Fast forwards four and half months to a few weeks ago … After months of being unhappy that I never got to fully finish my costume, it was time to start work on the costume again. The first step was to start masking off the hard armor for the final coat of paint, which as to be a dark brown similar to the brown material used on the vest and the cape.

Masking off the armor for third coat of paint …

Once masked, it was time to paint the armor brown …

And after a long, long, long task of masking the armor with tape and then peeling the tape after the final coat was applied, I had finally achieved the 3-color tiger stripe camouflage pattern that I had inked in my original marker renderings.

So although I wasn’t able to get the third coat of paint on for the 3-color tiger stripe camouflage pattern, I decided to wear the costume out on Halloween anyway. Needless to say, I had several comments that I looked like a zebra or even a cow. And although this may be true, it also lends itself to creating even more back story to the character of the costume. Perhaps the color scheme matched the skin of a Krayyt dragon species that roamed the deserts of Tatooine. And just maybe this particular Mando had to paint his armor that way to appear as young Krayyt while out in the field … to blend in to avoid detection while sniping Tusken Raiders off in the distance …

But before it was ready to wear I still needed to do some weathering to the hard armor parts. This was done by bashing the armor against rocks and concrete walls, as well as taking razor blades and scraping through the coats of paint to allow the metal to show through. This was done rather haphazardly so as to replicate battle damage.

Here I am wearing the costume to the annual Halloween party at Fender …

So this would be the state the costume would stay in for the next four and a half months …

Since I have zero sewing ability I leaned very heavily on Lance’s girlfriend, Joanne, to create my armor vest, ammo cartridge leg string, and cape. She is truly an amazing talent and should be working as either a costume designer or fashion designer as a full-time gig. There is no question she has the skills to do it. Not to mention, Joanne had already completed the task of creating several (like 6 or 7) vests for the previous group of Mando”ade.

After buying the various material early on in my armor project, I spent several late evenings with Joanne and Lance as we custom-tailored the vest to fit me perfectly. The most interesting part about the vest is that the style used on it is the same amongst most of the Dune Sea Garrison Mandalorians. Thus, making us truly appear as though we all come from the same clan.

Here is a picture of the final vest, complete with all of the velcro which the armor plates will attach to …

Here is a picture of the leg string that holds my ammo cartridges. This was made from some of the black nylon strapping that I picked up at the gun show. This stuff was great because it was vintage – nice and worn in.

And finally, the cape. This was created from two linen laundry bags I picked up at the military surplus store. They were cheap, like $7 each, and worked perfectly in terms of material. The secondary colored cloth was left over cloth from the trim on the vest. I really wanted the two-tone feel to go with the camouflage, and I really liked what Lance and Joanne had done with Lance’s cape so we went with a similar setup.

The cape would be able to be worn as a regular cape, or be draped around the front to work as a poncho. I really liked the idea of having a poncho, similar to that of Clint Eastwood Once all of the measurements were made and the fabric was sewn, Joanne placed two eyelets on either shoulder of the cape so that it could be attached to the metal shoulder and neck armor via two leather laces. The only thing left here was the weathering.

The cape …

The only thing left now was the weathering. This was taken care of while at Jen (SL-) and Joe’s (TC-) house during the day of armor dishing. Their son J.T. took my vest, burying in the sand, dirt and mud; followed by some good ‘ole bashing against a concrete wall. Lance, on the other hand, decided to play tug of war with Jen and Joe’s dogs, using my cape!

Weathering the soft parts …

Once the armor was dished and formed, it was on to painting. Again, I would be painting the pieces with the 3-color tiger stripe camouflage pattern. The first coat was black, followed by the light tan. Unfortunately, time and the lack of adequate sunlight to bake the paint only allowed for the black and light tan coats to be applied before I simply ran out of time. Remember, my goal was to have a finished costume by Halloween …

Armor with first coat of black paint …

Next, a lot of masking in preparation of the light tan coat of paint. Again, I would use the torn paper method for masking off the tiger stripe pattern.

Armor with masking for second coat of paint …

Second coat of light tan paint applied …

The result? A 2-color tiger strike camouflage that ended up looking more like a zebra …

Once cut, it was time to start forming the metal and dishing it to the proper curvatures to fit my body shape. If you don’t have any experience with metal working and shaping, I would suggest practicing with scrap pieces of metal. But, since I was on a time crunch, I had Lance (TK-2035) handle all of the dishing. He had already helped several other members dish their armor, and he had a vast amount of knowledge from building SCA armor. Who better to have help?

In retrospect, I wish that we would have had more time to work on the metal forming, as it would have made for a good learning experience and a chance to pick up a skill that may prove to be valuable in the future. But the time crunch really inhibited that possibility. Fortunately, the fact that I had my armor cut from 20ga aluminum proved to be a blessing in disguise. Initially, it was thought that the thinness of the metal would make for flimsy and unrealistic armor; the only benefit being that it would be light to wear. However, since the metal was so thin, it was very malleable and Lance was able to form and dish all of the armor in one day! So while Lance dished metal, I ran each piece through the bench grinder to smooth off the edges and the overall finish of the metal.

Lance dishing armor while I grind down the edges of the armor plates …