More Serger Action

Even though today was supposed to be dedicated to a "deep clean and re-org" of my apartment, I ended up doing a bunch of dorking around with my new serger instead. So it goes.

Yesterday was wildly productive, and I'm not sure if it's just a newfound burst of enthusiasm linked to the new machine, or if it's just the fact that the machine is so darn efficient that I can get all kinds of stuff done.

What's kind of funny is that with this new serger, it is not the machine that is the long pole in the tent. With my old machine, I would basically spend MOST of my time rethreading it, re-sewing, stripping out bad stitches, etc. Just a real piece of agony. But now I find that the bulk of my time is spent on refining the pattern, tracing onto material, cutting and pinning. The actual sewing takes just a minute or two per seam. Just amazing.

After version 1.0 of the top part of the suit, I found a lot of places that needed to be improved upon. I took my existing pattern and made a series of modifications to it. Along the way, I also learned a lot about how the pattern is SUPPOSED to work, and the things that are wrong with it that hinder this. I think I mentioned this in an earlier post, but overall the pattern is pretty sloppy. The seams do not line up quite right, nor do they match. I originally thought this was just me, and I didn't know what I was doing. But the more I play with the pattern, and the more I put samples together, I realize that it's just a tad sloppy. Kind of a bummer, but it has proven to be a really great learning experience.

Here is a picture of the modified pattern that I came up with. You can see where I've grafted on new sections. I've also removed some material here and there to get a better fit.



Here's the finished version 2.0 shirt. The collar is a million times better than the last, but still not perfect. Still some research to do on that one, but it's getting there.



In general, my modifications were about half and half, hit or miss. Some of the stuff I did worked, and some of the other changes did not. As I said earlier, I'm learning how the pattern works, and figuring it out more and more as I go along. I'm very happy with how things are coming together so far. By my estimates, it's really just a matter of refining the pattern until it is exactly where I want it to be.

With that said, I percieve the main barrier to this effort to be momentum. Or lack of it. I can TOTALLY see myself getting burned out on this, as it is taking HOURS to put together just one top. With that in mind, I started looking for ways to improve my process, and make the entire thing go faster.

Some of the things I did were simple. For example, I was using a fine point sharpie to mark my fabric. I switched to a regular point. It glides much better, and goes WAY faster. Technique is also important too. The tip of the pen is the trailing edge of the pen, not the leading one. This stops the fabric from bunching up, and lets me go way faster. Having thicker lines also makes cutting much easier. Before there was a lot of squinting. Now I can just cruise along.

The real breakthrough came from the cutting technique. I switched from scissors to a cutting wheel. This allows me to go so much faster. I also get much smoother lines, which is a big plus.

Before, I would lay my fabric down on the kitchen floor, tape it into place, then lay my pattern on top of it. Then I would draw around it with my fine tip sharpie.

The new plan is that I just lay the fabric down on my cutting board, place the pattern on top of it (no tape involved anywhere), lay a couple weights on top of the pattern, and get to tracing with the regular tip sharpie. Without even picking up the fabric, I then go in with my cutting wheel and get my final shape.

To reposition, I just spin the cutting board with the fabric on top of it. That way I'm not crawling all around the kitchen trying to get it from the best angle.



Aw jeeze, and I forgot to mention that previously, I was ironing the fabric before cutting it. The new batch of fabric I have is folded, and not just thrown into a bag, so it doesn't need as much attention. But not ironing cuts a few minutes straight off the top of the process. So far I have not had any problems with unironed fabric. When it gets laid on the cutting board with the pattern on top, it flattens out nicely.

These changes to my technique were both thought up during the night, and also just kind of came together accidentally. I forgot I had a cutting board and wheel, but remembered when I was snoozing. Go figure. Some of the stuff like not moving around the kitchen, and not switching from kitchen to living room just evolved out of the process.

Newly equipped with my sped up process, I decided to start again from scratch with the pattern, but hit it hard with the modifications. My first two suit tops certainly showed me a lot, and I knew where I needed to change the master pattern. As you can see from the photo above, I tweaked the patterns so much that it became sort of hard to work with them much further, so I am just starting from the beginning.

I went with the sleeve first. It was a little short, and didn't quite fit snugly enough on my forearm.

Five tries later, and I had a perfect pattern for my arms.



I can honestly say that had I not gone through that process improvement cycle and gotten my technique refined, I probably would have given up after sleeve number three. I didn't time how long it took me to make each one, but there's probably not more than a couple of hours work here. I would say that using my original process, it would have taken an hour per sleeve. With the new refinements, I'm down to about 20 minutes. It is a significant difference.

I guess the lesson/point from this post is that process is everything, especially for something like this that is very labor intensive, and where there are MANY different approaches and techniques for each step along the way.

New Serger Has Arrived

Well, it's pretty much nerd heaven here in Columbus today, as my brand new Brother Serger arrived today via UPS.



While here, I will give a quick plug for WalMart. Yup, I actually got the thing online at www.walmart.com. I blush. While I don't think this will secure me a place of honor at People Of Wal-Mart, I still feel a little icky about it. I must confess though, for me, the main deterrent to shopping at Wal-Mart is physically being in the store. Shopping online doesn't offer the same, er... CHALLENGES that you find in the actual brick and mortar locations.

Alas, I am ranting, when I should be raving. Let me start out by saying that this machine is absolutely amazing. Just stunning. I can't believe I've lived this long without owning one. This particular machine, the Brother 1034D is an entry level model which I picked up for under 200 dollars. Oh, and shipping was 4.95. And it arrived about three days after I ordered it. Logistics aside, it's just an amazing machine.

I cannot really compare it to OTHER sergers, as this is not only the first one I have ever owned, but also the first one I have ever played with. What I can tell you for sure is this: it took me about five minutes to go from taped up box to sewing seams up. It was immensely easy to thread, and I was tearing it up immediately after that.

Here's what the machine looks like out of the box, all rigged for sewing.



All the weird colored threads are what came with the machine. Just demo threads, I presume.

Some people like to bronze their kids first shoes. I like to take photos of my very first stitch.



And here's the very first time I joined two pieces of fabric. I know. Kinda nerdy. But here's the thing. With my old sewing machine, I had reached my wits end. The thing is always breaking threads, dropping stitches, always doing something wrong. It's really frustrating and tedious to deal with. I don't like it. So you can imagine my surprise when this little beast threaded up really quickly and started producing REALLY excellent results right away.



With the new machine up and running, I thought it was time to take another run at the Superman Returns body suit. Right now I'm just working on refining the pattern for the top half. The legs are pretty much done. I did a lot of fudging of the store bought pattern, and came up with these. This is the pattern for the sleeve, the front of the torso, and half of the back of the torso.



The most time in this entire project was spent not only getting the pattern together, but also cutting the fabric. The actual sewing was the fastest part of the entire affair. Here are the final results.



Overall, I'm extremely pleased with this, even though it is not perfect. I must point out that the machine did not stutter ONCE!! I did not have to rethread it once, it didn't drop a stitch. It's just a total dream to work with. And it's REALLY fast too. I can chew through fabric like nobody's business. I am very impressed with this machine. I suppose the real test will be to see how long it can maintain this level of excellence. I don't really plan on beating it up at all, so hopefully it will serve me for many projects to come.

As for the pattern, there are definitely things I need to change about it. The sleeves need to be lenghtened and tightened up a little around the forearm. The collar needs to be tightened up a little. Stuff like that. The original pattern is also kind of a mess. What I originally thought were just things about the pattern that I did not understand turned out to be genuine shortcomings of it. For example, some of the seams do not line up properly. One half will be an inch longer than the other, or something like that. Just a little sloppy. Nothing I cannot fix, and for 12 dollars, I suppose I should not really complain. The great news about the pattern I'm using as a base is that it is fundamentally correct in its design. I just need to clean it up a little, and make it fit my corpse a little better.

I am thinking of spending some time tonight modding the pattern, but I just don't know if I have it in me to go the whole distance again. I think start to finish, it took about six hours to get that blue shirt finished. I'm sure this time will be quicker, but I am feeling a tad worn out at this point.

I guess at this point, I'm just SO happy to not be dealing with the never ending stream of frustrations I had with my old machine. It makes me think I might want to pick up a traditional sewing machine from Brother, since this serger seems so great. As for my reconditioned Omega, it still has ONE thing going for it: it can sew through REALLY thick stuff. This will come in hand when I sew up the next cape. Other than that, I'm just about ready to chuck it out the window.

Legs Pattern Test Is Good

My first test of scratch built pants turned out pretty well. And yes, I realize that there are two different colors used here!!



I made these using some scraps I had lying around, and the point was to see if I could make them with a single seam on the inside of the legs, just like the screen used Superman Returns costume. Turned out it worked pretty good. I am not sure what the backside of the screen used suit looked like, but I know that the front had a "fly" type operation for easy access. I will be reproducing that to the best of my ability.

These were made entirely from a pattern made from the ground up by me. No store bought patterns used here, sir! There are definitely some things I will change, namely scaling the entire thing down a bit.

Overall, this is really good news and great progress. I think my next test will be with material a bit closer to the final product. I also need to start working on the torso pattern. For that, I am indeed going to modify the existing pattern that I have used in the past. I like the way the sleeves and the torso work together. I will probably try to modify it to move the side seams around to the back a little, though this is not critical to me. I would be OK if the seams were still on the sides, but I'm going to take a stab at it.

More Fabric Has Been Ordered - Twill!

I did a little digging around today for Twill, now that I am very hot on that fabric. I found a number of choices at an online store that I have dealt with before, though none of them were perfect. There was a very nice looking red, but it was ONE inch too short for my purposes. But then I got to thinking that if it's perfect, and will work out of the box, maybe I could just shave an inch off the cape. Nobody would notice. There were some other choices that are close in color, and I'm thinking maybe with a little dye work they could become perfect. Not sure. Anyhow, samples are ordered.

Pattern Work, Leather

Last night I did a bunch of pattern work on the body suit. I cut out all of the panels, though I think I'm only going to use the upper body portion for the final suit. I'm going to totally re-do the legs from the ground up. But there is some stuff from the pattern I'm doing to use, namely the inseam. That's sort of done well on my pattern and I may as well preserve it. Recall that my plan is to have seams only on the inside of the legs.

As for the torso, the pattern is actually pretty good, though I will need to move the zipper to the back. I've already made the necessary modifications to the pattern to accommodate this. I will need to remove the seam from the front though, which is really just a matter of taping the two front halves of the pattern together. No brainer.

The overall plan is to create NEW patterns using my butcher paper roll that is sitting in my closet. I will use that pattern on all future suits.

Also of interest is that I ordered a panel of laser cut micro-S's today from MKEngraving. Though i already have this part covered by some stuff that RebelScum sent me, I want another option. I know the work that MKE does is really top notch, and they are very fast with the turnaround. I expect they will finish up my order within a week or so.

I am also still hoping to hear from my friend Thom about the Returns boots he was wearing at DC. They would make an excellent base, as they were a really good overall shape.

New Sewing Machine Inbound

After Dragon*Con, I have been struck with a new wave of enthusiasm for this Superman Returns costume. One of the things I have wanted to get for many many years is a good serger. This is a type of sewing machine that is essential for sewing stretchy fabrics. I did a little bit of research on the internet, found what appears to be a decent quality entry level machine, and pulled the trigger. It should arrive in about a week.

In preparation for that machine, I am revisiting the body suit pattern I purchased a while back. I'm going to take another stab at doing a test build, but making a lot of mods to the pattern as I go. For example, the zipper will be in the back, the leg seams will only be on the inside, and I will probably move the side seams towards the back a bit. It should be a good exercise for me.

In other pretty exciting news, I heard back from Ricky Broussard about getting some fabric custom printed with my own diamond artwork on it. Basically, it's no problem. It's not cheap, but it's no problem. This is great news. This will allow me not only to get the diamond pattern PERFECT, but I will also be able to include the racing stripes in the fabric. On the screen used suit, these details were all screen printed. My research has shown that this will simply be cost prohibitive for a one off suit. I don't have the means or interest in setting up a screen print shop in my garage, which means I will have to outsource it. Just the setup costs for an oversized screen will run me many hundreds of dollars. At this point, I am willing to sacrifice a tiny bit of screen used accuracy if it will go virtually unnoticed to even the most sophisticated observer.

Overall, a really great day, and I'm very happy with the prospect of getting the fabric printed by Ricky. I am also pretty sure I know which blue I'm going to go with for the body suit. The color is VERY close in match to the screen used fabric, though not perfect. But it's the closest I've found. It's also a very nice fabric that has a nice feel to it. I think it will work out great.

New Fabric Find Looks Very Promising

I made a run to the fabric store at lunch time today, primarily to pick up some stuff for sewing stretch fabrics together. More on that in a later post.

While I was there, I figured I would peruse the fabrics to see if something caught my eye that might be useful in the cape. I was in luck! I found SOMETHING that looks REALLY promising. It's a twill that is 100% cotton. It's really light, has a nice hand, and looks like it will flow very nicely.



As you can see, my excitement got the better of me, and I wanted to do an adhesion test with the cape I had laid up previously. Keep in mind that the current latex layup in the cape mold was done mainly to clean the mold, and also to get a feel for how many coats of latex I will need to do. So it's not like I was wasting good latex.

The bottom line is that the fabric worked VERY well. It stuck to the latex very nicely, and did not bleed through AT ALL. One of the drawbacks of the stuff I was using before was the bleed through. The latex would push through the fabric and you'd end up with gobs of the stuff on the inner surface of the cape. With this new stuff... not so much.

Not only does it stick well, but because it's 100% cotton, it means it will take dye very nicely. This is critical to me, and is very exciting.

Now that I have this fabric, the next trick is to find it in wide bolt. I was originally looking for gabardine, but almost all the gabardines I found were a poly/cotton blend, which makes dying problematic.

Anyhow, good stuff.

Here's a couple of pictures from Dragon*Con. I'm dressed as Smallville's Clark Kent. Red Jacket. See if you can find me.

More Latex For Capes

I ordered some more latex today, as I used up my existing supply on my current test cape. As usual, I got it from Monster Club.

I am still looking for a good source for wide-bolt fabric that will meet my needs. I suppose I should do some more searching today.

Laser Update

I am back from Dragon*Con, and more pumped than ever to finish this suit up. I saw some really great costumes this week, and it's totally gotten me re-energized and ready to go.

With that said, today I sent some more information and final details to one of my laser cutting resources on getting some leather engraved with the micro-s pattern. At this point, I'm really just covering my bases. I already have 2 options all squared away, but I think this last one might yield the most perfect results, so naturally I am pursuing it. Nothing much else to report for today.

Cape Process Refined

I had a couple brain storms the other day about doing the cape layup. Now that I am getting closer and closer to perfecting my technique (both in terms of materials used and actual/physical mechinations) I figured it was time to take another run at making one.

The real secret to success here is equipment. I went to Lowe's the other day and picked up an extension pole for my paint roller. That one tiny piece of technology has turned cape layup from a pain in the rear to a quick little bit of fun.

In ONE evening and about 20 minutes of work, I laid down four coats of latex rubber into the cape mold.





I am documenting my process in my new notebook, but will probably repeat it here eventually just for archival purposes. Bottom line is that this new process saves me LOADS of time, gets better results, and is actually kind of fun to do.

What I really need to do now is perfect the cloth attachment process. Which is next, by the way.