LUX 2018: Pom and Pom

Here are images of our final costume with the head piece and final shaggy looking body. We didn't have enough time to sew shaggy wool all over it, as the sewing takes a long to do itself, and then sewing it onto the lycra form took a while. After finishing the body and the orb, we went to the locations we had scouted out and took photos at night time to see how it would look in the spaces and in the darkness. We found varying levels of darkness, and found the darker the better as the lights and colour stood out more. The white lycra also glowed really well, so whether or not it is covered or is poking through the shaggy wool, it will glow really well.  Below is a link to see the final Pom in action! https://youtu.be/PcQkupGNux0

Will spent a lot of this week putting together the UV light orb that a 3rd person would hold to create an exterior light source for the poms. Using the UV LED's and strip lights he tested out different ways to create a stronger light source First testing various material, such as balloons and thin vacuum form plastic with a single UV LED. The Vacuum form plastic came in white and also clear, which he sand blasted to create better light dispersal.  The sand blasted plastic showed more promising results then the white plastic and the balloon. But just wasn't bright enough to lite up the Pom's or there surroundings as the LED was only 3V.  Therefore, we switched to using a short segment of  UV LED waterproof strip. This was 12V and much brighter but required more battery power.  The LED strips were much brighter and provided the ideal light source. Will then tested the orb...

In this final week, we got the idea to use lycra teamed with hulahoop esk. pipes threaded into it to create a stretchy spring like shape. Zoe pattern made and created a body form out of lycra based off exaggerated body measurements, adding in the high stretch of the lycra. She also created casings on the inside for the hoops/poles to slot into. Kate dyed most of the yarn green and stitched the yarn in rows onto calico to give it strength and form a straight line, and then it was stitched onto the lycra body using the sewing machine, leaving 10cm gaps to allow for stretch. Kate and Sarah created a head out of plastic bowls and yarn, making sure the shaggy yarn covered the face but had gaps where the person could see out.  Finally we hand stitched the UV lights in place along the inside casing. The battery pack sat in an internal pocket which was stitched in place on the casing.  Dying the yarn Testing the yarn with UV Threading the rods in  ...

These sketches were done by Will while we discussed what kind of shape we were aiming for. The Kane-mail we were using wouldn't hang in the shape we really wanted, so we're currently looking at what kind of materials we can use to create a better structure. We're thinking about using foam to build the rounded structure off a suit, or use pipes to make a round body shape that the shaggy-ness can hang off of.