After watching tutorial after tutorial on armor making with various cosplay materials, I felt fairly confident attempting to make a cybernetic arm for one of my favorite X-men characters, Cable, to wear for Denver Comic Con 2017. Here’s how I did it…
I had some experience with using foam to make armor in the past, but I wanted a different look than I got with the foam and had a chance to try a new product called Cosplayflex that my wife had just purchased. (A thermoplastic similar to Worbla and WonderFlex.)
The Cosplay Flex worked great, and I was amazed how easy it was to you, even on my first try. Of course there are some things I would do differently if I started over again.
Steps:
- Create a pattern. To do this, my wife covered my arm in plastic wrap and then in Duct Tape. We cut this off and folded it flat making darts (Small little triangles on the curves) to allow the 3D shape be turned into a flat 2D pattern. (Make sure to label the pieces very well so you know how you’ll attach them back together, including which side is top or bottom.) I wanted to make sure the arm was two pieces, which would allow me to still move it.
- Trace the patterns onto thin craft foam (and copy the labels you drew on). I made sure to add a little extra room to the pattern as I wanted the finished arm to be not quite skin tight, so I could slide it on and off.
- Trace the craft foam pattern onto the thermoplastic. Then draw a rough line about an inch around that pattern. (This is so you have room to fold the plastic over the craft foam to create a thicker, more comfortable layer.) This led to a few wrinkles and folds in the armor when we were fitting it to the arm, but we were able to hide most of those when layering on the detail.
- Cut all of the corners of the extra inch you added to the Cosplayflex pattern, as you’ll be folding all of the excess plastic over the foam. Place the craft foam pattern on the Cosplayflex, matching pattern to pattern. Heat it with a heat gun and fold the edges of the excess cosplay flex over the foam.
- Heat up the thermoplastic wrapped craft foam and mold it onto the arm it is going to be on. I made sure to wear a long sleeved shirt because this part got hot. You definitely need a second person to get this part right. It involves a lot of bending and heating, and bending and heating. (And a fair amount of cursing.)
- Detailing. Now that I had two two base pieces of my arm that I could slide on and off, I could remove tham and start to work on the detailing. I cut long narrow strips of thermoplastic and added them on top of the arm, trying to mimic the look of Cable’s arm in the comics. This allowed me to get the look of layered metal and a way to hide hide the lumps wrinkles made when shaping the arm. This was very time consuming because you can only heat a few inches of the Cosplayflex at a time or you risk them losing their shape and looking all “melty”. And there were a LOT of strips, probably 25 or more for my arm pieces.
- Smooth it out. After adding the detailing, I took a dremel tool and tried to smooth out any major bumps or screw ups.
- Using a versa tool (wood burning tool) I went back and added a few “dings” here and there and also used it fix a few seams and cracks. This was a trial-by-accident and, in hindsight one of the most important parts of the project. With a little patience you can fix just about any small crack, crevice, or soft edge.
- Sanding. This step is one I did not do well enough. I took some fine sandpaper and rubbed both arms pieces down until the looked fairly smooth. But metallic spray paint shows…ALL. Every nick, scratch, or, not quite smooth spot is brought to your attention as soon as you spray. Sand it all until you think it’s smooth, and then sand it a little more. (Also, be sure to wear a mask or respirator when you do this, I assume inhaling tiny plastic particles ain’t good for the lungs.)
- Paint. I started with a clear Plasti Dip coat of spray paint. Cosplayflex says you do not need a primer, but I really like the plasti dip as a primer as it gives the spray paint a slightly malleable surface that seems less prone to cracking. Then, I used a metallic silver Rustoleum spray paint.
- Weathering. I used black acrylic paint to do some weathering of the metals and give the crevices between the metal layers some depth. I mixed a little water with the black acrylic paint and filled in all the cracks between the details strips of thermoplastic. (You can be a little sloppy here.) Then I used a series of wet paper towels to clean off the excess black and then dabbed a little back over the silver areas, allowing the black to fill in any holes or cracks for a slightly-weathered look. Many tutorials I found advised painting the entire piece with watered down black acrylic paint, but I found that to be unnecessary for my needs.
- Clear Coat. I sprayed Rustoleum semi-gloss clear as a top coat to set everything and gave it a little gloss finish.
- I had my wife sew a piece of silver cloth into an arm band that covered my elbow that I wore under the arm, so even when I bent my arms and the two pieces separated, there was a layer of silver.
**If had this to do again, I would skip the craft foam parts of steps at the beginning because the Cosplayflex stretched much easier than the foam and I think would have been strong enough on its own. I would just trace my pattern on the plastic and form that single piece around my arm**
Violà! One cybernetic arm, ready for battle.
So, lots of trial and error with this one, but I’m really happy with the product and I feel like it gave me some confidence to see what else I can make out of Cosplayflex.
[uix_button icon=” fontsize=’12px’ letterspacing=’0px’ fillet=’50px’ paddingspacing=’1′ target=’0′ bgcolor=’blue’ txtcolor=’#ffffff’ url=’http://getgeekish.com/x-23-claws-tutorial-using-cosplayflex/’]X-23 Cosplay Flex Claws Tutorial[/uix_button]
