Preface: Convolution 2015 is about a week away, and I'm pretty much done with my outfit, save for a few minor bits & bobs. I've also finished writing up most of the project notes for this cosplay, which I'll be releasing over the next few days leading up to Convolution.
For those following at home:
The Making of....
The next part of Hawkingbird's outfit was Black Widow's belt that she nabbed from a locker in the Avenger's Mansion. Well, according to the Marvel Wikipedia entry, the belt belongs to Black Widow although after doing some cross-references, it doesn't even appear to resemble her belt at all.
Example of Black widow with belt
Kate's belt.
Okay, I'm not going to sweat the details, but they don't look anything alike. I just went with the Kate Bishop version.
I didn't want to make the belt from scratch, but did notice that it had a passing resemblance to a few "stretch plate" belts from the 80s. I scoured my local thrift store and found this one for a few dollars. It didn't quite match, but it was close, and with a few modifications, it would work.
First, I had to paint the whole thing silver. I used Testor's paint and painted each "scale" individually.
Next up, I had to re-do the belt buckle to be more of a larger dome shaped. Worbla to the rescue. Using a compass, I made a couple of paper cut-outs of what would be an appropriate size dome. Then, I cut the worbla. It ended up being about 4 inches in diameter. I cut out two pieces. One for the dome and one for the backside of the dome where I could attach the rest of the belt.
Then using a heat gun and a ceramic bowl, I molded it into a "dome" like shape.
Because I needed to attach a flat piece of worbla to the back, I put in support structures on the inside so that the worbla wouldn't collapse onto itself. (As a note, do not put warm worbla on a paper towel. It will stick....)
Here's the finished worbla piece. I smooshed the two pieces together then used a leather edging wheel to smoothen out the edges of the dome.
I forgot to take more "in-progress" photos, but basically, my Viking helped me add bondo to worbla to smooth-en it, then we sanded, then sanded some more....then added bondo...then sanded some more, before adding primer and a gold metallic paint and a glossy finish.
It's not perfect, but it ain't bad. With the belt stretched out, it's nearly the perfect size. I might have to remake this at a later date.
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