Journal 3 - Gravity Falls -bookmarks

Journal 3 has two bookmarks,  one that looks like a tassel, and the other which ends with a small magnifying glass.

I found some red drapery tassel at Fabricville and got 0.3m.  Which is more then I needed, but I wasn't sure dirtying up the tassel would work the first time so I got extra.  Just in case.

I cut off a bit and curled it around to make a tassel, then I sewed it to a ribbon.  After I sewed it, I took charcoal and rubbed it all over the tassel to darken it up. I then added the mud mixture I made to dirty it up even more.

The ribbon the tassel hangs from in the show is gray, but I didn't want to just buy gray ribbon.  So I found some white ribbon and grayed it up again with charcoal and added mud.  I also placed it between two pieces of sand paper and roughed it up.

I did the same for the yellow ribbon that the magnifying glass hangs from.  Both ribbons are glued into the spine of the book.

And here is the finished exterior! I have no fake metal tree to find it in, but I did have a nice mossy stump to lay it on for photos.

Front

 

Back 

  And here are a couple close ups of the  front and back with the dried mud and charcoal smudges.

Front and back

Just the front

Just the back.

Journal 3 - Gravity Falls -mud

The glue finally dried!  And I added more charcoal to dirty up the front cover.

I added a bit more to the back too.

My 'mud'.
It's actually cocoa powder, cinnamon, coffee and water. It's pretty effective and smells like cookies!

My muddy book, you can already see how when the 'mud' dries and looks like dirt stains.  I ground some into the 4 corner pieces and between the fingers on the hand.

Journal 3 - Gravity Falls

So in preparation for my upcoming Dipper Pines cosplay (my best friend is gonna be Mabel),  I needed a couple of things, one the Hat, that was easy thanks to Ebay and two Journal 3.

So I began looking for books in the right size and colour (which is a maroon) and after much searching and deciding not to use a second hand bible (they are always the right colour and shade) I found a book at the local second hand book store on English Architects and Architecture that was already water stained and only $5.

What do you need?
- 1 old book

-craft or exacto knife

-pencil

-sharpie

-charcoal

-paint (gold, black and maybe copper)

-cardboard or mattboard

-craft glue

-spray bottle with water (optional)

-light sandpaper
-tracing paper

The first step I did was print off some reference pictures.  The second step was draw on the torn edges lightly with pencil and then cut them out with an exacto knife. I then frayed the edges with the knife and sandpaper.

For example, here is the back.

Then I found some book corners at Michael's and attached them with pliers and craft glue. You can do this or make your own.

Then I waited for glue to dry.

 Journal 3 has been in a tree somewhere in the woods behind the MysteryShack for an unknown period of time. I do not want this book to be pretty. I want it to look like it's been inside a fake tree. Which is one of the reasons I bought a book for $5 that had water stains, but  it wasnt't enough water stains, so with a squirt bottle, I added more.

The end product looks like this:

 Now that I had the start of the stains and the rips on it, it was time to tackle the hand.  I found another reference image of the book cover and printed it off so it would be the same size as my book.  this took me a couple tries.

Then I tested to see if it would be the right size and for placement.

Once I had that I dug out my tracing paper.

And traced it.  This is so I would have the right placement/shape for the 3 in the center as well as a guide for the black boarders around the edge.

Ta-da!

Next, I dug out an old scrap of Matt-board.  I chose to put my hand on the black side rather then the white side because my edge clips are not a pure gold, more like a tarnished gold and I wanted the gold hand to look similar.

I traced it with a white chalk pen (found in the Clover section at Fabricville or where ever quilt supplies are sold).

Time for the paper transfer! Remember to flip the image over and re-trace on the back side of it or the graphite transfer if the image wont work. To do a paper transfer with tracing paper, simply place the image over whatever it is you are tracing and the draw over it again with a hard leaded pencil.

I was going to do the gold with paint, but then I remembered I had this baby!  It stinks, but it works soooo well!

One gold  hand ready to go!

Except the gold was too perfect, so I sanded it a bit with fine sand paper to make it look more worn. I also added a wash of copper and black acrylic paint to make the gold look more like the antique gold edge clips.
Sadly this did cause the gold colour to dust into my black edges and #3, but that is what black acrylic paint is for!

Since I was using matt board which is black on one side and white on the other, I also had to paint the edges of my hand black with a fine brush.

Finished product, ready for attaching (and a bit of drying, the 3 is still wet there)

The symbols on the back I had drawn in lightly with pencil after I ripped the old cover off. I tried charcoal at first, but I knew it would rub off, so I brushed that off with a bit of kleenex (making the book look more dirty in the process, bonus!) and ended up using a sharpie to draw on the symbols.

I really liked how the charcoal stuck to the fabric cover of the book, and wanted the edges to look more..animated then they did (at the very least, stand out more) so  ended up going around them with the charcoal and then rubbing it off with the same piece of kleenex.  I think it added a nice depth to the look of the book.

I used this kind of charcoal (aka burnt sticks) which I had left over from Art school.

I also flipped the front over and did the same around the edges of the gold corner clips, around the edges of the rips and along the spine.

The charcoal before I rubbed it off.

After the heavy lines were rubbed off.

 After I did that, I rubbed charcoal onto the cover, along the spine and on the back more to make it look more dirty.  I got it to a point where it looked good and was ready to attach the hand logo to the book.

So I took the original printed version of the had I had, and after finding the placement I thought looked best, traced around it so I would know where to put my painted hand once I had glue on it.  I did this because I didn't want to get glue everywhere while trying to find proper placement.

So here is the book so far!  I think I may add some more charcoal to the front, it looks too clean in comparison to the back, and once the hand has been glued to the cover, I am going to make some "mud" and splatter the entire book a bit.  However, it is currently stuck under 2 dictionaries to make sure it dries flat, so that will have to wait till later!

 Our group (minus our Porom who was dressed as Edea Lee from Bravely Default)  entered the costume competion at Animartime 2014, a first time for everyone!

I enjoyed it greatly and the best part was two of the Judges were from the film/costume industry!

I made my costume and Edge's.

Point of Light Productions took some awesome photos of us up on the stage.

And I won 2nd in my division! Woo!

and here are some random other photos!

Did I mention that three members of our group won in the competition?  Our Cecil won 1st place in Journeyman and our Porom won 3rd for her Bravely Default costume!

Here is her costume along with my Applejack one :)

More to come, this time with a spear!

Kain Highwind, Palom (FF4: The after years version),  Edward Geraldine (FF4: The after years version) and Cecil Harvey.

Paint teasers.....

Thank you Billy for the awesome paint job, it turned out great!

Some progress pictures of it.

Dat codpeice!

So Kain, has this....wonderful? Questionable? Weird? purple banana hammock thing going on. I think it is meant to be a codpeice, but one can never quite tell with Amano inspired artwork.  So, with all the armor over to our painter to be primed and painted, it was time for me to start the fabric parts of my costume (HOORAY FINALLY!!)

So, I am a lady, and a many banana hammock would have just looked.... bad, so I had to think of what to do to make one work for my shape.  And then I recalled I had won this "lingerie rose" at my friend batchlorette party earlier this winter and therefore had a nice cheap thong to hack apart and take a pattern from.

Remember kids, when cosplaying, recycle, reduce and reuse!  Everything has a purpose!



After what was a very short time, I had that lovely red thing taken apart.

Very soon after that I had a pattern for it.

I made this lovely thing out of a purple leather look fabric and some black stretch cotton.  Once on it is much smoother, it is the lingerie stitch making it look all rippled.

 I'm here, lets talk about ALL the fabric stuff! WOO

Next up: The corset!

So to begin with, I cut out the shape of the yellow dragon stomach thing Kain has on his under armor. I personally think it looks like a turtle tummy and not a dragon tummy, but eh!

I cut out a piece that looked like a fat peanut and then I made a small paper template of the diamond/ Zelda Rupee shape that it is quilted with.  I started in the center and worked my way out, tracing out the shape till if filled the entire price with a pencil.  Then I sewed it to make it look like it was quilted or embossed.

 After I had it all quilted, I went over my vinyl with a yellow wash of acrylic paint, the above picture is actually the (now painted) piece leaning up against the original fabric.

Close up: the acrylic wash made it come out mottled looking like actual lizard skin, and highlighted my stitching even more. The effect is pretty awesome.

The next step was to attach it to the corset I made, well fake corset, it has no boning and zips up on the side.  I took my judy off her stand and laid everything out on her and then pinned my tummy piece in place.  I then sewed it down by hand with invisible thread.

 The next step after the tummy part was attached, was to attach the silver leather cord piping for the piped details.  I  drew out the pattern on one side first, then attached the piping and then (again) used the tracing paper/etching technique to get the pattern and transferred it over to the other side so they are mirror images.

After the front was done, I did the same with the back. You can see my red chalk lines from where I traced the pattern onto the second side.  The piping is also attached with the invisible thread by hand.

The final product (back).  Now that I have worn this, I plan on adding some straps. While it fit well in the front, I think the edge of my back armor caught it and caused it to wrinkle in the back and I want it to look smooth everywhere when I wear it.  So I am hoping straps will fix that issue.

For some reason (probably I was running short on time) I have no pictures (yet) of my finished butt-cape.  But here is the pattern pieces. I'll try to get some better pictures later.