First off, thank you so much everyone! The 405th is such an awesome community! I really appreciate the support. I want to apologize for the huge progress jump so I used the work we did today as the basis for a pretty basic tutorial:
Most of my work I do by eye so I don't have any formal templates. I drew the larger section onto graph paper then transferred it to the foam (draw the piece slightly bigger than you want because it will shrink when you wrap it in fabric). I then cut out and shaved down the section using scissors. I recommend using an electric knife. Scissors are a pain to achieve a smooth surfaces across larger sections (as you can see mine are pretty choppy) but they were all I had. If there were details I wanted to be maintained after fabric, I outlined them with super glue, which melted the foam and dried hard (white areas on the two bottom R pieces).
Exo-Santa
The fabric is wrapped around the foam and sewn on the back side. It isn't glued anywhere simply because I didn't have fabric glue available at the time but I imagine it would be very helpful at reducing slippage. Next I paint the part using the mesh from the side of a folding laundry basket. Lastly designs are sewn in using the machine (floating X in that last part). They are then hand stitched on to the suit.
I'm leaving to go back to the states in day so this may be the last suit update for a while, but I'll be taking up the Ma37 I abandoned once I get back to school and overhauling it with some MAS influence. As for the armor, I plan on doing some variant of a HSLD inspired Recon.
Consider:
Plan for flexibility. Even though the fabric and foam stretch, the stitching doesn't. Some parts, such as the chest and shoulders are directly connected but others, like the plates in the abdomen, are sewn into the suit so that they can separate.
Design a way "to go" without needing a full support crew.
Oh and I forgot to mention, the foam is a 1" lightweight cushion foam. Idk the exact composition. Apparently it's used for chair and headboard cushions.
Hope this helped. Thanks again for all of the support!
