Stephonatron's Phasma Build - WIP (Jimmiroquai)

[stephonatron]

Hopefully I'm putting this thread in the right place...

 

So, I had the best birthday surprise ever and had my Phasma armor kit delivered 2 days before the estimated delivery date! It's Jim's kit, though it was bought second hand (but brand new) off of someone who realized she wouldn't have time to build it. Still need to order basically everything else, but this should keep me plenty busy until it all arrives Getting over a nasty cold so I probably won't do much work on this until I'm feeling better - hopefully this weekend!

Also, for anyone who orders one of Jim's kits - I would recommend wearing gloves if you want to handle the pieces. The fiberglass on the insides of mine was still pretty rough and now my hands are itching something fierce. As someone who has worked with fiberglass before I should have known better... whoops...

 

 

Progress - Updated 2017/04/05

Progress so far. I'll keep this list updated as I work on my build.

• Helmet
  • Received (jimmiroquai - v3)
• Armor Kit
  • Cutting and re-sizing in progress (jimmiroquai - v3)
• Additional toe/foot armor
  • Some pieces not included in Jim's kit/slightly innacurate
  • Toe armor has been constructed from worbla
  • Under piece of heel armor to be constructed from worbla
  • May make modifications to/reconstruct lower back shin piece for greater accuracy
• Gaskets
  • Received and Assmebled - needs strapping (Imperial Gaskets - rubber)
• Belt
  • Received (Belts of the First Order)
• Neck Seal
  • Need to sew
• Undersuit
  • Leaning towards using black leggings/cooling athletic shirt to maximize comfort/convenience
• Gloves
  • Black leather gloves - need to buy
• Boots
  • Black suede chelsea boots - purchased (on sale!) at The Bay
  • Custom heel lifts constructed from EVA foam
• Cape
  • Need to sew
• Blaster
  • Still researching - any reccomendations?
• Chroming
  • Will use Angel Gilding spray chrome

Edited April 17, 2017 by stephonatron

[SkulShurtugalTCG[501st]]

You have chosen your kit wisely!

 

The first thing you'll want to do is sand it down on the inside using a tough grit sandpaper to get rid of the excess fiberglass, then wash it all down afterwards.

 

This would also help if you decide going with Jimm's helmet. If it still makes you uncomfortable, you can plasti-dip the armor on the inside. That guarantees that fiberglass will not be a problem in your future.

 

I personally am looking forward to watching this thread! It's always fun seeing people build their armor, and especially with Captain Phasma, since it hasn't been done too often. Feel free to leave any questions you may have; that's the whole purpose of this website!

[JAFO[TK]]

Look forward to following your build. It's a great kit!

[stephonatron]

Sorry for the long interval without updates! I'm still working on this, albeit slowly. It's been a busy month (something something excuses something) so most of my progress has come in the form of purchasing things. 

 

 

So first of all, gaskets! I got some factory seconds from Imperial Gaskets, which means I got to save a little money (woo!) but I'll have to do a little extra work before my gaskets are wearable. Said work is just filling in a bunch of tiny holes left by air bubbles in the latex, and once that's done I doubt anyone will be able to tell there were any imperfections in the first place.

 

Service-wise, Imperial Gaskets had a few small issues on the communication front - they were at little slow to respond to my initial email (it took just over a week - slower than expected but nothing terrible), and I wasn't notified when my gaskets were shipped so I had a few days of wondering if my money had just dissapeared in to a void. I actually ended up contacting Wyatt through PM when I hadn't gotten a response to my email, which is how I found out about the factory seconds in the first place, and once I did get in contact he was very helpful. 

 

All in all it took just under 4 weeks from my initial email to get the gaskets, but keep in mind that this was for ready to ship factory seconds. The turnaround time is probably longer for non-defective gaskets (I've heard the cloth gaskets have a long waiting list - not sure about the latex ones). As far as packaging goes, I have no complaints, and the gaskets came with two bottles of liquid rubber to repair the defects, as well as a bottle of rubber glue to assemble the gaskets. The gaskets themselves seem to be well made defects aside, and are incredibly light! They're so much lighter than I expected them to be, which is a definite bonus.

 

 

 

Next up, the belt kit. I ordered JAFO's Belts of the First Order kit. Service was great - both fast and professional. It took just over a week from first contact to receive the belt kit. The kit itself seems to be made with quality materials, and comes with the buckle and screws necessary for assembly, as well as printed instructions.

 

 

 

And finally, la piece de resistance, the helmet! I already had the rest of Jim's kit that I had purchased second hand, so this was my first opportunity to deal with him directly. I found him to be professional, responsive and helpful and have no complaints. It took about 3 weeks from first contacting him to get my helmet, which was a faster turnaround time than I expected. When the package arrived the box was pretty beat up so I was a little worried, but I opened it to find the helmet snuggly wrapped in bubble wrap and completely undamaged. I was expecting the helmet to be the same flexible fiberglass as the rest of Jim's kit and thought that might be a little weird, but it turns out it's actually a rigid fiberglass, so nothing to worry about. The helmet also comes with bubble lenses. Overall, the helmet looks awesome and I can't wait to start working on it!

 

 

@SkulShurtugalTCG thanks for the idea to plasti-dip the inside of the helmet by the way, that's pretty much what helped me finalize my decision to get Jim's helmet. I'm thinking I might give the entire armor that treatment on the inside. I'm not sure it will be entirely necessary but at the very least it should give a slightly cleaner, more finished feel to it.

Edited November 30, 2016 by stephonatron

[JAFO[TK]]

Great to hear your journey is underway! Exciting times ahead (oh, and thank you for the kind words...truly appreciated)

[SkulShurtugalTCG[501st]]

That helmet looks beautiful. I can't wait to see it finished!

 

JAFO's belts are second to none. I personally don't know of any FOTKs that use anything else. And you're right about Imperial Gaskets. I got on their wait list back in June, number 112. I contacted them for an update in early October, and I had moved up to 103. So yeah, it's a VERY long wait. I'm glad you managed to snag some, even with defects!

 

Out of curiosity, how are you planning on chroming the armor? Yourself or by a professional? (And if you are a professional.... well, that works. I'm just curious)

[stephonatron]

I plan on doing the chrome myself. Originally I had intended to use Alclad II Chrome. But recently I've seen some people get really great results using the Angel Gilding spray chrome process on the Captain Phasma Costumers fb group, so I think I might actually go with that method of chroming. Gordon Tarpley apparently uses the same kind of process on his C-3POs and has a few videos about it as well.

 

When doing my initial research it seemed that that kind of process would have too steep of a learning curve and be far outside my budget, which is why I settled on alclad, but it turns out that that's not necessarily the case. It's still more expensive for sure, but I have a few other costuming projects planned or in progress that could benefit from the ability to make things super glossy/shiny, so in the end the cost of tools and learning time will be a pretty worthwhile investment.

 

Chroming will likely be one of the last things I do. It's getting pretty cold up here in the great white north, and I'm not sure how adequately I'll be able to heat my garage. I'll take the coldest months as time to focus on cutting/fitting/strapping the armor and sewing the cloth parts of the costume.

Edited November 30, 2016 by stephonatron

[stephonatron]

Before doing anything else with Jim's kit, as recommended I wanted to sand down and wash the insides of the armor pieces.

 

Now for a safety tangent (with a full disclaimer that I'm not an expert and this is just what I've learned while using fiberglass in various costuming projects): fiberglass is pretty nasty stuff and not only can the dust from sanding it make you incredibly itchy, but it can also wreak havoc on your lungs and damage your eyes, so you want to make sure that at minimum you wear work gloves, safety goggles, a NIOSH approved respirator, and clothes that cover most of your skin when sanding it. Don't cheap out and get a crappy dust mask - If you're doing a Phasma build and planning on chroming your kit yourself, I can almost guarantee that whatever paint you use is going to require a respirator so you'll need it later anyways. Also keep in mind that you'll probably never get the fiberglass dust out of whatever clothes you're wearing, so pick some clothes you're not too attached to. You should look at least as dumb as me when sanding fiberglass:

 

 

If you get fiberglass on your skin, try washing with cold water followed by hot water to help get fiberglass particles out and stop the itching.

 

So on to the fun stuff (?), sanding! It took me a couple hours to sand down all of the rough interior parts of the armor. I used 80 grit sandpaper. Sanding the inside of the armor won't make your armor look any better, but if you don't do it you'll be miserable and itchy any time you wear it. The left image is a piece of armor before sanding, the right is the same piece after.

 

 

After sanding you'll want to rinse the armor down to get rid of any loose dust/strands of fiberglass. An ideal setup would probably have been to put everything out on the driveway and hose it down, but my driveway is covered in snow and I've turned off the outside water for the winter, so I had to improvise. I used the utility sink in the basement to rinse off the larger pieces (helmet/chest/back/abs), and a gallon bucket that I filled and brought out to the garage for everything else. I scrubbed the armor pieces with a rag while rinsing to make sure no stray particles got left behind. After that it was just a matter of laying everything out and waiting for it to dry. I eventually moved everything indoors so I didn't come back to find my armor covered in ice

 

 

The next step will be to cut out the details in the armor where needed, and to cut apart and resize the pieces that are too big so that they're not comically large when I put them on. In the meantime I'm working on assembling my gaskets. They were factory seconds, so filling in the air bubbles is taking some time, but I should have an update on those to post soon.

 

This post was probably a little more detailed that it needed to be for such a simple step, but I'm hoping to keep up a similar level of detail in future posts. There seems to be a shortage of thorough Phasma build threads and I'm hoping to change that!

Edited December 31, 2016 by stephonatron

[stephonatron]

Finished filling and gluing together the gaskets. For filling, I just used a small paintbrush dipped in the liquid latex that was provided with the gaskets and essentially painted over the air bubble holes. Then waited for them to dry. Repeat ad nauseum until they look adequately filled. There are still a few imperfections but the only person they're really going to bother is me.

 

For assembling the gaskets, if you got your gaskets from imperial gaskets Wyatt posted a great how to on how to assemble them here. The only thing I did differently from his instructions was use scraps with the corrugated pattern on them to glue the seams together, as seen here. It gives more contact points for the glue, and I also found it made a helpful guide for lining up the ridges in the seams.

 

 

The gaskets fit me quite snuggly, and I probably could have left an extra inch or two of wiggle room, but they're not uncomfortable. The bigger issue seems to be all of the extra material I have around the torso/shoulders. The gaskets (and Wyatt's tutorial) were definitely made with someone with a larger frame in mind. I'm going to try them on with the armor and see how everything fits, and then decided whether or not it's worth the trouble to do a few modifications. The main change I'm thinking of doing is to cut a little further up the arm, as shown by the red lines in the image below. I may also need to trim down the edges if they show through the neck hole in the armor (although I suppose that would ultimately be hidden by Phasma's cape). 

 

[stephonatron]

So I did end up re-sizing the arm gaskets to fit a little better after all. I was able to carefully pull them apart where they were glued around the armhole, and then I cut up 8 ridges higher where they get glued along the seam on either side. Forgot to take pictures of the next part but essentially I just made a horizontal cut extending from the top of the vertical cut on one side to trim the excess material, and another horizontal cut a few ridges below the vertical cut on the other side to create a flap to glue the armhole together, very much like the original instructions.

 

 

After cutting I just glued everything together as normal. The fit of the gaskets is significantly better now. There isn't a bunch of excess material bunching awkwardly around the armhole, and I also have a better range of motion. 
 

 

[fn32940[501st]]

Ty I just got a set in and only figured out 1 knee. I will try your ribbed shim idea for the other.

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[stephonatron]

Phasma is very tall whereas I am more medium sized, so I made myself some shoe lifts!

 

The first thing I did was make a pattern for the lifts by tracing my shoes. The final pattern should be a little bit smaller than the shoes, otherwise the lifts won't fit.

 

 

Once that was done I traced it on to EVA foam (aka those puzzle floor mats). I traced incrementally smaller pieces so that they could be stacked to form a gradual incline.

 

I then cut out and glued the layers of EVA foam together with hot glue, and used a utility knife + dremel to smooth out the shape of the foam.

 

I used a pair of high heel shoes I had as reference for the shape of the lifts. Also, I made the lifts the full length of the shoes even though my foot doesn't go to the end with them in. It helps the shoes keep their shape, since my feet don't go to ends of the shoes with the lifts in.

 

The lifts + the height of the shoes give me a total of about 4" of extra height, bringing me up to almost 6ft. If I had gotten shoes that were a little bigger rather than shoes in my size, I probably could have made the lifts even taller. I'm considering getting boots that are a few sizes bigger than my actual size with some taller lifts as a future upgrade. I recently found out that my garrison is full of pretty tall people, so I need all the extra height I can get

 

With the lifts in and no armor covering them the shoes look kind of ridiculous, but they fit quite snuggly and are no less comfortable than a decently comfortable pair of high heel shoes. The EVA foam is decently cushiony, and I might try putting some gel insoles over the lifts for extra comfort if I can get them to fit.

 

Once I put the armor on things look a lot less silly, and it's not obvious that I'm wearing lifts.

Edited April 6, 2017 by stephonatron

[stephonatron]

Hey guys! Long time no update. It's been a busy summer.  Maybe I'm just aiming for the record for slowest build ever.

 

So the good news is that I have successfully resized my forearm and thigh pieces. They still need some trimming/filling/sanding, but they actually fit now!

 

 

The bad news is that my bicep pieces are turning in to a real headache. The flexible outer layer of the left bicep split after resizing (the resize seems to have created too much tension), but thankfully the inner fiberglass is still in one piece. I tried gluing the bicep outer layer back down where it was torn, first with CA glue and then with E6000 (thought it might work better because it's so flexible), and also made a second cut in the piece to add more space and release some of the tension, but I've had no luck. At this point I'm thinking my best chance at salvaging the bicep might be to reinforce the back with some more fiberglass to be safe, and then sand off the upper layer entirely where it's torn and user some filler to fill in/smooth out the area. Though if you guys have any other ideas I'd be happy to hear them.

 

Edited July 31, 2017 by stephonatron

[Ensi[TK]]

Ouch! I'd definitely try reinforcing with the fibreglass and sand/fill the cracks as you said. It should kill most of the flex, which should be good considering you are going to fill quite a bit. Just try to get all the cracks to prevent further cracking.

[Cache]

Do you mind sharing the circumference of the Abdomen section of Jimmi;s kit? As I understand it from the CRL this section must wrap (and seal) completely around the midsection.

[lucnak[TK]]

Anyone have advice to share with Steph here? I haven't worked with fiberglass before so not sure what to advise.