[TUTORIAL] Alice Madness Return's - Vorpal Blade Tutorial

I'm gonna attempt something different, I usually post reviews (that's what I made the blog for in the first place) but with Ireth we're trying to create something bigger and better, so we want to talk about conventions and cosplay-world, and posting tutorials to help y'all!

Material used:

• white foam, 2mm
• worbla's finest art
• champagne corks
• acrilic woodglue
• relief paint
• gold, silver, black and brown acrilic colors
• brushes 

The first thing I did is that I printed Kikunai vectorised vorpal blade !

Print it an A5 size (half A4), and it'll come with the measure I used. I did not use it to made the "flowers" design, but simply as reference for the blade measurements and then for where to start and where to end with the flowers.

I firstly cutted one pattern on white foam. I used 2mm thickness, but if you want a really resistant blade I advice you to use 3 or even 5mm. It won't be thin as a real blade, but you'll can move it around more freely.

I traced two more patterns, paying attention to keep the stitchy side to the right side of the patterns.

Attention!! cut these bigger than the foam shape, because this two will embrace the foam in the final blade. I suggest you to cut them at least 5mm bigger.

You'll come with 3 shapes of the blade. Just attach the two leaves of worbla together and keep the foam in the middle. This method is called the "sandwich method" and it's the most used to made anything (from blades/swords to armors) with worbla, since the foam itself won't stand.

 

 I painted both the handle and the blade with acrilic woodglue, you can also use air-drying clay, papier-mache and/or putty. When it hardened, sand it down until the surface is completely smooth, then cover it with a layer of clear varnish.

 Once the vernish has dried, sketch the pattern on the handle and on the  blade with a permanent marker. In my opinion, you don't have to exactly follow the reference, no-one will notice if you slightly change the adornment. Still, I used this as a reference for the handle, and the vectorised pattern I've linked before for the blade.

When you're satisfied with the sketched on pattern, draw it with a 3D pen. I used some relief paste, is something for painting outlines on glass and porcelain. Let it dry for a long time, otherwise it will ruin the whole pattern if you paint on it while it's still fresh.

(I used pebeo metal touch deco, in Gold code 301)

 

As i was saying some passages ago, I used 2mm foam, so my blade isn't really stable. I adjusted that by inserting a steel piece (like 5cm) in the blade, along the part that inserts in the handle. This will give stability and make it more safe.

 

Painting the handle in gold (I sprayed it) and the blade in silver (I used acrylic). Clothes hangers with clips come in handy if you want to paint both sides at once.

 About shading: this is what really makes cosplay props alive, and the better you master it the better your props will look! (I'm not very good at it otl)
You shade the silver by mixturing it with some black, and creating a dark-gray, and you shade the gold with some brown. There are two ways of shading:
1. The elaborate way: shade it with a tiny brush, know the shadows and recreate them on the pattern.
2. The fast and easy way: dab the color all over it with a sponge, then roughly wipe over it with a tissue. Repeat a few times.
Method one is more suited for things that are new, taken care of and clean. Method two fits old, battered and dirty objects.
Guess which one I used! ;)

These are the two pieces ended. Attach them together with hot glue and make sure it stays the way it is. And that's it! You're done! 

(I don't have photos of the blade attached because I'm going to put blood all over it for my Hysteria Alice, so--- rip good patterns and shading I did only for this tutorial!)