This cosplay started off with the idea of creating just a normal Shinra Soldier. I mainly wanted to build the Buster sword after I designed a pretty good blueprint for it. If I had the time, I'd gather the materials to make Cloud's outfit. When Saboten 2015 hit, I didn't have enough time, so I debuted it as-is. Two months later at AZ Fanfest 2015, I completed the outfit as Zack Fair. Though back at that time, the pauldron's were of a different style. For Taiyoucon 2016, I re-designed the Pauldron's to be more Samurai-esque, to give my Zack Fair it's on flair.
To start off, the items I had to buy were the boots, pants, turtleneck, suspenders, gloves, and wig.
The boots were custom ordered. I forget off which site. But the site sold them as Zack Fair replica boots, and when I received them, they were pretty spot on. Unofrtunately, as for most cosplay boots, these were uncomfortable to wear for me, due to my flat feet. Gel inserts sort of helped, but my feet swelled up most of the time and the boots were harder to get off after a long day of conning. These boots served me multiple purposes for future cosplays, so I'm getting my mileage out of them.
The pants and turtleneck I bought at a Goodwill. Luckily they matched each other's colors. The turtleneck of course needed to have the sleeves cut. At this point, I didn't have any sewing experience, so the sides were left frayed, which is okay because it gave the costume a ragged look.
Suspenders, you kind of need to invest in. I went through two pairs of cheap ebay ones and decided to get thicker ones for the third time. If you get thin suspenders, they will snap after day one of a con.
The gloves are Seibertron Motorcycle gloves you can get for around $10 to $12, and they look pretty badass because of their integrated armor into the fabric. If you plan on having a lot of cosplays that involve motorcycle type gloves, I highly recommend Seibertron.
The wig was ordered via Amazon, and labeled as a Kingdom Hearts wig. I don't remember the character, as I am not a hardcore fan of the series, but the image looked pretty close to what I needed. Styling the wig was easier than I thought, though it took a couple of tries since I didn't know the proper amount of hairspray I needed to keep the spikes solid throughout the day. It's highly suggested to use Got2Be Hairspray. It's a yellow can, and holds very well.
Moving on to the items created from scratch, the Armor pieces were made of Eva Foam, particularly the High Impact Mat foam. This foam can be found at a typical walmart or hardware store. I buy them in rolls of 10 feet, at Harbor Freight, as they sell it the cheapest, and at the appropriate thickness that's the best for armor pieces. Using a heat gun, I formed the curves of all the pieces, then sprayed plasti-dip on each piece. I then used a light coat of silver spray paint to give it a clouded metal look, then touched up with brushing the edges with gunmetal acrylic paint to give a scratched edge look. I covered all the pieces with Clear Satin spray paint to protect the paint underneath. A final touch I added was an engraved Shinra Logo on the left Pauldron. I printed out the design, and used the "pumpkin carving" technique of poking holes along the design, over the eva foam. I then used my Soldering Iron and burned into the Eva foam, connecting each of the dots properly. Foam is very sensitive to heat, so the slightest mistake can lead to disaster. One piece of advice I can give on engraving foam with a soldering iron, is to start engraving right away while the iron is still getting hot. Rather than going in hot, you can get your steady hand used to how light you need to apply the iron.
I used a series of utlity straps to attache the armor pieces together to make the pauldrons. Utility straps were used to attach the pauldrons to the suspenders, as well as wrapping the ends to my biceps. Invest in a lot of Velcro, as it will be your friend for a lot of cosplays in the future.
The belt was also made of the same Eva foam as the pauldrons. The SOLDIER design was created with a thinner craft foam, and super glued to the belt.
The Buster Sword, was the most time consuming build for this cosplay. It's basically built using thin balsa wood as it's core and styrofoam to thicken it's size. I basically sandwiched the balsa wood with styrofoam, then created a wooden hilt that would stable the wood core. it took me a couple of tries, but I came up with a design that would be less top heavy, so the hilt can withstand the length of the sword. Since the styrofoam basically dissolves when spray paint is applied, I applied Liquid Nail all over the blade. This is what took the most time. Once the foam is cut out to the proper dimensions, I applied a thin coat of liquid nail, let it dry for a couple of hours, turn the sword over and repeat for the other side. After both sides were applied with liquid nail, I sanded to smooth out the blade, then repeated the liquid nail process. I repeated this process over and over and over until there was a proper thickness to the coating that could withstand a light impact, but still be light to swing around. Now that there was a layer over the foam, i was able to spray paint the blade. I am very proud in how this sword turned out. It's one of my biggest accomplishments as a cosplayer. Even though I have new and better ideas on how to implement the same build, I still love this sword. It's one of the props I will forever hold attachment to.
