The Tesseract!

Stan Lee left behind an amazing legacy of characters, and is responsible for many of the popular heroes in Marvel today. He also co-created the Cosmic Cube also known as the Tesseract in the Marvel Cinematic Universe with Jack Kirby. Here's my attempt at making one.



Items used in this build:

3.5 inch Photo Cube

Blue LED fairy lights

Wax Paper

Fine Grit Sanding Sponge

And check out Uncle Jesse's Tesseract video which inspired me to make mine.

While I'm happy with how this turned out, the frosted spray paint that Uncle Jesse uses is probably the better alternative to sanding. I might go back and do that.

But this is a quick and easy project that anyone can do!

And thank you Stan Lee for allowing all of us to play in your universe.

Makonde Dagger Build

The Makonde Dagger was designed by artist Jonah Lobe to commemorate 250K YouTube subscribers for Punished Props.

Bill Doran built an absolutely beautiful one in a video you can check out here, and then issued the challenge to the PropTarts to build their own. Here's what I did.

Due to work, a few conventions I was preparing new coplays for, and a vacation, I had to wait until Labor Day weekend to start work on this project. A very generous PropTart with Fusion 360 skills far beyond mine uploaded a model for the dagger onto Thingiverse. It's an excellent model and I tried slicing it but could not for the life of me get the blade to fit on my 3D printing bed. So seeing as how I probably wouldn't be able to complete a full size build anyway, I decided to make a 50% scale version because you know, it would be adorable. So I printed out the sliced parts on my Prusa I3 MK2S using MatterHackers Pro PLA filament in gold.

LEGO Ectomobile Lights

I purchased an LED kit online to install lights in my LEGO Ecto-1. Here's how I put it together and how it turned out.



Putting it together took maybe an hour or two? The hardest part is probably putting the wires between the bricks so they are "inconspicuous."

The kit could be considered a little expensive but since I have no electrical wiring experience, this was the best option for me. I'd also prefer it if I didn't have to plug it in every time I wanted to turn it on, so maybe wiring in a switch would be a good beginner project.

But whatever... My LEGO Ecto-1 has lights now!

Kit from brickled on Amazon

LEGO Ecto-1

Baby Groot Project

Baby Groot was the scene stealer in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2, and I decided to make one for a Secret Santa gift exchange!

Toy Gun Repaint in 60 Seconds

I needed a gift for a White Elephant party so I got a cheap toy gun from Five Below and repainted it. Here's a 60 second recap on how I did it.

3D Printed Justice League Batarang

I apparently really like batarangs. But who doesn't?!? I made one out of foam last year and I 3D printed one about a month ago. Now, after seeing Justice League, I felt the urge to print another one. This time, it's the latest Affleck version from Batman V Superman and Justice League. Here's the Flash asking if he can keep it.

Sir Botsalot Model Kit Project

Recently Bill Doran from Punished Props designed a robot resin model dubbed "Sir Botsalot." He partnered with Level 52 Studios to help produce a limited run of these kits and I was lucky enough to snag one. 

Space Gun!

Space Gun!!! Repainting a toy gun was the latest challenge from the PropTarts, a propmaking group I'm a part of on FaceBook. I decided to use this "Space Laser Light-Up Blaster" I bought from Walmart as my base.

Chirrut Imwe Staff Build

Donnie Yen plays the badass, blind, warrior monk Chirrut Imwe in Rogue One: A Star Wars Story and I cosplayed as him at Emerald City Comicon. I started this cosplay by making his staff so here's how I did it.

The actual length of his staff varies throughout the movie so I decided to use this image as my reference. The overall length would be from the ground to my armpit, and the midpoint would be around where my hand is.

Mini Halo Sniper Rifle Project

I really should have spent this weekend working on a cosplay for Emerald City Comic Con, but I ended up working on this little project. It's a mini Halo sniper rifle! I started by finding an image of it (and a rocket launcher for a future build) and printing it out on card stock.

The basic premise is cutting out the image, tracing the basic shape onto foam, then building it out in layers. I used 6mm foam as a base, 3mm foam for the accents, wooden dowels for the barrel, and a pen cap & tire valve cap for the sight.

Lightsaber Build

One of the prop making groups I belong to, The PropTarts of Punished Props, put forth a challenge. Build a lightsaber using only $20 worth of materials bought from one store and only using small hand tools to build it. Above is my finished lightsaber. Below is how I built it.

So I chose Dollar Tree to purchase my stuff. I actually made two trips. The first time I went, I picked out mostly cylindrical objects without having a clear plan of what I wanted. That served to bite me in the ass because when I got home and plotted out my lightsaber, it just looked kind of boring. So I went back to Dollar Tree and purchased more items, this time picking things with textures.

Proton Pack Build V2

Proton Pack V1 vs Proton Pack V2

Six years ago I made a proton pack for Halloween. You can check out the build process here. I made it mostly out of cardboard, foam, and random things from Home Depot and the Dollar Store. It was a fun foray into prop building and while I love the pack, it is pretty fragile. The base is pretty much all cardboard, and the pack has a duct tape look to it, mainly because there's a lot of duct tape on it. I wanted to build a pack that was more durable and looked a little more screen accurate. So I decided to build another one completely out of foam.

Proton Pack version 2 had to satisfy two of my needs:

1. It had to be light, hence the foam construction. Proton packs are usually made of resin, fiberglass, or aluminum and can weigh anywhere from 35 to 50 pounds or more. Carrying that on my back all day during a convention is not appealing.

2. It had to house a backpack inside so that I had storage for things I bought at conventions, so I decided that the pack would split in two to access it.

So to start, here's the bag I got to fit inside the pack. It has a flat, narrow profile and I got it on clearance at BestBuy.

Minions Goggles Project

My friends and I went to a New York Comic Con party dressed as Gru and his Minions! It's a quick and silly costume and I was tasked with making the goggles so here's how I did it.

I made a template out of paper to fit my face and transferred it to 5mm craft foam. Here are the dimensions. If you get a regular piece of 9x12 foam, you can make 3 pairs of goggles from it because each eyepiece is 8x2. I don't know how long the angled side is but if you measure everything else, that won't matter. You obviously need to cut 2 of these out for both your eyes.

Stranger Things Wall Cosplay

Every year before New York Comic Con, I tell myself it's the last time I'm going. Then when it's all over, I do a 180 and can't wait until next year. Such is the case right now because I simply had a blast at NYCC this year! Thanks in part to this ridiculously simple cosplay I did of the Stranger Things alphabet wall.

Photo Credit: Colette Laroya

I did not expect the overwhelming positive response I got for this cosplay. I'm pretty sure I'm not the first to come up with this idea, and I'm definitely sure I'm not the last as a ton of people have told me they're using this idea for a Halloween costume. So if you want to do the same, here's the stuff I used:

Foam Batarang Project

Batman Begins came out 11 years ago and is one of my favorite Batman films. I decided to do a little project and make one of Batman's batarangs out of foam. Here's how I did it.

I started by finding a batarang template online. The one I used can be found on pinterest here. It even has dimensions on it so you can size it correctly when you print it.

I cut out the template, and traced two patterns onto 6mm foam.

Devastator Weathering Project

One day I looked at my Combiner Wars Devastator, which is BTW still available on Amazon, and said to myself, "He looks way too clean. Constructicons should be dirty!" And so started another project. This time to weather the crap out of Devastator and make him look like the filthy Transformer he's supposed to look like.

This was really just a simple weathering project using black and brown acrylic paint, watering it down a little, slathering it on Devastator, then wiping most of it off leaving the paint in the low areas where grime would naturally accumulate. This highlighted a lot of the detail on the figure that got washed out because it was all one color. Anyway, here are some before and after shots of the individual Constructicons.

Scavenger before.

Scavenger after. I also used an airbrush to paint the tire treads.

Destiny Hunter Knife Project

I made a thing! Officially, this is my first foamsmith prop, the Destiny Hunter Knife. I've only played Destiny a handful of times and it never really hooked me, but I wanted a small project to start with and this prop looked really cool. Can you believe this is made from a gym floor mat? It was a huge learning experience where I made a TON of mistakes and probably didn't document as well as I should have because of that. Plus I mainly followed Bill Doran's YouTube video on how to construct this prop (with a few differences), so you can check out his videos for a more in-depth look at creating foam props because he's the expert! But here was my process.

I started by getting the blueprint of the knife from punishedprops.com and it's free so anybody can go get it! I traced the pattern onto EVA foam and craft foam, glued them together with Barge, and roughly cut the shape out with a utility knife. I cut the holes with a coping saw. That was one of my first mistakes. It left a pretty jagged edge that I could never clean up that well. I should have used a forstner bit or sharpened PVC pipe as Bill suggested. Next time!

Captain America Shield Project

With Captain America: Civil War opening in the United States today, I finished this project just in time. There are more accurate shield builds out there using a satellite dish or a metal snow sled, but I wasn't ready to tackle cutting metal. So I decided to buy a plastic Captain America shield made by Rubie's and repaint it. I got the inspiration for this from Cosplay Chris who painted a child sized shield and it looked awesome! So I applied those techniques to my full sized shield. 

You'll see the costume shield is actually already pretty good looking. But I wanted to give it a very battle weathered look, as if it had been through a war, dare I say, a Civil War? Thank you, I'll show myself out...

Anyway, the back of the shield just has these small elastic straps. Those are getting replaced.

LEGO Millennium Falcon Build

Happy Star Wars day! May the Fourth be with you! I finally picked up a LEGO Millennium Falcon and boy is it shiny! Here are some photos!

BB-8 and R2-D2 Models

A few weeks ago, I bought this BB-8 and R2-D2 model set made by Bandai from Amazon. These models are 1/12 scale and pretty detailed for their size. The set is only about $27, and is fairly easy to put together. Each droid takes about an hour to assemble, and even if you didn't want to finish them, I still think they look pretty good.