Pictured with me is the beautiful Rana in her Samara costume :)

...but are they worth 25,000 credits?

A world worth fighting for...

Wore Shepard at Fanime today :) Overall I'm very happy with it! I could always nitpick it, but that's the case with any costume.

It may be a while before I get any glamour shots taken/posted, so these will have to do for now.

Used my friend's sewing machine this morning to sew the lining to the jacket, and I just now finished hand-stitching the lining shut along the bottom and the sleeve. My friend did one sleeve on the drive up to Berkeley :)

Still To Do:

I'm feeling a lot better than I did last night. This is definitely a good thing :)

Commander Shepard: Road Block...

The guts of my sewing machine jammed tonight. No movement on the pedal or by hand. I got through finishing the front detail and refining a bit of the satin stitch, but my to do list is long enough that the only way I'll be able to wear this at the con would be to borrow my friend's machine for the next few nights...

We're going to Berkeley for a night, then a friend's place for a night, then Fanime. So much traveling... While I'm excited to go and I'm ready for this vacation, I'm also tired and stressing and sad right now.

I'm going to go to bed and set an early alarm so I can take care of packing/cleaning and head over to my friend's place and maybe get some more work on the coat done.

Real Quick To-Do List for Shep

I can't even think straight enough to put together a packing list... 'night all...

Front detail work tonight, need to buy another thing of bias tape after work tomorrow :)

I had to sew the sleeves shut after opening them up to satin-stitch the forearm detail, and holy crap I forgot how quick a sewing machine can be. Have I mentioned how much I love sewing machines?

No costume is complete without a shouting match with the sewing machine. This time it was pretty much my fault. I have found satin stitching to be pretty sensitive with regards to how much thread is on the bobbin, and when it was getting low the top thread wasn't catching with the bottom. Thus, shouting match.

I'm not the happiest with the stitching I've done. I have a half a mind to go over some of the white a second time, but I'm honestly not sure I'll have the time. I still need to match and install the lining, in addition to buttons/snaps/closing items and the front design piece.

Sleep beckons so I can get to work and not be dead tired... not gonna lie, I'm really really tempted to take an extra day off (if they let me) so I can be happy with this costume and still have time to pack.

Oh yeah, the plastic ring that keeps my dress form up cracked so I have to put it up on a table or chair -shrug-

I have watched so much Buffy today, you have no idea...

I love weekends! No progress yesterday/Friday due to getting a haircut (yes, I'm going to match my first-run fem!Shep :) ) and seeing The Avengers a second time in IMAX/3D. Definitely recommend IMAX, don't recommend 3D.

I've been pretty happy with the appliqué process so far, although I've forgotten about how long satin stitching takes... the back-and-forth movement of the needle is a bit hypnotizing and I can't afford to lose focus. The back piece is a bit less than half ironed-on, and while I was a bit worried about the side wing things, I think they'll turn out okay.

I still have a lot to do, but assuming I don't get a later start tomorrow (like I did today), I should be in good shape to getting this done :)

I'm hitting that point in this costume where I start to lose confidence. Not that I won't get it done, but that I won't be happy with it when I am.

There are two (maybe three) techniques I'm considering to add the giant color panels: actually seam it in (the top two, and if there's a word for this, please tell me) or cleaning up the edges and sewing it directly on (the bottom two). The former option could get very complicated very quickly, but has a better result. The latter will essentially add layers upon layers and won't be nearly as clean visually, and since the jacket is already going to be lined... well, let's just say this is going to be a very warm costume. The third kind-of technique would be to just use heat-and-bond to get it all on, but I'd be worried about making sure the edges were clean... I may use a combination of the second technique and heat-and-bond...

Scratch the nerves, I think I've figured it out! All I need to do is buy copious amounts of heat-and-bond. I can have my clean seams, but I'll still be pretty warm, which I think I'l be fine with if it looks good. I need to make some test panels (like what is pictured) to be sure, but yay!

Another lovely challenge for myself: since I want to have it shaped to fit my body properly, I have the lovely bit of making flat cloth fit a curved pattern. It'll be easier than fitting paper because cloth can actually stretch and move, but that doesn't mean I'm not nervous about actually getting everything installed.

Still need to buy/mod pants (I need a nice new dress-pair anyway) and find/buy a skin tight black shirt, maybe Under Armor to help keep cool.

Sorry about the excessive amount of typing today, thanks for sticking with it if you made it this far :)

Tried the thinner edging... didn't like it so much, so I'm going to stick with the thicker bias tape, which should also be easier to use.

Started chalking out the larger designs on the jacket. These will be installed before adding the lining, but to be perfectly honest I still need to research haven't figured out the which method I'm going to use...

Shaping this front piece is a pain in the butt. I’m still not super happy with it, but after I make a tracing paper pattern with it I’m going to try using narrower white strip (to simulate the bias tape). Right now I’m using 1/2”, but I really want to get this right.

Chores got in the way of any significant progress, so here, have my favorite reference pictures! This is my first run through fem!Shep, Jon.  My male!Shep is named Jane… Clever, no?

Got a late start today. Thought I'd play 1-2 hours of my renegade male!Shep play through of ME1, but instead played closer to 5-6 :X I also have to work tomorrow, so I have to head to bed early (I have to wake up at 4:10... ugh). The next UGC Highlander season is starting relatively soon so I'll have to start balancing my time a bit better.

Anywho, trimmed the jacket's outer layer and now I'm working on patterning the black stripe detail. In hindsight I should've trimmed less so I have a bit more flexibility, but I'm not too concerned... here's hoping I don't eat those words later...

Woo tracing paper!

Today was pockets and sleeves and marking where cloth needs to be cut day. I'll do the trim cuts when I'm more awake and more sober tomorrow.

PS I hate sleeves

Off to TF2!

Today I saw the Avengers SO GOOD worked on the lining. I got the pieces sewn together, then fitted in the same way as the jacket. I chose to use that shade of blue for the lining because even though Cerberus is more aligned with the Renegade choices, I played as Paragon on my first run through. I don't know if anyone will even see it, but I want to be able to open my jacket when I get too warm and not worry about fuzzy seams.

Yay progress! I could continue working on it tonight, but frankly I'd like to play some video games, most likely TF2.

Today I narrowed down what the exact size I need patches to be and cleaned up the top layer of the jacket. I had to take in the side seams, the seams at the top at the shoulder, and add darts to the back. The front is still pretty boring so far, so just a picture of the back today.

One of the downsides about working with black fabric is that it can make for some pretty boring progress pictures xD I look forward to getting a lot done this weekend, because I'm really happy with how this is coming so far.

...just because I said that, I'm going to run into some bizarre hurdles I didn't even anticipate >_>

Nothing done with cloth today, but I did make forward progress!

A friend of mine has an embroidery machine, and she is helping me out by letting me commission the patches for Shepard's uniform (3 cerberus logos, and the circle design on her back) as long as I get the vector/.png images to her. I managed to find a vector/.png of the Cerberus logo on DeviantArt (here, if you're interested), and I floundered about with Photoshop Elements 3 trying to make vectors until I got frustrated. I did a bit of google searching and found a freeware program called Inkscape and managed to make the circle design myself :)

Woot!