How to Make Links Deku Shield out of EVA Foam for your Legend of Zelda Cosplay

com now one thing to know is that this shield is scaled for young link so it’s about and a half inches wide about 16 inches tall so if you need your shield bigger be sure to scale your pdf up once my shield template was cut out it was traced onto some 10 millimeter hd foam with a pencil before i start cutting the foam i always sharpen my knives to make sure i get the cleanest cuts possible now to get this shield to the correct thickness it’s first off going to be made up of two layers of 10 millimeter foam the first one is cut out very close to line because this is going to be the base for the shield now this second piece needs to be slightly smaller just to give it a tiered appearance so after i have this piece rough cut i mark it in about a half an inch all the way around the perimeter and then cut this foam away at an angle it’s important to cut this foam away now because i’m going to fill this gap with foam clay later on to adhere these two pieces together i’m going to be using some weld wood contact cement this adhesive is applied generously to both sides and a heat gun is used to speed up the dry process now because the seam needs to be pretty tight i’m going to put a bead of super glue around the edge before the two halves are pressed together once the glue is good to go the two halves are firmly pressed together and a pvc pipe is used as a rolling pin to get even distribution with the main section of the shield now set aside to cure i can start working on the template for the bark now i really want this shield to have an organic look with lots of layers and textures and so rather than making it like the hd version on super smash brothers with as simple as painted on i would like the symbol to look as though it’s cut out so to start this process i sharpen my pencil and trace the outline of this template onto the stacked foam this is then taken over to my sanding station for refinement using a medium grit sanding drum on my Fordom rotary tool i knock down the sides of the foam and i start to add the wood grain texture now at this point it’s very basic no major details in it i just want some good ground work for my foam clay later on now for the symbol in the middle i want it to look as though they used a scoop chisel to knock this out so to achieve this look i’m constantly rotating the shield and using just the very top tip of the sanding drum i’m also making sure to vary the size and the depth to give it that hand carved look with the front refined it leads to this point i can now start working on the back the wood texture on the back has achieved just like i had done for my viking shield and if you notice i don’t have this marked out i just kind of let the drum do what it needs to do that way it seems less planned and it looks more organic now just like the front you want to make sure to vary your lines and the depths once i have most of the thicker lines taken care of i then switch over to a smaller stone bit to add some more detailed lines this process will get us pretty close to the final look but i’ve got a few more tricks up my sleeve all right now it’s time to take care of the seam but before i do that i use my heat gun to seal off all the foam foam clay is going to be used to smooth this transition between these two pieces that are glued together using my hands and some silicone tip tools this will look virtually seamless in the end now for those of you that haven’t used foam clay before the first thing you want to do is wet the surface with some water this will allow the foam clay to adhere properly and i don’t add a whole bunch of clay at once i pull off small bits and add them just along the seam line once the seam is pretty much covered i can then go in with some silicone tipped sculpting tools and follow those lines that i created earlier with the sanding drum and in this type of application this is where foam clay works really well taking your time and slowly working around the piece you can really get some interesting organic shapes now if you notice i added more foam clay that i needed and i did this for two reasons the first is that the foam clay will shrink a little bit as the moisture wicks out and the second is that after 24 hours i’m going to go back and sand this down to make this seam more uniform so while the foam clay gets set aside to dry i can start working on the piece that will make up the bark my template for this is transferred onto some six millimeter hd foam and cut out with a scalpel blade notice i have lots of ridges on the top and on the bottom these are going to be great markers for me to add texture to the bark later on now while i’m cutting this i am trying to follow my template and be detailed and careful but if it doesn’t match exactly it’s no big issue again we want this to have that hand carved look after 24 hours the foam clay is dried and now i can attach the bark to the main section of the shield the majority of the area will be covered with contact cement but i’ll be using a bead of super glue all along the perimeter this will keep the build clean and will make sure all these little edges stay down the bar can now be placed onto the shield and you can see how it looks against the exposed wood and how it rounds over on the sides now it’s time to add texture to the bark and i’m going to use all these jagged little points at the top and the bottom as a guide as to where the details need to go i mark the main detail lines that i want to accent with a pencil and then use a small sandy drum to remove the foam now remember when you’re doing this always be rotating your piece that will vary the cut into the foam and not make it look so uniform so for this process i’m constantly adding lots of little different textures i go around the cut and i start to add the battle damage now this is a technique that i’ve been playing with and it turned out to work great i’m going to use wire brushes to add some vertical striations this larger brush specifically added some really my new details to the bark that you would not have been able to create otherwise i want the handle for the shield to be pretty robust so i cut down part of a metal yard marker this piece can then be bent and pressed into the foam to check for fit once i determine that it works it’s traced onto some bristol board and then i sketch out the final handle this metal bar is going to be sandwiched in between two pieces of 10 millimeter hd foam to get the desired thickness so just like the main section of the shield contact cement is used along with some super glue and these two pieces could be firmly pressed together the excess foam can then be trimmed away and i used my dremel rotary tool to also give this kind of a hand carved look now remember link is left handed so this shield is designed to go on the right hand super glue is added to the exposed foam and the handle can be pressed into the shield the handle is now secured and it’s not going anywhere i’m really happy with how this turned out to make the armband i cut a strip of six millimeter hd foam approximately two and a half inches wide the strap placement is marked onto the shield and then i use a smooth sanding drum on my dremel rotary tool to round over all the edges i’m going to be adding the tinfoil leather technique to this foam by heating the foam up and pressing the tinfoil into it i’ll have a link for the original video up above so you can check that out but this process always gives a great subtle texture using a pencil and mark on the top and the bottom of the strip exactly where the glue is going to go then after gluing one end down i insert a roll of paper towels to get the correct curve for the strap now you can always vary this process depending on the size that you’re going to need for your arm but since this is going to be a display piece this will work fine using a 15 millimeter hole punch i’m going to be making some faux rivets now if you don’t have a hole punch you could sharpen a metal pipe or just cut them by hand the edges of the fake rivets are knocked down with a sanding drum and then just glued into place it’s been a little over a full day so now i can start to address the foam clay that’s been covering the seam i start by knocking down the majority of it with a smooth sanding drum on my dremel rotary tool then using the very edge of the sanding drum i followed the lines that i had made earlier on to make it look seamless with construction of the shield complete i can do a light heat treatment over the entire surface and then move on to sealing and painting i’m always looking for safer non-toxic alternatives for my art projects so this time around i’m going to be using creature cast which is a neoprene rubber that can be brushed on or airbrushed now right out of the jug the semi-rigid is pretty thin so i’m going to be using this neo fix to thicken it up just a little bit this consistency will definitely help me brush it on but it won’t destroy any of my details i paint the creature cast onto the surface using a chip brush pulling in the direction of the grain to make sure that it gets down into all the details creature cast adheres to the foam really well and because it is a neoprene this is going to be a very strong surface now it is possible with the thickening agent that this could build up some and leave some brush strokes if you didn’t want to deal with that you can just run this directly through an airbrush what’s also cool about this material is that after a couple layers of put down you can even wet sand it for a smoother finish one thing i’d like to note is unlike plasti-dip where you have to let it dry for quite a while before it’s really ready to use this is almost more like an acrylic paint you can even speed up the dry time with a hair dryer here on the armband i laid down an excess amount of the creature cast and then stippled that to give it an additional texture another thing i like about this product is you can tell when it’s still wet because it’ll be light gray when it completely dries it’ll be black to start the painting process i’m going to be using some liquitex heavy body unbleached titanium for the exposed wood parts in the beginning this is laid down with a one inch mop brush and it’s pretty watered down this is just a base layer for all the additional acrylics to adhere to i’ll also point out the paints in general stick really well to the creature cast now it’s time to start defining the darker shades for the wood and to do that i’m going to be using utrecht brand burnt sienna and raw sienna these colors are mixed together with the unbleached titanium and a little bit of the mars black here you can see the different variations in the brown and that’s good it gives a lot of different contrasts and colors to it and i usually tend to work from dark to light this paint mixture is painted on the top and bottom of the shield on the front and the entire back and then a hair dryer is used to lock it all in for the bark on the front of the shield these same colors are also used i just add additional burnt sienna and mars black for a darker tone and by using these same colors throughout the entire piece it unifies it and keeps it within the same color family the one inch mop brush is used to paint this mixture across the entire surface and then a little bit lighter mixture is painted into the design cutout while i’m allowing all that to dry i can go in with a smaller filbert brush and start to clean up the edges along the perimeter this mixture has less water to it with a higher pigment count that way it covers considerably better for the symbol that’s cut out in the middle of the shield i’m going to be using some utrecht brand cadmium free red medium in the beginning this is mixed in with the wood colors i already have mixed up available on my palette but then i keep dry brushing and building upon this mixture adding more of the cadmium free red each time in the end this will give me a very vibrant and rich color centralized to the middle of the design much more so than just painting the cadmium red to begin with now that the symbol has been painted i can go back in with my filbert brush and clean up all the edges of the bark now dry brushing is where the magic happens and using the same colors that i’ve used the entire time i lighten them up just a little bit i add no water and i use my one inch mop brush to lightly hit the tops of all the highlights i want to take a minute to give a shout out to all my patreon subscribers and those of you that have been purchasing my line of hd foam from blick art materials and remember if you are be sure to go through the links that are in the description section or those are on my website because i do receive a small vendor affiliate which allows me to continue to build awesome things like this and show you how to do it so once again thank you all so much for your continued support after that i dried i went back in with a little bit of the burnt sienna just to make some parts pop so it didn’t look all the same to highlight the raw wood i went with some unbleached titanium again no additional colors and no water this pure paint was applied just along the edge giving it a really nice highlight using the same dark tones that i had mixed up for the bark i add a little bit more of the mars black this color is going to be used for the leather strap the paint mixture is applied with a small filbert brush and left to dry the same dark mixture that i use for the leather i watered it down a lot and then dropped that into all the cracks in the battle damage now you guys know me i love my layers of paint and the exposed wood was looking a little too bright to me so i mixed up a wash and applied that over the entire surface this knocked all the colors down just enough that it gave it that dirty worn battle used look then i could go back in one more time with the unbleached titanium highlight and now it looks perfect for the fake rivets on the leather straps i used some liquitex heavy body iridescent rich silver and applied that with a small filbert brush so you all can see the steps that i took to put together link’s deku shield from the ocarina of time or at least my version of it my own interpretation but i think it turned out great and hopefully these are the types of techniques that you guys can utilize in future builds hopefully you’re enjoying these videos and if you are give them a thumbs up share them with your friends and family and remember if you’re building any of my builds or using hd phone be sure to tag me at sksprops on twitter and instagram because i want to see your creations and until next time build your best with the best hd foam you.