Strong World Shanks Cosplay. Fanime 2011

Strong World Shanks for Fanime 2011 marked the beginning of me actually trying to LOOK like the character instead of just making a really wacky weapon. He didn't have the sword in the statue, but he did in one of the game sprites so I decided to make it for lulz.





Sword and sheath were actually straight as per about 2/3's of the art I could find, so I made it straight! His sword was made with plywood and I beveled the edges by sanding them with a belt sander. Sheath is built like a box and is lined with cloth in order to mitigate scratching on the wooden sword's paint.





By sanding the handle round as well as the sheath I got a very nice effect. I added some plywood panels the beef up the handle.







Made the handle guards out of MDF and carved the swirl with a dremel tool. Learned tsuka-ito (Japanese handle wrapping) quickly and cobbled it together. I decided to stain the handle instead of painting it white, I am partial to wood grains on props wherever possible.



On a side note Jen made me the costume itself...and it is a SUIT JACKET made from SPANDEX. Yeah...that JUST happened.



Made a pommel out of MDF and glued it to the bottom with liquid nails then painted it! Time to work on the cannon!



So I was TOLD that if you coat foam with paint you resin won't eat it. Well...they were wrong.



I failed a couple more times too. First was the one pictured above, and 2nd was when I tried to go Foam -> Bondo. The problem with going foam -> bondo is that the foam is soft and the bondo WILL crack if ANY pressure is put onto it because it is not strong enough to bear the pressure. My final gun (the one on top) had a layer of masking tape to prevent the resin eating the foam, fiberglass matte to keep the thing rigid THEN the bondo.



I got a PVC pipe and some plumbing unions to serve as the muzzle of the cannon. Was a bit long so I had to shorten it.



Added some MDF, styrene and a doweling rod for detailing and everything went well!



 We did the scars from scar wax and nail polish, the wig was as is from an eBay seller. Not the best presented project, but was a great stepping stone. Debuted at Fanime 2011!!! Questions, comments, concerns? Let me know in the comments!