Eldritch

This is going to sound weird, and might not work on armour, but... Kitty litter. I make my own props for doing magic, and found a website long ago that explained how to age playing cards to give them an antique look. The process involved using shoe polish. The final step was to get rid of the shoe polish smell and it required burying the cards in a tray of (fresh, clean, unscented and UNUSED) kitty litter. I antiqued a pack of tarot cards, buried them in the kitty litter for a couple of days and sure enough, my cards came out without the slightest whiff of shoe polish. My only real hesitation in using kitty litter to get rid of the glue smell would be what the litter could possibly do to the armour's finish. Kitty litter is rather abrasive; it'd be like burying a piece of armour in a pile of aquarium gravel. I dunno...wrap the armour in a single layer of tissue paper or gauze or whatnot? Sounds weird, but it worked for my cards. Rob

Hey, guys. I got off work early today to be at home when the joyous event occured. No more than 45 minutes after I got home, Big Brown delivered my brand-new shiny white suit of AM armour. The box was packed extremely well (I gave it the obligatory shake and there was only the tiniest movement inside) and the pieces inside individually wrapped. In all, I cannot express how pleased I've been with AM's customer service. Tupperware rocks! The work you guys have showed through WIP's, tutorials and show-and-tell threads has prepared me well; the kit doesn't look forbidding. Involved? Yes. Tricky in places? Definitely. Time-consuming? Yup. Do-able? Oh, yes indeedy. For the record, I went ahead and got the full kit. It's going to be a slow process; I'm using the suit as a motivator to get back into shape, and have a little way to go. I want to take my time with this anyway. The helmet's gonna get done first. Having the FX bucket to build will allow me to get some helmet-building practice in over the next couple of weeks as well as giving me a second lid...I can use it at events for kids to wear in photo ops, keep as backup if something happens to my regular lid, etc. I know there are options out there for EIB-approved buckets, but I'm gonna wait to see what AM does with their new helmet. One thing I've done to is to combine the base stormtrooper CRL with the EIB (ANH Stunt) requirements. I cut and pasted the EIB requirements into a copy of the CRL, and made all the CRL "Should Have" items "required" in my version. So, as I build this armour, it'll be EIB from the get-go. Tonight's agenda: 1) Buy digital camera (I'll have it sorted out by Sunday...maybe post some pics?) 2) Read instruction manual 3) Stare at my new armour 4) Finish sewing my Tusken robe (started while waiting for armour to arrive. Am I gonna get addicted to this costuming thing?) 5) Watch Dave's Garage again Target date: June 21. Enough talk. I've got a stormtrooper to build! Regards, Rob

I found e6000 by accident today while shopping for nylon strap and snaps at Hancock Fabrics (a chain fabric store). I looked up from where the strap is kept and there it was. Wallyworld didn't have it, Lowe's didn't have it, Home Depot didn't have it... Maybe a large fabric store could be a possible backup source for ya if your Michael's is as poorly-stocked as mine is.

Well, the deed is done. Payment has been sent for a spiffy new suit of armour. Seeing as the 501st has a serious jones for photos, I'd like to contribute. However, I've never needed a digital camera nor had the need to post pictures before. I did hit the search function before posting, but all I got was something about TD's kickin' butt. While I do plan on getting dirty in the future, I didn't think that would apply. I've got access to a camera (and I guess the cable to connect it to my computer), but I'd like to know if there's a preferred method to posting photos here on the FISD forum. Would the command staff prefer that pictures be linked from a site such as Photobucket or Flickr (my first choice so far) or is it okey-dokey to upload direct from my machine ("probably not" is my guess)? I see the buttons for linking and uploading at the top of the topic menu bar thingie, so both options are, I guess, technically possible. Just tryin' to get it right the first time. Cheers! Rob