty new to mold making, but it's an interesting process. Many thanks to Dave and the folks in Texas for that little gettogether. It taught me a LOT.
Detailing the knee. It's being molded right now. Just need to build a mother mold and hopefully it'll come out fine!
Cast handplate with a gauntlet (rough). I modified the gauntlet so it would be ambidextrous like in the game. Plus then I can mold it and save some time.
Ab plate is next. Just needs final sanding and detailing. Slowly going up in complexity for molds.
Next up. The shin is slightly warped, and fixing that has been a pain, but probably not as big a pain as pepping and redoing the shin from scratch would be. Bleh. Gauntlet looks better, but it'll be more of a pain to detail.
Anyways, I'm rushing on this project amidst summer school, military obligations, and a tight schedule..plus trying to retain sanity, so updates will be sporadic. I haven't been documenting this as much as my ODST suit. Still, if you have any specific questions, please ask!
First off a tribute to my ODST. The first suit I made. I have a soft spot for Marines, and Marines the jump out of spaceships definitely are badass in my book, even if they're not real.
Here's what it looked like when I first showed it at AX:
The helmet took about 2 weeks to pep, because I probably have ADD. It's very rough, so the best lesson I can give to everyone is that a good paint job can make or break a suit. A lot of people have said that the roughness was well disguised as battle damage...lucky me. I followed the painting tutorial right here on the 405th and it worked great. Also, a flashy red stripe helps distract everything. A few of the details I did in cardboard, because I hadn't discovered foamies or other thigns yet. I would not recommend doing that again..cardboard likes to disintegrate after a while.
The visor was a cut up sun visor. I liked the look and the fact that it was tinted...however it kept falling apart. In fact the entirety of AX 09 my motto was that the suit was held together by dreams and duct tape..lots of duct tape. I had a roll strapped on my belt.
Detail of the sun visor so you can see what it was supposed to look like until it fell apart.
I also have a lot more WIP pictures if you want, but I think people have seen enough pictures of bondo and resin to last a lifetime.
Flickr Gallery
After the helmet (yeah, I like to do the helmet first. =P) I did everything else in 3 days, starting with the chest piece. I'm not a fan of most of the ODST chest pieces that were out, since they were based off concept art and lacked the "curve". Much love to the modelers, but it just bugged me. So I ended up pretty much destroying my piece with too much rondo trying to reshape it. It weighed a ton, it was hideous, it was messy, but I loved the superintendent face so much I left it on my Mickey suit. The little strap details are two marine corps MCMAP belts folded up (didn't want to cut them apart).
The only other piece I had pepped in time for AX was the stomach piece. For the side plates I used two ammo pouches I spray painted gray. They just needed to fill in empty space, but they worked really well. The belt buckle is a cardboard housing that is continually falling to pieces and held together by duct tape. The codpiece is cardboard or foam board wrapped in fabric with little straps glued on. I used a russian RD-54 harness painted black to add additional detail, with padding from straps used to bulk up the shoulder straps. I used my camera bag as a butt pack.
The shoulders were cut out from cardboard, resined, bondoed, and painted. Ghetto, but they worked for short notice! The grenades are water bottles with spray paint caps glued on. Still need to repalce them. The leggings are catcher's greaves with random pouches strapped onto them. Still using them today since I suck at making shins.
The forearms are painted kiddie shin guards. Apparently a child's leg is the size of my forearm. Score! I found foamies by this point and used them to make it appear to wrap around my entire arm.
So that was the AX debut.
Next timeline was a rush job to get everything done for the Gamestop tour. I pepped shoulders (including a CQB shoulder), hip plates, butt plate, knees, stomach pieces, a new chest piece...and some really lame thighs. I suck with fiberglass. Luckily on a really fun trip out to Texas to Ithica's (so sad I haven't gone again!) Savvytank let me cast up one of his amazing chest pieces and it's so great I'm still using it today. Oh yeah, I also velcroed a flashlight on and got a link visor.
ODST gamestop tour.
And then...next deadline: PAX! Yeah, I always rush things. But BUNGIE..come on, gotta show off to Bungie.
I think they like it.
Okay, so for this one, I pepped a comm pack to complete the Mickey look...so rough. I really need to spend time finishing things more. I also did up a Dare costume for my sister. The new shoulder straps were made from MOLLE 2 backpack straps, and I cast up a rough flashlight mount. For the ONI operative, I let my sister use my RD54 harness to give her a little different look since the ONI suit had different straps/packs. I used a recon helmet cast by Ithica with a different forehead piece he was kind enough to give to me in Texas, and thankfully someone came out with a Dare stomach pep a few days before PAX. I took an old ODST stomach and modified it a bit to be more like Dare's piece:
I redid the top part and used foamies to add additional details. Rondoed it up to give it a the boxier look.
After PAX there were no real changes aside from getting a set of Savvy's awesome gauntlets. I used the WETA ODST shouldrs to make the little part that comes out over the elbow.
Went to the midnight launch in costume..the antenna broke off as it's prone to doing. Oh yeah, and Halloween. Got very drunk in this thing and hopped some fences in it, but I won $100 prize costume contest as well! And lost to Ms Piggy in another contest, which we won't speak of.
So what's next for the ODST? Well it's going back to AX this weekend! Entered into the cosplay.com costume contest and I'm in the finalists..so here's hoping I win some monies.
I did the bondo thing a little bit to make the visor fit a little tighter, spend a little time smoothing out a few things, and I integrated a flashlight into it better. Added the UNSC logo to the chest piece. The shoulder straps were repainted black with fabric paint, then I ended up spray painting them gray. I got those kevlar protective thighs that NewSpartanCreator and SavvyTank used, just because my thighs didn't look good anyways and these were easy improvements. I painted a simple camo pattern on the thighs and forearms. Here's hoping I don't need the duct tape as much this time around!
=====
Okay, so the ODST was a rush job to get it doen for AX..then the gamestop tour..then PAX. And I'm pretty happy with how it got pulled off. Now it's rush time for another game release! Even sooner than release actually... because I know bungie will be at PAX, so I need to finish before Sep1. >_< So I've been working in overdrive.
My little workshop area. I still need to pep boot pieces, a thigh, and the helmet attachment. Most of the stuff has been rondoed for strength. I plan on making casting these in plastic for the most part, so long term strength isn't a huge concern for me. They just need to be strong enough to support a mold.
These need to be reinforced before I can resin them. I am terrible with getting things resined without warping, so I'm kind of nervous. The belt I'm trying to decide how I want to approach it. I'm thinking about chopping it up and doing it in sections, plus that will let it be fitted to more people.
Playing around with molds at night because power tools are a no-no after 10pm. I'm pretty new to mold making, but it's an interesting process. Many thanks to Dave and the folks in Texas for that little gettogether. It taught me a LOT.
Detailing the knee. It's being molded right now. Just need to build a mother mold and hopefully it'll come out fine!
Cast handplate with a gauntlet (rough). I modified the gauntlet so it would be ambidextrous like in the game. Plus then I can mold it and save some time.
Ab plate is next. Just needs final sanding and detailing. Slowly going up in complexity for molds.
Next up. The shin is slightly warped, and fixing that has been a pain, but probably not as big a pain as pepping and redoing the shin from scratch would be. Bleh. Gauntlet looks better, but it'll be more of a pain to detail.
Anyways, I'm rushing on this project amidst summer school, military obligations, and a tight schedule..plus trying to retain sanity, so updates will be sporadic. I haven't been documenting this as much as my ODST suit. Still, if you have any specific questions, please ask!
Last edited by a moderator:
