Clothes - Part 3 - Accessories

Buttons. To prove that I am actually a man, I used nails for the buttons. I went out and got the smallest nails I could find at the hardware store, which was 1/2". They ended up being a little longer than I wanted, but I was able to fix them in the end. I started by painting them white.

After the paint had dried I cut the nails down to about 1/4" (maybe a little smaller) with my Dremel.

I had to reshape the ends to a point so they could be pounded into wood. Again, I used the Dremel and carefully cut a point at the end of each nail.

I realized about half way through painting that the paint was going to come off of the nails as soon as I started pounding them into his chest with a hammer. Fortunately, It did not turn out that bad. In fact, I kind of like the way it looked so I left it.

Belt. This was relatively easy in comparison to the buttons. I started out wit a piece of pleather cut from an old purse. Using an Exacto knife, I cut out a strip about 1/4" wide and just long enough to go around the waist of my model.

I rounded the end with a pair of scissors.

To make the buckle, I started with a paper clip that I had previously dipped in acid to remove the shiny outer coating and cut it in half.

I folded one side in and trimmed off the excess.

I then glued the buckle in place with super glue

I put double stick tape on the inside of the belt to help it stay in place.

I cut the head off of a straight pin and stuck in at an angle to make the prong. I added a little more double stick tape to the end of the belt to hold everything in place.

You may have noticed that there was a stain on his shirt next to the buttons. I had some grease on my hands when I was pounding in the nails and got some on his shirt. I found that you can take out stains like that with Bissel carpet cleaning solution. I mixed 1 part Bissel with 2 parts water and put it on the end of a cotton swab and GENTLY rubbed out the stain. I added water to the other end of the swab to rinse it out.

He totally has a belt made out of a purse.

Up next... Animation.

Clothes - Part 2 - Shirt

Shirt. I found this pattern at undeadthreads.com. It is actually for a trench coat but I modified it to be a dress shirt. It was very easy, I cut the length in half to accommodate my model, shortened the sleeves a bit and omitted the flaps in the front. Because this pattern was made for a doll, I did not need to resize it in Photoshop. Instead I just cut away what I did not need after printing.

I pinned the pattern to my material. I used an old pillow case for this one.

I started with the vest.

I hemmed the bottom and the front. The seam on the front was curved for the extra flap on the trench coat so I sewed it straight to make it a dress shirt.

I attached the front and back together at the shoulders.

I then attached the arms to the vest.

To make the collar I started by drawing a straight line for the seam on the pattern.

I sewed up the sides and trimmed away the excess fabric to make it easier to turn inside out.

Tada! I actually had to make the collar twice. The first one I made was too short for the neck hole. But that happens to me a lot.

I then folded the cuffs in half a sewed them together.

I attached the cuffs to the end of the sleeves. Before I put the collar on, I noticed that the shirt was a little bigger than I wanted. I decided to take about 1/2 inch out of the back of the shirt. I did this by folding the back in half and sewing a straight line from the bottom to the top. I then cut off the excess material. Then I could attach collar to the neck. 

Finally, I ironed the collar down and sewed up the sides and the sleeves. I folded the top front directly underneath the collar at a slight angle. I did not think I could sew this piece so I used a bit of Stitch Witchery to hold it down.

I will need to add buttons to the front at a later date.

Contemplating his next move. 

It is at this point that I began to have nightmares of this model coming to life and trying to kill me. I guess that means it's working.

Up next... accessories, and buttons probably.

Clothes - Part 1 - Pants

Pants! I am not the best at sewing so this is actually the hardest part for me. I tend to make a lot of stupid mistakes, and end up redoing quite a bit of work. Anyways, I started by finding a free pattern on google, which for pants, is very easy. I took the pattern into Photoshop and resized it to my needs. I printed the pattern and pinned it to my material.

I had already added the seam allowance in Photoshop so I just cut along the outside of the pattern. 

From there, I hemmed each piece along the top and bottom. 

Here is where I made my first mistake. I hemmed each piece the same way, so all of the pieces where right fronts. So I actually had to start over and recut two new pieces and re-hem them the right way.

Making sure the pieces where facing the right direction, I sewed the two front pieces together and the two back pieces together.

Placing the fabric face to face I sewed the front and back together. I turned them right side out and...

Pants!

Up next... Shirt.