So, this isn't much of a post because I'm taking short lunches all week so I can leave early for pre-reg badge pick-up on Thursday. But what the hell.
While it will be many more blog posts until all the information is up, I have finished my Haruhi costume. And 4 days ahead of time! Hurrah.
Wow. That was...daunting.
There was a point in time this Friday night as I struggled to finish the top that I wasn't sure I was going to make it this time, that I'd set my hopes too high and the costume was beyond my ability to make not look like fugg.
A dark time, since a detail-oriented obsessive personality like mine usually means I've planned every last detail (or tried to) before committing to a task. But there you are.
Still, I bucked up because really--what else was there to do? Not finish? Give up and accept a bunked-up result? Hell no.
This was by far the most difficult costume I've ever put together. It is leaps and bounds the hardest sewing project I've ever done. But it's completed now, and the rest is candy.
Bring on the candy.
~Raiphin
Monday, March 29, 2010
Thursday, March 25, 2010
This is how the magic happens, people. Pay attention.
I've been sick, which was super-great. It's now one weekend until the convention and I still have some serious work to do, not my favorite place to be. But I'm at work on my lunch hour, so while I can't catch up on that I can get started with how I made the top of Haruhi's outfit.
As you can tell from my pictures about the straps, I'm basing all this on that bra. BUT I want the top to be bigger than the bra, so I had to draft out how I wanted it to look. I put the bra on me, for starters, and took a look at where my curves are--waist, and such. In most of the pictures available Haruhi has the world's LONGEST TORSO EVER and, well, I don't.
I do, however, have a lovely hourglass figure and I want to use it to the max.
As such, I wanted the end of the top(ruffle bottom included) so stop high enough above the smallest point of my waist that the difference would be visible. Reference pictures seem to put the top just at her waist, or at least where it would be on me--but that makes me look stumpier than I need to. *
*a point of philosophy, if you will: One of the rules I have in cosplay is that I will modify the proportion of a costume in order to better suit my body. I think this gives a more purposeful, realistic feel than if I tried to be 100% accurate. On your own costumes, you make the call.
One of the things to note also is that by making the top shorter than the reference pictures, I had to change the number of criss-crosses in the front of Haruhi's top to avoid having the area look scrunched. I'm doing 2 crosses instead of three.
So, in the mirror I gave a good hard look at my bits and pieces and came up with about where I wanted the top to end. Then I put the bra back on my dress-form and took bits of muslin and pinned them all around where the top would be. I then cut away the exess muslin and drew in where I wanted to put seams on the top. The result looks like this:
The result is a bit hap-hazard, but not bad for my first attempt, eh? If you don't have a dress form you can get someone else to pin & draw, just be careful not to stab or be stabbed. You want to get a close but not TOO close fit--this is to get an estimate, and you need to be able to breathe. You should probably use one long piece of fabric for this rather than bits of pieces, but either way it works out.
After cutting the muslin down to size & drawing on the seams, I un-pinned the fabric and cut along the seams to make separate pieces of fabric to start my pattern.
As you can see, it's all rough right there. I labels the pieces to helop tell them apart--(Right Center Back, Right Back, Right Front, Right Center)
You only really need 1 set of the pattern, it's not like your right and left side are all that radically different from each other. AND it helps prevent wobbly boobage, which is not the goal.
Then I did some MATH.
I looked at the pieces and measured out (to the nearest .25", anyway) how big each piece was. Then I added .5" to all sides to account for seam allowance. Usually you do 3/8" for seam allowance, but who wants to measure that out? Bleh. So I get 1/2".
I then got a DIFFERENT piece of muslin and cut out the pattern AGAIN. Isn't this fun? It looks like this:
href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/37157244@N03/4418676882/" title=" by raiphin, on Flickr">
Lovely. I sewed those pieces together to make both sides of the top (but am not sewing it together in the back. I want to use the bra clasp for security & a zipper or snaps or something over the top of that.) I then pinned the result to the dress form.
And that's when I noticed 2 things.
1) part of the front is sewn the wrong way. Make sure you know, really KNOW which side you're working on, because they look very, very similar if you're not careful.
2) Gap-age. There are gaps. Why are there gaps?
Ah, that'd be the hourglass figure I mentioned. Unfortunately--where sewing is concerned--I am not shaped like a tube. It would be a whole lot easier if I were, but there it is.
So. Now what? Now it gets interesting.
What I did was veeery careful put the whole concoction back on myself, and stare at the mirror again. Then I pinned the top on both sides in as close to an even manner as possible. It was also jutting down in a weird way, so I grabbed a Sharpie and drew where I wanted the bottom to end.
This is all a bit fiddly, I realize. I have a good eye for proportion & knew exactly what I wanted to achieve. If you have problems with this step, take a deep breath and figure out how what you've got differs from what you want and work from there. It'll take time and pain, but will be worth it.
In the end I got this:
You can see the sharpie lines, and how some of the edges are now curvier. I ended up straightening the seam that's under my arms from a curved seam to straight after this step, and that seemed to work fine.
Then, FINALLY, I cut my fabric. I used the black suiting I like so much at first, but it was too stretchy and I went back and got a nice easy black peachskin fabric instead and used that. After all that work on the pattern, I didn't *need* the stretch.
Whew. After all that, draping the white part should be a piece of cake right?
Right?
~Raiphin
hint: wrong.
As you can tell from my pictures about the straps, I'm basing all this on that bra. BUT I want the top to be bigger than the bra, so I had to draft out how I wanted it to look. I put the bra on me, for starters, and took a look at where my curves are--waist, and such. In most of the pictures available Haruhi has the world's LONGEST TORSO EVER and, well, I don't.
I do, however, have a lovely hourglass figure and I want to use it to the max.
As such, I wanted the end of the top(ruffle bottom included) so stop high enough above the smallest point of my waist that the difference would be visible. Reference pictures seem to put the top just at her waist, or at least where it would be on me--but that makes me look stumpier than I need to. *
*a point of philosophy, if you will: One of the rules I have in cosplay is that I will modify the proportion of a costume in order to better suit my body. I think this gives a more purposeful, realistic feel than if I tried to be 100% accurate. On your own costumes, you make the call.
One of the things to note also is that by making the top shorter than the reference pictures, I had to change the number of criss-crosses in the front of Haruhi's top to avoid having the area look scrunched. I'm doing 2 crosses instead of three.
So, in the mirror I gave a good hard look at my bits and pieces and came up with about where I wanted the top to end. Then I put the bra back on my dress-form and took bits of muslin and pinned them all around where the top would be. I then cut away the exess muslin and drew in where I wanted to put seams on the top. The result looks like this:
The result is a bit hap-hazard, but not bad for my first attempt, eh? If you don't have a dress form you can get someone else to pin & draw, just be careful not to stab or be stabbed. You want to get a close but not TOO close fit--this is to get an estimate, and you need to be able to breathe. You should probably use one long piece of fabric for this rather than bits of pieces, but either way it works out.
After cutting the muslin down to size & drawing on the seams, I un-pinned the fabric and cut along the seams to make separate pieces of fabric to start my pattern.
As you can see, it's all rough right there. I labels the pieces to helop tell them apart--(Right Center Back, Right Back, Right Front, Right Center)
You only really need 1 set of the pattern, it's not like your right and left side are all that radically different from each other. AND it helps prevent wobbly boobage, which is not the goal.
Then I did some MATH.
I looked at the pieces and measured out (to the nearest .25", anyway) how big each piece was. Then I added .5" to all sides to account for seam allowance. Usually you do 3/8" for seam allowance, but who wants to measure that out? Bleh. So I get 1/2".
I then got a DIFFERENT piece of muslin and cut out the pattern AGAIN. Isn't this fun? It looks like this:
href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/37157244@N03/4418676882/" title=" by raiphin, on Flickr">
Lovely. I sewed those pieces together to make both sides of the top (but am not sewing it together in the back. I want to use the bra clasp for security & a zipper or snaps or something over the top of that.) I then pinned the result to the dress form.
And that's when I noticed 2 things.
1) part of the front is sewn the wrong way. Make sure you know, really KNOW which side you're working on, because they look very, very similar if you're not careful.
2) Gap-age. There are gaps. Why are there gaps?
Ah, that'd be the hourglass figure I mentioned. Unfortunately--where sewing is concerned--I am not shaped like a tube. It would be a whole lot easier if I were, but there it is.
So. Now what? Now it gets interesting.
What I did was veeery careful put the whole concoction back on myself, and stare at the mirror again. Then I pinned the top on both sides in as close to an even manner as possible. It was also jutting down in a weird way, so I grabbed a Sharpie and drew where I wanted the bottom to end.
This is all a bit fiddly, I realize. I have a good eye for proportion & knew exactly what I wanted to achieve. If you have problems with this step, take a deep breath and figure out how what you've got differs from what you want and work from there. It'll take time and pain, but will be worth it.
In the end I got this:
You can see the sharpie lines, and how some of the edges are now curvier. I ended up straightening the seam that's under my arms from a curved seam to straight after this step, and that seemed to work fine.
Then, FINALLY, I cut my fabric. I used the black suiting I like so much at first, but it was too stretchy and I went back and got a nice easy black peachskin fabric instead and used that. After all that work on the pattern, I didn't *need* the stretch.
Whew. After all that, draping the white part should be a piece of cake right?
Right?
~Raiphin
hint: wrong.
Saturday, March 13, 2010
Strap in, it's gonna be a tough ride.
So, this is Haruhi's top. This image has the ruffles going up the sides of the black in the front, but usually it's just a solid line across the bottom--that's what I'm doing too.
First thing I did was get a strapless bra to base the top on. This was a Le Mystere brand "Shameless" bra in nude. It had a thin layer of nude spandex on top that I caaarefully cut away to reveal the underneath. Then I stuck guidelines on it with quilter's tape to help me get things even...this was mostly useful for straps and such.
You'll see I already added the straps on. Haruhi had two sets, one slightly longer than the other. I originally made the longer ones an inch longer, but .5" is probably better so that they don't just slide off your shoulder constantly.
Note that the straps are racerback in the front (more toward the center line of back than straight down.) This means you can't just stick straps where the strapless bra wants them. This is good, because that shit's almost always uncomfortable & gave me weird armpit pooches. BAD.
You can kinda see in that picture that where I have pinned the strap in the front there is a mark. That mark came from making a strap out of muslin and pinning it places in the front until it looked right. You can also see a small nude seam slightly further right which is where the strap originally went.
See how much sexier the racerback straps look, even just pinned like that? MmMMm. Make sure to get them even, and take the back of the bra into consideration--which hook are you using? Try to maintain as much stretch there as possible, you don't want it to pull on itself or get stiff. I did an up-down seam instead of left-right for that reason.
You can wait and sew in the straps after you do a lot of other things, just try not to stab yourself with the pins too many times. (Like I inevitably did.)
As for how to make the straps--I figured out the length and thought that I wanted them to be 1" wide at the ends and 1.5" at the middle, for extra sexy and because I like pain. I did a rolled edge hem like I did on the bottom of the skirt, but it was a lot harder and didn't turn out as nice. I'm not sure if rolled hem just requires more fabric, or what I did wrong. So be careful. I tried to go back and make double-sided straps, but sewing shiny/slick to shiny/slick was...unsuccessful, shall we say. You can also probably just use ribbon and sew the ends together, but I wanted some stretch to hold up, y'know, my bits.
Next up, pattern-making. If only we were shaped like tubes.
~Raiphin
Tuesday, March 9, 2010
The four horsemen of my apocalypse.
TOOLS. They are important.
Without these 4 things, I would die. And by die I mean screw up this costume royally.
1) A good sewing machine.
Are you serious about this? A lot of cosplay you can get by on just a straight stitch and a zigzag here and there. I soldmy car last July and dropped 600$ on a middle-line Huskvarna Viking Emerald 183(I think). I'd been using my grandmother's sewing machine, the one she used to make my skating costumes back when I was like, 10. That was a while ago. I knew what the machine could do, but no damn idea how to make it do them. These are the perils of being self-taught. (Grandmother is 83 and lives 2 time zones away. So I couldn't really ask her.)
Wow, things have come a long way since...the 80s, maybe? Early 90s at best. My new machine is lovely and automated and smart. It tells me when there's something wrong with it, and what foot to use with what stitch. Genius. Also, the JoAnns in Southcenter (Tukwila, WA for reference) had a Viking center--where I got the machine--which got me a complimentary hour of training on my new machine, and that hour has been PRICELESS.
2) GOOD SCISSORS. This seems easy. I got a spendy rotary tool this weekend and we'll see if it's that much better than scissors (it was 50% off due to a coupon, anyway) but good scissors make your life easier. Remember those child-scissors that bent construction paper all the time? And how nice it was to have scissors that could cut shit? Scissors aren't that expensive, get some good ones. Gingher is a good brand, but most that're 15$ or so should be fine for cosplay use.
3) Chalk pen. GENIUS. I'm very, very bad at cutting straight lines. I blame astigmatism. Anyways, my chalk pen (5$ at Pacific Fabrics, I think) lets me draw all over my dark fabrics and then I just cut along the lines! No more pinning my fabric to patterns, or weighing stuff down with books while I cut around them! We life in the future.
4) Disappearing ink pen. STILL GENIUS. This is the same idea as above, but for light fabrics. You can draw and make marks, and they just dissappear! I used this making button-holes for the top of Haruhi's blouse, and it is generally awesome.
Without these 4 things, I would die. And by die I mean screw up this costume royally.
1) A good sewing machine.
Are you serious about this? A lot of cosplay you can get by on just a straight stitch and a zigzag here and there. I soldmy car last July and dropped 600$ on a middle-line Huskvarna Viking Emerald 183(I think). I'd been using my grandmother's sewing machine, the one she used to make my skating costumes back when I was like, 10. That was a while ago. I knew what the machine could do, but no damn idea how to make it do them. These are the perils of being self-taught. (Grandmother is 83 and lives 2 time zones away. So I couldn't really ask her.)
Wow, things have come a long way since...the 80s, maybe? Early 90s at best. My new machine is lovely and automated and smart. It tells me when there's something wrong with it, and what foot to use with what stitch. Genius. Also, the JoAnns in Southcenter (Tukwila, WA for reference) had a Viking center--where I got the machine--which got me a complimentary hour of training on my new machine, and that hour has been PRICELESS.
2) GOOD SCISSORS. This seems easy. I got a spendy rotary tool this weekend and we'll see if it's that much better than scissors (it was 50% off due to a coupon, anyway) but good scissors make your life easier. Remember those child-scissors that bent construction paper all the time? And how nice it was to have scissors that could cut shit? Scissors aren't that expensive, get some good ones. Gingher is a good brand, but most that're 15$ or so should be fine for cosplay use.
3) Chalk pen. GENIUS. I'm very, very bad at cutting straight lines. I blame astigmatism. Anyways, my chalk pen (5$ at Pacific Fabrics, I think) lets me draw all over my dark fabrics and then I just cut along the lines! No more pinning my fabric to patterns, or weighing stuff down with books while I cut around them! We life in the future.
4) Disappearing ink pen. STILL GENIUS. This is the same idea as above, but for light fabrics. You can draw and make marks, and they just dissappear! I used this making button-holes for the top of Haruhi's blouse, and it is generally awesome.
Ruffles taste like pain.
So, sewing the ruffle layers to the tube skirt turned out to be a giant pain in the butt. Well no, I lie--sewing them to the skirt was easy. Sewing only the parts I WANTED to the parts of the skirt I wanted was a good deal harder.
Learn from my mistakes:
Do NOT use 4-way stretch material to make the pencil skirt. When you have sewn the ruffles to the skirt they add a lot of bulk, and this will stretch out and pull down the skirt. I have since added a band (from baby blanket ribbon, actually) around the waist to add stability.
Leave maybe an inch or two more at the top of the skirt, and cut it down to size after applying ruffles. I kinda needed to add a waistband because the skirt was falling below the line of the belt, which is silly and wrong.
Test the length of all your ruffles BEFORE you sew. Trying to cut more off/hem it after it's been gathered and sewn is needlessly painful.
After taking up the skirt several inches as I think I mentioned prior, I took it up AGAIN before sewing it all together. If you look, the second black layer of ruffles is actually the same damn length as the short layer--in the front center, anyways. I noticed this AFTER I'd sewn it all on so I got to go back and trim a bit more off, and then it hemmed a bit weird...I may have to re-do it if it keeps bothering me.
Follow my lead for:
Do run a line of thread along the gathered zig-zag before you sew it to anything. This adds stabilization.
Do run a line of thread along the raw edge of the gathered material...this flattens it and makes it easier to work with.
All I have left to do now is apply the velcro patches to the belt and skirt waistband, and let that set for 24+ hours. Whee!
Oh yes, and the top. I've actually done a lot on that, but that's for another post.
Learn from my mistakes:
Do NOT use 4-way stretch material to make the pencil skirt. When you have sewn the ruffles to the skirt they add a lot of bulk, and this will stretch out and pull down the skirt. I have since added a band (from baby blanket ribbon, actually) around the waist to add stability.
Leave maybe an inch or two more at the top of the skirt, and cut it down to size after applying ruffles. I kinda needed to add a waistband because the skirt was falling below the line of the belt, which is silly and wrong.
Test the length of all your ruffles BEFORE you sew. Trying to cut more off/hem it after it's been gathered and sewn is needlessly painful.
After taking up the skirt several inches as I think I mentioned prior, I took it up AGAIN before sewing it all together. If you look, the second black layer of ruffles is actually the same damn length as the short layer--in the front center, anyways. I noticed this AFTER I'd sewn it all on so I got to go back and trim a bit more off, and then it hemmed a bit weird...I may have to re-do it if it keeps bothering me.
Follow my lead for:
Do run a line of thread along the gathered zig-zag before you sew it to anything. This adds stabilization.
Do run a line of thread along the raw edge of the gathered material...this flattens it and makes it easier to work with.
All I have left to do now is apply the velcro patches to the belt and skirt waistband, and let that set for 24+ hours. Whee!
Oh yes, and the top. I've actually done a lot on that, but that's for another post.
Monday, February 22, 2010
It tastes like ruffles.
I am SO CLOSE to being done with the skirt I can nearly taste it. And by close I mean perhaps 3 or 4 hours out. >_<
Having cut out all three layers of circle skirt with the intention of gathering them in, I then hemmed the shit out of all of that. It ran me out of good black thread. Get at least 3 spools of black and 2 of brown for this thing...perhaps it's a bit late to be saying that now, but oh well.*
*First! I figured out I wanted to raise the hemline of the long layer in the front to about 14", and then cut another 2" off the back. Make marks with chalk at the longest and shortest points of the skirt on the circle you've cut out, and then figure out the deviation (mine went from lik 14" to 22" so had about 8" of deviation) and mark half-way points, and then halfway between the halfway points...until you get an oval kinda thing. It's like using a compass but not for a circle.
I used a rolled hemming foot and it was fabulous. Don't try it without one...only pain lies that way. Also, it is hard to get a fine curved edge--that's why they tell you to practice on straight lines first. This is true. For curved edges I futzed up a lot--ask me at Sakuracon if you want to see where. It doesn't make much difference if you're not staring at it from three inches away, but I strive for perfection. This is because I am nuts, but perhaps you are too.
The black fabric had stretch in it--just a little, but enough that with the weight and length of the fabric it pulls and I'm not sure if anything can be done about it. It makes the hemmed edge a bit wavy but...so what? It's for ruffles and doesn't matter anyway.
Go slow, be careful, and slide the edge over tiny bits constantly...this way you slowly make up for the changing width of the curving hemline.
Good luck, have patience. Unpicking it's a pain in the butt, so care is better.
Having hemmed everything, the next task was to gather them up into the right size to be sewn to the skirt.
I sewed the ends of the layers together, which in retrospect was probably not a good idea. The chiffon layer turned out to be almost a foot longer for some weird reason, so I had to cut it apart anyway. Also, working in the halves makes less fabric to drag around.
First off, figure out what lengths you want the skirt layers to be. DO NOT go crazy and sew the chiffon layer to the top skirt layer (yet) and then discover the lengths are wrong and spend an hour and a half unpicking the two apart.
DO NOT do that. It sucks.
DO sew the chiffon layer to the top black satin layer when you have the lengths right. This will keep the two from shifting around when you gather them in the next step. Yay for stability!
DO set the sewing machine on a big zigzag stitch. DO buy some embroidery thread (thicker, whatever color) and pin it to the fabric in a spot directly behind where the zigzag stitch will be. Pull the embroidery thread through and under the foot...(it's a C foot on my Viking) The idea is that the zigzag crosses over the embroidery thread and then at the end you pull on the pinned thread and VOILA! Shit is gathered. AND you can futz with the gathering to make it as much or little as you like. Fabulous.
So I've done that to the bottom layer. Tonight I'll go RE-sew the top two layers together and gather them again, and THEN sew some stuff to the skirt!!
So close.
~Raiphin
Having cut out all three layers of circle skirt with the intention of gathering them in, I then hemmed the shit out of all of that. It ran me out of good black thread. Get at least 3 spools of black and 2 of brown for this thing...perhaps it's a bit late to be saying that now, but oh well.*
*First! I figured out I wanted to raise the hemline of the long layer in the front to about 14", and then cut another 2" off the back. Make marks with chalk at the longest and shortest points of the skirt on the circle you've cut out, and then figure out the deviation (mine went from lik 14" to 22" so had about 8" of deviation) and mark half-way points, and then halfway between the halfway points...until you get an oval kinda thing. It's like using a compass but not for a circle.
I used a rolled hemming foot and it was fabulous. Don't try it without one...only pain lies that way. Also, it is hard to get a fine curved edge--that's why they tell you to practice on straight lines first. This is true. For curved edges I futzed up a lot--ask me at Sakuracon if you want to see where. It doesn't make much difference if you're not staring at it from three inches away, but I strive for perfection. This is because I am nuts, but perhaps you are too.
The black fabric had stretch in it--just a little, but enough that with the weight and length of the fabric it pulls and I'm not sure if anything can be done about it. It makes the hemmed edge a bit wavy but...so what? It's for ruffles and doesn't matter anyway.
Go slow, be careful, and slide the edge over tiny bits constantly...this way you slowly make up for the changing width of the curving hemline.
Good luck, have patience. Unpicking it's a pain in the butt, so care is better.
Having hemmed everything, the next task was to gather them up into the right size to be sewn to the skirt.
I sewed the ends of the layers together, which in retrospect was probably not a good idea. The chiffon layer turned out to be almost a foot longer for some weird reason, so I had to cut it apart anyway. Also, working in the halves makes less fabric to drag around.
First off, figure out what lengths you want the skirt layers to be. DO NOT go crazy and sew the chiffon layer to the top skirt layer (yet) and then discover the lengths are wrong and spend an hour and a half unpicking the two apart.
DO NOT do that. It sucks.
DO sew the chiffon layer to the top black satin layer when you have the lengths right. This will keep the two from shifting around when you gather them in the next step. Yay for stability!
DO set the sewing machine on a big zigzag stitch. DO buy some embroidery thread (thicker, whatever color) and pin it to the fabric in a spot directly behind where the zigzag stitch will be. Pull the embroidery thread through and under the foot...(it's a C foot on my Viking) The idea is that the zigzag crosses over the embroidery thread and then at the end you pull on the pinned thread and VOILA! Shit is gathered. AND you can futz with the gathering to make it as much or little as you like. Fabulous.
So I've done that to the bottom layer. Tonight I'll go RE-sew the top two layers together and gather them again, and THEN sew some stuff to the skirt!!
So close.
~Raiphin
Saturday, February 13, 2010
Let's talk about belts.
I'm watching the glue dry on the belt as I type this. It's about as interesting as you'd expect, but I'm excited nonetheless. The belt leather, silver trim, and fake studs look amazing, and the proportions and scale are turning out fabulous.
Now that I'm done bragging, let me tell you how I did it. ^ - ~
So, the first thing to after you've got the right belt blank material (mine came from ebay and is about 2" wide) is make sure it's long enough. I got 2 yards, which I knew was more than I needed but that's a good place to start. I then cut the belt blank in half and using small clamps and masking tape worked out the right angle for the belt in the front and back. I then sliced a small bit off the belt on both sides in the part I decided would be the back. I then glued a bit of pleather to the joining point of the two pieces. When that dried, I discovered it wasn't sturdy enough to keep the edges from moving, so I glued a small bit of metal I had from a belt I'd dismembered to make it sturdier. That's how you get this:
After that I glued the metal studs to the top of the belt at intervals of about 1.75", which seemed to be what worked for me. Make sure to avoid putting studs under where the belts cross over in the front, or in a place that's on the line or whatnot because it'll look dumb.
Then I did a lot of staring in the mirror and looking at pictures to figure out how long the belt should be after the cross in the front. Most pictures show only 1 stud past the cross, but I decided on 2 because I thought it looked better. Then I carefully experimented with cutting the leather into the kind of point I would need on the extra belt leather I had. Good choice! It's HARD to cut straight and warps and is generally a pain. What eventually worked was drawing the line in its entirety and slicing along it with an exacto knife WITH a straight-edge (protractor, in my case) so you can't accidentally wibble the line. Then after going over the line about 3 times I used me sharpest jewelry scissors to finish the job. Looks kinda like this:
I did it on my cutting mat which made it pretty easy to get the angles right--1block is half an inch, so I marked the middle of the belt at the end and then 2 blocks down on either side and drew the connecting line between them.
After that was done, I took the silver belting I showed in an earlier post and sliced it down the middle. It was already folded over on the back in a way that made it super simple to cut in half. Then I had to glue the silver to the back of the belt so that it stuck perhaps 3 milimeters past the edge? Something that looked right. Then I cut little triangles out of the silver belting so that it could bend around the edges of the belt. And that looks like this:
from the back anyway.
that's a wider shot of the back. Me smarter than me and remember to take the masking tape you used to mark where the belts should cross BEFORE you glue other shit to it. I'm just saying.
it looks like this when you're done. And by 'this' I mean 'awesome.' And that's E-6000 I've been using, that's some good glue. Stuff STAYS glued, and what more can you ask for?
one tricky thing is making sure the edges of the belt adhere at the tips and whatnot. These tiny clamps are adorable and perfect for this. Note that I shoved some craft foam in there so that the tiny clamps don't leave tiny clamp marks in the process. I could probably have gotten by without that since the belt leather is tough enough, but who wants to be wrong?
The final step I haven't taken pictures of yet. Sue me. I cut some velcro on a slant and put a strip on either side of where the belt crossed over, and then followed directions and WAITED 24 HOURS before touching it. Seems to be holding for now.
Next up, skirt work. I hemmed the hell out of everything already, so now it's a matter of gathering and sewing. Hopefully that'll get done tomorrow.
Hopefully.
~Raiphin
Now that I'm done bragging, let me tell you how I did it. ^ - ~
So, the first thing to after you've got the right belt blank material (mine came from ebay and is about 2" wide) is make sure it's long enough. I got 2 yards, which I knew was more than I needed but that's a good place to start. I then cut the belt blank in half and using small clamps and masking tape worked out the right angle for the belt in the front and back. I then sliced a small bit off the belt on both sides in the part I decided would be the back. I then glued a bit of pleather to the joining point of the two pieces. When that dried, I discovered it wasn't sturdy enough to keep the edges from moving, so I glued a small bit of metal I had from a belt I'd dismembered to make it sturdier. That's how you get this:
After that I glued the metal studs to the top of the belt at intervals of about 1.75", which seemed to be what worked for me. Make sure to avoid putting studs under where the belts cross over in the front, or in a place that's on the line or whatnot because it'll look dumb.
Then I did a lot of staring in the mirror and looking at pictures to figure out how long the belt should be after the cross in the front. Most pictures show only 1 stud past the cross, but I decided on 2 because I thought it looked better. Then I carefully experimented with cutting the leather into the kind of point I would need on the extra belt leather I had. Good choice! It's HARD to cut straight and warps and is generally a pain. What eventually worked was drawing the line in its entirety and slicing along it with an exacto knife WITH a straight-edge (protractor, in my case) so you can't accidentally wibble the line. Then after going over the line about 3 times I used me sharpest jewelry scissors to finish the job. Looks kinda like this:
I did it on my cutting mat which made it pretty easy to get the angles right--1block is half an inch, so I marked the middle of the belt at the end and then 2 blocks down on either side and drew the connecting line between them.
After that was done, I took the silver belting I showed in an earlier post and sliced it down the middle. It was already folded over on the back in a way that made it super simple to cut in half. Then I had to glue the silver to the back of the belt so that it stuck perhaps 3 milimeters past the edge? Something that looked right. Then I cut little triangles out of the silver belting so that it could bend around the edges of the belt. And that looks like this:
from the back anyway.
that's a wider shot of the back. Me smarter than me and remember to take the masking tape you used to mark where the belts should cross BEFORE you glue other shit to it. I'm just saying.
it looks like this when you're done. And by 'this' I mean 'awesome.' And that's E-6000 I've been using, that's some good glue. Stuff STAYS glued, and what more can you ask for?
one tricky thing is making sure the edges of the belt adhere at the tips and whatnot. These tiny clamps are adorable and perfect for this. Note that I shoved some craft foam in there so that the tiny clamps don't leave tiny clamp marks in the process. I could probably have gotten by without that since the belt leather is tough enough, but who wants to be wrong?
The final step I haven't taken pictures of yet. Sue me. I cut some velcro on a slant and put a strip on either side of where the belt crossed over, and then followed directions and WAITED 24 HOURS before touching it. Seems to be holding for now.
Next up, skirt work. I hemmed the hell out of everything already, so now it's a matter of gathering and sewing. Hopefully that'll get done tomorrow.
Hopefully.
~Raiphin
Sunday, February 7, 2010
The benefits of having no butt.
I got the belt sized correctly this morning. It's masking-taped together because you never EVER want to cut something you don't have a back-up of until you're sure WTF you're doing.
I managed to slide it off still taped into position, but it was a tough thing. As I lost weight I re-discovered my lack of ass, but it's something of a boon here because I just need a LITTLE give to the belt, rather than having to install a zipper and attach it to like 4 different materials and not have it gap/sag/wibble/etc.
My thought right now is to glue the belt entirely together in the back, after cutting it on the appropriate diagonal. I have vinyl I can cut and glue to the belt pieces for extra support as well. The front will be trickier. Haruhi's belt crosses over with the right side overlapping the left. Underneath that overlap I'm going to--instead of gluing the bits to each other--glue a small piece of not-very-elastic elastic to each part of the belt. Ideally, this will give the belt a bit of lee-way when I want it (I intend to remove it before entering bathroom stalls and when in a car, for instance) but not cause the belt to flip open or bend in weird ways when I don't need it to. We'll see how that goes.
~Raiphin
I managed to slide it off still taped into position, but it was a tough thing. As I lost weight I re-discovered my lack of ass, but it's something of a boon here because I just need a LITTLE give to the belt, rather than having to install a zipper and attach it to like 4 different materials and not have it gap/sag/wibble/etc.
My thought right now is to glue the belt entirely together in the back, after cutting it on the appropriate diagonal. I have vinyl I can cut and glue to the belt pieces for extra support as well. The front will be trickier. Haruhi's belt crosses over with the right side overlapping the left. Underneath that overlap I'm going to--instead of gluing the bits to each other--glue a small piece of not-very-elastic elastic to each part of the belt. Ideally, this will give the belt a bit of lee-way when I want it (I intend to remove it before entering bathroom stalls and when in a car, for instance) but not cause the belt to flip open or bend in weird ways when I don't need it to. We'll see how that goes.
~Raiphin
Saturday, February 6, 2010
Snip, snip.
Wow, did a lot the past few weeks. Bought almost all my materials for Haruhi, for one. As of this morning I've cut out ALL the circles I need for the skirt layers, and the skirt base itself. Check it out:
That's the organza layer, in dark brown. Came from JoAnn's normal 'casa' fabric section, AND is washable! I won't be able to really wash the skirt by the end (due to the belt and all) but I can steam it or soak it and that'll be convenient.
That's the satiny ruffle part of the. It's a black 'caviar' satin from JoAnns with a wee bit of stretch to it. Hopefully I won't hate that later. It's got a lovely weight to it though, which is good because it's like 12$ a yard. I got it on sale both times(had to finish off nearly 2 bolts) but it still ran me almost 100$. BLEH. Organza cost me 30. Stupid circle skirts. I've got a lot of satin left over, if I get ambitious I may use it to line the top to make it all soft and nice.
Maybe.
SPEAKING of the top, check that out--OK, so maybe it's fuzzy (stupid iphone) but that cross between a nightie and a curtain is actually the white part of Haruhi's top. I've already stitched in the buttonholes where the black ribbon will go through and then gathered it at the top. I'm going to have to gather it at the bottom too, and cut it off, and then sew it to the bra (which it's pinned to right now.)
I've also got more materials for the belt and sleeve bits.
That red fabric's going to be for the red belt thing on her left hand. I'm going to wrap it over itself or something to get something sturdy enough to use, and then probably stick a bit of elastic in it or at the back so I can get it on and off my hand.
I tried to find metal pyramid studs at JoAnn's but failed.Instead I found these things--which are iron on, I guess, but it's a costume so I don't care. I'm going to glue them to the belt (also pictured) and that should work nicely.
then I get things more put together, I'll put more pics up.
~Raiphin
That's the organza layer, in dark brown. Came from JoAnn's normal 'casa' fabric section, AND is washable! I won't be able to really wash the skirt by the end (due to the belt and all) but I can steam it or soak it and that'll be convenient.
That's the satiny ruffle part of the. It's a black 'caviar' satin from JoAnns with a wee bit of stretch to it. Hopefully I won't hate that later. It's got a lovely weight to it though, which is good because it's like 12$ a yard. I got it on sale both times(had to finish off nearly 2 bolts) but it still ran me almost 100$. BLEH. Organza cost me 30. Stupid circle skirts. I've got a lot of satin left over, if I get ambitious I may use it to line the top to make it all soft and nice.
Maybe.
SPEAKING of the top, check that out--OK, so maybe it's fuzzy (stupid iphone) but that cross between a nightie and a curtain is actually the white part of Haruhi's top. I've already stitched in the buttonholes where the black ribbon will go through and then gathered it at the top. I'm going to have to gather it at the bottom too, and cut it off, and then sew it to the bra (which it's pinned to right now.)
I've also got more materials for the belt and sleeve bits.
That red fabric's going to be for the red belt thing on her left hand. I'm going to wrap it over itself or something to get something sturdy enough to use, and then probably stick a bit of elastic in it or at the back so I can get it on and off my hand.I tried to find metal pyramid studs at JoAnn's but failed.Instead I found these things--which are iron on, I guess, but it's a costume so I don't care. I'm going to glue them to the belt (also pictured) and that should work nicely.
then I get things more put together, I'll put more pics up.
~Raiphin
Monday, January 18, 2010
Let's do some MATH.
So on the guitar front, some research into the process of resin casting determined that to properly hollow-cast the guitar body with something that would be strong enough to lug around but light enough to carry would be about 200$ just for supplies. I could do that, but it's not an optimal use of a budget. The new plan we embarked yesterday was to take the guitar apart (apparently my mechanic friend has put together guitars before. Who knew? Super convenient.) and plan to hollow out the back to make it lighter. The idea's a bit spooky because it's using the original--fuck this up and we're SOL. But I trust them. It'll also be useful because the actual Italia guitar Haruhi uses is a hollow-body anyway, and they're interested in--if I get/make a stencil--recreating the weird S glyph thing on the guitar. That would be awesome!
I treasure having friends who actually get excited and want to help with my weird projects. I'd be lost without them.
With that in their hands and taken care of, it's clothing time. My plan today was to work out making buttonholes to slide the black ribbon through for the ruched part of the top....but I can't find the buttonhole foot. AWESOME.
Plan B was to test out my memory of how to gather fabric. Good news: EASY AS HELL!! Bad news: probably doesn't make enough volume for the skirt to ruffle right. It gets kinda sad at the bottom. That means circle skirts, and THAT means math.
Let's math, shall we?
There's 3 ruffle skirtlayers:
1 chiffon
1 short satin
1 long satin
At the widest point, my hips are now about 39" (BITCHIN~ Used to be 41, back when I first started checking!)
the chiffon layer should be at least 10" long
the short satin later should be at least 14" long
the long satin layer should be at least 27" long in the back
those are approximate lengths, usually about the length I think I want plus 2" of leeway for heming and just being wrong. I can always make them shorter, although that'll be a giant pain I admit.
The rule as I understand it for gathering fabric is that it requires approximately 3 times the normal amount of fabric for a task. That's going to be a lot of fabric. I actuallygot the black satin today, I found one with a bit of 2-way stretch (eek) that just felt lovely...soft shine and with a nice weight to it. Hopefully I'll still like it when this is all done. (stretch + slick? hahah, dumbass.)
here is the tutorial I'm using for making my circle skirt:
http://taeliac.deviantart.com/art/Tutorial-Circle-Skirts-90497598?offset=125
It has pictures, directions, and formulas. lovely.
I'm using the directions for a waist of 32" and up because this part of the skirt is going to basically start at my hips.
39" + 2"(ease) = 41" WAIST(for the purposes of the tutorial.)
so
X = WAIST/6.28
X =6.528 (which I will round to 6.5)
Oh but wait--I want this GATHERED. And that means it's actually 41" x 3 = 123"
X = 123/6.28
X = 19.585 (19.5 rounded) or 6.5 x 3, same thing.
Now, because of the gathering the skirt is MUCH too big for me to be able to just cut out normally. (Of course it is. Sigh.) So I gotta figure out how much fabric I need.....
4x skirt length + 4x X number + 18"
For the chiffon layer: (4 x 10) + (4 x 19.5) + 18 = 136" of fabric, or 3.77777 yards. So, 4 yards. Good to know.
For the short satin layer: (4 x 14) + (4 x 19.5) + 18 = 152" or 4.222 yards. The fabric I bought today had 4 and 5/8ths yards on it,so that's pretty much perfect. But it means this next calculation will HURT my pocket book something fierce...That fabric was on sale for 5.50/yard...there's more, but at 12.99/yard.
For the long satin layer: (4 x 27) + (4 x 19.5) + 18 = 204" or 5.6666 yards. Which means 6 yards for extra fudging. This is how I end up with loads of extra fabric, and I'm not sorry about it. I know the long satin layer is going to be much shorter in the front, but I don't know how much short yet and don't want to try and skimp or change the math. Math is NOT my strong point, so I have to work around that fact. And pay for it on occasion...like the 80$ that's going to go into just the long skirt layer. *wincing*
Next up will be making the belt and the arm things, I think, as I look for the button foot. And for a JoAnn coupon!!
~Raiphin
I treasure having friends who actually get excited and want to help with my weird projects. I'd be lost without them.
With that in their hands and taken care of, it's clothing time. My plan today was to work out making buttonholes to slide the black ribbon through for the ruched part of the top....but I can't find the buttonhole foot. AWESOME.
Plan B was to test out my memory of how to gather fabric. Good news: EASY AS HELL!! Bad news: probably doesn't make enough volume for the skirt to ruffle right. It gets kinda sad at the bottom. That means circle skirts, and THAT means math.
Let's math, shall we?
There's 3 ruffle skirtlayers:
1 chiffon
1 short satin
1 long satin
At the widest point, my hips are now about 39" (BITCHIN~ Used to be 41, back when I first started checking!)
the chiffon layer should be at least 10" long
the short satin later should be at least 14" long
the long satin layer should be at least 27" long in the back
those are approximate lengths, usually about the length I think I want plus 2" of leeway for heming and just being wrong. I can always make them shorter, although that'll be a giant pain I admit.
The rule as I understand it for gathering fabric is that it requires approximately 3 times the normal amount of fabric for a task. That's going to be a lot of fabric. I actuallygot the black satin today, I found one with a bit of 2-way stretch (eek) that just felt lovely...soft shine and with a nice weight to it. Hopefully I'll still like it when this is all done. (stretch + slick? hahah, dumbass.)
here is the tutorial I'm using for making my circle skirt:
http://taeliac.deviantart.com/art/Tutorial-Circle-Skirts-90497598?offset=125
It has pictures, directions, and formulas. lovely.
I'm using the directions for a waist of 32" and up because this part of the skirt is going to basically start at my hips.
39" + 2"(ease) = 41" WAIST(for the purposes of the tutorial.)
so
X = WAIST/6.28
X =6.528 (which I will round to 6.5)
Oh but wait--I want this GATHERED. And that means it's actually 41" x 3 = 123"
X = 123/6.28
X = 19.585 (19.5 rounded) or 6.5 x 3, same thing.
Now, because of the gathering the skirt is MUCH too big for me to be able to just cut out normally. (Of course it is. Sigh.) So I gotta figure out how much fabric I need.....
4x skirt length + 4x X number + 18"
For the chiffon layer: (4 x 10) + (4 x 19.5) + 18 = 136" of fabric, or 3.77777 yards. So, 4 yards. Good to know.
For the short satin layer: (4 x 14) + (4 x 19.5) + 18 = 152" or 4.222 yards. The fabric I bought today had 4 and 5/8ths yards on it,so that's pretty much perfect. But it means this next calculation will HURT my pocket book something fierce...That fabric was on sale for 5.50/yard...there's more, but at 12.99/yard.
For the long satin layer: (4 x 27) + (4 x 19.5) + 18 = 204" or 5.6666 yards. Which means 6 yards for extra fudging. This is how I end up with loads of extra fabric, and I'm not sorry about it. I know the long satin layer is going to be much shorter in the front, but I don't know how much short yet and don't want to try and skimp or change the math. Math is NOT my strong point, so I have to work around that fact. And pay for it on occasion...like the 80$ that's going to go into just the long skirt layer. *wincing*
Next up will be making the belt and the arm things, I think, as I look for the button foot. And for a JoAnn coupon!!
~Raiphin
Wednesday, January 6, 2010
Breaking News: Guitar Update~!
So first off, two of my friends are the most awesome people in the world. Conveniently they date each other so I can see both at the same time. One, my best friend, has a theater degree and designs sets and helps with staging and stuff. Her boyfriend is a mechanic and skilled enough technically to be re-modelling their house by his lonesome. They have a shop in their garage that dreams are made of. My cosplay dreams, anyway.
I've enlisted the guy's aid in making the guitar more con-friendly--lighter, for the most part. He knows someone with a rotational resin-caster which just sounds sexy. My original intention was just to cast the body, but he's not sure the caster is big enough. If not, he'll help me with the process of making a silicon mold and the using fiberglass or plaster to make the body. Either way sounds pretty much awesomepants, and I'm looking forward to seeing how it turns out~ (and what, no doubt, screws up.)
My goal now is to work on the costume itself as much as possible so as to be ready to spend time/money/effort when the call to arms comes for the guitar. Whee!
~Raiphin
I've enlisted the guy's aid in making the guitar more con-friendly--lighter, for the most part. He knows someone with a rotational resin-caster which just sounds sexy. My original intention was just to cast the body, but he's not sure the caster is big enough. If not, he'll help me with the process of making a silicon mold and the using fiberglass or plaster to make the body. Either way sounds pretty much awesomepants, and I'm looking forward to seeing how it turns out~ (and what, no doubt, screws up.)
My goal now is to work on the costume itself as much as possible so as to be ready to spend time/money/effort when the call to arms comes for the guitar. Whee!
~Raiphin
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