Tutorial: Darkrider Sejuani helmet

yessa!! since I opened the blog I only wrote about Ellie versus. So it's time to write here a tutorial!!
*^*

D a r k r i d e r    S e j u a n i     H e l m e t

Materials:

- Yoga mat (6mm thick)
- Eva foam ( 10/15 mm thick
- Polyurethane sheet
- Spray putty
- putty (by brush)
- acrylics
- spray painting
- vinylic glue
- hot glue


Step 1 - Model

I'm sorry I have no photos of this part but I worked using a mannequin head ( that I usually use to style wigs) and I covered it with Tintfoil. After this I covered all with masking tape. then I draw the helmet basic shape on it and details to put on. then I cut all and used a old newspaper to remade the model of every piece of the helmet.


Step 2 - Foam Base

Once I had the model for every piece I decided which part do with the thickier foam and wich do with the yoga mat. The two pieces with the hole (for horns) and the big part on the front are made with thickier eva foam. the other pieces are made with the yoga mat.
I used hot glue to put all the pieces together (It works well with yoga mat)


Step 3 - Details and Tons of Vinyl glue

I made details with pieces of yoga mat and polyurethane. I cut it with a cutter and sculpted the shapes that I needed for the helmet. Then I covered all with two layers of vinyl glue. I put on "tons" of hit and leave all to dry. Also the horn is made of polyurethane.


Step 4 - putty putty putty

I used spray putty (spray stucco) to work faster on the big parts and I put two light layers of it. Then I used putty by brush on some part to make the helmet look better and sanded, sanded, sanded.
This was to prepare the base for painting.


Step 5 - painting

Well as base I used black spray painting. then I leave it to dry and coloured it by brush the day after.

I used five acrylics: black (mat), dark gray (satin effect), electric blue (satin effect), silver (mat), white (mat). I painted the darker part with a base of dark gray and I mixed it with the blue to make the gradient effect on it. I used silver for all the details of the helmet. Then I used white and black for shades. 

So that's all! I will post something in detail for the polyurethane horn with the making of Sona's etawhl. so for now that's all.

stay tuned!

ellie

ellie vs budget

Hi! since I'm home and I'm spending time with family and boyfriend I have not so much time to spend on the blog. So I didn't post anything yesterday but I want to write something fast today ^^


e l l i e    v s    b u d g e t

There is a sort of new mode in cosplay which is characterized by posting a image of a cosplay and write near it all the cost infos such as materials, fabrics, conctact lenses and so on. A lot of cosplayer showed that for do even a cosplay that may seem simple there is a huge cost while others tryed to say the opposite.

A lot of people felt tired by this and posted something against this mode saying "no mattere how much do you spend, just have fun!". I think it's completely right, by the way everyone has a budjet, everyone has limits. I think for which concerne marerials may be important to show the costs.

Just for someone new who doesn't know which material pick and how to use it but knows very well how much he can spend for cosplay.

I did a lot of cheap cosplay because I'm a student and I have not so much money to spend for this hobby xD often I started a cosplay only when I found the fabrics on sale. (that was with my officer vi cosplay). I picked also the materials in base of the cost. that was because I had a budjet of 50€ max for cosplay, all included (wig, shoes, materials, fabrics, lenses and so on). this didn't let me to try some material or better quality colours. Now I decided to spend little by little and do one big cosplay for year and try different materials to improve the quality of my costumes.

I still have the Idea that having fun is important but even stay into a small budget sometimes may be the main point.

photo by Il fantasma del Castello

photo by Fiora Luna

I leave here a pair of photos of my Officer Vi cosplay. It is one of my cheapiest cosplay because I already had wig and lenses, I found fabrics on sale and I used cardboard as main body for the hands.

that's all folks,

ellie

ellie versus traveling with cosplay

Today I'm coming back to home for a weekend with family, boyfriend and friends. I live away from home to study 
at the art accademy so I have two houses, the one near Bergamo and the one near Bologna (that's why sometimes my 
wip are taken in different places, because I work at cosplay both in Bergamo and Bologna). anyway You will see this
post when I'll be at home because here I have no internet. I don't want to talk about my private life but about traveling
with cosplay.


e l l i e    v e r s u s   t r a v e l i n g    w i t h     c o s p l a y


I never went on a con outside Italy so I never took the airplane. and I'm quite happy because make luggages with
cosplay props and dress isn't easy. especially if you are going to cosplay a character with armor or particular big
props (such as VI's hextech gauntlets). I saw many cosplayer change their progect considering also the travel they may
do with their cosplay. for example "Shinju's workshop" (https://www.facebook.com/shinjusworkshop/timeline) made a pair of VI hands that can be dismantled to put them into
a small luggage. this is amazing! but not always one think about moving when he makes his cosplay or maybe he thinks to
go only in near cons using the car and then He joins a group for a more far convention.

what can someone do when he wants to cosplay something but he has a problem of space?
I avoided the problem by not picking big things for cons if I couldn't reach them by car. By the way if you don't want
to sacrifice that specific cosplay you can stay strong and find a solution.

so here there are my insane tips for traveling on train (based on my little experience):


1. when you decide what cosplay bring to a con, if you stay there more than one day, don't pick more than one big cosplay.
I mean the one with the biggest or heavyest prop. this may seem obvious but you should consider that even a "not so big" prop
may become bigger while you have to put it into a backpack. So think about the cosplays you want to do and think about the space
they may take. then join groups and so on...


2. you must bring all by yourself without any help. Yes don't count on your no-cosplayer friend just because he have only a
simple luggage to bring. that's so bad because even if you can take it all by yourself there may be a situation in which you need
help from this friend, if you give to him more thing that may be a big problem while moving.


3. be original, be insane. that's sounds stupid but you have two hands and a back so you can find a lot of solution to bring your
props with you. be insane becase if you want to do a particular cosplay don't be afraid to wear the helmet of your character
while traveling ( I have to admit I didn't do that with sejuani xD but I had space for it ). Another example is my ryuko's scissor
blade. I put it into a guitar case and I used the space also for senketsu, sona's dress, some armor piece and all the wigs.
(yes I had a lot of things on my back and nobody suspected nothing *^*

actually this how I brought with me my scissor blade for Lucca comics (sorry bad quality)

4. you don't need so much no-cosplay dresses. you are going to a con and maybe you decide to do all the days in cosplay. just pick
a pair of outfits for the travel and the evenings and add to them some shirt and a pair of jeans and you are ok. don't try to think
about cool evening outfits and similar thing. if you have travelings problems with space probably your cosplay will make you
feel tired at the evening.


5. that's not so bad if you have not all the weapons. yes I said it. but it is about the cosplay you have already wore or you are
going to wear into another convention or in a photoset. I'm talking about those characters who have a full arsenal of weapons and
you made all of them. that's amazing, you did a good job but really it isn't necessary to bring all of them if you risk to ruin
them or you can't bring them. doing Jinx with just pow pow or fishbones is not so bad. if you can't bring all and you really can't
find a solution don't give one of them to your no-cosplayer friend. just bring it on another con.


so... I just want you to know these are all my ideas and for someone cosplay travelling may be completely different. I just wanted
to share according to my experience the steps I thinks about when I'm preparing for a convention.

stay tuned for other versus posts!
ellie.

ellie vs circle lenses

First post of the versus theme. I will talk here about my experience with wigs, materials, lenses and so on. This is not a review post but just me writing what happened when I tryed something for the first time and how is now.

e l l i e    vs     c i r c l e    l e n s e s

Geo Yuna Lens from Eyecandy lenses shop

As first I don't need graduated lenses or glasses so my experience is limited from the point of view of simple coloured lenses.

I bought my first pair of lenses with my first cosplay. I cosplayed an original version of Alice from alice in wonderland and I didn't really need them. By the way I wanted to try to use lenses and I bought a three months pair of lenses from a ebay shop.

It was terrible. They were hard and I took almost an hour to wear them. I also watched some tutorial but it didn't help me so much. During the con my eyes cryed a lot especially when I was outside (it was a sunny day). I also bought them just looking at a image of a eye and the shop didn't show photos of the lenses weared by someone. so my eyes weren't blue but violet (like the violet of daenerys tagaryen's eyes).

The second time I bought lenses I decided for softer lenses (that I find way harder to put on but more confortable to wear). I bought them from Pinky paradise lenses shop and I picked a pair of lenses which show also a reference images of a brown eyes person wearing them. the colour was perfect.

I did a sort of training because my bad experience with lenses and I weared them almost every day for few hours doing different things that involved eyes and screens (because of lights who caused me a lot of troubles the first time). I weared them only at home for a while and then I tryed also to wear them at school. During the convention I was more confortable and I was quite happy.

After two years I can finally put them at the first attempt (yes, I always made a lot of attempt before wearing them) and I have no problem to take them on for a full day ( I just never drive my car with lenses on. NEVER).

Someone may have no problems from the beginning with circle lenses but I had troubles and it's quite unfair that a lot of people easily say how to wear them when they are trained for lenses. a lot of my friends had trouble with coloured lenses and use a lot of time to put them on.

that's all folks!
ellie

Who I am

Well every blog has a first post so here there is mine. I'm 20 years old and I attend art accademy in Italy. I started to cosplay 2/3 years ago and I didn't know how to sew or make a prop. I started from basics. my first cosplays aren't sew by me but by my aunt which also teached me how to work with a sewing machine. after one year my brother gave me a mannequin as a present and then I started to make patterns based on it instead searching them online.

The first cosplay I've completely sew by myself is White Mage Serah Farron. I was really proud of it because it was also full of details and I had to work a lot on them.

For the craft and props part I started to work alone with materials I could use with ease as "wood pulp cardboard". the first prop I made was Lightning's gunblade in it's gun form. I worked with layers of this particular cardboard and I put all my attention to details.

After this I tryed to improve more and more and now I am here writing a blog xD
Don't know If it will be interesting or not.
in any case

stay tuned,
Ellie