Progress towards July

So taking two accelerated grad classes in the month of June while working on the majority of my costumes is probably not the best idea ever. But I'd like to be done with school by next Spring so them's the breaks.

Since the last time I updated, I finished a bunch of pieces for the con.
Lots of pictures below the cut.

Anime Expo in a Month!!!

As usual, real life reared its ugly head these past few months. Since I started grad school, I was extremely busy with papers, readings, and presentations. Only these past two weeks have I been able to make everything in lightning speed.

Picture heavy post below the cut.

Progress for PAX East 2013

Goose and I are attending PAX East this year and one of our friends had asked if I would put together some Jedi Robes for him, specifically Obi-wan Kenobi from Episode 2. I said that I would make them for him as a belated Christmas gift.

From http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/c/c5/Obiwan1.jpg

Picture Heavy Post after the break

Let AX 2013 planning commence!!

So right now we're super motivated and getting our ideas together for next year's con already! We'll see how long this keeps up for me >>

This is our costume list for now. We're doing an MLP group and a Pokemon group as well. I'm also going to be making a Battle Angel Alita/Ganmu costume. As in Gally in the Last Order series with the crazy damascus blade butterfly knife.

So onwards to reference photos!

(I may or may not be slightly buzzed from inhaling alcohol fumes while cooking, and Nave had me try one of his favorite beers. Beer + Me = CAPSLOCK)

Last Minute Progress

Here's a quick list. I'll post pictures when I get a moment to breathe.

Kaylee's jumpsuit, pouch and belt are all complete and distressed.
Wash's jumpsuit just needs to have the patches, pocket and shoulder details hand-stitched on.
Wash's harness needs to have one more area stitched, then all of his details glued on.
Zoe's vest and pants are all done. All the pleather pieces are darkened and weathered, but I need more snaps for the shrug and to attach it to the vest. The holster is mostly complete, it just needs the parts where the gun holds on.
Zoe's gun needs one or two more coats of paint and all of the bullets are painted and drying.

18 hours until Goose, Madhouse and I are on the road. Still need to shop for supplies, do the laundry, make the apartment ready for the weekend for our fur-babies, and pack!
Running on less than 5 hours of sleep today, but it's all worth it in the end.
Can't wait for Otakon!

Massive Productive Weekend!

This past weekend was the only full weekend that Goose and I had for cosplay, so we made the most of it by working from 8 am to 10:30 pm on Saturday and 7 am to 10:45 pm on Sunday. Here's what we did!

(Warning! Image heavy post after the jump!)

Never Enough Time!

Once again, Goose and I are hurrying to the finish, despite goals of starting and ending sooner. I love reading the Otakon and cosplay.com boards, but since everyone is counting down to Otakon, it makes it hard to read. Just reminds me of my crunchy deadline.

This past weekend, I have finished the base for my Zoe capris. They still need to be fitted, hemmed and the details of the boot cuffs added. Goose has finished the frames for Ilo/Milo and the foam has been cut to size. They just need to be shaped and the pockets for the fabric made to fit in the foam. After that it's stamping the Ilo/Milo fabric, making the face, arms and legs, and Goose finishing the support system. I started working on Goose's Wash jumpsuit and have finished most of the torso base. I need to sew on one more sleeve, sew the pants, attach the pants and put in all the zippers. Goose is working on the patches for Wash (which is proving difficult without a proper drawing software).

What's left to be done: (Because I love lists...)
Firefly
Zoe
-Capri Details and fitting - Akira
-Vest (pleather for the vest, shrug and holster should arrive this week) - Akira
-Shrug - Akira
-Holster - Akira
-Mare's Leg - Goose
-Knife - Goose
-Darkening and distressing leather - Akira

Wash
-Jumpsuit - Akira
-Harness - Akira
-Patches - Goose

Kaylee
-Dye the fabric for the jumpsuit - Akira
-Jumpsuit - Akira
-Teddy bear patch (furry fabric should arrive this week) - Akira
-Details - Akira

IloMilo
Ilo and Milo
-Finishing securing the frame and supports - Goose
-Shape the foam - Akira
-Make the pockets for foam - Akira
-Sew together the skin - Akira
-Attach the skin to the frame - Akira
-Hands and Feet - Akira
-Face - Akira

If I'm really diligent, I'm sure I can get most of the sewing for Firefly done this week, depending on when my shipment of pleather arrives. And Goose has really been stepping it up for the mascots. I think we can get it done if we work really hard every day until the day we leave for Otakon. (*knock on wood*)
I'll post construction pictures if I remember to take them in the blur of the next few weeks.
Wish us luck!

FMA progress, an Inara vest and a Malcolm coat!

So ever since I got this new phone, I've been taking a lot of my progress shots on instagram and posting them on twitter.

Warning: IMAGE HEAVY!

Here's what's been happening:

More Progress

Since this weekend was a long weekend, Goose and I were extremely productive. After I finished cutting out the squares from the last post, I stitched together the panels for the four sides of Ilo and Milo.

(Picture heavy post after the jump. But all the stuff I've posted to Instagram.)

Let the Countdown Begin

We're in the middle of May and that leaves us a little over two months to get everything completed. *flail*
Now that Goose and I are done with our wedding stuff (yay, we got married in April *little fanfare*) we can finally get started on our costumes. Not a lot of time for five costumes to make, but we'll make do.

I just ordered parts for Zoe (contacts, wig, boots and Mare's Leg pieces) and a Hawaiian shirt for Wash. There are a lot of pieces that we need to build IloMilo and I'm still lacking all the fabric I need for the three Firefly characters.

I don't assume the clothing for Firefly will take very long at all. I've made jumpsuits for my Portal cosplay and both Goose and Madhouse are wearing jumpsuits. Zoe's vest, shrug and pants will probably take me one weekend of good solid work. Probably a week for all of Firefly's base construction, not including the props and details. Both Goose and Madhouse have a lot of patches, or little details hanging around. Then we'll have to construct my gun, holster, bullets, and Goose's harness. That will probably take another week or two.

The things that I'm more worried about are Ilo and Milo since they both are experiments and Goose and I will have to figure out support, framing, and the skin of the mascots. We have designs of what we think will work, but as of now, we only have theories. Ilo & Milo construction will take the better part of a month to complete if we work consistently and efficiently. This is all assuming that our theories and designs work out the way we're projecting them.

With a lot diligence and luck, we'll be able to get everything done by July 26th, but it'll be close. Again, we'll probably be working up until the day. But hopefully not working while at Otakon. Next year, we'll hopefully get started much sooner.

OH GOD TWO WEEKS

Quick update (pictures from prior hacks will come when I get home):

- Need to finish Azula. This requires a sewing machine. I do not have one. This requires me finding friends with a sewing machine I can borrow (or hours upon hours of hemming by hand, or buying a machine & returning it later). e____e;;
- I have light hazel contacts for Azula that I do not know how to put in properly. After several half-hour attempts (more than that and I'm afraid I'll go blind) and lots of eyejabbing, I'm still not quite there. They do, however, look AWESOME.
- Still to come: one more t-shirt mod, turning an old Threadless t-shirt into an open-shoulder crop top for the Otakon dance.
- I'll be walking in the Sixh. Fashion Show on Friday at 4pm and getting my J-goth on. (I don't even have an inner visual kei/gothic lolita fiend, so this is just going to be slightly bizarre, while interesting.)

If I remotely have the free time, I may make a last-minute run to a hardware store & see what I can improvise in the way of Sailor Saturn's glaive that doesn't look horrendously crafted. I do not want to be one of these...

but add that to a photoshoot on each of the two weekends between now & Otakon, and songs to finish, and the chances of me having the free time to do a glaive looks slim. I'm disappointed in myself. :x

Akira and Kaye's work looks rifucklously amazing so far, and I am EXCITED. Although apprehensive. I have no idea where I'll be this time next year, and while everyone + several other friends are talking about attending Otakon next year since they've gotten excited-by-proxy, I really don't know if I'll be here again. I'm doing it for the experience of enjoying this process with my friends, and getting really swept up by Akira & Kaye's skill and enthusiasm, but I myself am no longer an active anime fan nor much of a con-goer. Still.

...Maybe I'll do NDK next year!

and thus appeared a Lira

hello, world! Akira & Kaye may have mentioned me in passing as a model, but I've been enabled by their talents into jumping back into the world of crafts, needlework, and winging costumes-- which I haven't so much as touched in at *least* four years. So here's to getting my rusty crafting neurons back into gear.

My starter projects are:

- at least two mods of old Threadless t-shirts & old shirts in general
- beachparty!Azula from Avatar: The Last Airbender (I decided to bite the bullet & go for the slightly more complex version, to challenge myself) for Otakon

Possibilities, if I de-rust myself adequately with the above:

- accessories to add to my Victorian/steampunk wardrobe, also for Otakon
- Sailor Saturn's glaive

I'm a strong believer in winging...pretty much everything, so I'm going to need to rein myself in to some extent.

Oh, and I also have a tendency to be very OCD about geometric shapes, lines, parallels, etc...so I'm also going to need to rein that in lest I spend over 20 minutes pinning & cutting one t-shirt hem...like I just did... *facepalm*

Update from Akira

It's been a long time since I updated.
Between my last post and now, Goose bought me this super sweet new sewing machine. It's a Brother SE400 and does embroidery from templates on the machine.

My new baby

Then he gave me another surprise by giving me this (ridiculously expensive) software to make your own templates or from images. These are the patches that I'm using for one of my cosplays and the template was made by Goose. (He's such a software-phile. He loves to mess with stuff like this.)

Pretty patches! Easily resizeable too

I'm pretty pleased with the results. Besides the embroidery function, the sewing capabilities of this machine make my old machine look like a kid's toy. Auto reinforcing, auto cutting of threads, tons of different stitches, powerful machinery behind the shell; this machine makes sewing things super easy. (shameless plug)

It's just a matter of me buckling down and actually sewing. After I get into a routine, it should get easier to schedule my time for cosplay creation.

As Kaye said, she and I will also be working together to make sailor senshi costumes. I've recently bought from brass sheets from the local hardware store and will be trying my hand at that very soon. Pictures will soon follow.

Goose, Kaye and I have a pretty sizable list ahead of us, so there should be many updates to come along too.