Before I get ahead of myself, WE WON PRIZES Y'ALL! Oh wait, I should have waited until the end to say that but I just couldn't help myself! Oh.... and this post, among others is SUPER LATE....
Who: Persesus, Princess Andromeda, and Medusa
When: Pre AND post beheading
Who's: Louis Leterrier's Clash of the Titans (2010)
We have been working on our Clash of the Titans costumes for MONTHS and it was so lovely to have everything work out so well! Not that we didn't screw up some things and have other things break right before Workmanship Judging, but it was so great to have everything work out after so much hard work! And another thing, to be fair, we were up against some pretty stiff competition!
I've written about Guavious/Perseus's shield
here, but I'm going to
try an summarize all the high points in this post. We decided shortly after Norwescon 34 (Dune) to do Clash of the Titans for Norwescon 35. We knew that Wrath of the Titans was going to be coming out sometime around April so we thought it would be relevant. We weren't expecting the total backlash of the movie bombing, but it was going up against some really tough competition! We decided on Guavious being Perseus (natch), myself being Princess Andromeda, and Dejathoris to play Medusa. Surprisingly many of our ideas of grandeur that came out of our initial brainstorming phase ACTUALLY TURNED OUT!
Perseus: Perseus is made up of Wunderflex, leather and many, many, MANY rivets. We used some hockey equipment to mold the leather for the shin guards, and old pop cans to mold the wrist guards.
Another major piece to this project was dying all the leather... If you've noticed, for some reason I really like taking pictures of paint drying... I still have no idea why I do this....
Either way, in order for the outfit to read as worn rather than use a flat black we used a Smoke Stain and did between two to three coats on everything. While this was all drying, we worked on the Wunderflex!
Dejathoris cut out hundreds of those little tabs and and then painstakingly adhered them together with the heat gun. They were then molded on top of the leather and then riveted on. The same process was then completed for the wrist and knee guards.
The chest piece was one large piece of Wunderflex, with the "muscle definition" pieces being a second layer of Wunderflex being adhered on top of this. All the Wunderflex was spray-painted battered silver, with gun metal coloured paint hand brushed on for definition. The tunic was a nice dark green linen sewn in a matter so that none of the machine sewn edges were showing so that it looked truly authentic to the time.
We also took the liberties of making it a bit longer than the movie version as we didn't want Guavious flashing his goods around in his lovely skirt! Speaking of the skirt, we cut all the tabs differently to, again, add to the detail and 'worn' look we were going for. The only part of the whole outfit that was machine sewn was the skirt tabs to the skirt belt.
The belt was a large enough piece to wrap around Guavious waist, and for extra detail, Dejathoris hand stamped a replica of the symbol from the Clash of the Titans sword we purchased. She also hand stamped a matching scabbard and riveted that together as well.
Princess Andromeda: Logically, and by that, I mean by my logic, this damn costume should have taken a couple of days... However, it did not. We kept finding "better fabric". At the end of the day, we went back to our very first fabric... We tried planning, we really did!
So the main part of this costume, the sheath dress is a piece of fabric we picked up at Bhatia Fabrics in their discount bin. We then attached the straps using gold cord from the dollar store of all places! And created a little bit of pin tucking to add a more delicate detail on the bottom. Next, we attached this heavy gold and cord belt (left) around the waist. The final dress detail on the dress was attaching these golden medallions: One where each strap met the dress, two on each sleeve, and one on every pin tucked seam.
The ORIGINAL second piece of fabric was the perfect blush colour to show off our original inspiration Clash of the Titans (1981). Princess Andromeda has a lot more stills from this film and is generally seen in this gorgeous peach/pink dress. We tried bringing the fabric into the 2010 version by spray painting medallions onto the fabric but that turned out AWFUL. So in our last minute rush, I grabbed my wedding sari, and we used that instead. Selfishly? I loved being able to show off my wedding sari again. However, Guavious pointed out how clumsy I am and was extra-special worried I was going to wreck it... Which by my record? It's a miracle I didn't!!
The jewelry was modified from a set purchased at Bhatia. The necklace was turned into a tiara, and the earrings stayed earrings. The necklace I wore was another medallion added to a leather cord.
The makeup, although I have yet to find a good closeup, was where I spent most of my time. I used Nyx and LIT cosmetics and CAKED myself in gold body glitter. I then drew leaves and swirls all around my eyes in different golds, using mostly LIT cosmetics They had the best selection of golds but also had a great primer which really held on.
Medusa:
Medusa was created in several parts - the base being a ton of body paint over which a black skirt with an 8 foot tail attached, a leather underbust corset, and a scaled bra piece made with wonderflex was worn. Two snake headdresses were then constructed using wonderflex and dollar store rubber snakes, one having moving snakes which would be worn, and the other was secured to a full scale model of Dejathoris' severed head.
For the "Alive" Medusa we created a scaled bra piece using leather tools to create the snakeskin texture on our Wunderflex, which was then spray painted a flat black. A skirt was created using wide leather strips on the front down to the knees, with an 8 foot, stuffable train attached to the back, with a leather "rattle" on the end, which gave the impression of a giant snake. The leather corset was worn on top to mimic the look, along with the tiered leather front of the skirt, of the famous Minoan Snake Goddess. Earlier in the week, we had purchased a bunch of pillows and spent the better half of the afternoon stuffing and hand sewing the tail, which was then pinned up in a curl to allow for mobility.
HOWEVER, once the outfit was complete there was the process of turning Dejathoris' skin into Medusa's scales. We sprayed her from head to toe in a silver hair spray. After drying we then used the most ridiculous technique of rolling on scales that I hope makes sense: Black Elmers non-toxic paint, a lint roller, and a large stamp pad with a snake skin pattern (intended for scrapbooking). The black paint actually looks more navy but I digress. We wrapped the stamp pad over the lint roller and coated it in paint. I then GENTLY rolled the scales onto Dejathoris' legs, arms, neck, and face. As this dried we sealed it twice with our cosmetics sealant. White, snake eye contacts were used to complete the look.
Finally, in order for the prop to be effective "Beheaded" Medusa and "Alive" Medusa's heads needed to match as closely possible. So for this, Dejathoris spent part of her December holiday getting her brother to do a life cast of her head. Check out our Flikr page http://www.flickr.com/photos/thecostumeguild/sets/72157628642107293/
for a detailed photo log of this involved process. Using expandable insulation foam from Home Depot over top of a skull prop from a Halloween shop, a base for the severed head was then sculpted so that the moulded face piece could be attached. She then worked on the headdresses at the same time. A crown of wonderflex, again given a scaled texture using leather working tools, was then woven with rubber snakes for each one prior to painting. For the "Alive" headdress, remote control motors were included in order to enable the snakes to move a bit. However - lesson learned! - the batteries had gone dead by the time we got to Seattle, so unfortunatly we were unable to show off this special effect as they had been sealed off with wonderflex and paint. A new rule was then established: always ensure batteries are accessible when including electronics in your costumes so that they can be replaced as needed.
Overall this was a pretty big undertaking. We made a full suit of armour, two heads that had to match, and someone was wandering around in part of her wedding dress! No pressure! Our presentation was a mini-version of the movie. I came out as Andromeda, asked Perseus to help me, he then goes off to get Medusa's head and just before I'm sacrificed to the Kraken (I got to scream wicked loud here, it was my shining moment), Perseus runs up and saves me with Medusa's head. As Novices, we were up against some UH-MAZING competitors. We won Workmanship and Best in Class both in the Novice Category. And the judges gave us some really positive feedback. Although we had a really thought our skit, the fight scene of Perseus and Medusa ended up being too focused in one corner and we should have used the whole stage. Something that we definitely put in place in future Masquerades.
