Pepakura Ghostbuster Proton Pack build

"Why Worry? Each of us is wearing an unlicensed nuclear accelerator on his back"

I have finally taken the plunge into building the greatest prop I could ever think of... The iconic Ghostbusters Proton pack!!

Since Ray and Egon accidentally "busted" a helpless maids cleaning chart in the Hotel Sedgewick, i have been in love with the Proton pack.

As a kid I had everything Ghostbusters, including the Proton pack, which looked nothing like the one from the movies, or even the animated show, The Real Ghostbusters. But I didn't care! I just wanted to catch some ghosts!

Now I'm all grown up....well.....older...and am finally going to realize my dream and build my self a pack!

I have been researching this for a long long time. Years of years of searching for parts and plans, instructions and tutorials and I have many a folder on my computer dedicated to this dream. Orinigally I was going to try and find a Proton Pack shell made of plastic and add all the bits and pieces, and add all the lights and sounds. From what I can see it's the easiest way to go about it (besides buying one right off eBay...but wheres the fun in that?!)

So after all that searching, I can't find anyone local who makes pack shells (Local is key, due to the cost of shipping)
So again I start researching and found a builder who made his pack from pepakura (paper craft). I had just started building with pepakura my self so I was intrigued to say the least.

I found the best of the best pepakura proton packs on the GBFans forum.

These files were made by Adam VanDuyn and are by far the best files ive seen

So here I sit, with a stack of 110lb card stock on my printer, getting everything I need to start this build!


I started with the very easy, smaller parts. The Ion arm and some spacers.



Every builder I found who has taken on the pepakura pack challenge has said that when applying the resin to strenghen the pieces, the weight collapesed them. They all said the same thing, to add aluminum foil duct tape to the back to strentghen them before resin. so i did!



This is where I am now. not much done I know but its a fresh build.

Just these pieces have gotten me so excited for this. I cant wait to see this thing come to life. I have a long long road ahead of me, but Im looking forward to every minute of it.

Next up I will be cutting folding and foiling the Power Cell and PPD box


I will be adding some photos to this blog but most of my progress pictures will be loaded to my new Facebook page.

PLEASE go there and hit LIKE!!!!!!!

Captain Halloween | Facebook Page

Thank you and wish me luck!!!!

"Maybe now you'll never slime a guy with a positron collider, huh?"

Aliens: Colonial Mistake

The Alien franchise is one of my all time favorite movie series. I had them on VHS, I had them on DVD and now I have them on Blu Ray. I even spent money on the god awful Aliens vs Predator game (Collector`s edition which saddens me more).

But when I first started seeing the first concept art and place holder screen shots for Aliens: Colonial Marines, I was incredibly excited. I thought `finally a real Aliens game.`.

I waited YEARS for this game to be released. Following every new bit of news, every screen shot, every amazing game play and cut scene trailer. They all looked AMAZING! From the dark, misty, creepy atmosphere, to the true to movie way the Xenomorphs moved and attack. And how can you not smile when a Marine takes down a Xeno with a M14A Pulse rifle complete with authentic sound. Even Hadley`s hope looked amazing in those vertical slices.

And then the day was upon us and Aliens: Colonial Marines was released. And every gamer who shelled out $70 turned it on and thought `what the fuck is this shit?!`.
The graphics are NO where near the level of the game play trailers, there is no creepy atmosphere, and the Xenomorphs attack like they want to give you a big alien hug.
Lets not forget about the AI, or the lack there of. Standing in place saying pointless, useless lines of dialog, screaming to opening fire, but never blinking an eye, let alone pulling the trigger. And if a Xeno attacks them and rips them apart? Don't worry they'll just get right back up, dust them selves off and say something stupid.

This farce of a game comes from one of my favorite games studios, Gearbox. This is the same studio that game us Borderlands 1 and 2 (They also brought us the new Duke Nukem but that's for another time). But now we hear that Gearbox shelled out most of the game to other studios and may have only contributed about 25% of this game. If that's true then they outsourced a great looking and great conceptualized game and slapped they're name on it to try to get more sales, and didn't even stop to check if it was worth selling. An Aliens game brought to you by the same studios as Borderlands? Sign me up! said a younger, more naive, version of myself.

Colonial Marines took everything great about the Aliens movie and seemingly threw it out the window for the final product. It doesn't feel like its part of the franchise. It feels more like they were making a generic shooter then decided the slap some Xeno's in and label it Aliens to sell a few more copies.

This game is a slap in the face to any Aliens fan who waited and waited just like I did. If game studios want to make licensed games then DO THEM RIGHT. Listen to fans, see what they want! Licensed games CAN work, look at Batman: Arkham Asylum and City, Star Wars: Old Republic and The Walking Dead. These are games that have a huge following for their franchise and also work as games! Great games! You can't throw a game together because a new movie is coming out because then you get Thor, Iron Man or the Fight Club video game. (First rule of the Fight Club video game. You do not play the Fight Club video game)

My wish would be that something could rescue this game. Ang Lee's Hulk movie made me weep for comic book movies, but then Louis Leterrier's The Incredible Hulk brought justice back. Maybe there's a Leterrier out there for Aliens: Colonial Marines. Or maybe we'll be waiting a long time to head back to LV-426.

GAME OVER, MAN!

Modern Mario and Luigi

I have been working away on designs for my real life, modern, Mario and Luigi (and Peach) costumes, for my self and friends for this years Toronto FanExpo

So far I have come up with a company logo I love and can't wait to see on the uniforms, hats and fake business cards




Yesterday I sketched out some designs for the Mario Bros. costumes and found 1 I liked. I threw it into Photoshop for a quick coloring. And here's what I got



I wanted to try and modernize the classic look of the Mario Bros. look. Since I don't know anyone who wears denim overalls (or sells them for that matter) Coveralls seemed like the perfect modern replacement. I torn the sleeves off and opened the front to make it still have the look and make the shirts clearly visible underneath.

The grey random blotches on their arms will be Mario Bros. themed tattoos that I am still designing.
I plan on making a pipe out of pvc and painting it green like the games iconic pipe (with some wear and tear of course) and the wrenches with be foam (safety first) and will most likely have plungers hanging from their belts.

I want the logo I created to be big and prominent on the back, and will also be on the trucker style hats.
I was also thinking of adding M and L belt buckles to the tool belts, to give back some of the classic elements I took away.

Peach has been a little more difficult to design. At first I was thinking of a Jersey Shore-esq diva. In full pink track suit, Snookie poof and tons of bling.
But as the design for the Bros. has come together. I'm thinking I might try a different design to flow with the other costumes.

Thinking maybe a modern rocker Princess, Pink skirt, with stripped leggings maybe.
My plan is to try and get a lot of designing of Peach and maybe the tattoos done today and tomorrow.

I'm really having a lot of fun creating these new looks and hope it all turns out.
Stay tuned for more updates!

Captain Out.

Costumes! Costumes! Costumes!

Since this is a blog about cosplaying, I figured I'd finally post some pictures of my costumes.

Now since i'm still pretty new to costume building most of my costumes are easy made costumes.

First up if my first ever cosplay!
At the 2011 Toronto FanExpo, one of my very best friends and I decided to dress as characters from our favorite show, Supernatural
I wanted to do my favorite character, the angel Castiel, so my friend went as the rouge angel Anna Milton


I loved this costume, even though many people thought I was the Doctor from Doctor Who.
But the people who stopped us and knew who were, were awesome

At Toronto FanExpo 2012, my friend and I were at it again, this time with her bf
And this time we did our very favorite show, Firefly!!!





The man they call Jayne!!! This costume is one of my favorites
Met the most amazing people who stopped me to talk about the costume and the show. I'd cosplay Jayne again in a second
On the list of the awesome people we met, nothing compared to meeting and getting our photo taken with Alan Tudyk!!


We gave him toy dinosaurs and he started playing with them. And we now have the best picture ever of Wash doing his evil laugh!

At the 2012 Silver Snail Halloween party, I broke out my Han Solo costume
This picture was taken with Veteren Foxx of Geekpron!



And last but not least.......Bob Ross!!!




Captain out!

Photoshopping around

Lately I have been on a designing rampage. I can't stop sketch and Photoshopping. But that's a good thing!

So here are 3 things I have made lately I have been showing off.

First up was just made for fun, just playing around in Photoshop one night. I found this tutorial to make your own Judge Dredd badge in Photoshop and since I love the new Dredd movie I thought it would be cool to make one. (Also great reference for future Dredd badge build)


This Coleman badge is my profile picture for everything right now! I love it. It's even the background on my phone. What can I say? I always wanted to be a street Judge!

For the second design I will keep with the Judge Dredd theme.
As you can tell I like Judge Dredd! And plan on a future Judge Dredd armor build (from the new Dredd movie)
I started looking into ways of building a Lawgiver gun. Since I can afford to buy a replica or even a kit to build one I plan on relying on something I've done before on a Jayne Cobb from Firefly build and mod a Nerf gun.
Too me the perfect Nerf gun to mod for this gun is a Nerf Recon (only the main blaster part)


I printed out the reference image then sketched over it to see how pieces for the Lawgiver could fit onto the Nerf gun. Also figured out what parts I could cut out for different bits and pieces.
After I threw it into Photoshop and made an outline of the Lawgiver / Nerf mod


I'm very happy with how the design turned out

Hopefully when I get a Nerf Recon, I can make the real thing look just as good

The last but certainly not least design is my favorite of the 3.
For a future convention myself and some friends are going to be attending as Real life Mario, Luigi and Peach.
I'm working the designs for the costumes and wanted, instead of the traditional M and L on the hats, for there to be a company logo.
After many and many variations on the logo I finally found one that I loved


This design was hard because I wanted to make it look like it could be a real company logo, but still keep a Mario and Luigi feel to it. The pipe works to say its plumbing but also a Mario icon people will recognize.

My plan is put this design on the hats and maybe overalls. And I plan on making business cards with the logo on it and handing them out to anyone who takes our picture (on the back will be the address to this blog and my twitter name, shameless self promotion at its best!)

Hopefully soon I will have more designs to add, as I'm always sketching them up

Captain out.

Post-Apocalyptic Scorpion

With my Iron White Power Ranger temporarily on hold, I have been sketching away ideas and designs for future builds.

I started designing a Post-Apocalyptic Mortal Kombat Scorpion (Still in the rough sketch stages, don't judge me!)


It's a costume I've wanted to build for a long time and now that I'm learning more about foam building and sewing, I feel the time is right to start. I do a rough sketch of the armor bits. Old tire bits to make the tabard, gas mask, chain wrapped around his arm for his spear. The most sketching was trying to design his spear.
I have about 50 sketched out, and maybe 5 I like.


That is only 1 of 3 pages of designs I made. This was my favorite page of designs. After a while I started to get an idea of what I wanted and came up with this design
I really like the look of this blade, but I can't help but keep thinking it doesn't fit with the feel of the character....I don't know...I'm still working on it
My inspiration for this build, and where I've taken some ideas from, was from an incredible talented modeler on Polycount, who create this amazing character.

Check it out here!!

From his design I took the tire tread and gas mask idea. Aside from that I am trying to come up with my own ideas fore the rest of the costumes.

Hopefully I can create something as awesome!

Now back to the drawing board!!

Captain out.

Star Wars: 1313

On the long list of things I love to do, writing is high up there.
It had been a long time since I wrote anything, so I started to try to ease myself back into it with some short stories and then I wrote a small article about the next Star Wars video game Star Wars: 1313

I ended up emailing the article to the amazing people over at G33KPRON (If you're a nerd you need this site)

And by some miracle they liked the article and posted it! 

Please support these amazing geeky girls...and might as well read my article while you're there!

www.g33kpron.com/star-wars-1313/

Captain out.