DIY Uka Uka

Hoga-boga! Anyone remember the spiritual mask that followed the oddly shaped bandicoot, that vanished when damage was taken? I certainly do, and someone gave me the idea, after saying one of my masks reminded him of Uka Uka. Such ideas I consider too good to pass up on. Apparently he was a spiritual shaman of sorts, then he died. Which turned him into a floating mask. A mask that gives advice and invulnerability when three are collected, without taking damage. Uka Uka can be translated into spiritual guidance, which is what he does. For all intensive purposes it's a piece of wood, with a wacky face on it, adorned by several colorful feathers. However I'm not a woodchuck, nor a wood worker. Instead I opted for foam instead. Which I tailored to mostly fit my face. Cut out holes for the eyes and the nose. Then trace lines downwards with a soldering iron, melting groves into the foam. Which gives it a very much wooden look, further enhanced by a decent paint job. Where several gradients of brown was used, the nose is just a red triangle. All in all a very quick build. that I also used on a larp. Basically playing a wonky voodoo priest, with to noisy bells in his belt.

Zaceron

Wonder Woman Shield

Wonder Woman’s Shield

Due to the recent and decent wonder woman film, recently released. I decided to make her shield. It was surprisingly easy and took around five hours in total. This is the definition of a DIY (do it your self). Despite how good it looks, I did mess up the runes at the bottom. They’re a bit crooked and nonsensical.

All it took was a wookpan , a sheet of EVA foam, soldering iron and a heatgun. That being said, it is a bit on the small side. However that is just a minor complication. Basically i traced a circle around the biggest pot lid I found. After struggling for quite some time, I did manage to cut a decent circle, Far from perfect. I’m not sure why I removed the pot lid and tried to do it freehand. Some of the liens got a bit wobbly. The hardest part was still to find the mid point of the circle. In the end I just used a ruler to draw up a square around the circle. Then traced a line from corner to corner, this also gave me a decent guide. Now the sane thing is to draw all the lines and do all of the scribbling on the surface before curving it.

The pattern I drew on plastic sheets I put on top of my pc screen, after hoisting the screen onto my lap. We truly live in fantastic times. The old crt monitors made this virtually impossible to do. Basically i found out I can use the flat screen as a make shift light table.

All of the decorations where carved out with a soldering iron, which incidentally releases some dank fumes. A breathing mask is recommended I suppose. After carving out several wonky trenches and gibberish Greek inspired runes, I heated the circle up. Then stuffed it into the wookpan and squeezed it into shape. Heated it some more and pull it out after it got cold. On the backside I attached another smaller circle of foam to attach the shield straps and to make it more sturdy. The straps it self are glued and bolted onto the foam, just to be on the safe side. Some paranoia is always recommended, plus durability is a must. Incidentally this also hides the straps on the backside. Making the whole product much more tidy.

Meanwhile the symbol and the colors was a deliberate pick. The original one from the comics always looked like a plastic toy. Hardly fitting a Greek amazon warrior. The new one looks a lot more fitting, but it lacked the logo. Which game me the idea combining the two designs. On the edges I carved in several crocked and wobbly runes as well, which in all likely hood is garbage and gibberish. But when you consider that people in the ancient world did not have powertools, some imperfections is to be expected. This is also the first time I’ve made a round buckler like this.

There are two plans for this shield, one is to have someone dress u and use it at launch day and then to give it to a lovely little lady, whom is a huge fan of Wonder Woman.

Zaceron

#wonderwoman #shield #diy #foam #protection #superhero

The man behind the mask

At long last I have come up with a stage act, an act worthy of a cosplay competition. Not to mention the fact hat I have made reapers mask as well. It is probably one of the fastest cosplay props I’ve made. The prop is made from EVA foam as usual and the result is quite stunning indeed. I have a very interesting and a bit silly way to approach this. By simply pressing a paper against the face, while marking out the eyes, the nose and the mouth with a marker pen. It can also be done with the help of a fried or family member with measuring tape, though that is hardly considered good fun. Ones the placement has been found, I proceed to use a transparent overhead sheet to draw out the pattern. It’s very easy to find reference material online, or just use the Overwatch in game gallery. Ones the lines are in place, it is simply a matter of cutting out the various parts. A scissor will usually do the trick. Take the template onto foam and trace it. Cut out the main skull piece, then the beak like nose, followed by the ridge on top. Naturally it is important to refer to the pesky reference picture as much as possible. The mind is terrible at remembering details and I have at several points done silly mistakes, because I got too overconfident. Glue the pieces in place after removing the studded backside with a knife, sand paper or a rotary tool. Which is also my favorite. It’s important to let the adhesive to properly dry and carve out the space for the nose under the beak. While this is well and all, the two pieces on the side has to be cut out as well, but those should be attached after the main portion has been bended with heat. It’s also recommended to cut out a small triangle on top of the skull, to make it curved a the top. When the piece got properly assembled I attached and adjustable strap, allowing me to wear it and other people as well. For the color I mostly went with white mixed with a dash of brown at different density, which I smudged with a sponge, to achieve a more smooth transition. Any slot aside from the eyes I also attached black fabric to make the contrast more striking.

One of these days I will build a Gundam for no apparent reason.

Sighing out

twitch.tv/zaceron

Zaceron

Cop Stopped?

17th May, the Norwegian independence day. It comes around every year and is wildly celebrated by people form all over the country. Mostly by walking as a huge group waving flags. It’s also the perfect opportunity to advertise clubs and everything in-between, from bikes, old mobiles, Vikings and kilts. There are very few limits. Naturally I went in my Reaper cosplay, minus the guns. I don’t trust people and their ideas of what is considered a terrorist threat. I have spent way too much time and effort on them to let them be confiscated by a man in blue. It was bad enough that a constable was concerned about my spice bottle grenades. Yes I got stopped. Right after that I was stopped by some reporters as well. Some fellow with the worst hand writing I’ve ever seen. Which is saying something, I have worked with children.

I came across a couple of annoying things I might just have solved by now. First of all the grenades kept falling out and was very hard to glue in place. The second issue I had was the ammo belt, which was made with screws and ductape. That was not very smart. However the solution came to me today. I just used a more stretchy black fabric to make the loop and instead of short screws I used bolts, with a nut on the end.

The other thing I spent a lot of time on, while streaming was to assemble new hoops and fixing the paint job on my guns, which looks fantastic by the way, if I do say so myself.

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#independenceday

I need more Blanco

I have to paint most of the shotgun white, I guess that is why it is called El Blanco. Apparently it is a pun based on correction fluid and the Mexican prefix El. The clay rouses turned out fantastic, way beyond my expectations. My original plan was to go with thermo doll clay. It’s a simple clay that one pop into the over and let it dry. But I needed it to stay in shape until dry, so I went with troll dough instead. Also because it is very simple to make and very inexpensive. It can also be over treated. I also used the same substance on the handle grip. If this works or not, time will tell. However one thing is sure, this gun is not one to throw around as the paint job will go awry and clay will probably break. To rectify this I plan to use some ski card devices. The one you can pull out a thread from, that retract when letting go of the thread. I’m not sure what this device is actually called and can’t be bothered to look it up just yet. I added a lot of minor details and isolated a lot of the colors. It made me wonder if I should use a more ivory color palette. Other that I did stream a lot of Sleeping dogs. Which is why this blog has been a bit slow to update.  

Troll Dough 03.05.2017

Greetings and salutations, it is time for another stream update report. Lately I’ve been spending considerable time on various games. Such as unlocking stuff in Overwatch. I just had to get the officer Dv.a skin. For some insufferable reason America got it first. Naturally I just switched over to those servers instead. By definition it is cancer mode, everyone and their mother was shouting add me in the chat. Not only that people are carp, especially since everyone is lov level as well. Progress does not carry over. Slow loading time and people disconnecting is to be expected and they will be replaced with a retarded AI, which is likely to be better then the AFK player. The poor little sod has a habit of sauntering of minding it’s own business. Failing to use any meaningful abilities and recall when at full health. SO to say business as usual.

As for my El Blanco Reaper shotgun virtually all of the important elements are in place. I had to look up the actual model within the hero gallery, in order to get the details right. The bottom of the gun now resemble the actual model. The smart thing is to paint all the parts separately and then assemble them. But that does not work all the time and will make the process of painting painfully annoying. Colors bleeding over is a real annoying and real problem when I crave pixel perfect precision. Aside from that though, everything is good. Meanwhile I have some reservation about how well my flour, salt, water and glue dough will act when dry. If it drys that is. Essentially I molded the roses with air dried clay, that I coated with glue. Since without it the mixture started to crack, crackle and dry up. That being said though, this troll dough is excellent to entertain children with and can be baked in the over and then coated in paint. It’s not recommended to eat it, sice the salt makes it rather unpleasant.

1 cup water

1 cup salt

2 cup flour

Zaceron

Update 24.04.2017

Games, games and more gaming and photshop. Because I have a game in the works. Plus I’ve made more game videos uploaded to Gamers-Haven.org. The other reason I’ve been doing less cosplay the last week is also due to painting the living room white. Also why I have not been using the greenscreen effect while streaming.

Other things I’ve been doing is to clean up some plastic in nature, by carrying around a plastic bag, when going for a stroll. It’s the small things after all. I’ve come to the conclusion that if the political climate can change, so can the environment. Besides that I hate living with thrash and pollution regardless. After spending time in Beijing’s horrid air pollution I can say one thing. I don’t miss it one bit.

As I was saying, I’ve started to work on a game project, where I’m in the process of writing the design document and making a collection of weekly waifus on my Patreon account. Drawing lovely monster ladies is a fun past time and will also build the foundation for my in game characters. Stau tuned for more.

Greenscreens is a relatively simple thing to set up. Especially in obs, as there is a chroma kye filter. Hand up a bright canvas behind the gaming chair. Like a bright green piece of cloth, have some good lighting and wear a color that is not the same as the fabric. You can also probably go to the local paint factory/ store and have them mix up a green or blue concoction to paint on a surface.

I also spent money on upgrading my PC, but to tax returns I will probably eat a little bit less this month and the next one. Oh well, time to bake bread. 

Zaceron