StL's Official Costuming thread!!

If we want to do a saber making class it would probably be even more benificial to make everyone one for the fan film. Perhaps we could start at my house some time, then all pile in the van and go to Lowes with a shopping list and then come back and make sabers.

However, I'd have to get the main tool to do it again (I borrowed one from a friend)... and they're expensive. Anyone happen to have a dremmel?

And speaking of fan film and costumes, There's also the hologram of the besieged pilot in the hologram that will require a costume of some kind (from the waist up at least). For some reason I'm thinking a Bravo Leader type helmet and a microphone used to hide the perons's mouth (like Han in the AT-ST in RotJ) so you can still tell it's Skyrax that sent the transmission but not have it be blatantly obvious.

Jon, is there a home depot near you as well, the last couple sabers I built I wound up getting parts from both home depot and lowes.

no home depot to my knowledge.

(32) Vaccum-frame sized sheets of .080 Guage Polystyrene Plastic

And what does one sheet cost?

From SteeLep's post:You can buy styrene for $25-50 a sheet

I think each large sheet can then be cut into 8-10 vacuform sized pieces.

I'm in. Carpool anyone?

If it's next Monday, I'm working from 8:30ma to 8:30pm, and might have a hard time making it, unless you're planning on meeting later in the evening.

I really want a set. My wife and I still get into "aggresive negotiations" over it. If the cost is down, it will only help my cause.

what time are we planning on?

On the styrene, I have a link here for US Plastics (not sure if they have a vendor in the STL area). A .08 thick, 40" X 72" sheet costs $25.04 with discounts given for quantity, ie 5=5%, etc

Styrene{/link]

For ABS, the same place has 48" X 96", 1/16" for $24 or 3/32" for $36.

Won't be able to make the meeting, for hope this will help in the dicussion some.

Steel
*edit* spelling & sorry for the long link.

For those who haven't done the research, ABS is usually glossier and better quality than styrene. But as you can see it's also more expensive.

Um, where is the meeting at? What city? I might be able to make it, although I don't really know much about costuming and such, I think this could get me started.

All right. Tonight I did some serious figuring trying to figure out exactly what everything would cost everyone. I used Studio Creations as my resource. Here's my break down (by steps):

Body Cast
I haven't looked up every product inolved yet, but I'm estimating it should be oughly around $300-$400. However this would be divided among the number of people investing in this project. It will also require 5+ people to do. 1 model, and several other to apply the bandages to the model.

I'm thinking that Dajuan's b/f (Randy) should be the model. He's around 6'0" and has a fairly good build. Thus, for the smaller people we could cut a bit off the top and reheat the plastic and form it into a slightly smaller shape.

So if we have 10 people interested, figure this step costing $50 at most.

Costume sculpt
This is the 1st sculpt for the costume. Material for this should cost around $150. Thus, w/ 10 people, that's $15 a person.

plaster mold
I wasn't able to find any prices for this so I'll shoot high and say this step should cost $300. Again, $30 per person.

Vacuform table
I figure most of the expensive parts (ie the Shop Vac) someone already has (I think Dajuan said she had one, but it needs to be 3 or 4 horsepower) so we can probably build this for <$50. So $5 per person.

Everything above can be bought communally. From this point in, everything will be bought seperately.

Plastic
Using the price that SteelLepp mentioned earlier (and figuring that each of those sheets could make 4 vacuformed sized pieces), this would cost roughly $200 per person.

EDIT: Looking back at Steel's post, the prices he quoted are very thin and would probably not be a good thickness to use. .8 gauge is recommended if I remember. I haven't been able to find prices for that thickness so I'll leave the $200 for now.

Detailing and Assembling
I'm estimating this will cost roughly $50 per person, depending on how fancy you want to get.

Other parts
The aforementioned costs only include the hard plastic parts. In addition, you will be needing a body suit ($40) and shoes ($70).

Also, if we think we're good enough, we can attempt to mold our own helmet. These prices have assumed that we would. However, if we can't make a good sculpture of a stormtooper helmet using clay, then we'll most likely have to buy one. Decent quality ones start at $70 on ebay (look for Don Post. NOT Rubies) and go all the way up to several hundred.

Total
If we build a helmet, the total comes to just over $400 per person. If we buy helmets seperately, it will be closer to $450-500.

So, knowing all that, how many are still interested? Also, who wants to volunteer their space to do this. I can volunteer the attic of my garage and or my old basement, but neither are comfortable to work in.

Wow, that was a long post. I am very interested in this project. I would offer space if I had it, but my basement is in total dissaray, and my dad is currently in the process of finishing it, so I really don't have anywhere to do it.

Actually, Studio Creations recomends .080 for styrene & .090 for ABS (which is roughly the 3/32" posted above) .8 would be very thick (and heavy and hot)

Using SC's 21x24 frame size as a guide and the 40x72 sheet size, we could make approximately 6 frame sized pieces per sheet (not sure if an inch off the "21" would affect the chest/back armor any).

How big is a vacuform table?

The vacuumtable has to be bigger than your vacuumframe. Actual demensions beyond that are kinda sketchy. I would say, using the 21x24 frame above, the table should probably be around 30x35.

Do we have anybody who would be any good at making the moldings?

Actually, Studio Creations recomends .080 for styrene & .090 for ABS (which is roughly the 3/32" posted above) .8 would be very thick (and heavy and hot)

Thanks for catching my mistake. I swear I'm dislexyc (sp?) and moved the decimal point.

Do we have anybody who would be any good at making the moldings?

The guy that created the Studio Creations site said it took him 3 weeks to make the helmet while working full time and having no prior experience. Thus, it can't be to hard.