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[Knight0351]

I LOVE your art style and can't wait to see the finished product

[Slade Kel]

Your cut lines look very clean, very well done

[trashcanmando]

Thanks guys! 
Today I'm trying to clean up the edges even more, I'm worried that the dremel marks will show up worse after the plates are painted. I'm also working on the girth belt today and cursing myself for not extending the cod plate about an inch so more of it was hidden under the belt.... Ah well.
I also shaped the plates that don't need to go directly onto my body and ripped pockets off the flight suit. Here's my progress so far:



Sorry about the glowing plates! It's all or nothing lighting in here lol

[AmiSky]

Looks super cool! And wow, great tutorial for the flak vest--yours looks amazing! I might have to try your method as I'm about to start on mine.

[Bade Duun]

Nice work on the horns. Weathering looks damn good too.

[trashcanmando]

Thank you both! Feel free to PM me with any questions you might have about the flak vest.

Just a couple small updates tonight. I meant to alter the flight suit this evening but instead I watched Mercsconline! Loved the twi'lek makeup tutorial. I also have a strong desire for rubber knees now...

So a couple days ago I realized you can totally put craft foam through a sewing machine. I was trying to make a pauldron, and that didn't quite work out, BUT I realized it would be a great way to make a girth belt! I didn't expect the first try to really work out, but I have a pleasant surprise:



Totally did work! I'm super pleased with how this turned out. I'm making a second one for my first kit. The girth belt for that one was too small and also terrible quality to begin with. All I did was cut craft foam to the shape I wanted, tape it all together for rigidity, (if you do this, try to keep the tape out of the areas you will sew in, at best your thread will break and at worst you'll majorly screw up your machine) and sew duck cloth over it! If anyone decides to try and sew with craft foam- make sure to set your sewing machine to the widest stitch you have, or you will just perforate the foam and cut it to pieces. After I had the whole piece covered in duck cloth, I just added sew-on velcro in a wide patch. This girth belt can adjust by a margin of probably at least six inches.

I still have to weather this belt, which I will do in a batch when my second girth belt and my flight suit are finished. I'm also trying to find an empty spray bottle for some diluted bleach weathering. Never thought an empty spray bottle would be a dificult item to source.



This is the other thing I did today (mostly while watching the online con)- updated clan trophy and MMCC logo trophy. My pattern for these is posted on page 1 as well as the patterns for a trophy for every Vhett Manda OM- whether or not I can fit all 11 trophies on my kit is a different matter! I didn't like the way I finished the edges on the old clan trophy, I like this way much better. The old trophy will be finding a new home with another Vhett Manda OM.

After this I'm getting into a busy week at work, so we'll see how much I can get done this week. I would love to finish the flight suit, but we'll see. Hope you all have a great weekend.

[Slade Kel]

Looks awesome . Awesome weathering, and I like the way the foam bulks up the girth belt; should add some nice rigidity there. That's something we had a lot of trouble with when making my wife's, and even my leather girth on my last kit had a tendency of bunching.

[trashcanmando]

Just a few small updates after coming off a busy work week. First off, boots are nearly finished being de-logo'ed!



There's a few touchup spots yet and then I need to reweather them, because I wasn't thinking and weathered once before logo concealment. But after that boots will be completely finished.



Finished some clan trophies because it's something I can do at work. Alor'ad and Ver'alor down, Ruus'alore next! After the officers are done I'll have five more to do. So seven total. My fingers hurt already lol



And finally, I made some mando bottles! Made the design myself, printed it on clear sticker paper, and slapped it on some bottles from Hobby Lobby. The ink didn't turn out as vibrantly as I was expecting, but I still like it a lot. I want to fill a couple with some spacy looking fluids- glowing blue like from the Mandalorian would be great if it's possible- and keeping a few food safe. Maybe I'll figure out a way to attach one to a belt so I can carry around a safely swarzy water bottle lol

I'm moving into a slower work week, so I'm hoping to FINALLY get the flight suits finished. If I tell myself this will be the week often enough, eventually I'll be right! I also had some magnets come, which is some nice motivation to keep working on plates.

[Athin Ordo]

First, I want to say your work is awesome!  Love the zipper on the inside of the vest and the art on the planning page. 

Now, I have questions. 

So a couple days ago I realized you can totally put craft foam through a sewing machine. I was trying to make a pauldron, and that didn't quite work out, BUT I realized it would be a great way to make a girth belt! I didn't expect the first try to really work out, but I have a pleasant surprise:

When you say "craft foam" what do you mean?  Close-cell? Open-cell? and how thick?  It doesn't look like the blue one is very thick but since it's covered I can't really tell if it's open or close.

[trashcanmando]

Thank you!  Hmm, I'm not entirely sure what the right terminology is for the foam. If the package had labels I threw them away and I've had it for years. It's the sort of foam you'd use for children's crafts. Pretty sure I just got it at Walmart. The blue one certainly looks better when the fabric isn't being stretched willy nilly by pins but the one made with duck cloth does look more solid. Here's a picture and maybe you'll know more about it than me.



Just noticed I posted the boots picture twice! Previous post has been updated with the right pictures.

I finally finished the flight suit for my other kit. Had to remind myself what the heck I was doing but now I have a better idea for this one, and hopefully won't make a grievous error when bringing in the legs. It's fine now I fixed it, with much frustration and seam splitting. Also decided to try my hand at leatherworking for the bags since I can't find what I want anywhere, and my policy is 'give it a try before you buy' for everything except blasters and buckets.

[Athin Ordo]

Thanks for the pic of the exact foam.  (Thought I replied earlier, this week has been nuts.) It looks like a kind of close cell foam. Which just means the foam is pretty dense.  Open Cell foam is like what you find in couch cushions.

So, I have lots of questions now, because your work is awesome and I've gotten some time to think seriously.  I love the flak vest design with the zippers in the inside.

1.) Why did you chose to have the back zip to the front panel?
2.) Do you know of a reason not to have the pane from the back meet in the front and zip under the front panel?
3.)  Those sheets of foam don't look long enough to wrap around a waist, how did you get the length for a girth belt?
4.) Did you do the quilting on your vest?
5.) How ON EARTH did you get the embossed logo off those boots?  (Those boots ROCK, BTW.)

[trashcanmando]

No problem! I keep meaning to update again, but, yeah, everything's nuts. Thank you very much, I'll answer as best I can!

1- The flak vest is inspired by whitecrow1's flak vest, which is a more complicated deisgn where the straps from the back wrap all the way around to center front and then zip together, and then the actual material of the front of the vest velcros down onto that. It's hard to verbally explain, I think I posted a link to his WIP page, and on the second page of that there's a video of how it works. This is a simplified version but the same principle. It allows the vest to fully separate on both sides, so you don't have to worry about any arm holes while getting it on. Just slip it over your head and then zip and clip both sides.
2- I think what you're talking about here is basically what whitecrow did. I just wanted a simplified version, but having the panes longer and then zipping to each other would definitely work.
3- I used painter's tape to tape two strips of foam together. It adds enough rigidity that it acts like one solid piece. If you do this, just try to keep the tape out of areas you will be sewing in. You can go through painter's tape without destroying your sewing machine (or mine was fine at least), but you have to go slow and your thread will probably break and it's annoying. Just stop the tape about an inch from the edge.
4- I bought it like that! Joann Fabrics carries several different colors of quilted fabric.
5- I used a vinyl repair liquid! It took about a thousand coats, and could honestly still use a few more, uhg. I can't decide if I want to be picky or if 'you have to know it was there and be looking for it' level of concealment on the logo is okay. It was like 20 bucks on amazon, which sounds really expensive for logo removal, but I have a ton left over.

[trashcanmando]

Okay so things have been crazy, and the next thing I need to do is alter my flight suit and shape my plates... Dreading altering the flight suit and waiting for armor parties to be a thing again to shape the plates. BUT! I made a deal with Dragon Sunkiller. Made him a flak vest yesterday, and he's making me metal plates for an eventual third kit out of a car hood. Also, I'm borrowing my cousin's 3D printer and printed Dragon off some gauntlets and will be printing myself a scaled version of the same pair.





This flak vest was done in just a bit over 8 hours, all the way from drafting to sewing the neck seal on! Well, ok, 98% done because my roommate had gone to bed at that point and I couldn't use the sewing machine to finish the velcro on the collar lol. It's not for me but... totally counts to post in my build forum because I'm trading it for metal plates, right? Lol

Pics of gauntlets to come in probably about a week, as that's about how long they take if I have the printer running constantly lol.

[trashcanmando]

Right, so, I ran into printing problems and never did finish those gauntlets, but my cousin will print them off for me.... eventually. But we did lose the files, so I sure hope I can figure out the scale I used again... I'm also finally off night shift so hopefully things will get rolling again.

Last month I did a photoshoot of my kit with my cousin Facebok page here and although this kit is only about a third of the way done, I tried out the full makeup and I am THRILLED with the results. The horns are going to make the helmet really interesting but with some creative padding I think it will be okay. Here's the unedited makeup, before photoshop touched it. There were a few touchup spots after this photo but it's like 95% finished.



I know the girth belt is sitting awfully low in this one but once plates and everything are finished I think it will be alright.



It took... quite a bit of doing, but he SOMEHOW managed to get a couple of me looking sort of scary! I have determined that I am simply incapable of looking menacing without my face covered.





So far I am SO happy with this kit, the makeup and flak vest are looking so good. Forgive the baggy flight suit, I never did get around to altering it. More pictures are to come after I see him for Christmas. Have a Merry Mando Christmas, everybody!

[trashcanmando]

Update but no pics (sorry)- got all the plates shaped and the trauma plates glued onto the primary plates! I was hoping to get all the magnets glued on over New Years vacation, but I did the math and I need more magnets anyways... Also want to buy a smaller size of magnets. Currently thinking I am going to glue magnets to the plates and then sew metal discs into pouches in the flak vest. Also throwing around some ideas to greeble up the backside of the plates like Din has going on, but everything I've thought of seems like it would add too much bulk. At least I'm going to prime and paint the back of the plate silver.