I suck at cosplay

Time to look at the next prop I 3d printed - Moxxi's Maliwan Bad Touch.  The Bad Touch is my favorite Borderlands weapon.  While it isn't really a gun Wilhelm would probably choose, I don't care . . . I love it too much.  So, when I decided to do a Borderlands cosplay, I knew instantly what gun I would use.

For my Wilhelmina costume, there are a few things I decided to 3d print.  One being a Maliwan SMG (gonna paint it like Moxxi's Bad Touch) that I felt was too complex to try modelling or fabricating myself.  The other items I was sure I was printing is the Saint support drone and Wolf attack drone. I will go into Bad Touch and Wolf in other posts, but I thought I'd tackle Saint in this one.

Part two of my posts about 3d printing for cosplay.  I am going to go into some things you will need to know before you start planning to print.  There are some misconceptions about 3d printing.  That it is a super easy thing to do.  Just a push of the button and you have a finished product.  While that can be true to a certain extent, the reality is a little more complicated.  I try to explain some of that after the jump.

Alright, I've had some people ask me about 3d printing for cosplay.  I am not what I would consider an expert on the topic, but I do know a decent amount about 3d printers and printing in the home or on a small scale.  So, I'm going to do my best to cover it.  This will not be an all encompassing thing, but I'll tell you what I can and the post will also serve as a decent segue into my 3d printed props for Wilhelmina.

     Okay, so I haven't been great about going through the stuff I learned or even posting pictures of the Eiger costume.  But now I am working on my next project for Nebraskon - genderswapped Wilhelm I'm calling Wilhelmina!  I have only started the process a bit, so I figure this is a good time for me to actually document what I am currently doing.  So, with that in mind, let's start with my game plan!

The leg and boot armor was fairly simple to do, yet I messed it up and was forced to remake them a few times.  The resultant product was not ideal and I definitely wish I had been able to redo it one more time.  These are one more element of the costume I will be redoing for any future use.  So, here's what I used and how I messed up.

In this post, I go over the materials I used for my first cosplays (mostly Eiger).  I loved each of these for different reasons and I hated them with a fiery passion when it came to others.  The biggest things to remember when using any material is to research what application it should be used for, learn its limitations, and take some time to practice with it before you start seriously working with it.  These three things will result in less frustration and better looking results.  So, anyway, the materials I used . . .