[Editor's Note: scroll down for pictures of each entry and commentary from each team's armorer. All photos by View Staff.]
Team Iste - Mouse and Higer (Renee and Derek Booke)
** WINNER **
In many ancient
cultures the stag stands as a majestic and complex symbol of regeneration, and
the cyclical nature of all life. His antlers grow in the spring, and fall off
when autumn comes. These creatures are no strangers to change, and stand for
the ability to move through life and all of its trials with grace and dignity.
It is for these reasons, that we believed the stag to be an appropriate symbol
for Queen Iste’s armor entry. The Queen herself proudly wears antlers upon her
helm, and is also a Changeling by blood. As such, she is keenly aware of her
own personal cycles of being. This piece is a celebration of her life and
Sylvan nature, but also the perseverance and strength of our team.
Throughout this piece
you will also see the use of oak leaves between the pauldron plates, and laurel
up top, just like what is depicted on the tabards of the true supporters. In
many ancient cultures, laurel and oak were used to make wreaths and crowns. These
crowns were given out to acknowledge martial victory and strength in
competition, as well as heroic acts of protection and valor. Many people
speculate that because oak trees were honored for their endurance, stability,
strength, and noble presence, using their leaves in rituals and military awards
became common practice. The oak, just like the stag, represents a powerful
figure and tends to stand taller than the other trees around it.
Now that you understand
some of the ideas and symbolism behind this project, we can talk about how it
was made. We started construction with a lengthy design process. Hygar doesn’t
work from patterns, so even the basic shapes and plates of the pauldron had to
be created from scratch, and then tested together to see if they would fit and
flow. We knew we wanted more curved edges than straight or pointed, and
believed this would give the project a more Sylvan feel to better reflect the
Queen’s heritage. Once the initial design was done, we hand drew the shapes and
leaves, and cut them out of a six ounce hide. Once this was done, we moved onto
sanding and preparing the leather; which took over eight hours alone even with
two of us working on it.
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| Front detail |
After our shapes were
cut out we soaked them all in water to begin the tooling process. Every
individual plate on this project was struck hundreds of times with a stamp to
give our background and empty space a more detailed and textured appearance.
Then you have the plate borders, which are completely freehanded with a
sculpting knife. We chose this intertwining vine work pattern not just because it
looked Sylvan, but because it highlighted interwoven strength and grace, one of
the concepts the stag stands for as mentioned above. Visually, we thought it
lent credence to the original symbolism. Altogether, this portion took a little
more than twenty hours.
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| Trim and stamping detail |
For the next part, we
moved onto the oak and laurel leaves. Each one of these is hand tooled with the
same sculpting knife used on the vine work. No patterns were used here either,
and Hygar drew out each line in the leaves using his own creative intuition.
One aspect we are particularly pleased with here is the molding of the leaves
and how we curled them at the ends. This allows them to better hold their
shape, and gives them a relatively natural look. This entire process ended up
being a minimum of around thirty minutes per leaf.
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| Side of armor with individual leaf details |
The neck guard/collar
was another separate piece that had to be cut, measured, and shaped. Believe it
or not, this piece started as a flat rectangle. Hygar soaked it in water and
folded it by hand, molding it into what you see now. This was a gradual
process, and involved jury-rigging the neck guard onto a mannequin form
overnight as it dried. After that, it was strong enough to hold its shape on
its own. If you look at traditional plate armor and pauldrons, they often had a
neck guard of some kind, or what is called a “sword breaker.” This small piece
had the very important job of preventing a sword from decapitating you.
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| Back of piece with neck guard and detachable cape |
With all of this done,
we could finally move onto dye. We chose the colors of green, brown, and gold
because of the already established nature/Sylvan theme we had going on. Each
plate used both a green and brown oil based dye that was applied via
paintbrush, and received at least two coasts. Once these coats were dry, we
went back and started to paint the vine work. For this we cut a gold acrylic
paint with water and applied in light, thin layers to help reduce cracking, as
well as wear and tear. Every piece was also treated with leather lotion and
sealant, which cleans, polishes, and preserves the leather and colors below.
This step took about 3-4 hours if you ignore the time in between waiting for
the pieces to dry.
Once all these artistic
aspects were complete, we arrived at the assembly part of the process. We
started by riveting all of the leaves to their respective plates, and then
attached the lower plates to leather straps. What this does, is allow the
plates to collapse in on themselves as the wearer moves. Fighters need that
extra flexibility in the arms, and this design gives them that while also
giving them adequate coverage. After that, the uppermost small plates were
riveted to the larger plates on the top of the pauldrons; and all the remaining
pieces were riveted to each other. Connecting the pauldrons to a chest/back
base in this manner allowed us to avoid straps that go under the arms,
something people frequently complain is uncomfortable if worn for long periods
of time.
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| Individual plates help the pauldrons move with the shoulder |
The last step was what
we like to call “fancification.” With everything in place, we wanted to add a
little extra just to make our project pop. This involved adding conchos on the
main upper plate towards the front side, as well as adding matching d rings on
the back. The conchos add a much needed splash of color
where they are, but also provide a more pleasing visual symmetry from the front
side. The d rings, on the other hand, play an important part in allowing these
pauldrons to not only be appropriate attire on the battlefield, but the feast
hall as well. Using snap hooks, you can attach and detach a cloak to the d rings
as you see fit! Your armor just became that much more versatile, and you can
make it a garb centerpiece.
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| Shoulder leaf detail with cabachon |
All in all, it took
several weeks of work to get this piece done, and we were quite pleased with
the results. It was my first time designing pauldrons, and Hygar’s first time
doing such an in depth creative collaboration. Neither of us had made a full
set of pauldrons before, so the challenge was a welcome and rewarding one that
tested our ability to work as a team. We hope you enjoy the outcome as much as
we did. If you have any questions about our process, please feel free to ask! - Renee Booke
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| Front of armor |
Team Saegan - Aiden Penclaw (Arthur Granger)
So what we made was a piece entirely made from scale and chainmaile. It is approximately 5000 scale, 1000 ring, and incorporates seven different forms of jewelry weaves into an armor format. Without the coin bag the entire project has a weight of one lbs in total and is a fully flexible piece to your arm and shoulder in combat. On the artistic end of things it shows two large skulls in scale (a throwback to the planar shield stone), a 3D Chaos wheel in a byzantine weave, a smaller section of scale in a Knights of the Steward shield, and Iron Lotus pendant. The project took my fiancee and I four months to design from scratch and piece together. - Arthur Granger
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| Aerial view |
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| Side view of the piece |
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| Small scale in detail |
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| Close-up of detail work |
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| Skull pattern worked in scales |
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| Attached maille pouch |
Team Jack - Dan Neville
This
is a set of scale pauldrons made from blue and black anodized aluminum
scales and rings. It incorporates two sizes of scales, extra large and
large. It is attached with leather straps and collar. I tried to make
sure this would fit snugly to the wearer and not shift or slip in
combat. This item and custom ones like it will soon be available on my
Etsy shop Forge And Fleece. I make chainmail and scale mail armor and
jewelry for costumes and Larp. I greatly enjoy working on custom
projects. Please feel free to contact me at Scalesmythe@gmail.com or on
my Etsy shop. - Dan Neville
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| Close-up of shoulder scale detail and strapping |
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| Aerial view from the front |
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| Side view of scales, front chest strap, back adjuster plate |
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| Side view close-up |
