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Do you attend a rennaissance faire

Last response: in Entertainment
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September 25, 2013 6:04:47 PM

seeing as how i will be attending the ren again this year... i figured i would see if any of my fellow th forum members are also attending a ren faire this season.

if so, do you dress up?

More about : attend rennaissance faire

September 25, 2013 6:35:39 PM

Yes - I attended, No - I did not dress up, but it was fun ;) 
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September 25, 2013 7:00:39 PM

Yes, I go when I can. Have gone, when I can, for the past 30+ years. I still remember my first turkey leg, wooden sword, and all the times I failed at Jacob's Ladder. No, I do not dress up.

Found a leather worker to make a sheath for my Sword of Darkness



-Wolf sends
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September 25, 2013 9:30:28 PM

i'm dressing up for the first time this year..

my work so far.... need to finish up by saturday :p 

planning on leather scale armor, leather greaves, braces and a cloak... all hand made. i will be wearing bought period pants and shirt. i will be wearing my coat of arms on the back of the cloak... which will be of anglo-saxon style with shoulder broach.



















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September 28, 2013 3:47:25 PM

I have been to The Georgia Renaissance Festival 5 or 6 times.

http://www.garenfest.com/

Never dressed up or anything but I still have 3 commemorative mugs and I have lost several more over the years from ringing the bell at the test of strength game where you use a big hammer to hit the lever and try and rig the bell at the top. You get a beer and the mug if you ring it. Great incentive!

Are you going to be part of the festival? I need to go back up there. I haven't been in years. Love the food.
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September 28, 2013 4:10:41 PM

this will be my second time to the ren faire. so far i have 2 of the mugs.

i dont remember seeing anything about free beer and mug at our ren faire for hitting the strength bell but i will have to look next time.

no, i'm not going to be a part of the actual cast. i figured it would just be fun to dress up. about 1/4 to 1/3 of the people dress up in some way.

three beers and a turkey leg... now thats gourmet.



this is the finished costume i went with.

i bought the period pants and shirt from sleveless shirt from ebay. the sizes ran large (an understatement) and the pants were much baggier than the photo i purchased from. the material is rough woven cotten so its very period and the shirt has a nice neck lacing. i should have went for the sleved shirt however and the sleveless didnt really look as good (opinion) and it was a little long (they said it would shrink (so i got a large not medium) but the large was like an XL...)

i handmade the vest along with the braces and greaves from 8oz premium leather. every single scale is stamped with a gryphon emblem, dyed black and 50/50 carnuba wax/beeswax double dipped hardened. while not armor grade (16oz is what is used for this) a steak knife stabbed at full force will only barely penetrate (i used some test pieces for this). the braces and greaves are not hardened but coated in parafin and buffed for some water resistance. i was using paracord for lacing (as its cheap and is easier to pull through than leather lacing).

i will actually be placing these up for sale on ebay in the near future as i would like to pursue another concept for the next time.
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September 28, 2013 4:29:40 PM

Very impressive! That obviously took some time and effort. You should look at trying to sell it at the festival. Some of the handcrafted arms and armor go for high dollar. I remember looking at some hand forged chain mail one year and thinking how good my at the time girlfriend and now ex-wife would look in that and nothing else. Then I saw the $12,000 price tag and decided that was a fantasy I really couldn't afford to pursue!
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September 29, 2013 12:10:21 AM

@anort3

i'm not so sure they would like me walking around trying to sell armor and competing with their vendors. not a very appreciated practice i would assume. you are correct in that there are lots of people around who are interested though. i did get quite a few looks and comments. mostly people talking to eachother about it like "those are the type of braces i want", "yeah now thats what i call real armor" and the nods of approval from other people dressed up in armor. i didnt actually have anyone come up and ask me about it but perhaps i wasnt personable enough (keep in mind i had one hour of sleep the night before for some other reasons and you could guess how i looked.)

you can get a long length chain mail hauberk (chest piece) for about $300 from some large corporations and about $600 from some european custom armor vendors. the actual material costs if you did it yourself would only be about $200-300 if you bought at theringlord. prices at the ren faire, especially for costumes are rather high. while no doubt the work is adequately done you can find armor by real armor experts over in europe who do nothing but produce armor for less money (than $12k). for that kind of money you could get a suit of plate armor...

as far as what i'd most likely charge... figure that the source design for my armor was about $350 on etsy... for an 8oz riveted leather scale armor hauberk.. but then my additional time stamping and the hardening process. the greaves and bracers design normally retail for about $65/pair.

i was going to shoot for around $450-500 for everything. hopefully i can get that considering the amount of work it takes to produce one. this would then fund another itteration i can wear at the next ren faire.
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September 29, 2013 9:16:55 PM

Gorgeous work!
This is something I'd love to get into some day. It looks like you put a lot of work into that armor.
I used to fence and i'd love to take HEMA classes. I've also always been into cosplay, so this would be right up my alley. Sadly though, being a high school student means very little time to spend on projects like these, and few resources too. Maybe someday.
Again, gorgeous work.

And @ ssddx, that is not what I pictured you looked like at all. haha
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September 29, 2013 9:25:44 PM

well... the greaves and bracers really didnt take too long. perhaps 4-5 hours including creating some various templates to figure the design out and the chestpiece i'd say about 50 hours including the template. considering i started with nothing except for a few photos i have to say i didnt spend too long on the project.

how exactly would you have pictured i looked? i never gave any indication as far as i know.
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September 29, 2013 9:37:55 PM

In all honesty, i pictured you as a smaller asian man. Probably becuase to me, your profile picture looks sort of anime-ish and your evangelion 3.33 gif looks like a scene out of some anime. It could also be because all of my friends who were giving me computer advice were asian, so i related them to you.
I don't know though. haha...

Over the summer, I made some armor out of cardboard, probably speant a good ten hours on it (more since my friend and I were goofing off a lot), so I can only imagine how labor intensive real leather armor would be.
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September 29, 2013 9:54:10 PM

lol.

i'm an anime buff. need i say more?

i did go to tokyo, japan for a good 9 days though... good fun.

honestly... it wasnt too bad just a bit time consuming. for the chest piece...

planning..
1)found image showing what i liked
2)found images of leather scales
3)worked up some paper scales and how they fit together
4)create paper scale template and adjusted it to fit my frame
5)when leather is complete test rivets and grommets on material.

doing...
1)on back of leather drew 1/2" grid with framing square and ruler
2)figured out best use of space (basically rows like photo above) and drew in 45 cut lines for points.
3)cut scales out by hand (painful for the hands)
4)stamped each scale by hand with punch (a press would be easier but isnt cheap)
5)used a nail to punch 4 holes (why you need to draw the whole 1/2" grid not just outlines)
6)dyed each piece starting with sides, then back, then front with a paintbrush and water soluable leather dye
7)dipped in 50/50 wax solution 4-6 at a time and let cool. (this hardens the armor)
8)dipped again in wax and pulled out one at a time and buffed with cloth to remove excess wax.
9)drilled out nail holes since they close up during hardening.
10)assembled based on paper template
11)heat assembled armor with hair dryer to bend shoulder pads into shape (hardened leather bends when hot)
12)drill holes and install grommets in sides for lace up.
13) heat sides of armor and bend around general form (else its like one huge flat piece)
14) lace up the sides and heat again and bend until its close
15)try it on and adjust from there.
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September 29, 2013 9:57:44 PM

Haha, no need to say more. Again, awesome job. Thanks for the steps. Maybe when i get some free time, I'll translate my cardboard armor into leather or some other material. That would be cool.

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September 29, 2013 10:07:12 PM

i can point you in the right direction if you choose to do that. leather is expensive though. i paid $120 for each leather piece (i used two) and rivets normally cost $60 per 1000 (but i got ones going out of production for $20) at least at the local leather shop. as you can see the material costs are decently high so i'm not really making alot for my time (lol like $4/hr) but i did it for a fun project not a job.

hopefully i can find a buyer for my armor set on ebay or craigslist.

i'm going to add the last remaining grommets tomorrow i think (i ran out of them) so it will then be ready to sell. next up is some photos and dimensions. honestly it will fit any medium to large frame person since it has side lacing and its all adjustable. i think my asking price of $450-500 for everything is really reasonable (see above a few posts up) since i'd actually make a little bit of money from this to fund additional projects. elsewhere this would cost at minimum $480-680 (and thats not with it being hardened or with the embossing). of course the price is going to be negotiable and if i dont sell it i'll be taking offers.
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September 29, 2013 10:12:49 PM

Yeah, material costs are high. I wish you the best of luck in selling it!

What i was thinking would be cool is to take sheet steal or sheet aluminum and cover the cardboard plates with it. It would be relatively easy, and sheet steel is relatively inexpensive. My dad works with it on occasion, so I have the necessary tools, but we'll see if I ever get around to it. I have to go to bed now, but perhaps we'll discuss armor making some other time.

kaijne
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September 29, 2013 10:19:27 PM

the hardest part is getting the form correct. i would do this out of cardboard or cardstock. once you get that down working the metal isnt too bad. its trial and error.

something like lorica segmentata is probably the easiest to do.. (look at google images)
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September 29, 2013 10:40:48 PM

That seems pretty cool. I already have some decently form fitting carboard armor, I'll post some pictures tomorrow if I get the chance.
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!