The Patriot- Dragoon

Have I mentioned I love Jason Isaacs? No? Well, I do. And William Tavington has an amazing costume. Therefore, I'm cosplaying it. Well, crossplaying it. Since it has a skirt.

For costume reference--

Part 1- The Coat.

I'm not finished with this part yet, considering the coat alone has at least twenty gold buttons on the lapels, not mentioning the sleeves. Or the vest. And gold buttons are apparently very hard to find in our little town. The only place we could find them was Joann's, and they were 2 to a card, for $3. Given that I'll need at least 15 cards.. Yeeeah no. But I finished the rest of it.

I started with a red winter peacoat, found at Saver's for 8 dollars.

Excuse the bad quality.

I also had some green felt. (A lot of green felt..)

First up was the pockets.
This coat had a different type of pockets than the original. In the picture, the green part of the pocket is a horizontal flap over the pocket, whereas with my coat, the pocket is a diagonal slit in the fabric. So instead, I just cut 2 rectangles from the felt and fixed them over the pockets. It still looks okay.

Easy enough.
Next, I sewed a band of green felt around the cuffs of the sleeves. Since there was already a cuff on the coat, I just measured up to the seam, rather than making it a certain length.

I then cut the buttons off the front of the coat, folded the lapels back, and covered them with felt.

The only problem in working with the felt and the coat was that when the already heavy fabric was covered with the felt, it made it very hard to sew, and made it really thick. So in making the collar, I simply cut the already existing collar off of the coat, and made a new one out of just a plain layer of felt, then sewed it on.

After scouring the entire town for gold braid, and not finding any, (because why would they have it?) I discovered that we already had some. I think it's upholstery braid, like the kind used for trimming sofas and things. Could probably be found in Joann's, but I didn't look in that section there, just the ribbon. It looks like this, and is about 3/4 of an inch wide.

I trimmed the pocket flaps, sleeve cuffs, and the collar with the braid.

So as of now, it looks like this. I'm pretty happy with the way it's turning out. With the exceptions of the pockets, it looks pretty close to the original.

Now to find 30+ gold buttons with a design on them... I think it might be easier to find a billion buttons that have the same design but different colours, then spray paint them all gold...

~Michelle

CSD-- Costuming Stress Disorder

Lainee got a case of this while working on her Supergirl costume.

Lol xD You're a weirdo, Lainee.

~Michelle

Cheshire Cat Makeup- *NEW*

Because this is what I do when I'm bored, screw with my makeup and test it out again. I actually managed to take pictures of the process, so hopefully it's easier to see this time.

 First up: Supplies.

I use Snazaroo face paint, white and black. They can be found at Michaels for around $8.50. They're pricier than plain old face paint, but believe me, it's worth it.
I originally bought it for theatre, when I was in Cats. It won't smear around, as long as you don't rub your hand across it, and it won't crack when you're wearing it. The only problem I have with it, is if it's hot enough, and you sweat, it WILL drip and run. (But that was during theatre, so maybe it had more to do with the fact we were wearing full jumpsuits, fur arm and leg warmers, and fur wigs. In addition to it being almost 100 degrees on stage from the lights. In July.)
The paintbrushes are just cheapie paintbrushes from the Dollar Store.
The other things I use here are blue liquid eyeliner from NYX, and blue eyeshadow from Sally Beauty. Plus my general foundation and mascara.

Step 1- A thin paintbrush to stripe white paint below my eyes, under the lashline, leaving a small gap, and winging it out on both the inside and outside of the eye. (Ignore my tired, no-makeup face.)

Easy enough.

Step 2- I lined the underside of my brows with a strip of white paint, then filled in my brows with blue eyeshadow.
I also did my eyelids with the same blue eyeshadow.
The extra thing I did was take the blue liquid liner and add another wing to the outsides of my eyes, right above the white strip.

Also added some mascara. When I actually do this costume, I'll use really thick fake lashes, but I didn't want to fight with them today. Since fake eyelashes are a pain.

Step 3- The Smile
First, take the thin paintbrush, and make a small dot centered in the indent above the upper lip.
Then, make another dot below the bottom lip.

Step 4- Find the bottom of the cheekbone, and make another dot. Mine is about an inch or so from my hairline. Do this on both sides.

Step 5- Brush a line of black paint from the dots to make the corners of the smile, on both sides.

Step 6- Now take those dots above and below the lips, and draw a line completely down onto the lip.

***Sorry for the bad descriptions, but I don't know how else to explain it. Just use the pictures to find what I'm talking about.***


Step 7- Another set of vertical lines on each side of the first lines. They'll be curved slightly to follow the shape of the lips. And yes, I'm aware it looks like the Spiderman symbol. xD

Step 8- Another set of lines.

Now it's just a really big spider.

Step 9- Continue adding lines out towards the corners of the smile. Begin to curve them more than the ones in the center.

Step 10- Once that's done, begin to close the lines into triangles, to make the actual shape of the fangs.

They don't have to be perfect, they'll be filled in later.

Step 11- Fill in the spaces between the teeth, and the corners of the smile.

And now, instead of the Spiderman symbol, it looks like some weird adaptation of the Batman symbol.

Step 12- Now take your white paint, and begin to fill in the teeth. I use a paper towel to wipe the brush off between teeth. Otherwise, you'll get black mixed in, and it'll turn the white a dirty greyish colour.

Step 13- Now take your thin brush and the black paint, and round the bottoms of the teeth.

Step 14- Add dimples on the corners of the smile, and smudge up the outline of the smile. I also paint a vertical line up from the top teeth to the bottom of my nose, and then paint my nose black. Also, little dots of black can be sprinkled across the cheeks.

All done!

For reasons unknown, some of the teeth got angled backwards, and I'm not sure how, given I just now noticed. That can be fixed with some extra white paint.
Add a blue wig and some cat eye contacts, and you're done! Don't forget to speak all in riddles and stare creepily at people.

~Michelle