December 2011
7 posts
Finished Eyes
I neglected to post finished photos of Branwen’s eyes on her head. Here’s a few.
Seeing the photos I took I can tell the eyes are not both on there precisely in the same manner; I’m disappointed but it’s subtle and if you are in person watching the mask move, it’s probably not even A Thing.
Bird Hands!
I ordered a pair of 23” black satin gloves (not so sure on my material choice, but we’ll see how it goes) and purchased two packages of plastic eagle talons from Hobby Lobby. What I wanted was a set of hands that looked like birds’ feet. What I got is spot on. My first glue attempt was using rubber cement in a similar fashion to how I glued on the eyes to the mask. The nail dried...
Feet Inspirations
If you don’t want to make specific feet for whatever creature costume you are making, consider shoe styles. Vibram Five Fingers are paw-like, and could work for many animal types. In my case, I had a pair of Japanese tabi boots on hand, and my search for bird feet is over before it began.
If you don’t want your character to wear actual shoes, then you’re rather out of luck....
Bird Tails
I didn’t really take many photos of this process like I should have but let me just say it was a bit of a pain. I used black fleece for the backside of my raven tail and used both the long- and short-pile furs for the visible side. I sewed dividers between each “feather” and stuffed them with polyfill, and stuff the base as well just a bit. The attachment I decided on includes...
The Eyes Have It
Those eyes I talked about last time? So I worked on them, using that tutorial I linked. It wasn’t as hard as I thought it would be but I definitely learned some important things along the way. I acquired 40mm wiggle eyes from Hobby Lobby. Being very careful not to punch through and scratch the clear plastic, I removed the backing to all four of them and took out the wiggly bit inside. I...
