Body Suit Zam Body Suit

:lol: Yeah, I can just imagine me a-chinese starwars rapping fly-girl in de house!

"your republic credits are no good here..."

Kim 'n cris, they wouldn't sell the pattern to me. Darn... Oh well, guess I gotta have my seamstress draw up one. Renaissance dancewear said that we needed a 4 way stretch material in order to make this. I have a feeling, we need our bulk order to have 4-way stretch material, or we'd have to be ordering more yardage.
 
i made up a trial pair of pants in a 2 way stretch (haven't made the top yet) but the pants turned out very well (stretch wise, anyway- the pattern still needs a little tweaking) then again, i don't have to contend with too many curves..... LOL. I'll play with it...

~MaryAnne
 
Wow, blue-that's awesome, seamstress in de house! Yo yo yo! ok, I'll stop it now :lol: I'm annoying myself with the-almost jar-jar ebonics. Can't stop the Jenny lopez songs in my head either. If it worked out really well, with just two-way stretch, then we'll get that. :love less expensive the better. I think that if people wanted a unitard, then 4-way stretch would be the way to go, but since I think more people want a two piece, for costume wearing reasons, 2-way stretch is the way to go. Blue informed me that you have to have the 2-way stretch laying horizontally for the pants.

Once those swatches go out, y'all in the fabric project will really start understanding all this talk about thickness. I bought a bottle warmer from the dollar store just to understand the foam core concept awhile ago. Sorry the swatches will be small, since I only have just enuff to go around. Please pm me your addresses, for those who want samples. I will need two weeks before they go out, after dcb gives me the "most accurate color" swatch. I still have two companies who might do a color match.
 
The double laminated neoprene swatches will be unavailable to view online this week, because my hubby's comp is down for the week, so, we have to buy another comp and do necessary upgrades. For all of those interested in buying the lycra-neoprene fabric, please start emailing/pming me your addresses so I can mail you the swatches of lycra and neoprene that I have. You will have to imagine the lycra swatch laminated to the neoprene swatch. I am going to keep on asking companies the cost to dye the fabric, while I gather every one's info. There is one swatch that I think that comes pretty close because it has a mettalic sheen that makes us understand why in some pics it appears like a dark purp, and in some lights it appears lavender. So, I will be asking companies if we could have the same type of lycra but dyed one shade darker of mettalic sheen purple. You will see what I am talking about when you recieve the swatches. We will consider what are the next options once everyone has recieved their swatches.

*EDIT* DCB sent me the color pantone, and printed it out from his color printer to match what the pantone shows. When the lighting is dark, it actually comes out to be a plum color. Pantone #5135 u Lots of lighting probably makes it sorta lavender. Still swatch searching in the mean time.

Sorry, I edited it again 11/9 7:45 pm:
*UPDATE2*:p Neoprene company#1 will not have us pre-dye lycra and ship it to them. Instead they want to double laminate their white lycra version to .5mm neoprene and then send it to another company to sublimate the pantone color onto their white lycra. Total thickness=1.5mm. Their lycra is not shiny enough (too much like a matte nylon color), so, mebbe go with option #2? which is neoprene company #2. I will buy white 4-way stretch shiny lycra have it dyed and then send it to company#2 to have it laminated to one side of the 4-way stretch neoprene foam core 1.5mm, at the same time co#2 will laminate a black nylon on the other side. Total thickness 2.5mm. I am going to see if they will accept a test piece, cause we don't want to waste $ if we don't know if the chemicals used to laminate will work with this type of 85%nylon/15%lycra. If that is successful, then I will mail yall's the actual swatches. It doesn't make sense, but Co#2 is actually cheaper. All the other nylon lycra swatches aren't close enuff color-wize. pantone 5135 is hard to match.
Option#3 (Cheapest way)Go and get dyed this sample called jumbo white spandex (spandex is another name for lycra), It is somewhat heavy maybe .75 mm? It's thin enough and still bulks up a bit like the MOM costume pix, and we might not have to fool with the neoprene, and it's easier to sew. No sweating to death either.
 
I would recommend that you avoid the dye sublimation if at all possible. Dyde the material first and then adhere to the neoprene if that is the way to go...
 
splain! splain! so why is dye heat sublimation a not-so-good process? I need to learn... I know nothing about textiles...
 
Reason it is not good is because the dye willget into the rubber part and then will milk throught to stain your skinor other things.
 
Well, now we know more about these two neoprene companies. I think I have to search out other neoprene companies. If I can't find one with my specifications, then, we might have to go with option #3. Opt#1=dye sublimation only to get the right color. Opt#2 They will only give us a cut of 1.5mm neoprene with .5mm lycra, and .5mm nylon backing=2.5 mm which is way too thick to sew at the edges(to fold under) You can just tell by dcb's comparision shots on the "bodysuit revelation" thread. You can see that it's thick but not 2.5+2.5mm thick folded under. Option #3 Could be it. Or, I will have to contact other neoprene companies. Those who previously pm'ed me thier addresses will be recieving swatches in the mail, I will mail them out on Tues.
 
i got ZIA's swatches today...

SH-2 is SO close to the real thing. If that was just a shade or 2 more plum purple - i think we'd have a match. The pix i have from MOM are really hard to tell the color on because of the way the light bounces off the fabric. But it's DEFINITELY that metallic-like finish to it. All the other fabrics are WAY off.

Perhaps you can get a few samples of shades close to SH-2 with the same metallic sheen... we are SO close :)
 
Ragrasen is correct on dye sub. Part of the problem is the bleed through. An additional problem is that it is applied with heat. The way that fabric is sublimated to neoprene is by heating up the adhesive so that it bonds 100% to both surfaces (neoprene and fabric). When you go back and reheat it to do other forms of sublimation, you create defects in the bond which will later appear as bubbles or tears. I got this from Glomex when I was screwing with this the first time. That is why I tried screen printing which uses a very low temp. Unfortunately, this is only a 2D topcoat that chips away after wear. If you have inded found a close match on fabric, then you are almost there.

Dan
 
dcb, what do you think of option#3 and it's sheen? Drop some purple and red dye on it or sumthin. I was told that the metallic-like sheen is actually due to the weaving of the fibers. I know option#3 isn't not lycra and neoprene, but it's thick enough material.
btw, option#1 was glomex. So option #1 is out.

wookie- Man, I didn't realize you got that far with glomax. I thought the rep. paula wasn't much help. well, actually, now I can see why, but... I thought she wasn't much help from the get go. But, did she actually gave you neoprene swatches and explain the dye sublimation?
 
Oh my this is starting to become a very difficult project is it not. And all those Jango's and Boba's thought they had hard Projects. I think Zam is turning out to be just as hard if not even more complex.
 
Wrangling neoprene companies is tough. They are sooooo specific on what they need to adhere the fabric. So many guidelines and rules! I've learned a lot, but man- I didn't think starting this suit, I would be doing this. I first thought it would be easy as pie, like putting together my greedo suit. I saw KimnCris's zam from afar at cII and thought, Oh, maybe their already in production.. Boy, was I wrong! Then, I think if I am not mistaken, Don Post was bought out by another company. That was probably a bad merger. That puts a zam out fit WAY WAY out of production, my guess. I mean with Jango, you can at least replicate some of Boba's parts and just tweak it a little. Zam is a whole other story.
 
*fights bout of major depression....* :(

Yes... this is turning into a major production. But the costume is just so cool! *sighs*
 
Ok-- Trying to think calmly here. I am really, really close. The only thing that is stopping me right now is that some of the major neoprene companies won't deal with retail sales other than company#2. And their neoprene stock is too thick. So, if/when (I am working on this one) I get a federal id# I can use, then it will open me up to these other neoprene companies. I mean, we have the pantone color, we have the lycra company, and the dyeing company. We have the thickness we want the neoprene to be...It's just a matter of getting the right supplier who can join that type of lycra to the thin neoprene. By the way, two of you will be getting the swatches a little later than I had planned...sorry, ran out of stamps. But you will get 'em so you can see what I am talking about when I say option/co.#1,2,3 etc.
 
It is settled now. With all the work that is going into this Zam I can not just leave it on a manniquin. So come one come all to Dragon Con 2003. Thjere is a good chace I will do an hour or so in the Zam there if it is finished by then.
 
i hear ya ragresen. The girls complain that all the good SW costumes are for boys... but they have the advantage of being able to get away w/ wearing the boy costumes w/o anyone thinking twice... and they get all the cool girl costumes too (zam, boushh, aurra, padmé, etc.)

but a boy wearing a SW girl costume would not be good :(

We could make up a "boy version" of a clawdite... but that may be bordering on the line of über-geek. ;)
 
Well if I do the guy in Zam my face will get covered by, yes you guessed it a Clawdite Mask. I am still haveing doubt about doing it because well I just am not into the guy doing female characters. I am doing the costume because I liek the character and will definatly have it on a manniquine (spelling?) for display. And I am regretting to have to actually alter Paul's pieces to make them right. But I am going for the over detailed version.
 
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