I decided to make the Elder Wand from Harry Potter as a gift for my brother, because when we visited Universal Studios in Japan together, he wanted to buy a wand, but I discouraged him by saying I can make one for him if he wants, because duh, I'm a cosplayer, we do stuff like this!I asked him which wand he likes and the most famous one, the Elder Wand, was the one he chose. But if you fancy one of the wide variety of other wands, that are present in Harry Potter universe, you can apply my technique on any other chosen wand too!
DISCLAIMERS:
Yes, I know you can buy a lot of wands pretty cheap in pretty decent quality, but there's nothing better than a feeling you made something by yourself! But if still prefer buying it, THIS is one of the decent looking wand auctions I found and the price is pretty cheap and it is actually a light inside!
And yes, I know there are a lot of tutorials how to make wands on the internet, so I try to show you 3 different techniques depending on what result you want to achieve!
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| Přidat popisek |
1) THE EASIEST WAY
a.k.a."I just want a cool Halloween costume"
MATERIALS:
- (Round) chopsticks or skewers
- Hotgluegun with hotglue sticks
- Acrylic paints
- (Blowtorch or a lighter)
- Small decorations (depending on a chosen wand)
I wouldn't choose this technique especially for the elegant wands, but for some organic looking, this can be the good way to make a wand from your chopstick.
I'd advice you to sand down the chopsticks, that are not round or doesn't have a smooth surface first. Then apply the hotglue on the chopstick with a lower heat, so it doesn't melt and drop and form it with your fingers (be careful with the heat, use water to protect your fingers).
I'd advice you to sand down the chopsticks, that are not round or doesn't have a smooth surface first. Then apply the hotglue on the chopstick with a lower heat, so it doesn't melt and drop and form it with your fingers (be careful with the heat, use water to protect your fingers).
The girl in video below uses for the bumpy structure beads as a decoration, but I'd recommend heating up the hotglue lightly and pressing in a wet tip of the brush or a round stick, so it looks more convincing. You can see how it is made in a video below:
2) THE EASY, BUT CONVINCING WAY
a.k.a."I want to have a good cosplay, but I don't mind some minor imperfections"
MATERIALS:
- (Round) chopsticks or skewers
- Aluminium foil
- Masking tape
- Acrylic paints
- Modelling (polymer) clay, that can be hardened in an oven (Super sculpey gray, cernit, fimo, premo)
- Sculpting tools - pointy rubber tip, metal ball tip, dental explorer tool (or anything sharp), acrylic rolling pin or pasta maker, clay softener
- Paper and printer
First I found a good referrence pictures for the Elder Wand - one screenshot from the movie, one pic of a movie replica and one referrence of the inscription pattern on the handle.
I made a pattern in a vector program to have an idea about the size of the wand and position and size of the bumps. You can DOWNLOAD THE PATTERN HERE, or from a picture below. Print it on A4, cut and glue the both pieces together. The resulting pattern should measure around 36-37 cm.
Then I started making the wand using 3 skewers and I taped them together with masking tape on few places leaving only one skewer for the skinniest part on top of the wand.
Then I wrapped the places, where the bumps should be with and aluminium foil and taped them in place with masking tape. This step is not necessary, but it makes the whole wand a little lighter and it makes you use much less polymer clay.
Then I rolled the polymer clay and I started wrapping the wand in layers of polymer clay (I recommend using darker color of clay like black or brown, so you can use less time covering it with color and scratches are not so visible) till I was satisfied with the amount of clay and I shaped the clay in the right proportions with my fingers.
After that I've used ball tip tool for making those small crater like gaps in the bumpy areas, I've also used rubber tip for making the wood structure between the bumps and sharp tool for making the area with small inscriptions. Be careful by working, don't smash with your fingers the places, that are already finished! Then I've transfered the wand to the bakng plate with baking paper, used clay softener to get rid of the fingerprints and baked the whole thing (follow the instructions on your polymer clay to know how to bake it).
The first part of me making the wand like this live is here:
Then I rolled the polymer clay and I started wrapping the wand in layers of polymer clay (I recommend using darker color of clay like black or brown, so you can use less time covering it with color and scratches are not so visible) till I was satisfied with the amount of clay and I shaped the clay in the right proportions with my fingers.
After that I've used ball tip tool for making those small crater like gaps in the bumpy areas, I've also used rubber tip for making the wood structure between the bumps and sharp tool for making the area with small inscriptions. Be careful by working, don't smash with your fingers the places, that are already finished! Then I've transfered the wand to the bakng plate with baking paper, used clay softener to get rid of the fingerprints and baked the whole thing (follow the instructions on your polymer clay to know how to bake it).
The first part of me making the wand like this live is here:
For the painting, I've used dark brown matte color as a base and the I've used my sponge-tapping technique (that works similarly to drybrushing, but it's alittle easier) and applied lighter shades of browns and yellows to make the wand appear more structured and wooden.
For the inscription part, I painted it with white color mixed with yellowishbrown to make it look like a bone color. I made 2-3 layers to cover the dark color underneath, let it dry and then I painted the small inscriptions with a really tiny brush in a dark brown, almost black color.
I let it dry and then I sprayed it with transparent acrylic varnish to make it shiny and beautiful.
Watch me painting the wand live here:
As a final touch I printed out a stand for the wand from black PLA on my 3D printer and painted it with golden color with my sponge-tapping technique.
You can download several different very beautiful 3D printable stands in the links below:
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| My result |
ELDER WAND
DEATHLY HALLOWS
OLLIVANDER
OLLIVANDER 2
HOGHWARTS OWLS
2) HARD AND CONVINCING WAY
a.k.a."I want to win a darn cosplay contest"
MATERIALS:
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| Molding a peeper sculpture from Monster Clay using water based clay |
- (Round) chopsticks or skewers
- Aluminium foil
- Masking tape
- Monster clay medium (oil based sculpting clay)
- Hotglue gun and hotglue sticks
- Sculpting tools - pointy rubber tip, metal ball tip, dental explorer tool (or anything sharp), acrylic rolling pin or pasta maker, clay softener
- Casting tools - pots, mixing sticks, scale, gloves
- Paper and printer
- Silicone for making molds
- Carboard
- Water based clay
- Resin
- Easy release spray
- Sharp knife and sanding paper
Disadvantage - Very expensive and time-consuming preparation
This method is ideal if you want to have a great replica or reproduce the wand you've made in future.
It starts the same as the second method, the only thing that changes is the clay you use. Monster clay is used for scupltures, it is quite hard in normal room temperature and you can form when you heat it.
The whole success of your work depends on how sculpt the wand in first place.
After your wand is scuplted, put it into your refridgerator, so it doesn't deform when you insert it in the water based clay. Prepare a layer of water based clay and insert your wand inside, so one half is covered in the clay and the other sticks out. Seal carefully all the connections of clay and monster clay and make little dots with your brush in the clay. Create a border around the whole thing with carboard or foam + hotglue. Mix and pour your silicone inside the finished border, try not to touch the monster clay by pouring. Cover the whole area with good amount of silicone and let it harden. After it's hard, open the border and get rid of all the water based clay very carefully. Do not disconnect the monster clay wand from the silicone. When cleaned, spray the silicone with Ease Release spray, so your silicone layers doesn't stick to each other. Assemble the cardboard border again around the cleaned silicone with the master Monster caly wand in it. Mix and pour second layer of silicon covering the whole thing richly. Let harden. Then carefully disassemble, take out the monster clay master wand. Spray inside of the mold with Ease Release, use hard rubber bands or double sided velcro to close the silicone together, mix your resin and pour it inside the mold. Let harden, take outside, clean the edges with sharp knife + sanding paper and it's ready to paint! You can use the same painting technique like I did on my wand!
See the whole molding and casting process in this video:
This article was made with support of my Patrons on my Patreon! There will be no time doing this without them!
I hope this article will be useful for someone and if yes, you can follow my work on cosplay (and other stuff) on my FACEBOOK PAGE or TWITTER or INSTAGRAM.
And if you like this stuff I do, you can support my work by donating on my PATREON.
Yours
Germia
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