Sunday 10 August 2014

It has come to an end. Today we finish off our three part series on how to emboss and build armour out of worbla.

Again 519 Geeks would like to thank 

for supplying the items for us to make this armour!
ready?
On to the tutorial

The things you will need:
Scissors
Paint brushes 
(of varying sizes)
Guesso
Heat gun
Sclupting Modeling tools
(I paid about 5$ at Michael's for mine)

The first thing you need to do is pick a small area on either side of your armour and heat it up with the heat gun. (I usually work my way from one side to the other from top to bottom, that way you don't miss any parts.)
Once the part is heated use your sculpting tools to gently push down into the sections you have cut away from your EVA foam. don't press to hard or you will find the worbla will tear and it will be hard to get it to look the way you want. 




This is an optional step but I'm going to quickly show you hae to put edging on your armour if you so want it.
It's super easy Just cut out a bit of worbla the length you need and figure out what width you want it. Slowly heat up the strip of worbla you have cut on both sides then run the heat gun over the already embossed armour to make sure the worbla will adhear to it's self and apply it along the edges. make sure the measure your corners and make sure they fit together before applying the edging.



Your on the home stretch. It's time to finish the worbla assuming you don't want the ruff pattern that worbla has. if you do you can just skip this....I wanted something ruff but not quite as ruff as worbla so I went with about 5 layers of Guesso. 



after that take a very fine grit sand paper and sand it to the softness you want. There are several methods you can use when doing this part. 
Some people use friendly plastic and roll it on a marble or concrete surface to get it smooth. 
Core geeks also came up with a pretty incredible way of making smooth worbla and I'll post that again.
check out the video at the bottom to see how I did it in sped up. 


 don't forget to visit
for all your worbla and costuming needs. 
Worbla is being sold in some shops now. You can check out 
to see if there is a store near you carrying it :)

Until next time Geekies

 

Friday 8 August 2014

We are back!

So sorry for the time away. Life for all of us at 519 geeks is getting a bit hectic. A few new members, a few old ones left but the tutorials will prevail! 

Now we have the Second installment of our three part Tutorial series brought to you by....

Dani's Cosplay Supplies!


So where we last left off you had created the pattern for your worbla Armour by wrapping your model in cling wrap and painters tape. Now we are going to put what we made to use and begin your Armour.  (see the previous post under this one :D)

The things you will need are:

Worbla 
Scissors
A Pen
Heat gun
EVA Foam
(also from cosplay supplies XD)
A Crafting Knife
Template for your embossing


 First step is to cut your template for embossing out of EVA foam. Make sure if there is alot of detail there is enough space to push the worbla down into it so it doesn't look like you just mashed it in. 
Next you need to trace the pattern you made onto the EVA foam and cut that out 


  Alright got that done? awesome....
Now do it again....ON THE WORBLA YAY!
So for cutting out the worbla you will need to of each piece. Our Armour had three pieces to it, two in the front and one in the back so we needed to cut out 6 pieces of worbla in total. What I did was traced around the patterns once then just eyeballed the second of each piece to make sure it would fit over the pattern with a bit to spare on each side. That way you can do lots of trimming. 
 


obviously the next step is to cut it out. 


on the right you see me just eyeballing the second pieces for the front of the armour. Just making sure there is enough to cover and enough to trim off. ---------->




Finally whip out the Trusty old Heat gun and start slowly heating up both sides of your worbla. Make sure to heat it up slowly on both sides until it is malleable and starts to get floppy. then take the side that was shiny before heating it up and apply your foam to that side.


Trim all the extra foam from around all your edges





Now remember those second pieces you made? the ones that were just eyeballed and bigger and didn't really have anything traced on them? yeah those ones. Now you get to heat that up slowly on both sides and place it on the other side of the EVA foam, Making a Worbla Sammich and trim that up leaving about an inch and a half on each side.
Normally you would actually sandwich the pieces so the worbla would meet in the middle of the EVA foam on the side. However for the look I was going for I needed something that looked big and clunky. Also since I was doing embossing on some of the edges I needed to re-enforce those edges with an extra bit of worbla on the side so I folded the front piece over to make a lip.





I did use a sculpting tool to help me flatten the edges. 

after getting everything sandwiched and ready to go you have to heat up your worbla again. yes slowly on both sides, but it won't be as floppy as before. do be careful tho the worbla can warp and you may not get it back to the shape you want it to.
Of course the best way to shape your worbla and make sure it's not going to be uncomfortable for you model is to shape it on them. You can also shape it on a dress form if that model is you.


and there you have it. If you have decided not to emboss the worbla you can leave it as it is and begin to prep it for paint... Coregeeks cosplay has found the best ways to make your worbla shiny and smooth!


as always thanks to the ever so awesome

and if you want to watch the video of us doing these steps you can do so here!


Till next time Geekies!