Tasha’s Costuming Blog

Current Status: Planning stages

Rosso the Crimson has a very intricate costume. The sewing parts will be easy enough; I only see a few problems with things like the grill she wears at the front of her crotch, and the lighting.

The lighting is going to be easy. Many cosplayers simply stick bright blue fabric when they are cosplaying Tsviets, and it works, but I want Cally’s costume to actually light up. I discovered something called electroluminescent wire that I think I can work into the costume. Electroluminescent wire is almost as if it were created for my purpose; it requires very little power and can run on batteries, and it is cool to the touch. Perfect for costuming. It comes in a variety of colors and is relatively cheap.

I know that I can purchase the battery connectors at hobby shops, so all in all that particular problem should be easy. The only problem I think will continue to annoy me is where to hide the batteries in Rosso’s costume – it leaves very little to the imagination. Affixing the wire to the costume stumped me for a moment, and I toyed with the idea of inserting it in medical tubing and gluing the medical tubing to fabric to be sewed in, but I think that when I paint the latex on the body I can simply press some of the wire into it to make sure there’s an indentation, and hot-glue the wire itself into the costume (the wire is not exposed; the color part of it is actually a colored version of medical tubing). This way I can rip it out if it needs to be repaired with relatively little damage to the costume itself.

The problem that is perplexing me the most is the crotch plate. I don’t want to make it out of actual metal, despite how realistic it would be, because Cally would probably hurt herself. I discussed this at the Genesis Forums (A Final Fantasy VII fanfiction forum that I am a member of) and someone very nicely pointed me in the direction of a site about casting and molding in regards to cosplay. It was very helpful and can be found in my links section.

Right now, the current concept is to get a cast of Cally’s waist (I’ll probably just use paper mache for that, it doesn’t need to be permanent) and use that to create a life-size replica out of Sculpy or another sort of polymer clay, and then use liquid latex to create a mold. Once the mold is created I can figure out what I need to fill it in – I’m thinking more latex, because then we can produce a few of them and they’re disposable if they rip. I can also create hollow spots within the back of the grill to hide wiring and batteries in for her top (because she is opposed to the idea of storing the batteries in her cleavage XD).

I think I can also use liquid latex for the costume itself – I will make the costume out of regular fabric and then color it in with liquid latex. The costume is shiny at points and that’s where I’d use latex. The decorative spots I can mould out of latex and glue to the fabric before I paint it. The arm guards I can also make out of latex; the actual sewing is going to take up far less of my time than creating molds and painting latex onto things. Luckily for me, I have an in at a costume shop near where I live and can get large amounts of liquid latex for relatively cheap. I want this costume to look as realistic as possible, so I got a few shots of Rosso’s backside as well:

All this means is that I’m going to have to run some wire to the back of the costume for that one luminescent strip, and make some more latex decorations. The butt-flap, as I call it, will be easy to make out of any red, fuzzy fabric.

If you look at Rosso’s picture at the top, you’ll notice that there are two glowing points on her thumbs in the gloves. I intend to not make those glow, but cast some blue jewels with foil backing using a tutorial I found on the Internet (in my links section). I’m also going to use this and possibly some polymer clay to create the emblem on her chest. I managed to snag a pretty good screencap of it on my computer, so I think I can recreate it with a minimal of effort:

The hair seemed like it would cause a problem – as much as Cally wants to portray this bad-ass Tsviet, she was not willing to chop, dye, and otherwise mutilate her hair (understandably, the girl has amazing hair and it’d be a shame to ruin it). So I came up with the idea of getting a standard red costuming wig and, using a bust to prop it up, styling it ahead of time and shellacking it in place. Rosso’s hair almost looks fake anyway so I think it’s a reasonable compromise.

The last thing is the weapon. I don’t intend on making a weapon, unless someone can come up with a cheap, lightweight way to do it. Cally is fine with not having to carry a weapon around a busy convention.

All in all, I can’t wait for Cally to get out here so I can start doing this. I’m making my husband and mine’s costumes ahead of time so I can dedicate a full month to this costume; I suspect the actual sewing will be done within a few days, and after that it will all be decoration.