LynZhang: ToothlessCostume

 

Designs and conceptualization

I wanted to make my cat Princess Chupacabra into Toothless from How To Train Your Dragon. I really liked the design of Toothless, and Princess Chupacabra is a black long-haired cat. I was heavily inspired by these similarities to create a costume for my cat based on this character. I planned on making the skeletal structure of the wings and to use other materials like leather and cloth to make the skin of the wings and tail (cloth because in the first movie Toothless loses part of his tail and gets it replaced with one of Hiccup's designs). 

I decided to make these separate objects: two wings, a tail, and a brace with parts of the arms to the wings attached. I wanted to make a brace around her torso to hold the wings in place and make a belt to attach the tail print to her actual tail. I wanted to make the wings large enough to look like they could be anatomically a part of her body rather than cute cherub-like wings. I was also worried this would be difficult to attach, especially for pieces like the tail.

References:

Modeling:

I used different tools for the modeling of the skeleton, including the mirror tool, array, sweep2, and a LOT of boolean tools (union, difference, trim). There are joints built in to the skeletal structure that enable the wings to expand and fold, which was what needed most of the boolean tools. I also used array to smooth out parts of the wings like where the different extensions merge, and I used the explode tool to be able to add the more organic shapes and curves to the wings.

Keyshot renderings:

I wanted to make Princess Chupacabra look like she was in a forest as if she were Toothless wandering the wilderness. This required a lot of natural lighting to pull out the different features she had in her wings and body.

The photos:

As you can probably tell, Princess Chupacabra did not cooperate much with the photoshoot. And, upon putting the wings and tail on her, she immediately flopped on her side and refused to move. Highlighted in the photos are the size ratios of the wings and tail as well as the changes made to the brace. It was originally going to be two belts looped around her, but attaching the belt to her collar made it easier to keep the wings in place in relation to her actual body. The joints also worked very well, allowing a wide range of motion for the wings to unfurl and fold. I attached the leather to the wings with hot glue and emphasized the shape of the wing’s extensions with how I stuck the glue to the wing.