How to Make a Big Hero 6: "Hiro Hamada" Costume

After the Big Hero 6 movie came out, we were inspired to create the team to show off at 2015 Chicago Comic and Entertainment Expo. My friend is fairly tiny, so we appointed him to be our Hiro. The costume itself is pretty "easy" and comfortable in comparison to the other outfits.

Costume is for sale. Please write spicypandacreations@gmail.com for inquiries. $100 + shipping includes all armor pieces and helmet. Will fit a child or petite adult.

so with that, let's get started!

Materials

- Eva foam

-craft foam

- black capri pants

-black long sleeve shirt

-black converse high tops

-cardboard

-hot glue

-elastic

-worbla (optional)

-bondo

-black ski gloves

- caulk

- black plastic clips

-exacto knife

-heating gun

-acrylic paint

-Wig (optional)

-red fabric

-Modge Podge

1)For the chest, take your tape measure and measure from the shoulder to the bottom of your rib cage. Now add on 1 more inch to the width. From there, cut out that measured rectangle out of the scratch paper.

2) fold it in half, draw in your template and then start cutting out the general shape from the folded paper (pic 1). When you unfold it, you should have the front piece (pic 2) *this pics is not the actual chest plate, but the concept is the same.

3) do the same process for the back. (pic 3)

4) Cut these out from the EVA foam (pic 4).

5) From there, press the chest AND back foam pieces onto the person. The reason you added an extra inch to the width is so that you can make the fitting flush. Overlap the side flaps of the chest over the side flaps of the back piece. Mark off the excess foam and cut them off. (pic 5)

6). Glue your plastic buckles onto both sides and clip them in. (pic 6)

7). From there, cut the back piece in half where the crease is. The reason for this is that your back is not perfectly flat. It will look nicer if the armor is more contoured to your body. (pic 7)

8) Just as you overlapped the side pieces, overlap the two back pieces till they are nice and contoured to the shape of your body. Mark and cut them to the correct shape. Now glue them together.(pic 8 + 9)

9) now get more foam and put it into the shoulder sections. I just took some extra foam, placed it in the vacant gap where the shoulder strap would be, mark it, and then cut it. Glue in place once completed.

9) From there, grab your paper templates and draw in your extra details, such as extra plating, pectoral pieces, etc.. Basically anything that you want elevated.. You can use either craft foam or EVA foam, depending how thick you want it to be. cut out those sections(pic 10 , 11)

Shoulders

1) To make your shoulders, you want to cut out a giant tear drop shape from your scratch paper

2) use that template and cut it out of foam. save that paper template though (pic 1)

3) grab your heating gun and heat both sides of the shoulder.

4) while hot, press the teach drop shaped eva foam into a ceramic bowl to get a nice dome shape.

5. Cut out little circles and attach them to the front of the teardrop pieces.

6 Attach them onto the chest pieces with elastic strips

7) i took some worbla and secured the elastic down on the inside of the suit

8) this is how it should look at this point (pic 3 and 4)

Collar

1) i just took some extra foam and lined it up to the space around the neck line. (pic 5)

2) don't forget to add a clip to the back to get your head in and out. (pic 6)

Knee Pads

1) I usually use a paper template with everything nowadays. draw out your template first from a square. i think i cut off the corners to give it an octagon shape

2) cut out two octagons from EVA foam

3) Take your foam octagons and concave them by heating them up with your heating gun, pressing them into a ceramic bowl, and letting it cool into a bowl shape.

4) use a circle template (i used a large jar lid) and cut 2 circles out of craft foam

5) glue the circles onto the center of the the EVA bowls

6) you can create lines and graphics in the foam by cutting into the foam with an exacto knife and hitting up the cut. the cut will expand from the heat.

7) attach elastic on each side.

Belt

-Hiro's belt is fairly simple. It's just a strip of EVA foam and a rectangular buckle. If you can, put the separation in the back because no one will see it for pictures. (pic 1)

-For the pouches, i just took some EVA foam and made essentially a cube. For the tops (colored green in picture), i took some craft foam and wrapped it over the body of the pouch. (pic 2)

Stripes

- We got lazy for the stripes, so we used some sewing tape (which is like double sided tape).. we took our red fabric and ironed it onto the shirt. (pic 3)

-remember that there are 2 stripes per arm. (pic 4)

1) I made a cylinder with the EVA foam to make a wide-sized arm gauntlet.

2. Glue it together

3) I cut a little area out where his elbow joint is. (pic 1)

4) cut an "O" out of the EVA foam and put it at the top of the arm guantlet. Make sure the inner part of the "O" is big enough to get your forearm through, but small enough that your arm doesn't wiggle around too much in the gauntlet.

5) cut out a back hand protector from EVA foam and glue it onto the edge of the EVA cylinder. (pic 1)

6) grab your craft foam and add a wide layer down the middle of the gauntlet (color blue in pic 2),..

7)cut segments out of craft foam and glue it onto the craft foam from step 6. It is still colored blue in pic 2

8) Create a strap (color pic) to go across the gauntlet

9) cut out two red circles from craft foam and glue them onto the palm of the winter glove. (pic 3)

10) paint ALL foam with modgepodge glue and then paint designated colors. Seal again with modgepodge (pic 4 + 5)

1. You want to take your eva foam to make the helmet. I find it easiest to use the crown method that i have done with cardboard.. you are making this out of foam though.. From here, you are using a sharpie and just eyeballing the general shape and counters of the helmet. its like creating a puzzle, but with foam pieces.. cut away things you don't want, and just keep adding where you do want. (pic 1 and 2)

2. Once you have the foam helmet, hot glue the foam helmet with cardboard. this is because you will have to bondo the helmets to give it a hard exterior. i wasn't sure that bondo would stick to foam well, so i went with a cardboard shell first. (pic 3)

3). once completed, start bondo-ing the cardboard helmet. just keep adding layers of bondo, sanding, and repeat until you are satisfied.(pic 4, 5,6) 4) once you have the base of the helmet, it should look like a motor cycle helmet.

1) For Hiro, he has the ears on each side. I first drew up a paper template and then cut it out of EVA foam. (pic 1)

2) I dremeled the edges and then i used a exacto knife and heat gun to expand the cut on the circle portion of it. (pic 2)

3. i thought that EVA would probably bend with us being so active so i worbla'ed each ear. that way, it was nice and hard (pic 3 + 4).

4) glue each ear to the side of the helmet and then fill in the gap with caulk.

5) make a paper template of the detain section. (pic 5)

6) cut out the templates from your craft foam and glue in place (pic 6)

7) this is what the helmets should look like. don't forget the very front face decals. (pic 7)

- you can use caulk to fill in any gaps of spaces in your foam.

-ALL foam pieces should be painted first with modge podge glue to seal it. Foam is pretty absorbent, so it's just wasteful to paint directly on it. You can use several layers of elmer's glue also if needed. Of you can plastidip all the pieces..

-paint all parts the designated colors

- style your wig before your put on your helmet

More current projects at Spicy Panda Creations on Facebook.

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