Neo Crusader Helmet Help

So the more I toy with this idea the more I want do a suit of this crazy armor. I have decided that I am not going to do any thing on it untill I get a helmet made. So here is where I need some help. Looking at the pictures and reading what little I can find on this armor hasn't answerd my biggest question. I know the front part of the helmet, the part covering the face is hard. I just can't decide what the rest is made of.

Is the thing covering the head armor, or is it some sort of fabric?

I am trying to decide if its more like an imperial royal gard helmet or the front of the Snow trooper helmet.

So any one want to throw in their two cents on this discussion. I would really appreciate it.

Just FYI, there was someone's personal take on the KOTOR Mando helmet up on eBay a couple of days ago. If you search you might find it and see how they interpreted the idea.

Well I went and found that after reading your post. I must say I think its a bit of a shabby rendition of the helmet. It just looks like they cut a T-visor into a royal guard helmet. In fact thats basicly what he calls it, a KOTOR royal guard helmet.

The head and neck appear to be flexible...maybe some spandex would be a good start. It looks like the only hard part on the headgear is the faceplate.

I've been doing a research on this subject, and found that in the comic books they appear to be made out of layers - one full head helmet, just the visor area and to the back of the head, then a layer of rubbery substance on top to the neck where it connects to a hard "neck ring" on the bottom. The main person touched one before pulling on his head, and it made the fingers to shrink into it a bit, but then returns to it's original formation. But that would require sculpting experience.

So in theory I could make the helmet out of what ever I wanted so long as the visor was right. Then build a stretchy head pice that runs from the top of the helmet down to the neck ring.

I don't think that will be to hard to do...

Now the question is do I use some sort of vynal cloth (spelling?) or do I use some thing like spandax.
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Now to start getting more reference pictures.

Well, how and what style you do is up to you as long as it's satisfactory to you.

I know that, I just wanted peoples opinion on what to use. I really don't have an opinion on the subject yet.

[COLOR=#cccccc]well it all depends on how much you want it to look like it does in the games fabric and spandex will work but you need to think of a way to keep it stretched at all times [/COLOR]
[COLOR=#cccccc]If it was me I would use some 1/4 inch foam rubber that way it keeps its shape the whole time and you don’t have to worry about it pulling down on your head like if it were stretched fabric[/COLOR]

By foam rubber do you mean craft foam?

I make chain mail, and I must say I really don't think it would be the right material. It sags bad under its own weight. Also most paints don't last long on chain mail because of the nature of all the little moveing parts.

Not to mention you would be screwed if you got hit with a blaster bolt.

Not if it were made of Beskar =D

if only

but yeah, i had a friend in highschool who was into making that stuff...what about using a super light material? aluminum or something?

Well you could use aluminum, which you can buy already iodized in several colors. Includeing blue. But it will still sag with out something underneath it. You could reduce the sag by using more complex weavs. But the more complex the weav the heavier it gets. I think you would have to at least do a 6 in 1 weave to get a passable level of accurcy. 6 in 1 is not known to be easy to expand out. Which you have to be able to do when you creat a coif (head peice).

The alternitive is to use extreamly small rings, (around 1/8th I.D.) this would be more passable because then there would be an excuse for the game to leave out the texture on something this small. Which it would not have it if the helmet used normal sized rings. The upside to the helmet being made of 1/8 size rings is that you could easily expand it to make a coif. You are just going to need a huge ammount of rings at that size to make something that covers your entire head.

yeah 6 in 1 was the only way i was thinking of it being possible, haha

The problem with 6 in 1, is that expansion would be difficult.

Because when you expand out starting at the top, you add rings. So when you expand out 4 in 1 it becomes something similar to 5 in 1. So 7 in 1 would be a royal pain. Unless you were to use larger rings (over 3/8 I.D.) which becomes a problem with the solid look even with 6 in 1.

Any way as a side note to this project I plan on getting the materials to start makeing this helmet today or tomorrow. I will keep evey one posted on my progress.

foam rubber like the kind they make some holloween masks out of. the kind that bends but still holds its shape

A foam-rubber base/shoulder mount with a stretched-spandex outer layer hood, and a PVC/metal faceplate would probably work. If you stretch the spandex out when you apply it to the foam rubber, when you tilt your head it'll just go back to normal instead of bunching up.

The comics have a sweet and practical take on this. I'll upload pics when I can, should give you ideas.

That would be great, I don't have that many pictures of the suit yet.

Well, got these pics up finally as I promised.

Now, in the KOTOR games, we see that the helmet is flexable by the neck area and behaves like some sort of rubber or even spandex. Also in the game, they appear to be full metal helmets. Now that, I think, is what's most confusing and unreal about this. I've studied these from all available sources, few they are, but I know this is possible.

But the comic artists seem to have thought about this as well, and have produced number of versions, they are much more practical than the game version - they seem to be made for humans



Notice the visor area, and compare to the game version.



I put this one here to show how this might be put togather. Rare earth magnets for the mask?



And the last, it seems it's intended to be soft on top of the helmet itself.

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I hope this might help you, and may you forge an armour like no other has!

Awesome find. That makes a hell of a lot more sense!

Hey Sarim, what issues where the pics taken from?

The top one is from issue #8, page 1, panel 3. The middle is from #20 and the bottom from #21. Hehe I know Novall, the game designers went for the cool look only. But I actually like the comic version better (Dustin Weaver's, top picture), and I'm sure a lot more comfortable.

Oh I forgot - the game version.

I have also come to the conclusion that the face plate is the only hard part of the helmet. Unless there is a hard helmet under the clothlike thing. I think the rest is flexible.

I have also decided that the best way to make this easy to put on and take off is to place a zipper or snaps along the throat line in the front of helmet. To help keep the helmet streched out I am thinking of makeing the base of the helmet either the top half of a T-shirt or makeing it big enough to set all the way across my sholders and pull the flack jacket over that.

As to the hard visor I think I am going to do a style closer to the comic version. The more I look at the KTOR version the more I think it would be to hard to see out of to be safe to troop in.

And thank you for the pictures I appreciate it.

I think it's rather this way.

Hard parts:

* Face plate
* Helmet (Not full helmet. Goes around the face plate to attach and down to chin. Then around the ears and to the back of the head. Then, the soft part goes from the top of the head (bottom pic) down to the neck, then attached to the jumpsuit.)

That's at least how I'm thinking of making it in the future, when I get a hang of this sculpting business :-) No problem Z-man, I enjoy seeing some more having interest in the Neos.

Neos rock the world!

I make chainmail too, Z-man! I've found another maker! Woohooo!!!! XD