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| Photo by John Jiao Photography |
Struck First gives you a first look at a cosplay just as it's been debuted/had its first photoshoot. Cosplayers have been kind enough to let me have a first crack at analyzing the cosplay by providing me with brand new pictures.
When I last shared LittleSparkz, it was from her incredible Chromie that she made for BlizzCon a few years back! Well folks, BlizzCon recently happened this month and you better believe she outdid herself this time around. For 2018, Sparkz created the all powerful Druid, Malfurion from World of Warcraft. However, the outfit you see above is a skin variation from the MOBA, Heroes of the Storm. Definitely a different look for the Stormrage brother. Right off the bat you can see that the colors are more on the cool side, blue and purple for the main body piece and the feathers extending out from her sides. No worries, I'll get to those later on! It seems many characters from the Warcraft universe love tabards and that's exactly what you see in the frontal portion of Sparkz. The upper areas have an ornate like design with gold swirls placed on top of it. There's also a white trim on the sides.
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| Photo by John Jiao Photography |
The main piece also has a skirt like part as you travel through the cosplay downwards. Here is where the grey/silver colors come into play, and I'm betting this is armor based. Sparkz did a PHENOMENAL JOB making these pieces look like wood with the texturing and everything. Many of these pieces you'll find has a ton of fur added on the underside. Pieces like the shoulders which also has teeth like spikes poking out from them. The middle piece of the skirt is done in blue and white matching the tabard. However like the side spots, it's done in EVA Foam. The shoulder pieces are beautifully crafted in purple with white swirls in them.
Standout pieces include the giant horns and Sparkz's weapon of choice for Malfurion. The horns on both her head and the staff look to be done with the same material and have that wood like style to them. Blue bands can be seen attached to the horns. The staff is a deer head done in silver with purple spots in the mane. Willing to bet this is a reference to Cenarius. You'll also see one picture gives off a great look at Sparkz's feet. They're adorable and full on the fur department. Looking like boots and all that. There seems to be some armor attached to them and the fur color is all grey!
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| Photo by Tony Julius Photography |
The main part has to be the wings. Full on feather + fur was used here and you can see the tiers of material and color as you extend outward. Most of the pictures do a fantastic job of showing off parts of the cosplay from various angles. I was also lucky enough to reach out to LittleSparkz and have her send me some details about how Malfurion was created. Take a look at that here:
I started Malfurion in January. I started sketching a female version of the character and then got to work on the shoulders. I had to learn how to use an airbrush to detail paint the fur. When I was done with most of the shoulders, I moved on to the wings. The Heroes of the Storm skin I chose has wings different from his traditional wings, the feathers aren't attached to his arms but a separate piece only connected at his shoulder and wrist. I decided to use irrigation tubing and delrin rods for the frame and then started making feathers. I used The Crooked Feathers method of crafting feathers and then they were airbrushed + hand painted with acrylics. After the wings I moved onto the coat which is a strange shape. I used EVA foam as an interfacing to keep the lapel rigid and tailored the coat around the foam. All of the items that look like wood are made from EVA foam, and were textured then painted with a series of dry brushing and paint washes. I used monster clay to sculpt the saber cat faces on the first weapons and made molds to cast them in resin. The antlers are made from EVA and foam clay and attached to a helmet worn under the wig using PVC attachments. The staff is made from EVA foam with resin details. The wings were a bit painful after hours of wearing them. The antlers were very comfortable and I didn't need to take them off all day! It was also very hot and made it difficult to keep the body paint on in the almost 90 degree temps. I wore the costume for about 13 hours at BlizzCon. The whole process was worth it. I learned a lot and am proud for stepping out of my comfort zone.
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| Photo by Euronbeat Kasumi |
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| Photo by John Jiao Photography |
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| Photo by Martin Wong |
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| Photo by Tony Julius Photography |
Clearly LittleSparkz put in so much effort into Malfurion and I'm certainly nothing but amazed and inspired by the dedication she put into this. I'm including a link to her Instagram cause not only do you guys NEED TO FOLLOW THIS CUTIE, but there you'll find WIP pics of her bringing this cosplay to life <3.
