To complete Duct Taped Avenger costume, we decided to make the helmet/mask.  I started with a grocery bag over my sons head, but I warned all of the other children that we DON’T put bags on our heads!  I put some tape around the eyes and nose to work to define the shape of the mask.  I drew the eye holes on it (added some pupils for fun), then cut out the eyes.

I added some vertical strips of tape to the nose to define the bridge and the brow line for the mask.  I used smaller pieces of tape and around the eyes and then wrapped the extra tape through the eye hole to make a clean edge.  Then I cut the tape and angled it on to block out the shape of the ear holes and the back of the helmet.

With the head covered with the blue tape, I cut out some strips of white to make the details for the “A”.

Then we added the “Wings” on the sides, a chin strap, and then outside for some photos in the full costume

Last a little video overview and seeing the shield in action.  In the video I talked about the costume being tacked together with “glue” and I meant to say tape.  ;P

Alright, it’s Halloween, and the Duct Taped Captain America costume is done.  I’ll put two more posts up about the process starting with the belt and the ammo pouch.  I wasn’t really going to do anything more than the armor, but I realized that it’s the details that help to sell a costume.  As I was working on these, my daughter pointed out that it was a type of Duct Tape Origami.

I thought it would work best to use the dimensions of the duct tape as the dimensions of the ammo pouch.  One strip wide for the sides, and 2 strips wide for the front and back.  I started by laying out the tape and making a sheet of duct tape material.

I did a bit of folding and experimenting so that I could make a template for the boxes.  You can see the outline on the poster board in the photo.   This double strip of tape would act as the front, back and the flap of the bag.  I laid out a piece of tape for the sides on my template, and put the double piece on top of it.  I then added another piece of tape to seal it all up.

I added a strip of tape along both horizontal strips of tape and then cut along the side to prepare to fold and secure the pouch.

It takes a bit of patience, but next is the folding and stuffing portions.  I used two grocery bags to fill the ammo pouch and help it keep it’s shape.  I then cut the detail on the flap and added a strip of tape to keep the flap down.

I took another strip of tape and doubled it over and made a loop on the back to secure it to an existing belt and added a couple of smaller strips to tie my Indiana Jones holster to the belt.

Next up we’ll show off the helmet.

I’m not a big fan of Halloween, but I do love costumes.  One of my key costuming resources is cardboard and Duct Tape.  So when my 13 year old son said that he wanted to be Captain America for Halloween, I started doing a little research.  I was very pleased to find instructions on making a FLYING Captain America shield out of… (wait for it)…. CARDBOARD AND DUCT TAPE!  While our first attempt at the shield wasn’t perfect, it looks pretty good AND it flies.  Here’s a LINK to the instructions and a video from the instructions showing the flying shield in action.

So with a Halloween party on Saturday, and the actual date on Monday, I really needed to get cracking on this costume.  I started by putting a garbage bag on the boy.  I folded it in half and cut a scoop for his head and arms.  Then I cut a second bag in half and made the sleeves for the armor.  Captain America’s costume IS red white and blue, so I figured I would use the white bag increase his mobility by not having to tape around his mid-section.

Then I just wrapped him up in tape.  Well, I had some good reference photos so I wasn’t wrapping randomly, but it wasn’t completely thought out either.

 Next, I took some craft foam and wrapped it in tape to make the shoulder armor and added the Red and Grey tape details.

Can I just say how much I love that there is colored Duct tape?  Simply fantastic!  Next, I took some red tape and cut a circle, and then used that as a guide to make a star out of the white tape and added some shoulder details.

 The last bit was taking two strips of the blue tape and sticking them together and cutting them to fit as the collar.  We carefully cut him out of the armor with a single cut down the back and will be able to tape him in when he gets dressed.  We added a few belts for details and are now on the hunt for some Brown duct tape to make belt pouches.  All and all, I would say that was a good 3 or 4 hours of fun.

The other thing that’s great about Duct Tape is that it helps to keep the other kids occupied while you work.  

We are in the thick of birthday season at out house, so that means lots of birthday cake.  My wife recently took a cake decorating class AND we’ve been watching the first season of Cake Boss on Netflicks streaming, so we decided to team up and tackle a cake.  By some strange coincidence, my kids have become fans of Star Wars.  So we decided to make a cake of Clone Captain Rex’s Helmet.

We started by looking at the overall height and size of the helmet and discovered that we didn’t have any cake pans that would work.

My wife came upon the idea of using one of the #10 cans from our food storage to bake the cake.  The can is about 6″ in diameter by 7″ tall, and it worked pretty good to put a whole cake mix in.

She greased the inside of the can and then coated it with flour to help it release from the can after it was completely cooled.  One of the problems was that the cake took awhile to bake because it was so thick.

This made the cake come out pretty dense, but that helped with the carving.  She used a cake leveler to slice the cake into the 5 layers we needed and then staked them with chocolate frosting in-between each layer.  Then I carved out the basic dome of the helmet.

I wasn’t thinking about documenting this whole build until after the fact, so I’m sorry that I don’t have more photos in this section.  My wife smoothed the cake with the butter cream frosting and then rolled out a layer of fondant to cover it.  She colored some of fondant blue and yellow, then we bought the black fondant.  I cut out the visor shape while she cut strips of fondant and I put them on the cake.

It turned out pretty good for our first attempt at this cake sculpture stuff.  Even if the thing looked terrible, you can still eat it!

And the boy loved it!  :D

I’ve put together some images to create a 360 view of the helmet I worked on for the TK Project.

Here are a couple of images of the helmet I made for the Charity Auction at the Star Wars Celebration in Florida.  When I started to see all of the wonderful art work on the helmet, I started to feel like my work would not stand out much.  The long and short of it is that I was working to create a helmet that looked like a plausible space helmet with the design elements of the Stormtrooper helmet.  I started to feel a little better about my work when I put the images up against the concept art of the Stormtroopers.

Here it is, video #5 for the TK Project. The Star Wars costuming group the 501st Stormtooper Legion is inviting Honorary Members, Friends Of the Legion and a few 501st troopers to create one of a kind Stormtrooper helmets to auction off in a charity event to benefit the Make A Wish Foundation. This project is similar to the Vader Project that Sarah Jo Marks and Dov Kelemer completed. The auction will take place at the Star Wars Celebration on Sunday August 15th from 2-5 PM in Orlando Florida. Be sure to check out the site to see the other helmets in the series and become a friend on Facebook.

All things said and done, I really enjoyed working on the helmet. There are so many wonderful and creative helmets that have been done, I feel that this one may get lost in the crowd, but I had a blast working on it and making the videos. I hope that you’ve enjoyed them.

Almost there! Stay on Target! I just put together some images for the helmet and I’m pretty happy seeing it right up next to some of the concept drawings. It’s not a copy of those designs, but it’s got a good feel to it. Here is video #4 for the TK Project. The Star Wars costuming group the 501st Stormtooper Legion is inviting Honorary Members, Friends Of the Legion and a few 501st troopers to create one of a kind Stormtrooper helmets to auction off in a charity event to benefit the Make A Wish Foundation. This project is similar to the Vader Project that Sarah Jo Marks and Dov Kelemer completed. The auction will take place at the Star Wars Celebration on Sunday August 15th from 2-5 PM in Orlando Florida. Be sure to check out the site to see the other helmets in the series and become a friend on Facebook. I’ll be posting a new video everyday this week to document the build of my helmet leading up to the final images.

Here is video #3 for the TK Project.  The Star Wars costuming group the 501st Stormtooper Legion is inviting Honorary Members, Friends Of the Legion and a few 501st troopers to create one of a kind Stormtrooper helmets to auction off in a charity event to benefit the Make A Wish Foundation. This project is similar to the Vader Project that Sarah Jo Marks and Dov Kelemer completed.  The auction will take place at the Star Wars Celebration on Sunday August 15th from 2-5 PM in Orlando Florida.  Be sure to check out the site to see the other helmets in the series and become a friend on Facebook.  I’ll be posting a new video everyday this week to document the build of my helmet leading up to the final images.

Here is video #2 for the TK Project.  The Star Wars costuming group the 501st Stormtooper Legion is inviting Honorary Members, Friends Of the Legion and a few 501st troopers to create one of a kind Stormtrooper helmets to auction off in a charity event to benefit the Make A Wish Foundation. This project is similar to the Vader Project that Sarah Jo Marks and Dov Kelemer completed.  The auction will take place at the Star Wars Celebration on Sunday August 15th from 2-5 PM in Orlando Florida.  Be sure to check out the site to see the other helmets in the series and become a friend on Facebook.  I’ll be posting a new video everyday this week to document the build of my helmet leading up to the final images.