Well Well Well

Sadly I did not keep my own goal of recording the entire process of Akasha nor did I get a chance to snap some awesome photos of the finished product...

This photo is after finishing the belt to an almost 90%. Still needed a few things added.

After the belt I began the often frustrating work of figuring out the main neckpiece with the 7+ panels of a size I couldn't quite comprehend. Gah.

So my neckpieces ended up being much larger and pokier than I had anticipated (note to self when bending wire make sure to use needle nose pliers or some sort of jeweler's tools to provide some measure of comfort)

They're all connected to their neighbors via a very thin (low?) gauge wire found in Joann's Fabrics and Crafts.

I ended up redoing it as they were too spread apart to even show more than the middle three panels.

Silly wire     >>'

I was eventually able to connect them to a memory wire necklace that was first strung with some generic plastic beads also from the aforementioned store of goodies and cheap wonder.

As you can see the necklace parts don't go all the way around because I actually like my hair and don't want it (or my wigs even) to be completely wrecked from all of the knots in the wiring.

Jesus I couldn't look more tired. Yeaaa boy, college does that to ya.

Clearly I'll need to update this particular chunk of the necklace as I had organized the panels in the wrong order and need to fix that gap.

I'm whispering loudly while relaxing in chaos

Okay. So I ended up one wasting more money on more fabric for her arm drapes and skirt.

Who knew making a skirt and getting the right draping effect on the armbands would require so much work?!

I feel rather stupid but I finally have that stuff finished.

Lately I've been finishing up the chestpiece,

This is all craft foam, a bit of fabric for backing/providing support and a lot of paint (acrylic, 3-D fabric acrylic, and Rub*n*Buff)

I'm not entirely happy with the "gems" but it's the best I could manage for the time being. I'll definitely be revisiting this costume in the future.

 The belt

Probably made a few too many pieces for the main part of the belt.  But better safe than sorry.

Most of it was attached with super glue. The gems are tiny tiny I believe 7mm Glico rhinestones.


A few parts of the necklace,

and finally getting some of the headdress.

Once again utilizing craft foam, fabric for supporting the foam, and lots of paint.

 I'm waiting on my order of belly dance loose coins (7.50/10 ish with shipping that I bought from an etsy vendor)

and the mother of pearl sheets I also obtained from etsy. So far so good.
EDIT* THEY CAME IN!

If you ever needed mother of pearl veneer sheets then hit up these people - http://www.etsy.com/shop/MorningCalmStore?ref=seller_info

I suggest messaging them if you have need for more than one sheet. They're a little smaller than a piece of paper both length and width wise.

Your best bet in cutting them is probably also scoring it with an exacto knife or something along those lines.

I apparently sucked at this in the beginning so that's what awesome boyfriend is for;

Also for getting General Grievous Masks

Hopefully I'll get most of the costume done before the weekend is over so I can have smoother sailing til April comes around.

Akasha's Skirt

is a big pain. It kind of looks/ed like a Georgia O'Keefe painting due to the way I cut the material and sewed it up.

I have yet to invest in a sewing machine simply because the handsewing is a nice easy way to lose track of my hands and just relax. I guess once again I found some idle work for my hands to whittle away the time.

Nom

I have so far bought 5 yards of chiffon/organza (I can't remember which I had purchased right now) for the overlay/skirt and some sort of swimwear lining for the underskirt. 1.5 yards of purple chiffon/organza. A beadwork book. New fun tape. A skirt pattern that ended up being useless. Total spent so far: $110 ish.

The skirt is surprisingly irritating to work with as a result of my laziness in cutting the fabric and not really considering what I honestly needed to do to make it a circle skirt. Damn. At least I'll have the extended belt covering my mistakes.

-Kimdolion

Akasha's Hair...

Is causing me aneurisms. Dear god how can this hair be such hell to imagine.

I'm considering straightening my own hair for the well straight bit that hangs under her elaborate plaiting. The plaiting could be done using Katie Bair's World of Wigcraft godliness. (Wrap extensions/loose fiber around colored batting of sorts thus pseudo fluffy hair that I can wrap around in a big beehive cone thing)

I could also utilize an addon ponytail and then do the aforementioned plaiting on top of it. Though this might put a lot of stress on my own hair since the ponytail would be combed/drawstrung into my hair with this fluffy thing added on top in addition to the headpiece.

My god this is going to become quite trifling...

Maybe I'll also use a Kanekalon jumbo braid for the plaiting business. I just need to find black batting or whatever to wrap it around. Hmm..

Queen Akasha's Skirt + Armband Sleeves

I hate you. I hate you so much skirt and sleeves. You have made things much more difficult.

Also people who don't really look at the reference photos that can be zoomed in on. Thank you. Grawr.

I can see that there is a slight sheen and sheerness to her damn skirt.

See that background? That means it's sheer

I'm a little perplexed by this material. It's black but it's also a dark purple. So I'm starting to think that it's layered with a black and a dark purple. Great. That must give it the somewhat navy appearance to some people. Or maybe I'm crazy.

On cosplay.com's forums someone linked me a tutorial because they're awesome like that. They used chiffon in the belly dance skirt tutorial and it really looks like the material I want/need. I almost wonder if I could find chiffon here in Hangzhou since they've got a great silk market apparently.

I really need to learn more about fabrics and costuming. Such a terrible noob...

My next cosplay

is starting to seriously look like Queen Akasha from Queen of the Damned as played by Aaliyah (RIP).

I've been weighing her against Erza's flight/swift armor from the Oracion Seis story arc. One of my friends is apparently attempting Vampire Hunter D so that added to my already insurmountable like of Akasha. It'd be hilarious to fight each other in the hallways. Anyway,

The fight between Akasha and Erza was sort of decided on a few issues. Time contraints of course, resources another duh, finally difficulty/skill. I'm happy with how Aisha turned out for my first cosplay. I'm definitely revamping her wig and reattempting the damn leg band (it fell off at the beginning of the con so I decided to forgo it for the con and just re do the damn thing later). I'll also have to rework the breastplate to sit firmly on my breasts/chest without me constantly adjusting (oh what hell that will be to remold that fucker).

Anyway for Erza and Akasha it was beadwork versus swordwork. I know nothing of making props but I am well aware of many a tutorial to help me out. It might be simple enough but her twin swords for her swift armor might be a bit challenging especially if the only time I'll have to work on this is on campus.

Akasha could be cheated a tiny bit with a belly dancer skirt (to save me time for beadwork). The rest will all have to be done by me. (I once found a costume selling for 2k and it wasn't even accurate. What the eff? At least movie accurate, I know the book is different but I do love the portrayal of Aaliyah. Fantastic).

So for Akasha I've been doing a bit of researching. I'm torn between two skirts because from the reference shots I've scoured the internet for show her black main outfit as this somewhat transparent yet solid black fabric.

http://www.missbellydance.com/Belly_Dance_Satin_Full_Skirt_p/skc10.htm

http://www.missbellydance.com/Belly_Dance_Chiffon_Full_Circular_Skirt_p/skc18.htm

The first is satin and the second is chiffon. Both seem to be somewhat see through, though the chiffon is clearly more so. I almost wonder if I should just buy both and decide when I can see for myself. Then I could use the loser skirt for the arm sleeves. Though it would likely have to be the chiffon... Fuck that'd be about 100 bucks right there. It'd probably be best if I checked out the silk market out here in China and Jo*Ann's for chiffon like material. This might become difficult really quick... Eff...

I'm going to post on cosplay.com's forums and I'll return with some results hopefully.