Best products from r/cosplayers

Hey there! I work with LEDs a lot (but only strips of LEDs, not singular small pieces, but it's one and the same), and I'm a foamsmither too! Here's some of my work!

For LEDs, you can use any 3V small coin-battery operated LED like this. To power them, you can just use any 3V coin battery like this, perfect for what you're using! You may also opt to use a holder like this, if you want to wire them and easily replace them (instead of having to leave the coin in between the LEDs). They're easy to set up, the longer leg is positive, the shorter is negative.

If you're looking for transparent pieces you could use acrylic plastic, but that's a little expensive too. I use acrylic all the time, and getting a round piece is very tedious. The problem with dark red acrylic sheets is that the LEDs do not shine well through them, or at least, in bright lights like con settings, they don't show very well. Here's an example from my Project Zed blades, they shine well in the dark, but not well in the light.

If you do wish to opt that route, you can order a sheet of red acrylic plastic from here. I use these guys all the time, they're great. You could ask them for a commission, but it's like a $100 minimum (which is super expensive). It might take a few days to get out to you if you're on the East Coast like I am.

With painting, you are supposed to prime and paint with EVA foam. The best way in my own opinion (there are lots), for both ease of durability and quality of paint is to spray with plastidip, and then use acrylic paint like Liquitex Basics to paint over it (my favorite brand). When you're done painting it, spray a coat of plastidip over it again to seal it. Unless it rubs against other pieces or touches anything, there's a good chance it won't chip or scuff at all. After I made the switch, a lot of the paint job on my armors held up really well!

I've never worked with wood glue before, I've used gesso and that worked really well at showing off the colors I wanted to, but it's very susceptible to chipping when rubbing, unless you put a lot of coats on it. If it's foam, I don't know if moisture would not rub off of wood glue, but it definitely doesn't on plastidip. I walked through a huge rain storm for NYCC and just wiped the rain of and it was like I first painted it.

Apologies to you for the follow up wall of text (and shameless plugs) but feel free to message me or comment if you need additional help! :)

So I scale my makeup up or down depending on my character. A more rough and tumble type guy obviously doesn't get as much as a bishonen or female. Remember to always start your makeup routine with a freshly washed face and an application of moisturizer appropriate for your skin type.

1st let's briefly cover the "why" for those unaware of the benefits. Sorry OP if you find this patronizing. Skip ahead to the next paragraph if you already know why makeup is suggested for guys in cosplay. In your costume, I'm sure you want to make a good impression in the hall and in pictures. Makeup will help with this because it will:

• Reduce oily shine from natural oils.
  
• Bring out facial features that get diminished in pictures or poor lighting (eyes, eyebrows, skeletal contours, etc), especially with colorful costumes and wigs.
  
• Even out skin tone (scars, birthmarks, acne, redness, tan lines, etc)
  
• adjust skin tone to be more complimentary to your wig color or closer to character.
  
• Re-contour your face to closer resemble character's
  
  All these factors means the makeup type, amount, and technique required is pretty variable from person to person, costume to costume, even convention to convention.
  
  -----
  
  I would say that bare minimum is a matte loose powder (I use Maybelline Shine Free) and a brown eye liner (any basic pencil that glides on works but I use Sonia Kashuk gel liner). Make sure these are applied to a clean, moisturized face. These 2 products will take care of the top two bullet points above. Powder will knock down the shine and allow you to control it as it pops up during the day. Brown eye liner will bring out your eyes without being as dramatic and obvious as black eyeliner. The eyeliner can also double as a brow pencil but I use a brow specific pencil most of the time for natural colors.
  
  Suggested tools for these products? The loose powder will come with a puff that you can use to apply. I would suggest a Fan Brush or Powder Brush to knock off any extra powder that gets deposited. For the pencil, you should only need a sharpener; some even come with one. I just have a cheap 2-hole metal sharpener I picked up at an art store. If you want to use the pencil on your eyebrow, a spoolie brush will help even out the distribution of product. If you chose the gel liner, it will probably come with a 3-inch long angled detail brush. It works but I found the bristles very stiff and the handle too short to get my hand out of the way so I can see what I'm doing in the mirror. I picked up a longer handled synthetic fiber angle brush to replace it and have been quite happy. Only other tool I can suggest is cotton swabs to slightly smudge the edges of your eyeliner to make it more natural looking.
  
  Before I get too far, an important concept for you starting out is that you want products that have a matte finish. If they don't, you'll get flash reflection in pictures with and look lighter (you know when you see to pictures of women where their face looks 4 shades lighter than their neck and body, that's flash reflecting back at the camera). Shiny/reflective properties in make up is not always apparent when buying or even applying. Steer clear of products with names like luminous, dewy, illuminating, radiant, or brightening. Other words that are tricky descriptors but more of a crap shoot are color correcting or satin, maybe some others that I can't think of right now. Powders, both loose and pressed, are notoriously tricky about this. Eyeshadow is very difficult to find in matte.
  
  -----
  
  The next step up from bare minimum is concealer and foundation to provide coverage and color correction. If you just have a few blemishes you want to cover, a simple combination of concealer on those few spots and powder may be all you want or need. If your powder has a bit of color as the one I linked above does, it will even provide a bit of coverage. There are multiple types of foundation and many hybrids in-between and will probably take a few tries to find the one you like in terms of coverage, color, weight, and finish which all tend to be quite variable, even within brands. In order of less coverage to more we have powder foundation, powder to liquid, liquid, and cream. I really like liquid because it tends to be buildable, that is; you can put on a layer, let it set and dry, then add another layer if you need more coverage. While I use primarily budget or drugstore bands for my makeup, I to get spendy with my foundation and don't regret it one bit. I use MAC Studio Fix and will likely buy more when I run out. I have a couple of different shades that I use to change my complexion to go with blonde wigs. I'm naturally black haired so blonde, white, or pink takes some work. It will take some playing around to figure out what you need for a specific costume but I use the loose powder in light and medium to help me adjust lighter or darker from the two shades of foundation I have. Beard shadow also falls into color correction. Most beard shadow is bluish in tone. Reach back to your middle school art class color theory and remember that orange is blue's complementary color. For our use, putting one on top of the other has a cancelling effect. I sparingly use a matte orange lipstick like NYX butter in Hot Tamale before I put on my foundation in areas where the shadow is really bad. I much prefer taking down beard shadow with a close shave but that's because my beard shadow isn't that bad and my double-edge razor gets much closer than an expensive ass 5-blade monster.
  
  Tools for foundation and concealer. I dot on the foundation with my fingers and spread with a foundation brush. The brush can leave streaks so a blender sponge can help diminish them. Just pounce up and down with light pressure before it sets. Don't press and drag. Your powder application will take care of the rest. Do not apply your liquid foundation with a sponge unless you want to waste foundation. It's a sponge. You'll end up with more foundation in the sponge than on your face. If you buy your concealer in a stick, it's probably all you need but mine is in a pot and I like applying it with a synthetic bristle brush for exactness and blending out the edges. I have a lot of moles on my nose and this helps me get it on each and every one.
  
  -----
  
  So here we are at contouring. You'll probably notice foundation with medium to high coverage really takes some of the depth out of your face. It looks a little weird but can be easily corrected with a matte bronzer or dark concealer to add in shadows. Use the bronzer or concealer to add re-emphasize shadows in the hollows of your cheeks, under your jawline, under your brow bone, etc. Start with your own face shape and then expand your horizons. You are essentially forcing the perception of shadows and depth. Play around with locations, shapes, angles to match your character. Your character have a round face while you have a long rectangular one? Try adding shadow at your hairline and peak of your chin to shorten your face. Get a very light concealer and you can do even more by forcing the appearance of highlights and bringing things forward. This is a good pallet for detail contouring and eyeshadow when you're ready to try that. The eye shadows can be used anywhere on your face for contouring.
  
  Tools: For bronzer, an angled blush brush will get you some nice blend patterns and lines. Cream concealers go on nicely with a synthetic brush or cheap wedge sponges. All said and done, I suggest getting one of the brush kits from Coastal Scents, ELF, or Sonia Kushak. /r/Makeupaddiction tends to like the budget Eco Tools as well.
  
  -----
  My typical order:
  
  
• clean and moisturize
  
• primer/bb cream
  
• beard shadow concealment
  
• foundation
  
• concealer and contour
  
• powder
  
• eyes
  
• brows
  
• powder to set the eyes and brows
  
• chapstick
  
  -----
  Some resources:
  
  Goss
  
  Petrilude
  
  Kevyn Aucoin Face Forward
  
  Whew, I think this is my longest post ever. Hopefully it says what I think it does as I wrote it off and on through out the day and am to tired to proof it.
  
  EDIT: thought I should also specify that I'm a guy cosplayer and regularly use makeup in cosplay. This info is what I've collected through my 7 years of cosplay.

I did this same costume for Dragoncon this year.

Wig - I did a wig one day and my natural hair the other days. I prefered my natural hair to the "widow wig" I did take the wig in and have my hair dyed to match so that the red was right but seriously, go with any length hair you want.
Boots - Any combat type boots work well. I went with the below because of the buckles and wedge heel. http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00KR7IAXU/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o09_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Belt - I bought a large belt from goodwill, covered it in the same fabric as the cat suit (friend sewed it for me so we had scraps) and used oven bake clay to make the widow buckle.

Guns/holsters - here it is a matter of how much $$$ you want to spend. She uses Glocks where are near impossible to by airsoft versions of. It is also near impossible to buy cheap airsofts that look right AND fit in a left handed holster. I take cosplay seriously so I forked out the money. Best bet.. go to your largest area airsoft dealer with pics and see what you can find in your budget.

Holster. I made mine so that I could fit it properly. I did fork out the money for the actual buckles she used but they are spendy. A plain craft store buckle should be fine.

Gloves - Good luck. I managed to find the perfect match motorcycle gloves but they were a size to small and dyed white. Most places were out of stock of the white versions as well. I re-died them black with the help of a friend and cut of the fingers. I still need help getting them off as they are so snug. Best bet, look for cheap motorcycle gloves in your price point.

Stingers - Of all the widows I talked to at dragoncon these were the things people complained about the most. Many used a cheap plastic bandolier like http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0026KR6HC/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1 but then you have to glue and paint as the pieces fall apart easier. I used nurf gun bullets that I painted and sewed onto elastic but they didn't hold the paint well and I had to do a lot of touch up with black nail polish during the con. I wish i had gone with my first impression and made them from oven bake clay as well.

Overall. Don't worry to much about the details. NO ONE is going to be looking to closely at the details. As we like to say "There are no inspecty thingys." The bigger the group the more forgiving the audience is as well.

Good luck and have fun!

Well, let's deconstruct the look a little bit. Here's my guess on how to approach the costume:

• Bodysuit: You need a black form-fitting bodysuit that you can airbrush all the sinew-like ripples onto. Depending on your budget, you can look at buying a unitard like this or sew your own. If you don't have airbrushing tools or can't afford them, you could also carefully sponge grey/silver paint onto the bodysuit, but regardless of application you should make a duct tape dummy of yourself first in order to have some fuller form to paint on. You'll probably need separate black gloves, since most bodysuits don't have built-in gloves.
  
  
• Sleeves: Make sleeves that go to just below your elbow that you can pull up over the body suit to cover your arms, to make that sort of flared look at the wrists. You'll either need to find fabric that blends that way, or find a dark red fabric that you can bleach to get that gradient. If you want to go the bleaching method, /r/bleachshirts can give you tips on technique and safety.
  
  
• Chest: Painted with a brush and fabric or acrylic paint, or even mildly diluted acrylic ink, depending on what effect you're going for.
  
  
• Head: Papier mâché onto a large blown up balloon. Cut out eyeholes and possibly a mouth hole when it dries. Paint the whole thing black, then additionally cover the mask with black fabric that you can see through. That way, the fabric won't show the colour of grey newspaper underneath – it'll all be dark, and with care in construction people might not be able to tell there are even eyeholes. To make the silver trim, I would suggest some decent quality silver cardstock after you've covered the mask in fabric – that way, the cardstock can cover raw edges, and you can easily cut it out after attaching it.
  
  
• Belt+skirt: You can make your own belt out of felt, faux leather, whatever you like. Your best bet might just be to find a few red belts though, and buy 4 suspender buckles. The first red belt can go around your waist, the second you chop up to make the X in the front. Then when you make the skirt, you can permanently attach it to the red belt that goes around your waist. I see the skirt is blue and red, so you might want to make that two layers (blue skirt atop red larger skirt), or one layer (sew blue atop red, or connect them).
  
  
• Boots: Find some cranberry coloured (rain?)boots. Paint the stripes onto the boots. Then carve some medium- or high-density foam with the gear-tooth-like incisions (you can use scissors, an x-acto knife, or best of all, electric carving knife!), cover it with grey fabric, and glue it securely around the base of the boot. If you've picked up rain boots, you can cut the top of them to look like the shape it should be, and then cover the raw edges with dark grey/black foam tube shielding, or just plain black fabric.
  
  
• The weapon?!: Crap, that's hard. That's going to be a lot of patient work with some combination of any of foamboard, papier mâché, a wooden dowel (to go straight through the entire thing and give you max stability), some custom cut chains from the huge selection at Home Depot, and if you can find it, a nice blue baubly fake jewel thing OR the largest cat craft eye you can find, OR half a transparent sphere, opened snow globe, or something. You can even go up to one of those machines that takes 25 cents or a dollar and get a toy from it, toss the toy, keep the round translucent casing it came in. If you end up finding a large transparent half sphere of sorts, paint the black cat pupil FIRST, let it dry, then paint the blue iris overtop. The sphere will make the colours glorious, without having had to paint the round outer part of the sphere at all.
  
  These are just suggestions! Use what's right for you. Epic costume endeavour, good luck on it!

I have bought all my wigs on Amazon. I don't know if you're looking for an exact replica or a really high quality wig, but if you just want something cheap, I have had great success with this brand Map of Beauty. Depending on the size of your head, the inner cap can be a bit snug, but I have been happy with all of mine.

MapofBeauty 12"/30cm Role Playing Cosplay Short Wig (Light Blue) https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00JXDO2Y0/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_AnaGxbNHWNCP4

Right, okay, several options then based on time materials, ect.


Option 1: Super easy but probably the least impressive, Fairy String lights. Wrap those around a little low gauge wire so they keep their shape, plant the base up off the tops of the shoulder / head (to keep them from hitting people) and there you go, you can even bend the support wire in weird ways so it looks less like you're a walking crib mobile. The downsides are of course that you will have visible wires sticking up off you and each light strand will have to be turned on and off individually.


Option 2, and the method I personally would take: Plant star chip 3v leds in your suit various places, again, I recommend higher up but it matters less here. Wire them all together with a simple on off switch. Attach standard fiber optic cable to each LED (not side lit), sometimes you can get more than one strand per light, but it's a little tricky to place them like that. Hot glue a clear plastic or crystal bead. The hotglue should disperse the light from the fiber optic cable though the bead. It'll be heavier so again, you may want to use some support wire, or you can just let them move and sway naturally when you walk. The fiber optic line by itself is transparent , so it'll be less visible but at the cost of being less structurally sound. Plus less cost effective since you'd need the lights, the cable, the batteries, and the switch.

1. They look like martial arts pants and martial arts pants would probably look better for photos as they are made from a more stiff bodied material than sweatpants.
   
   
2. I've seen a lot of people use simple waterproof liquid eyeliner with good results for tattoos (you may need two or three pens for a tattoo that size), but there is also alcohol activated Skin Illustrator Tattoo that will only come off with alcohol
   
   
3. If you plan on making the mask, I suggest to buy a cheap skull mask as a base like this http://www.amazon.com/Cryptic-Cadavers-Skull-Bones-Halloween/dp/B001TEYIEA/ref=sr_1_41?ie=UTF8&qid=1396433677&sr=8-41&keywords=skull+mask, hotglue yellow spandex over it for and cut off the bottom portion. Reason being that you wouldnt usually get such a defined browbone structure from just wearing a cloth mask alone. Draw in the eye holes and trim to shape.
   
   Good luck, and if you actually try out this method of making the mask I'd love to see the end result as it's a theory XD

I can't help you with the poses but I have some experience with the hair. I have hair that's all the way down my back right now. Do a tight french braid. If it's thick enough that a single one leaves a visible lump going across the top of your head do pigtail french braids. If you have an excessive tail left over, try doing a french braid crown like this: http://babesinhairland.com/wp-content/uploads/IMG_2622E.jpg

For your wig, get some detanger to comb through it. It won't prevent all tangles but it'll help ease straightening it out again. When you're not wearing it, put it on a foam head and the head on a stand Some T pins will help keep it in place. During transport I've found it helpful to loosely braid the wig and put a hair net gently over it too.

This is pretty hard to do, but not impossible to pull off in the time given especially since you want to go reverse annie. I would try to find a cheap bear costume online to get that out of the way for your friend to wear so that you can both focus on the tibbers. You could try doing a larger bear costume but it might be harder to find since you're much taller and could get expensive.

http://www.amazon.com/Brown-Bear-Animal-Hoddie-Function/dp/B005MH6UP0/ref=sr_1_8?ie=UTF8&qid=1405384351&sr=8-8&keywords=bear+suit

http://www.amazon.com/Dress-Up-America-Mascot-Brown/dp/B007XF9EZC/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1405384351&sr=8-2&keywords=bear+suit

Since youre wearing a dress you dont really need a full body suit and could just modify either or to try and make it look scarier by adjusting eyebrows adding darker colors too the face fake blood etc etc.

As far as the dress goes you could sew it yourself if you have the know how or even shop for similar items by thrift store or clothing stores and make adjustments accordingly. Luckily for you it isn't a complicated dress. You might have to spend a few bucks here and there but like I said it's definitely doable this is just a start up suggestion for you to build on and get an idea of where to get started. Just focus on getting the most core concept done and then work on the details but most importantly just have fun with it!

Safety pins, hot glue, superglue, fabric glue, that fabric adhesive that you just iron, iron-on transfers for symbols/logos/etc., fray check. Did I mention safety pins? LOTS of safety pins. And lots of tea/coffee/other hot beverage.

Instamorph and other similar thermoplastics work really well for props and accessories, especially in a time crunch. It's easy to work with. You heat it in water on the stove, and by the time it's soft, it's cool enough to touch still and if you mess up, you just toss it back into the hot water. No baking or setting time required. It takes paint well if you sand it first and seal it, I've used clear nail polish in a pinch and it worked perfectly as a sealant.

I always make a bulleted list of things I need to do that I can just cross off as I go. It makes things seem less hectic and it calms me down and helps me focus. There's a sense you achieved something when you can cross things off.

The jacket seems to be the trickiest part of this costume. I'm finding white blazers with black piping and white blazers with a black trim and neither of those are quite right. After looking up more pictures of Gideon, I realized that his blazer is white with black stitching. I had a hard time trying to find anything like that online..

He's wearing just a solid red button-down. He has a solid black tie as well that has a triangular tie pin(?) through it. He has black glasses that look like these on his face. It also looks like his pants are just dark blue slacks.

His shoes were also kind of difficult to find, but they seem to be white oxfords with black soles and black lacing. This is the closest shoe I could find, and even then it would need black laces. These are also pretty similar, but the soles look more brownish than black.

Good luck with your costume! I think it'd look perfect if you even added a katana to go with your costume!

sorry nobody helped on this, I actually came to see about improving mine lol. I did bakugou a few times with these REALLY NICE looking pants but they melt your legs so I wanted something more breathable.


Here is what I got: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B007IS0W9G/ref=oh_aui_search_detailpage?ie=UTF8&psc=1

If your legs don't sweat they will work GREAT.


This is what they look like: https://www.instagram.com/p/Bnu3QnMBETX/

Anyways I'm off to look for something breatheable lol.

See if you can give the mask a more matte/opaque appearance so your face isn't clearly visible (without blinding yourself of course); I recall Tali's face was at best sort of foggy behind the mask, in the photo I can see your face a bit too well which can distract from the intended character.

Also three fingered gloves of course would help give the alien appearance~

Otherwise, your costume looks pretty awesome so far, nice work!

Edit: found a mask like this, so there are at least options; I wonder if something like this could be integrated into your current helm

You probably already found a solution, but I was just looking at these on Amazon. Looks like what you're looking for?

Hey Evil Ted (the guy on YouTube who makes awesome cosplay stuff, check him out) recommended this mask for projects like what you're describing! He mentioned using it for a Cobra Commander costume or a Destiny costume, but I'm sure it has a variety of applications. And it is said to be see-through on the inside. I haven't had a project to use it in yet but I am itching for an excuse to buy it and mess around with it myself lol.

Look at party and Halloween stores. I have one like this and I think it took at least four cups of gelatin to fill it. I don't know that there's anything on the market that's truly horse-sized, but a human-sized one is surprisingly heavy.

Heart Mold
you could fill that with a resin to make heart shape.

Just the bear arms? If it's not a full costume, this is the closest thing I could find.