gah.

D*C 2012 Parade pics pt. I (heroes & villains) 

thordogofthunder:

And Mjolnir is done!  It has been a long, painful process with a lot of lessons learned.  First of all, I had issues with some of my resin layers drying properly.  And then when I put the primer layer on, it got all crackly (see pic).  At that point I did another resin layer with fiber glass gloss, got my first swing at a power sander (soooo much fun), and then covered it with putty.  That went pretty well, and I was able to sand it down to a fairly good look.  Then it was primer, a ground coat to help the metallic look, and a few coats of dark charcoal metallic paint.  I attached the little circular knob thing to the top, wrapped the handle with soft leather, and voila!  My very own Mjolnir.  It’s not perfect, but I’m proud of it.  I learned a lot for all my future endeavors, and I’m excited to wield this thing at D*C, and since it has several strong layers of resin and fiberglass, I’m pretty sure I can bash Lopti as often as I want, bwuahahaha.

So intense that she made this whole thing

More Thor WIPs!

It still needs some paint and the cape attachment/shoulders aren’t quite done, but otherwise, we’re about there! As you can see, it has 4 big parachute buckles down the back that will be hidden by the cape (and painted black), and then one mini buckle in the collar just to keep the back seam near invisible. I can’t wait to see our Thor all decked out. 

EDIT: Oh yeah, sorry, and the iconic circles aren’t on yet.

thordogofthunder:

One of the other costumes I am wearing for Dragon*Con is Thor, one of my favorite Marvel characters ever.  In fact, my puppy, the husky in my profile picture, is named Thor.  But anyway, my sister Siffy is going through the ordeal of making my armor- it sounds like it has been driving her even more crazy than she already is, but I’m super grateful she is tackling it.  Hopefully someday soon I will give armor making a swing.  In the meantime, I am making Mjolnir (Thor’s hammer) and Thor’s helmet. 

The hammer was the first costume item I tackled this year, and it has been crazy.  My living/dining room covered in bits of foam, dust from sanding (probably should have done that outside, but it’s bloody hot in the desert!), making an entire hammer and scrapping it because it looked terrible.  But here are some progress shots.  I used insulating foam from the hardware store, cut it, hot glued the layers together, spackled/covered it in paste to smooth it out, sanded it, cut the edges, cut a hole and inserted the handle (a dowel from the hardware store that I cut down to the right size) and hot glued it in, and then tested out some paints. I’ve decided I’m not happy with the paint I used and how it is sticking, so I am actually in the process of covering the hammer with resin before I use some car paint for a more metallic look.  I am cover it with resin prior to that because 1. most paints melt foam 2. Foam dents easily.  If I decide I want to hit my friend Lopti at D*C, Mjolnir needs to handle it (there’s a reason it was forged in the heart of a dying star… Lopti has a hard head).  More pictures of this will follow after I resin and paint it, plus cover the handle in leather.  So close!

Here is the video that gave me some good ideas for the hammer- I’ve modified it, but this was the basis for using foam.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DHZm7vOk0qM&list=PL2A192B1F52A769B8&index=1&feature=plpp_video

This is my sister (the George to my Fred) who says she’s not creative and then goes and makes hammers that usually require a dying star to forge