Con crunch catches many cosplayers out, when things don’t go to plan or “one more thing” takes hold. It got me good at the last comic-con, as I mentioned earlier in the week. In the wee small hours of Friday into Saturday, a thought came to mind. What if con crunch was actually a mischief making character who comes to visit. I imagine them feeding on the nervous energy build-up to con and causing havoc to make that increase.
Capt Con Cruch – thanks to junkohanhero for the destroy x font and to Joanne for taking my crunch / car crash idea and bringing it to life.
Introducing Capt Con Crunch, they are the personification of the things that go wrong on a cosplay build. Paint that takes too long to dry, 3D prints that go wrong. Ideas for extra props that take hold of you so strongly, you put aside what you are working on. New techniques which you decide to use unpracticed, etc. You know the sorts of things – comment and tell me your stories.
It is like the man with the hammer who you meet on poorly planned, long bike rides.
Cycling folklore speaks of “The Man With the Hammer”. He will cause you to go from smoothly spinning your pedals to pedaling squares. He strikes when your mind takes more from legs than your body can provide.
Airbrushing at 2 am, finished at 4 am
The idea is never to meet him. Con crunch isn’t great, though the urgency of it all can feel like fun. It leads to doing things in a rush, skipping the second layer of primer etc. This time around, rather than rushing Dagur, I’ll do it properly and have a costume I’m happy with and not one I’m disappointed in.
I’ve also created a silly new character from all of this, so I expect Capt Con Crunch will return in some form over the next few months.
We made Max’s Heather costume which was a success, photos coming. My own Dagur costume got parked, as Max needed my help. This has given me time to reflect and approach building Dagur as an open learning process, aiming for May next year. Doing two at the same time was too much pressure on time and space.
There are a huge number of skills that you need to make a cosplay from scratch. I’ve made a few props and some costumes already, but there is still a lot to learn, so I’m going to take advantage of this and document my process as I complete Dagur. I need to work in a sustainable manner, not try to do everything. Con-crunch only gets you so far and some processes, like sealing, priming and painting foam have built in delays for drying.
Dagur’s Skrill emblem
So far, I’ve traced weapons shapes and armour designs from screenshots from RTTE. I’ve been using Adobe Illustrator and comparing it with Lunacy from Icons8. I’m going to make a video explaining how to trace a pattern from screen to generate a blueprint for an eva foam prop. I know there are some out there, but they seem to show everything quite quickly. So I’m going to slow it down and explain how pen tools work and about Bezier curves for people doing this for the first time.
Beyond that, I’ve taken those tracings and made 3d prints from them, in fact the Skrill about became a 3d print, as it is too fine to cut from 2 mm foam.
Then I’ll pull out over the coming weeks tutorials and examples from
different approaches to prototyping and pattern design using paper and card
Foam clay and leather work for belts and straps
a simple free 3d design workflow to create basic objects and when to use that
airbrushing, painting and weathering
I’ll create samples of these as I go showing the results from each process, as a work towards a finished costume and prop, rather than the focus being the actual finished item. Working in the open and showing my work in progress is the plan, borrowing form my day job.
I’m also going to put the patterns I have made up on Etsy, starting with the forge hammer from Leo Valdez.
My next character will be Dagur from the how to train your dragon tv series. I loved watching the programmes with my son Max, when he was younger. We both went to see the live action remake of the first film earlier this summer, which was also great!
Dragons: Race to the Edge
The tv programmes ran between the first and second films, expanding on the lives of Hiccup, Stoick, Astrid and all the other Berkians, with the Berserker tribe set in competition with Berk. Dagur becomes the leader of the Berserkers and over the seven series of Race to the Edge, he gradually becomes an ally to the Dragon Riders led by Hiccup. Neither Dagur, nor Heather appear in the films.
Dagur synopsis
He’s such a lovable idiot, as he reforms through the tv series. I’m going to choose how Dagur looks during the Race to the Edge seasons, when he’s trying to obtain the Dragon Eye and slowly becoming an ally to the Dragon Riders, led by Hiccup. The quote below is from the Dreamworks synopsis of Dagur for Race to the Edge.
Dagur is obsessed with Dragons and hates Hiccup. After his defeat, Dagur the Deranged was imprisoned on Outcast Island for three years. But rather than rehabilitate his fractured mind, Dagur instead focused solely on his next attack on the Dragon Riders. Dagur packed on considerable muscle during his time in jail, making him an even more formidable fighter. He finally escaped from his cell and the archipelago, eventually finding a new fleet of ships. With a new armada now under his control, Dagur is ready to launch his final assault on Hiccup and Toothless, and he’s going to use the mysterious Dragon Eye to do it.
Quick breakdown of how I’ll approach the costume
The costume has a lot of elements with a fair amount of armour and quite a centurion vibe to the look. I will also make his asymmetric double headed axe too.
Bracers
The arm bracers look simple enough, EVA foam and some straps, with the tin foil technique to make the foam look like leather. Warm the EVA foam and press the a ball of foam to make random indentations and make an edge from the sheet of foam to mimic the metal rim.
Bracers
Lower body armour
The skirt has pteruges, those heavier panels of leather with a metal edge in the image above. These are a greco-roman armour element, which Hollywood loved in its heyday. Think of Ben Hur or Spartacus. Actual archaeological evidence is scare, as linen or leather doesn’t survive. The Hollywood look is one which was led by style, rather than historical accuracy, but it is what the 20th century has left us with as Roman!
It is a little odd that Dagur, as a Viking, is cosplaying a Roman legionary. However that’s his costume, so I’ll create a panel based armour with 10-15 cm pteruges made of foam with an edge defined by a groove in the foam, rather than cutting dozens of strips and attaching them. I’ll then layer this over a short, semi a-line skirt using a pattern from New Look (6843).
Lower body armour showing ptergues
I looked a viking era dyes and materials, out of curiosity, There is a bit of disagreement over whether vikings had a reliable green dye for clothing. Some claim green came from Greater Knapweed (Centaurea scabiosa), others a yellow dye and an over dye with woad. Reeds do work as a green dye, but this wasn’t found until later. So it’s a little unclear if that green could have existed, but it’s a good colour, so we’ll use it. I should be using either linen or wool, but I’ll cheat a little and use a lighter fabric, as comic-con at the Excel is warm, even in October.
October update: I found a lovely video of viking dyeing processes, showing blue dyes and examples of greens on the table.
Lastly there is the body armour. I’ve spent a lot of time watching RTTE to figure out how the different panels work and how many layers there are at front and back. My understanding is that there is a shoulder piece, then a front and back panel which link through the strap you can see in the photo. They then connect to the cuirass, which is in close to the body. I’ve probably spent most time thinking about how this works and how to assemble it. I’ll use a mixture of worbla for the main shoulder section and 3 and 5mm foam for the rest of the armour.
Dagur in armour
Cardboard prototyping has been really helpful in figuring out how the different sections work together and which layers interconnect.
Boots
The boots are a fabric wrap with an armoured panel, similar to the bracers. Leggings will be bought woollen stockings and then there are also metal knee pads, which I’ll make from EVA foam.
Double headed axe
The double headed axe is a type of bearded axe or Skeggox, skegg is beard and ox is axe. These alledgedly come from wood working tools, but make for a good and dramatic weapon. Dagur’s is suitably large and has a fun shape, if not one that’s particularly historically accurate, but as a cosplay prop, it’s brilliant.
Metal wrapped axe head shafts in reproduction on right and the archaeological find from Langeid on left
The main purpose of the leather or metal wrapping is to strengthen the shaft in its narrowest part, which is most prone to cracking. An important fact is that metal-wrapped axes are basically always mounted from the top and not from the bottom. When mounted from below, the length of the entire shaft must be narrowed to the size of the axe eye. The installation from above allows the manufacturer and the user that the shaft does not have to be thinned along its entire length – it is thinned only at the intended top and at this point it is reinforced with sheet metal
I can imagine the heavy double headed axe which Dagur wields would benefit from this design approach, so i’m going to borrow this idea and retrofit it to the axe design. Looking at the screengrab above, I think it’s reasonable, as the handle for the axe does widen towards his hand.
Wrap up
I realise I am doing historical research on a tv programme which has flying dragons in it, but I’m enjoying this process and feel like it’s getting me into the character. Five weeks to comic-con and I’ve got materials and patterns bought or made for the main items and made a cardboard mock up of the main armour.
I’m also going to make the Dragon Eye, but more on that later in the week.
Much as I liked the earlier “code and components” branding, I’ve decided to change to a more straightforward gavinmakes. This is also the new handle for my main YouTube channel too.
So that allows for gavinmakes 2040cosplay and gavinmakes 2ndmagpiefilms (in time).
The main thing I’ve been working on in the intervening time has been a YouTube based course on how to make props with LEDs, sounds and buttons. I like teaching people how to do things in my job. From looking at youtube and going to comic-con, I think there is a gap on the electronics side of cosplay, which hopefully I can help fill.
I’ve got 12 episodes planned, which will grow, as I continue developing the material. I’m focusing on blaster type props, but will also cover swords and similar weapons, as I’ve made both types. It will cover
RGB LEDs from strips to individual one
Power management and power sources
Buttons as triggers and power on or mode selection
Amplifiers, speakers and making sounds
Which micro-controller to use
What kit you need covering soldering and no soldering options
How to put it all together into a prop
Programming the prop in circuit python
I should have the first videos starting this May, this autumn, as ADHD slightly got in the way. If there are things you’d like to see me cover, then please do add a comment.
Next is a build for comic-con, actually completing Buggy, but also possibly a new character, Stoick!
I’ve started scripting videos for my you tube channel on 2040cosplay and have got drafts for the following.
glues, primers and why they are complex and country specific with a guide to each country
Which microcontroller to chose for different lights and sounds props
Expanding on the microcontrollers video to show five different ways to include lights
How to put sounds into props
Let me know which of them sound the most useful?
I’ve also been learning a huge amount about making videos, recording audio, lighting, scripting, editing and generally setting up a youtube channel. There is a LOT to think about. I’ve also had the most shocking sinusitis, thankfully that was back in June.
It was great to go to the launch of the Artangel show “Come as you really are“, last week in Croydon. So many amazing objects in one room. Such a lot of creativity which Hetain Patal managed to bring into one building. The Guardian review writes nicely about the quiet sense of joy which the exhibition offers.
Above is the sword hanging below a sesame st sign and below is the hammer hanging out with Pikachu.
I’m delighted to say that 2040cosplay work is going to be in an art exhibition. The Blackcliff slasher great sword from Genshin Impact and the forge hammer from Leo Valdez have been selected to be in “Come As You Really Are“, run by Hetain Patel for ArtAngel.
The show opens on 18 July 2024 with 1000s of objects from hobbyists filling the space of Grants of Croydon in an exhibition that celebrates everyday creativity.
Blackcliff slasher
It’s been a lovely experience to take part in and I’m looking forward to going to the opening with Max. Really pleased to see the props get another showing outside of comic-con. Last night at the Cosplay Academy there was a good conversation about getting outside of the pure-con focus that cosplay can generate. So lovely to have this opportunity already. It will be great to see the other exhibits too at the show.
Hammer and Sword
Tickets are free and available now, the show runs from 17th July until 20 October in Croydon in South London. It’s approximately a 10-12 minute walk from either West Croydon or East Croydon train stations.
I was all set to be Buggy from Onepiece, but life intervened and took me in a different direction. The clown pirate will return, probably in October or around season 2 of onepiece.
So this comic-con I’ll be playing a combination of the war journalists Lee and Joel from Alex Garland’s 2024 film Civil War. I’m in the process of setting up a youtube channel for both here and 2040cosplay, so I have a nice new camera for that. I intend to cover costumes, code and components and shoot more of the making of things, rather than write up once it is made.
I think I can play a sort of Lee as photographer with Joel as audio journalist cross with my youtube channel. We’ll see how it works.
My plan on Saturday is to walk the floors (searching for the President) and interview lots of people, then edit and post a compilation of the people I met at comic-con.
Should be fun, find me with the 2040cosplay mic flag.
I’ve just written about max’s hammer and wanted to introduce a technique from my day job to assess how that prop build went. These are called retros, short for retrospective. We regularly do a team retrospective in my work to assess how we are working and change or improve things which are not going well, as well as celebrate things which are working. A retro is a good way of improving your own ways of working or evolving your cosplay practice.
Applying this approach to cosplay means doing this after the con / photoshoot and taking some time to reflect on how the overall build experience felt. The basic approach is to assess what you did and what the outcome of that activity was. Did it work well, was there anything you would do differently next time? Then assess each element of the prop or costume to see could it be improved or did you start in completely the wrong place and still succeed!
We did this between us once the dust had settled after the Leo Valdez cosplay and before we started on the sword build for Razor.
I want to apply the same retro ideas to cosplay. There are many formats for an agile team retrospective from “Sad, mad and glad” to “stop, start and continue” and lots of others. Cosplay builds are often done on your own or maybe with one other person, so I’ll use Liked, Learned, Lacked, Longed For (4Ls) as an approach here, as it is more process focused and softer in nature compared to “Stop, start and continue”.
Liked – foam is good to work with; acrylic paints are very usable; Mod Podge is effective as a primer; cosplay is fun, we’d do it again!
Learned – making wood handles which look realistic. prototyping with the paper templates for scale and using foam to mock up the squaricle design
Lacked – time, but I think this will always be true; making decisions on which character to cosplay early will give more time
Longed for – a painting and varnishing spray booth would be helpful; incorporating some lights and sounds into the props would be fun.
Retro outcomes – Having run the retro we kept the prototyping approach and decided on characters by January for the following May Comic-con. We largely stuck with foam and acrylic paints as build materials. I’d use the pin based approach to transfer wood patterning again.
Max read the Percy Jackson books and keen on the idea of being one of the characters for his first cosplay. Leo Valdez was the character Max wanted to be.
The primary prop was a big forge hammer. We made it mainly from EVA foam and it was a fun build. Two things I will highlight is the wooden handle technique and how to create the squaricle hammer head shape.
forge hammer
Firstly to get the right sense of scale, we started with a regular sledgehammer from amazon, biggest one we could find, which was 16lbs, over 7kg. Then made a paper plan of that and gradually scaled it up to a suitably heroic scale. We got Max to hold it to check sizing and went for the largest of the three templates below.
The hammer head ended up being larger than Max’s head, but it looked great and he got quite a few complements.
To get the hammer head right shape we looked at blacksmiths forging hammers, like this one from etsy. A lot of templates for cosplay hammers use individual panels to create the hammer head, but using one piece of foam made the hammer feel more like a tool. No seams showing or joins in the foam.
The template meant each side was about 10cm in size, so we cut a single piece of 10mm eva foam and then cut a v-shaped section out of the foam to allow it to fold and have nearly 90 degree angles. You can see the test strip we did the initial prototyping on above the flattened out hammer head. Contact adhesive (I like Alpha Thixofix) helped the foam take its shape and then affixed it to the handle.
We added a second layer of foam inside the head to make the connection area between the head and the handle larger. The last part of the hammer head were the faces for the hammer and the ends of the handle, the photo below is the top and bottom of the handle before heat-treating, priming and painting.
You can see the hammer head taped up and curing in the photo below.
The handle was a piece of plastic pipe which was wrapped in foam. Max did an excellent job of mapping wood grain onto the handle and then carving it with a dremel. The snake handle or Flexible Shaft Attachment is essential for carving EVA foam, it makes the work less tiring, as it is easier to hold. Some safety kit, as you can see in the photos is important too. A set of sealed eye goggles, some breathing kit with the dust and A2 vapour filters and some ear protectors will save your eyes, nose and lungs as well as your hearing from the dremel dust.
Testing out how to make wood grain
Mapping across the tracing of the wood grain before carving. Max used pins to transfer the tracing from paper onto the foam, which was really effective.
It then got painted and we stuck the handle onto the head of the hammer and added bit of aging to make it look less like it was just made. It would have been good to have more time to do the aging, but the hammer had a final coat of varnish the night before comic-con at 1am!
gavin makes 
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