Pre/Post Con Frenzy

Hey guys, apologies for my absence last week, I was in a frenzy last week trying to get all of my junk together for ConCoction since I had a vendor table there and actually did really well! It was a flurry of ties, life counters, and gears to restock after the clearout of my inventory around Christmas, and I haven't had time to build it back up again. If you are interested, I have all of the leftover inventory up on my etsy store, including a bunch of new tie designs and the arrival of the [NEW AND IMPROVED] Bow TIE fighters! And they look a lot more like real bow ties now! They're available in traditional TIE, First Order TIE, TIE Interceptor, and TIE Advanced, so GO BUY ONE! ==> BUY IT HERE

So now that we're post-con and I have a moment to breath (haha, yeah right), I've put my nose back to the grindstone of propmaking and at the moment, also lots of costume-making! Suki and Sokka are well underway and thankfully are almost done minus a few seams and some bias tape, and some coats of paint, and shin guards, and... ok maybe I lied and there's a lot left to do, but they're coming along nicely! Check them out:

It's still missing the side flaps in this photo, but it actually looks like a Kyoshi warrior, HUZZAH!

These are the bracers, which look kinda weird when they're flat... 

These used to be black fans, and now they're pretty gold ones! I never want to have to do that again because for as simple as it looks, they're a pain in the ass.

Sokka's weapons are finally getting some paint!

I am presently (and by that I mean it's literally sitting on the futon behind me) stitching Sokka's tunic together, there's bias tape in the arm holes that needs stitched in which I'd have gladly modeled for you all but it has a bunch of pins in it and I'm not in need of acupuncture at the moment.

The other fun project I managed to complete in the last couple of weeks was Isabella's necklace from Dragon Age. It probably looks familiar since I've made one before. Now I can make it even better cause I know how to work with worbla!

Funky understructure held together with masking tape. Yes, people, I am a professional.

See! Add some worbla and it looks much better!

Paint, medallions, and a fake gem! BOOM! We're done!

That's all folks! Join us next week for (maybe?) some finished Avatar: the Last Airbender warriors!

Almost there

Hey folks, welcome back to another WIP wednesday and it's an exciting one this week because my wips are almost done! As you all likely know I've been working on two big projects for the past... long time: Linkle's Crossbows (and some other accessories) and the Fat Man.

Well I'm excited to say both are completely built and (once they're done drying) can be painted! So let's stop talking about it and take a look!

The base is all foamcore so they're nice and light to carry around at the con.

It also makes carving the detailed designs into them pretty simple.

As you can see, there are some worbla details, along with some compressed paperboard and those are actually command hooks on the top that will function as the latch for the bowstring!

After my many trials and tribulations I finally got gems that are transparent, took on the proper color quite nicely, and don't turn into an amorphous blog of goo after a few hours, huzzah!

The compass is totally done minus the gold chord that it hangs from. And the thing in the middle actually spins!!

Now that these are all ready to go, I'll get to do some priming, painting, and finishing! If all goes as planned these will be done by the end of the week so I'll have finished photos of everything for you next time!

This is the final build for the Fat Man, minus the actual mini-nuke which will sit in it (which I haven't made yet...) and minus the long rods that will go along the top edges on either side of the track. Since I'm using shelving tracks for it which are actually metal, I'm going to wait until after I spray paint the base coat of silver before I attach them. Since this was made out of a bunch of wierd junk, I thought it'd be fun to take a closer look and find all of it in the photos!

So there you have it, the magic behind my Fallout Fat Man! I should have some nice finished photos by next time, at least of the Linkle props if not the Fat Man as well, and I'm still getting new orders in so the string of stuff won't be stopping any time soon!

MAKIN STUFF

So now that I'm done with the awesome suit of armor for Leo, I've now launched full-force into the four commissions I have for the next couple of months. So I guess I'll just show you some photos of what I've been making and go back to the crafting. Also, you can see new photos every day on twitter @mikeythelaguz under the tag #awipaday.

First up are some mock-ups for Suki & Sokka's outfits.. and a skirt & headdress! Now I just need to have the, tried on so I can start putting them together for real!

Linkle's Crossbows and compass are coming along quite well! I still need to make the cross layers for the second crossbow but that's ok. Also, the pointer thing on the compass actually moves!

And the Fat Man actually looks a lot more like it's supposed to now that it has a track. I need to figure out what I'm going to make the mini nuke out of though.

So that's what everything looks like now! Thanks for stopping in, and check out twitter for the in-between progress photos between now an the next post!