Edea's Headpiece - Progress 1

Sooooooo here's what's going on with my Sorceress Edea (FF VIII) helmet-thing. I've since done a lot of sanding, so it looks much smoother. It's surprisingly strong and very light! The next pic I post will be after Anime Boston of the finished piece!

Here's what I did, roughly. The pics go in columns, left to right.

1. I wanted it to fit, so I made a tape version of my head. I've got an old wig cap on under there to keep my hair safe. This idea is pretty much along the lines of how people make their own body forms for sewing. I used painter's tape, because that is what I had.

2. Attach your head form to something head-like, in this case an actual wig head. Turns out my head is a little larger.

3. I then made a paper version of the base of the headpiece that I could draw on, mark things, make notes and fit to be the approx. shape of what I wanted the finished piece to be. It also protected my tape head from the clay.

4. I applied Paper Clay (magical stuff, really) to the paper pattern. The plastic wrap in the picture was to keep the clay fitted to the head and fight gravity. This doesn't much help with the drying process, of course, so I put the whole thing near a the heater and waited a day or two and then took off the plastic so it could fully dry.

5. Progress shot of the front horn. I made a tin foil base and put paper clay over it.

6. Progress shot of the side "shell" and other thing. The shell I also made a base of tin foil and added the details in clay (then pulled some of the foil out of the back to make it lighter).

7. Between this shot and the clay drying one I did a lot. I'd made the base go down too far in front and back, so I broke off a lot of the edges. I also did a lot of sanding. Here I've got the un-sanded horns attached with more clay.