Want to experience the sweet sensation of a living hell? Alright! Try to make not just one, but TWO cosplays in a month or so. That's what Sushi-kun and I (Jaws) did last fall. Not only did we want to make Edea from Bravely Default, but one morning I stood up and said "Let's do it! Let's make Krem!" It sounded good on paper - who needed more than a month, right?
I wish I could wrap up this entry with a happy ending saying how Krem found his Maryden at SpillExpo 2015 - alas. But! We did almost finish it. The only reason we couldn't bring it to SpillExpo, was because it missed the finishing touches like proper securing and straps. (Suffice to say, we didn't finish Edea either, but at least we got started. She'll get another entry of her own once it's all done.)
Here's how we did it!
First of, if you don't know who Krem is, don't feel bad. (Yes, please feel bad, cos he's like the best side character in DA:I - totally unbiased.)
He's a part of Iron Bull's crew - The Chargers and a refreshing character for reasons I won't spoil if you for some godawful reason haven't played DA:I yet and still plan to. (Go get the GOTY edition -now! This entry will still be here when you get back.)
This is Krem!
A handsome, kind and chair loving guy.
Did I also mention a belt hoarder hugger?
As our first foam project, we had to get the essentials: heat gun, foam and a whole lot of blood, sweat and tears.
And let's not forget slaying an old leather couch for the fabrics.
After a trip to Stoff&Stil (aka one of the cosplay havens) we had some good starting points.
Oh and before we start. Sushi-kun is the designated armor smith, while Jaws is the noob seamstress.
Aaaaaa, the smell of fresh fabric.
First up was Krem's vest.
(Dear Bioware, the next time you design characters, please make their clothes make sense! Mapping out how Krem function was a nightmare. Half of the things don't even serve a purpose! (Did I mention those belts??)
Let it also be said once and for all that I ,Jaws, can't sew for what life is worth.
I view the sewing machine like something ungodly about to eat my fingers or ruin my very existence at any given moment.
The only thing worse than patters, is understanding math. And sewing sometimes becomes math, so hey!
See that keyboard btw? When you don't have long rulers, you make due with what you do have.
I used a vest I already own, drew the outlines and then modded it until it somewhat resembled Krem's vest. Because someone forbid even his vest would be normal, right?
*insert the ominous sound of someone cutting fabric after hours of dread*
Hey, everything went better than expected! First piece down, a lot to go.
After having finally cut out all the pieces (and having ten mental breakdowns for being afraid of doing anything wrong, due to lack of ctrl+z in real life), it was time to sew it all together. So I had to do some mockups and check that the machine didn't eat up my fabric or anything.
Hey, I know they can do that.
Success! With shaky hands and a headache-ensuing concentration, I managed to make it look somewhat decent.
Eat, sleep and repeat on the other side + adding detailing.
RIP almost every pin that had to be in contact with the pleather.
Moving on to the back piece. Pretty much the same process of adding details and praying I don't make too much of a mess.
And it's done! Wow! Who would have thought that this super noob would actually manage to sew a vest all by its lonesome? Still missing the last details like big stitches and leather straps (that, like a lot of other things, don't really make sense on this costume. But details, woho!)
Tattam!
Straps in place and all that remains is hand stitching.
Vest = le complete.
Next up was the skirt. Krem has a skirt? Yup, underneath the layers of armor and chain mail (yes, you heard me.. Chain mail..) there's a neat leather skirt.
So what did I do? Half guessed, half googleed how skirt patterns look.
First I did a mock up on this super nice fabric that I'll totally never use again. Pretty much everything, from Edea's jacket to every piece of cloth on Krem, was mocked up on this IKEA fabric.
The end result of the skirt was probably so pretty that I never felt the need for a photo.
So moving on to the real deal!
Cutting, sweating, cussing and cutting some more. Back and front pieces.
Sewing up some nice borders before sewing it all together. It was never too important to make the top of skirt look pretty, as it'll all be hidden beneath.... you guessed it! Belts! (getting tired of those yet?)
And of course, like always when you have a finished piece, it had to be tested:
Only to realize that what you thought was more than enough chain mail, wasn't. Which makes us take a natural leap over to 10 reasons to hate yourself: chain mail making.
We ordered rings from this sweet shop in the US (ebay, our best friend, hello.) And when they finally arrived, I had to try it out.
I mean come on, it looked fun! Don't judge me, I didn't know better back then!
Heeey! This wasn't so bad! This is kind of fun, even. (Aaaah, you sweet summer child.)
It's starting to become something now, this will be a peace of cake.
I fucking hate my life so much right now and I swear to something holy that this will never be finished!
Why is it never enough? Why?! Can't it just go somewhere, why does it always look the same from here on out?
I mean, come on. Pliers, cut my fingers some slack.
I give up, send help. My fingers don't function anymore, don't make me sew it on, on top of everything! Have mercy!
No-- hey would you look at that! It's done! That wasn't so bad now, was it?
The last week before SpillExpo, I sat day and night with this. I think I even ate rings as food. It's still not long enough, but luckily, Krem's chain mail is kinda banged up. So I can take some liberty at the bottom and make it look broken.
When I wasn't wasting my sanity on this hell hole, I worked on the shoulders.
More wild guessing and pattern making. His shoulder leather whatever-you-wanna-call-those-things, are well concealed beneath the armor.
So once again, my guess was as good as any and I had to take some liberty on how the final look should be.
That was until my machine decided to rip me a new one. Turns out that sewing zig zag through several layers of different fabric, wasn't this machine's idea of a good time. Those godawful sounds can make anyone shit bricks.
But we managed in the end and I weathered it all with black Warhammer paint before adding magnets. (To make it stick to the armor in the end.)
Done and done! Next - the cape.
No one can say this kid isn't flamboyant. But hey, I guess it comes with the Tevinter blood. I'm sure belts also are a Tevinter thing. (Alriiiight, I'll let go of the belts. But don't say I didn't warn you.)
After cutting out the fabric, I moved on to cut out the Kirkwall logo and trace it by hand with a pen made for fabrics.
Ready to be filled!
The face of pure concentration. I did this while watching the Euro cosplay finals on TV. Let's just say that despite the fact that the show was filled to the top with awesome, I barely remember any of it thanks to this pattern.
Here's the tools used for drawing and painting the logo. Can someone explain to me how he ended with the Kirkwall logo in the first place?
Then I had to cut the whole thing, which resultet in ten more mental breakdowns before I finally just did it!
This is where I stopped taking photos and moved on to sewing full time, so no more photos of the cape before it was finished.
So instead, have some pictures of this kawaii pouch.
But here it comes! Finally! Are you ready for this?
That's right! Ten sweet belts ordered from China via ebay! What? Did you expect you'd finally see the armor? After all this belt hype, it would be wrong to keep you hanging!
More belts! Dorian got nothing on this guy! (If you don't know Dorian, shame on you. But google him and start counting belts.) Sadly I have to admit, that after all this talk of belts, I have very little images to show for it. We got too caught up in the end to really stick to the belt jokes. So to redeem myself, have a gift from Santa Claus.
Bam! A shit ton of armor delivered straight to my doorstep.
Oh..
You wanna see how it was made? Well that's too bad, because Sushi-kun did not think it was a good idea to document every mousy step of the way like I did!
I will of course put her in her place, steal her phone and get the few images she has!
And so I did.
There's nothing as holy as brown paper mock ups and plans for everything. And let me tell you that Sushi is really good at this! I don't get how she wraps her mind around form the way she does. Half the time I just sat there with no clue what she was up to. Then she would magically trace it onto foam and it became something!
Here's a lot of the armor drawn out and ready to be traced on top of foam. But first, Sushi did a mock up on a tiny piece:
It's a shame we didn't do a "banana for scale" thing with this, cos this is leg armor and it's tiny! It's like 1/20th of the final size or something. Chibi Krem?
When your subject is much needed, but deeply engaged in a battle on PS4 (probably against PSN.) What? We needed breaks, ok?
Thus began the long and tedious process of cutting out every little piece in foam before heat gunning and gluing it all back together.
Sushi was a true champ during this period, because due to scale errors, several things had to be remade. She did a tremendous job and was ever so patient.
Don't even ask me how she kept a system out of all these pieces.
Details added with pink, thin foam and hot glue. I jokingly suggested that she could smear oil onto a transparent paper and trace the Kirkwall logo with hot glue (thus making it, in theory, possible to peel the cooled glue off again). And it worked! Cosplay = science.
Full focus!
Priming the armor with some base coats.
Mounting the shoulders - it's finally starting to look like something! The tiny dotted details on the armor is actually scrap book decorations.
The project was drawing to a close. Not because we were finished, but because when the time shows 02:30AM and you're due for a train ride the next morning at 07:59AM, there's just no way.
So instead of loosing our last bit of sanity (and dignity), we wrapped up, packed it away and went to bed.
These are the last images of the almost, but not quite completed Krem cosplay. All done during a month or so:
All that's left is to wrap it all up, add securing and strapping and to get a proper shoot! Which is within reach. See you all on the flipside and thanks for reading.
