Star Wars BB-8 Costume for Child

Our Halloween trio this year was Star Wars droids: C-3PO, R2-D2, and BB-8!

The BB-8 costume base is made from paper mâché, with a resin coat to provide smoothness/extra strength and decorated with paint, aluminum foil and recycling bin items for details.

The elements of our BB-8 costume:

- body (paper mâché sphere with small opening for head and large opening for legs)

- head (paper mâché half-sphere with bicycle helmet)

Yoga/exercise ball as a base for paper mâché body

Latex balloon as base for paper mâché head

Saran Wrap

Newspaper

Elmer’s Glue

Wood Glue (TiteBond III) https://www.homedepot.com/p/Titebond-III-16-oz-Ul...

Inexpensive Brushes and Plastic tubs to mix paper mâché (and fiberglass resin, if using)

Fiberglass Resin https://www.homedepot.com/p/3M-Bondo-1-qt-All-Pur... *optional

Sandpaper

White spray paint

Bicycle helmet

Scissors

Aluminum Foil

Butcher paper

Box cutter/X-Acto knife

Hot glue gun/hot glue

Paint pen (black)

Paint (white, orange, silver, black, brown)

Miscellaneous recyclables used for details:

Kebab Skewers (antennae)

Electrical tape (antennae)

Aluminum foil

Plastic spherical lid (ours came from some baked goods, but clear plastic ornaments could also be used)

Plastic bottle cap (for smaller camera base)

Plastic egg carton (for smaller camera top)

Plastic Wiggle Eyes (for smaller camera top)

Bicycle lights/small battery-operated “rave” lights

Clear marker cap (used for front light)

Inflate yoga ball to desired size for body, wrap completely with saran wrap (helps a LOT in easing off the paper mâché when dried); inflate balloon to desired size for head, cover top half in petroleum jelly

- Tear newspaper into 1-2 inch strips

- Mix paper mâché glue - I mostly used watered down Elmer's Glue, but also used watered down wood glue for my last three or so layers for added strength

- Lay newspaper strip onto yoga ball and cover with paper mâché glue, continue until the entire top 3/4 of the yoga ball is fully covered in newspaper and paper mâché *the bottom hole is where the costume will be entered and can be left open

- Lay newspaper strip onto top half of balloon and cover with paper mâché glue, continue until the entire top 1/2 of the balloon is fully covered in newspaper and paper mâché

- Let dry fully, then repeat until you have 4-7 layers of paper mâché -- I alternated horizontal and vertical strips with each layer

- When paper mâché is fully dry, carefully deflate the yoga ball and balloon - trim edges so they are neat; cut out top hole for head

- For added strength and smoothness, coat with fiberglass resin (do this outside in a well ventilated area and mix a little bit of resin as you go, it starts to harden as soon as the solution is mixed; also note the working temperature, as fiberglass resin needs to set at specific temperatures) *this is optional, but really adds to the smoothness of the BB-8 costume

- After resin is fully dry, sand and clean well

- Spray paint the body and head white - apply 3-4 coats (allowing to thoroughly dry in between coats) for full coverage

Orange circles:

Use butcher paper to plan out body details - it helped to cut out the six circles and tape to the surface to ensure spacing/sizing was correct before moving forward **I painted an entire set of too-small orange circles because I didn't plan this step out -- don't make the same error I did!

Each orange circle was traced by first tracing the outermost circle, then centering the inside "cross" pattern/negative space pattern and tracing

After all the orange shapes are traced, paint with 3-4 coats of orange paint, letting coats thoroughly dry

Aluminum details:

Using reference photos and scrap paper cut to size, sketch out each of the aluminum details

Glue sheets of aluminum foil onto paper (to add strength)

Overlay pattern onto the paper-backed foil sheets and trace -- the imprint will comes through onto the foil

Cut out aluminum foil details, affix with Elmer's glue

Finishing:

Trace all elements with black paint pen and add in any other details (rivets, lines on aluminum details)

Coat with Mod Podge (this will seal in the aluminum details) -- I also added a "rusty" effect at this stage by including some brown streaks of paint along with the Mod Podge

Add foam pads to where shoulders will be in costume for more comfort

Using various bowls/tupperware, trace circles along the top center of the head with pencil -- sketch out where each of the "panels" should be

Cut corresponding shape out of paper-backed aluminum foil. Due to the curvature of the head, I cut this "ring" into four pieces and glued them on separately to ensure the piece would lay against the curves of the head

Paint orange line under foil element and along the base of the head

Trace aluminum foil elements and orange elements with black paint pen

Apply Mod Podge to entire head, adding streaks of brown paint for "rust" effect

Large camera eye:

- paint inside of plastic half sphere black (ours was from playfoam pals case, but a half of a clear plastic ornament would work as well)

- hot glue to corresponding spot on head (it helps to also stack cardboard or foam on the inside of the sphere so that there is more than just the edge of the sphere to glue onto the head)

Small camera eye:

- cut out one "cup" from plastic egg carton, paint inside black

- paint wiggle eye black

- hot glue wiggle eye to the base of the painted plastic egg carton cup

- add cardboard/foam to the inside of the plastic egg carton cup -- this will help affix the cup to the bottle cap

- hot glue painted plastic egg carton cup to black plastic lid

- hot glue to corresponding spot on head

Front light:

- cut out hole on helmet (with a dremel tool) in corresponding spot (under large camera eye)

- create a light housing out of a clear cylinder (I used a clear marker cap); affix bicycle light or other mini battery powered light

- tape well to prevent light from leaking to inside of helmet

- hot glue in place

Helmet:

- hot glue bicycle helmet to inside of head to make it wearable **if I were re-doing this costume, I would first paint the inside of the head black so the newspaper wouldn't show

Antennae:

- paint kebab sticks white (one antennae is longer/thinner with a black top and one of shorter/thicker with a white top)

- wind black electrical tape along top of longer/thinner kebab stick, hot glue end in place

- wind thin strip of white gaffers tape along the top of the shorter/thicker kebab stick

- drill holes in corresponding spot on head, insert kebab sticks and secure with hot glue

We paired the costume with black/gray tights and any top (it won't show!)

Put body on -- arms will be enclosed in the body (we considered putting arm holes, but we thought the effect of BB-8 being fully round was a better look!

Put on head

**A fun part of this costume was the ability for our BB-8 to "tuck" into her costume: when posing for photos, she would kneel with her legs inside the body of the costume and tuck her head down a bit -- this really created the illusion of a spherical BB-8! She would even rock back and forth a bit, bobbing her head around to mimic BB-8's movements

Get together with your Star Wars crew and have a Happy Halloween!