Just a bit of Kerbal Cosplay

FYI -- This document is still in progress. I still have to add many photos yet and fix the story line some. If you have questions just send me a comment and I will respond when I have a moment.

Intro

Last year, for my son's second ComicCon, he decided he really wanted to go in costume. Who can blame him? Cosplay is fun and allows you to interact with others at a con that you normally would not ever talk to. So, then I began the question of should I buy a costume or try and make it? Take inventory of yourself. Do you have time, space to work in, and some skills? If yes, then the answer is to make it yourself. Take time out to watch and learn form others for a bit. Armed with info gathered from so many YouTube channels out there dedicated to building costumes, we decided to give it a shot ourselves and got crafty to build a dwarf costume to be proud of. We used EVA foam because it's cheap and easy to work with. Very low on the hazardous material list too so that's a plus as well. Since last year, the number of new YouTube channels and patterns for foam out there continue to grow by leaps and bounds. You name it and someone has either created it or they have built something else you can use to make it. Now it is important to mention that you need TIME to plan and build something yourself. From scratch you need lots of time to figure out details. Even with a plan in hand though you need time to gather materials, wait out a delivery or two from China if you need to, and actually build and paint. We kept a look out as far in advance as possible as to when our Con was to avoid getting crunched. We ended up starting work three months out, working an hour or two here ant there and maybe more on the weekends. This worked for us but YMMV so figure out the pace that works for you.

Inspiration

This is our second project. My son is also finally old enough to compete in the cosplay contest, so it was a big deal that we came up with something good with a nice wow factor that has not been done a dozen times over. A good inspiration is not always hard to find. It might be hard to pull off, but not always hard to find. In this years case, my son has developed a real passion for all things space related. Thanks to companies like SpaceX and the Google Xprize, space is cool again. There are a lot of space shoot em up games out there and of course the Star Wars juggernaut but one game in particular we both like is Kerbal Space Program. Design and build a rocket, put a Kerbal in it, launch it, and hope they don't die. The game is simple and brilliant. Jebediah Kerman is the lead pilot you start out with in the game. He's brave and smiling through most flights and a fun character to recreate.

Internet Research

Whenever you come up with a costume idea it's always good to pull up lots of photos of the subject so you can pick out the important details. Also check and see if anyone else has tried to make the costume before. In our case, a small number of people have made this costume before a few years ago. The original bunch used paper mache to craft the helmet and cardboard for the head. Another person used fiberglass to make them. This wasn't what we wanted to use. Nothing against them and their methods but we wanted to do foam because it's easy to work with, durable, cheap, and non toxic. We did get a few helpful ideas from seeing their work though so it's always good to look and give credit where credit is due if you decide to use their ideas in your design.

Material and Tools Needed

The primary build for this project is the head and helmet. Secondary items will be the harness, glove attachments and the patches. Store bought items will be the boots, orange flight suit, and gloves. You will also need a copy of Evil Ted Smith's "Foam Dome" pattern and either a projector or copier that can do 11" x 17" enlargements.

Head/Helmet

1x Evil Ted Smith's Foam Dome pattern

8x 1/2" thick EVA 2' x 2' floor tiles (helmet)

1x roll of 1/4" thick EVA foam sheet (outer head)

1x yard of light green felt (face skin)

1x 2' x 2' x 1/4" thick plywood board (armature frame inside head)

2x 14" round floral craft foam rings (helmet rings)

1x 12" round floral craft foam ring (head base)

3x Craft fur pieces (for hair)

2x 3.1" smooth craft foam balls or half balls (eyes)

1x 10" x 13" or bigger cross stitch plastic mesh (black or just paint it flat black)

4x 1/4" wooden dowells approx 3" long

Optional Accessories for Helmet

4x 10mm LED lights clear color

2x mini flip switches

2x 9v battery connectors

5' CatV or similar solid twisted pair wire

1x computer fan

Harness

5x 1" nylon strap buckles

25x nylon strap slides

1x roll two sided wrap velcro

50' of 1" blue nylon strap material

10' of 1" Yellow nylon strap material

Clothing items

1x Orange flight suit

1x pair of orange mittens

1x pair black boots

Tools and Supplies

1 box cutter knife (Keep it sharp)

1x knife sharpener

Sharpie pens

Heat gun

tape measure

Long straight edge ruler

coping handsaw or jigsaw

1 qt of Barges contact cement

Dust mask

scissors

lighter

Respirator mask (or work outside when glueing and painting)

dremel with cut off wheels and sanding drums

Optional but good:

Band saw

Belt sander

soldering Iron

Build 1: The Helmet

The helmet in KSP is really just a big round ball with a window cut in the front to look out, 2 light pods on top, 2 visor pivot pods on the side and two rings. To figure out the right size of the ball to make the helmet out of I turned to the internet research we did on other costumes that were done in the past. Hats off to user Awallick and her friends back in 2013 who did this series of photos and notes: http://imgur.com/a/tGaxR#GaAXr4Q I have to say that paper mache is time consuming and messy and they did it in their living room without destroying it! Great job! Anyway, they used a 55-75cm exercise ball and the scale looked good so that's the size we went with. Doing the math, we came up with a outside circumference of a 55cm ball to be around 67.8" or 33.9" for a half dome that we would duplicate into a full globe. The diagonal measurement on a 2' x 2' foam floor tile is just about that size so I knew we were in business.

To craft a giant ball out of foam we needed a dome pattern with the length of each piece to be 33.9" and about 8.5" width in the middle. Unless you want to cover an exercise ball in tin foil and duct tape and try and make it yourself the easiest way I found was to do this.

1. Obtain a pattern and resize it

Head over to Evil Ted Smith's website and download his free "Basic Dome Pattern" he has. http://eviltedsmith.com/product/basic-dome-patter/ He created this for a Youtube channel video he did to demonstrate how to make patterns and glue things. Go to his channel and see how it's done to support him as thanks. The pattern as-is is way to small for what we need, so we need to enlarge it. I've done half the work for you. The pattern enlargements I've attached are Ted's blown up to fit on a 10" x 17" sheet. if you have access to a copier printer that can do this size sheet you can simply print these out and then do 2 copies each (one for each end lengthwise) with enlargement of 100% and cut them out and tape together. If you use this method I suggest you mark the center lengthwise of the pattern with a line and put marks every quarter inch away from the center in both directions. When you photocopy the sheet, do the left side first then flip it around and do the right. If you no longer can see the cent line you drew you simply count the number of hash marks (they are now 1/2 inch apart) and you can fill in the blank area or print a third copy to get the middle bit. Cut out and tape these together and you now have a pattern the right size. I then took this pattern and transferred it to a big sheet of heavy rosin paper which is tougher and easier to trace with.

Alternate method: If you don't have access to a photocopier you can pick up a cheap video game projector online for around $40. Project the pattern onto a wall and resize it to be 34" long and 8.5" wide. Tape a piece of poster board or paper up to the wall and trace the pattern out. Take care to project the pattern straight so you don't distort it.

2. Trim patterns and trace out on foam tiles

Take the patterns and cut off 4" from the same side of both pieces. This is for the neck hole in the helmet. this also allows for the fact that puzzle tiles don't really have a full 34" of usable length diagonally. You can see it in the photo above.

Use pins or tacks to tack down your pattern diagonally on a foam tile and trace it out. You will need to do Left 1R & 2R then flip the patterns over to do 1L & 2L. Trace out one full set of these 4 patterns then trace out and additional 2R and 2L. To save material you can now trace out the top and bottom XX inches or 1L and 1R as 4 seperate pieces. We are going to trim away even more later but for now we can save material for the next step. NOTE: Don't forget to mark each piece with its' designator (1L, 2L, 1R, or 2R) and any registration marks to aid with glue up.

3. Trace out Light and side pod pieces

Print out the pod template I have attached and start tracing out the shapes in all the free areas on the tiles. You need 22x of these traced with the template face up and 4x with it flipped over (R for Reversed).

4. Cut out the pattern pieces

Use a box cutter knife(keep it razor sharp the whole time because it will dull fast) to cut out the pattern pieces. Keep your knife straight for all the cuts for the best seams later. If you have a band saw you will want to use it for all this. Be aware that a band saw blade will dull too and you will need to take it slow but it will keep chugging along for many many cuts without worries.

5. Lay out all the pieces and shape

Once you have all the pieces cut out, you will need to start forming them using a heat gun. Heat each piece and form over your knee or even a bowling ball if you have one. You will form the helmet with the smooth side out and pattern on the inside. Take your time and work it till you have something almost pea pod shaped. This shape also assists with pulling the edges together right for gluing pieces together. Also ensure you heat and seal the edges as well. This will allow the pieces to glue up easier.

6. Glue curves pieces together

There is no right or wrong place to begin. I chose to start on the right side of the helmet and work my way all the way around finishing on the 4 short pieces for the visor opening. A word of advice though is to take it slow. These are big pieces to glue up and they can pull apart while drying or get generally get messed up pretty easy. I only had late evenings to work on this so It took me 20-30 minutes each night for 8 days. One final caution: When working with Barges or any cement, work in a well ventilated area and use a respirator and rubber gloves. First pieces to glue will be a 2R and a 2L on the "Non-lettered" edges. I put a "C" on these edges because this is the center divider of the 2 sepreate domes you are building and putting together. Apply a thin layer of barges to the entire edge on both pieces and allow about 5-10 minutes to dry till tacky. You dry time will vary based on how thick you put the cement on, temperature and humidity in your shop, and if the glue is fresh or a bit old. You can watch it go from a shiny wet appearance to a dull look. This is what you want to work with. When it's this dry the glue sticks instantly together and does not want to pull apart to easy. Start at one tip and push the two pieces together and work your way to the other end. I used spring clamps to hold the tips together at the start and end points because they are under the most stress to pull apart. if any seams start to pull apart, just continue to push them together and hold for a minute or two for the glue to set up more. Put the piece aside and let it dry for a few hours to really set up. I'm a little paranoid on glue up so I checked it again after the first 20 minutes or so to ensure nothing pulled apart again. It usually didn't and was fine.

7. Carry on gluing the rest of the curve pieces

At your own pace of what you feel confident with, carry on gluing together the next pieces together. Glue the other side of 2L the "B" edge to the 1L "B"-edge using the same technique as before. Allow to dry then attach the 1L "A" edge to 1R "A," then 1R-"B" to 2R-"B," then 2R "C or No Mark" to 2L "C or No Mark," Finally glue in the 4 short pieces. The short pieces should go together and may look a bit jagged at the bottom. Don't worry about this we are going to trim away and define the opening better later.

8. Glue Light and visor pod pieces

As you view them from the front, Kerbal helmets have 4 bulges or pods on the outside of the helmet. The two at the top are for lights and the two on either side of the face are supposedly part of the visor pivot. These all have roughly the same shape, the side ones are just wider, so we will build them up using the same template piece. Separate out your 4x reversed template pieces you cut out from the rest. You will want to have smooth parts of the foam facing outward on either side of the pods so these 4 will cap off the right side of the pods and do that. You will glue 7x pieces together and 1x reversed piece for each of the visor pods and 4x pieces plus 1x reversed piece for each of the light pods. To begin, first you will need to rough up the pattern side a bit of all the pieces with some sandpaper to help with the glue up especially around the edges . Glue 2 pieces together at a time to start. Apply Barges to the pattern side of one piece and the smooth side of the next and put together when tacky. I used a board and clamps to squeeze and hold the parts tight together as they dried so they wouldn't slip or pull apart. When dried you can then glue 2 of the 2 piece stacks together the same way as before. Carry on this process until you have all the parts together into 2x stacks of 5 and 2x stacks of 8. Make sure the reversed pieces are the end piece on the right so smooth side is out on both sides.

9. Sand the pods

Once the 4 pods are dried, use either sandpaper or a belt sander to smooth and shape the pods. Lightly round over the side edges and square up the pieces. Take your time especially if you use a belt sander so it doesn't chew up or gouge the surface.

10. Reheat and Shape the Helmet again

Before we attach the pods to the helmet we need to first reshape it to make it more round, then trim and straighten out the face opening. What worked best for me was to take a 55cm exercise ball with the air out of it and place it inside the helmet and re inflate it. The ball should fit perfect inside and will stretch the foam into more of a round ball shape. Heat the foam on the outside working in sections and massage out the seams and smooth the curve of the surface. I left the ball inside and inflated while working with everything because it kept everything rigid and better to work with.

11. Mark the Face Opening and Trim Edges

The Kerbal helmet has a very wide open front. Viewed from the right side the line is vertical and the bottom line horizontal forming an "L" shape. Place the helmet in something to stand it upright with the "C or Non-marked" seam as your center point reference. You want the vertical line of the opening to be about 4-4.5" in front of the "C" center line seam on the front side of the helmet. I used some electrical tape and a ruler to lay a line all the way around the helmet. This tape is flexible and easy to work with. Next you want the bottom horizontal line to be XXX INCHES from the top along the center and "A" seams. This cut really needs to be straight and level all the way across so take your time and use a line level if you need to double check it. Once you have these lines taped, mark the cut line with your sharpie in case the tape slips. Deflate the exercise ball and use a very sharp knife to make the cuts. Stop and resharpen your knife immediately if you feel it start to drag and not cut smooth.