feathers Okapi

Some work updates!

We’ve been busy with a complicated suit, but this one is coming along! Here’s a peek of the pattern for this guy. 

PLUSHIES on sale now!

Our feathers and Cinder plushies are now available for preorder! They are not officially released for orders until next week, but patrons and clients may follow this link to order now: 

https://littlesofts.com/collections/smalldolls

They are limited and likely will not have a re-run so order now if you’re interested!

Dye sublimated taiyaki tail prop

One of my personal characters has a taiyaki tail, so I set out to use dye sublimation to make a quick and easy one! I decided to sublimate onto light brown minky, and drew my designs in procreate using a darker brown. all markings on this are dye sublimated! I used a template and photoshop to be sure that my sizing was correct. The main body of the fish has iron on foam interfacing on both sides to help it hold shape, with a layer of the same foam between each fin, which was then top stitched. This is a good example of dye sublimation not only making a project easier, but more attractive from my perspective! I love how clean it looks!

Dye Sublimated eyes

It’s time to learn about dye sublimation! Dye sub is a popular method emerging in fursuit making, primarily for eyes though it can be used for many other things. Dye sub uses heat to transfer an image permanently onto an appropriate surface, using a special printer and paper. It can be a costly process to set up.

The most important thing is a printer that can be used for dye sublimation. It is possible to convert Epson ink tank printers into a dye sub printer, but I chose to purchase a printer that is specifically for professional dye sublimation. The brand is called Sawgrass, and I had to go to America to buy it. The ink is very expensive, but lasts a very long time. Besides this, you will need a heat press of appropriate size for your use, and dye sublimation paper of your choice that fits in your printer.

Sawgrass has a special program for configuring prints, so you cannot just print from photoshop directly if you’re using one. It’s easy though, just format your page and save it as a png before uploading it to the sawgrass program. I started with eyes drawn in procreate and transferred to photoshop. I worked at actual size to help with the setup.

The material we will be printing the eyes on is also white on both sides. This means we will have to dye the back as well, so I make a page with black eyes as well.

Once the images are saved, I upload them to the printing program. It’s pretty self explanatory to set up the image at the correct size, but the next part will be the print setting.

Make sure to select the type of paper you’re using. The product selection can vary, feel free to test different settings. I used mousepad as suggested by LatinVixen. I make sure the quality is high and change the color mode to vivid. From there you can also adjust contrast and such, which might be necessary for deeper blacks.

After that, I go ahead and print the eyes along with the black backing. The colour on the print will appear faded or duller than the image.

now we go to the heat press and prepare the material. We have a larger press so we can use it to make custom minky and other materials as well.

The material we use for the eyes is white PC mesh, which we buy on eBay. You might be able to find it at computer supply stores. We like it because the holes are even and uniform.  We cut it to shape to fit each eye.

Next are the settings on the heat press. Right now we find that 325 degrees for 50 seconds is good, but your press might vary depending on material and make. Longer times can burn your eye material.

Lay down your eye material, with the colour prints face down on it. Make sure to cover everything with a heat proof sheet, these can be found on Amazon and some are specifically for dye sub printing. 

Once you’ve pressed it for the right amount of time, give the material a minute or so to cool down so it doesn’t warp. Then you can remove the paper and see the result!

Don’t forget to dye the back of the eyes black! That’s very important for good vision.

Above is a comparison of our new method vs the old one (the finished eye). Some more adjustments are needed for brightness, but it’s very close. The dye sublimation is permanent and waterproof. The vision is also superior and extremely clear. We would finish the eyes as we usually do with the walls and domes, along with a layer of plastic behind the mesh to completely seal the eyes.

Much better vision with the new method! No tinted colour vision.

if you want to get into dye sublimation, feel free to test any kind of eye material to see what works best for your use. 

Rolf fox head

Just some progress on a modified head base! 

Plushies!

Prototypes are done and will be sent to us soon! Some small changes are left to make, but soon you will be able to take us home. We can watch you make fursuits all day 👁

Zip on feet

Soupy asked us for zip on feet for Chicken Noodle. We don’t normally do zipper feet and the lower leg shape is entirely formed by the foot, so it was a little abnormal for us. We decided to keep it simple and just measure and add a zipper in the middle of the foot, so that the shape could still be kept by the foot itself. It isn’t very noticeable unless you’re looking for it. Not something we will offer regularly but fun to try out!

Fluffy progress

Fluffy is almost finished, so here are some details about the head. This is our first time using dye sublimation for eyes. The process involves printing on special paper with special ink that can be transferred to any white surface using a heat press. We followed guidance from Mixedcandy for this method, and use a Sawgrass printer that is specifically for printing for dye sublimation. You can create eyes, custom minky and fabric, and almost anything else you can fit under the heat press. Here we used white computer mesh, and dye sublimated the back black as well for better vision. This will also be our first time using magnets for removable eyelids!

Nikita completed

We finished her recently! She has a big fluffy tail and mane. 

Simple ear studs

Nikita has some circle studs, so we made some simple sewable earrings for her. It is a piece of 4mm EVA foam cut into a circle with silver spandex stretched over it and glued at the back. The back is then covered with stiff felt or another similar material, and from there they can be sewn onto the head. I prefer doing it this way so that glue does not damage the fur. 

Chicken Noodle

Chicken Noodle was returned to us to get a body! This handsome fellow is for Curlworks. We tried some new techniques this time, especially in the markings area. This tip was shared by fellow maker Syber, using iron on interfacing to seal markings and protect them. Ironing the backing of the fur does not melt the fur fibre on the other side, but it’s important to test your iron settings.

We also tried a new layering effect on the mane to give it more volume. We first created the mane as a regular stripe down the back and tail, but then added three flaps in certain places. one fin shaped piece in the middle of the back seam, with two flaps on either side that are sewn on top of the stripe of fur. They are single layer with the backing of the fur brushed out to create double sided fur.

Soupy also requested zip on feet, which we haven’t done for about four years now. If the process is successful, we will share the details here. zipper feet are not something we normally offer right now!

Dragon Chingado

This critter belongs to Jillcostumes! This will be our first time making a magnetic prop, the crown. Chingado is usually a cat, so it’s been fun to convert it into a cat/dragon like character. 

Resin printing!

We’ve been doing some cool things with our new Anycubic resin printers. We used to cast all teeth and claws individually, but printing speeds that process up x10. We are still tinkering with settings but so far everything looks pretty good! We have a prop crown here that we primed and painted directly after printing with no sanding etc to test it out. we made some of our little tiny chibi teeth similarly, and then coated both with a resin spray to protect the paint. The spray did seem to dull the gold so I’m going to mess around with it more, but otherwise this resin spray is a great way to seal painted prints. 

Head base orders and work update

Casting is in progress! We hope to cast and mail all head bases ordered this week. In the meantime we will have details about resin printing soon! We are trying many new things lately, but more work will be posted shortly. 

Head bases for sale

Here are photos of the head bases! Large muzzle is canine, smaller muzzle is regular kemono/feline. Please see our last post for sales information!

Head bases for sale

Reminder we are still offering limited head bases to patrons! We have two regular and two canine kemono head bases left. They are $200 plus $30 shipping within Canada and the USA. Please email us at kemonokapi@gmail.com to claim one!

Blank kemono head base preorders

We have decided to take orders for three regular and three canine style kemono head base blanks. These are blank foam bases that we cast with expanding foam. You must carve it out yourself! There are outlines to help with eye placement.

to order one, you must email us at kemonokapi@gmail.com with your base preference (regular or canine) and your paypal address.

the total is $200 for one base and $30 for shipping to USA and Canada. Please ask about other countries.

if it goes well, we may sell more in the future! They will be cast in the next week or so and shipped after Vancoufur in the second week of March. 

Lush almost complete

Lush finally got hair! This critter is ready for photos, so we will have the finished studio image soon. I should note that metallic spandex does NOT hold up over time and it will wear down quickly unless taken care of properly. It must be washed gently! I ironed interfacing to the inside of the spandex to prevent stretch. 

Viper head base and pattern

Viper the dragon is coming soon! This is a modified version of our regular kemono base. It’s easy to turn them into any creature. 

Padding suspenders

We finally settled on a design for suspenders to help hold up the large padding in our suits. To make them, we use regular cotton fabric, backpack webbing, and buckles. I would not recommend using something like elastic for the straps, as they’ll stretch and wear down over time.

having bag webbing by itself resting on your shoulders and supporting weight can hurt over time, so the design includes the fabric portion to help make the suspenders more comfortable and sturdy.

experiment with your own patterns to see what is most comfortable for you. To make the suspenders, I assemble everything separately before attaching to the padding. I then assemble the padding and triple stitch the cotton parts to the inside of the padding using straight and zigzag stitches. It can also be assembled to show no stitching on the outside if you wish, but I like to keep them easily removable in the case of repairs or replacements.

this pattern is one size fits all!

Selling Head Bases

I am thinking of offering a limited number of head bases for sale to patrons only. I would have regular kemono and large muzzle/canine kemono blank bases available for $200 each plus $30 shipping. For now I can only ship to Canada and the USA. Is there interest for these bases? Most of our suits are made on regular kemono short muzzle bases.

please comment if you are interested!

Printing eyes

In case anyone missed seeing it on twitter, I wanted to show off two eye prints, one of which is much more vibrant than the other. With some eyes, the printer just can’t read the colours correctly and the print turns out dull. In this case I changed the contrast settings during the print setup to correct it, and print eyes more accurate to the artwork. We use a canon pixma pro 100 printer for pretty much everything related to eye printing!

Nikita body

We have been working very quickly lately to meet a deadline, but we did take some photos of Nikita’s body pattern! We haven’t done stripes in a very long time

3D printing resin

We recently bought an anycubic resin printer.  We are using it to print teeth and claws for now, and the results are amazing and smooth. Right now we are trying to adjust the settings to create a clear claw with a frosted look to hide LEDs inside. The look is correct, but printed clear resin can come out yellowed from the UV exposure, so we are working on the settings that allow us to print as clear as possible. Once the print is washed and cured, it does come out a bit clouded. If you want crystal clear, this can be achieved using a resin spray or dip to coat the outside of the print in a new layer of clear resin. That clears up any clouding you might see. I’ll share what we use once our claws are complete!

Make sure your address is updated!

We have plenty of patrons with no address, if you want to get goodies in the mail please make sure to update your address!

your address must also be romanized for shipping to be possible, if you live in Japan, Korea, etc. thank you!

Lush belly markings

Lush has some metallic belly markings, and I decided to appliqué them on top of the fur. Here you can see the design drawn on the back, similar to how paw pads are done. The gold material however, is very fragile. To protect it from the feed dogs and presser foot, I used paper, and sewed directly through the paper. It was easy to remove the paper after. When sewing on top of the gold for satin stitching the rough edges to hide them (not pictured) I slipped another piece of paper between the presser foot and the gold material to protect it from scratches on top. 

April the spaniel

April is actually close to being completed already! She was adopted from our adoptable designs. I’ve had some questions about how we do necks, and here you can see that the pattern is done all at once with the head. I find this gives the most accurate shape, just don’t make the neck hole too small. 

Lush head

Lush is actually almost done already! Here they are bald, waiting to add hair. The horns are made from a gold spandex with interfacing ironed to the back to prevent it from stretching. It can still be difficult to work with, but you can make stretch fabric into normal fabric this way

Chingado

This is a trade for jillcostumes! Chingado looks like a normal cat, but they will turn into a dragon. Here is another example of painting the walls of the eyes, in this case they are yellow. Chingado also has a crown, and we will be testing this with our new resin printers. I’ve always wanted to make parts like these, so I’ll discuss the experience once it is printed. 

Oniigan

A very unique character! The eyes are very cool. In the black eye, we painted the EVA foam walls black. We sealed it first using mod podge in several layers, and then spray paint.