Year: 2025

Band Hat Construction – reference for cosplay

I’m making a Jagermonster (from the Girl Genius webcomic) costume that can also function as a Steampunk / Victorian costume of an unspecified hussar (it’s a type of light cavalry with really cool costumes). Of course, that means I need a nice hat.

A horde of Jagermonsters in varying uniforms.

To make life easier, I bought a vintage band hat (shako) off ebay. So this post is how that hat is constructed in case somebody else wants to do the same thing. I’m sure construction varies depending on company and decade, but this should give you an idea.

One of the ebay photos

The historical shakos were made of stiffened felt and leather. Naturally, modern ones are much cheaper. From the inside out: the base is molded ABS plastic. It’s covered in twill fabric in two pieces – the top and the main part which is sewn in front with the seam hidden by the plaque (the big brass thing). The trim on top is also sewn in front, but the trim on bottom is sewn on one side. The whole fabric cover is glued on the inside and the outside under the trim pieces.. I suspect you could pull the fabric off to use as a pattern, but it would probably have some tears.

Showing the plastic body. Ignore the hole – I added that. The clothes pins are holding the headliner out of the way.

Over the twill covering goes the visor with the edge trimmed (printed on the visor is washing instructions: Don’t.) Mine seems to be a layer of stiff card and a layer of vinyl. The visor is sewn onto the inside. Sewn over that is a faux leather (vinyl) sweatband with a headliner attached. The headliner allows some size adjustment. Mine is fabric – I specifically looked for that – but the newer ones are vinyl.

Photo from ebay showing the inside of the hat, with the visor, sweatband, and headliner, as well as a tag.
Inside the shako, with the stitching holding everything in place removed.

You can see how things go a bit better here, hopefully. The large hole is a vent that I suspect doesn’t help much. The bottom hole I added, so ignore it. The twist ties show the position of the hole for the brad (see below). It looks like a button, but has long metal arms like a brad. Naturally, I can’t get that so I’m using buttons and temporarily holding them with twist ties. The brad holds on the cord and the chinstrap.

side of the hat, showing the button-like brad

The last detail is the plume holder for the plume, pompom, or whatever decoration, which also secures the plaque. This is a flattened plastic tube that goes in a hole in the top of the hat.

the top of the hat
inside the hat, with a screw on the back of the plaque through a hole in the plume holder

The holes are far enough up the hat that you shouldn’t ever feel the screw (which has a small nut that should go on there, but I didn’t bother for the photos). The plaque can turn freely, but I suspect you could solder or glue on another screw to prevent that, since there are three holes.

I think that’s everything. I’ve made a new pompom and I’m going to add fancier cords, like a military shako, that hang from near the top. I’m sculpting a new plaque using the old one as a base. Eventually I’ll make a new, black leather visor, but I think I’m going to run out of time. This is my very rough and ugly mock-up (the plaque will look like brass, not embroidery). I’ll probably also replace the blue trim with gold at some point.

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Story Sparks Cards sketches, part 1

For decades, I’ve been poking at a deck of writing prompts that I’ve named the Story Sparks Deck (literally decades – I was doing drawings for it for one of my final art classes). But I could never figure out an illustration style that would work with the more abstract prompts. If you follow me on Dreamwidth, you may have seen the events I’ve hosted on AllBingo with the prompts. I’ve revised the list some, which I’m probably going to end up doing more, but I’ve settled on about 76 cards.

I’ve finally figured out a symbolic style that’s working for me. After I had sketched a few, I revised the palette a little, so I have some that have two versions. I’m going to share sketches here in multiple parts. I welcome comments on whether or not the ideas work – I’ve gone very abstract and I worry that some of them are too abstract.

Some of the cards are reversible, sometimes with different meanings depending on orientation. Those ones I’ll show both ways.

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Silvercat x3

line art of Silvercat in three poses, overlaid over each other, in blue, teal, and green

An experiment to use up one of the last prompts on Beige. A T-1 line allows multiple calls to made over a single line. So I was thinking of animation and that sort of thing. I don’t know how well it worked, but I like the poses.

Traced over three photographs of myself. Technically fits into Up at Silvercat’s because the non-UAS version has furry wings.

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The One Where They’re Human (and Also Magical Warriors)

My first AU (alternate universe)!

Felino is now Felipe, aka Crimson Puma. He’s Latino and a trans man, previously a butch lesbian. He can’t grow facial hair and he’s annoyed by it. He’s always ready to fight. He took a while to figure out his new name, so different groups of friends know him as different things. When people need something, he always knows a guy. He like punk music and fashion.

Mya is now Miyako, aka Saffron Lioness. She’s still cute and sweet, and likes to cook especially pastries, but now she’s Japanese-American. She’s very femme, and no, she doesn’t know martial arts.

Silvercat is now Sky, aka Indigo Tiger. Their gender is somewhere between “gender? I don’t know her” and “BUTCH.” They’re always tired. They’re white. They’re introverted and would really just like to be left alone to read and write. Her style is best described as comfortable. They do know martial arts.

The three of them were friends in high school. Now that they’re in their 20s, they’ve started a coffee, tea, and ice cream shop together, until one day a chocolate-brown, and rather chunky, talking cat strolled into their lives and told them they were destined Magical Warriors, and gave them each a transformation talisman.

Crimson Puma’s is a friendship bracelet. As Crimson Puma, he has the most raw power, and can fit in anywhere. (because mountain lion’s have the largest range of almost any animal)

Saffron Lioness’ is a barrette. Her power is the power of teamwork, cooperation, and charm. And also the magical pride of lions she can call up.

Indigo Tiger’s is a pen. They are a master of camouflage, stealth, and disguise. And also can claw through almost anything.

They all grow a couple of inches when they transform, which makes Sky and Felipe very happy. The hoods on their uniforms can hide their faces. And they can transform into their cat, a housecat sized version, or a magical energy version.

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5 Things Felino Killed and 1 He Didn’t (Up at Silvercat’s)

Rating: PG for animal death, hunting, and blood, theoretical child endangerment

Fun fact! The name thing with the pumabirds is called a noa-name. Also keep in mind that an adult Nyji is only 4 to 4.5 feet tall. The Nyji nation Felino is part of separates things by hunter (/ gatherer / warrior) and homemaker (/ farmer / crafter) instead of male and female.

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Up at Silvercat’s vignettes

I posted these on Rainbowfic, so now I’m posting them here.

(I haven’t completely decided how I’m handling the Tynthna honorifics that apply to Mya/Maa) (Maa is how it’s spelled, Mya is how it’s pronounced)

(I’m also not decided on how high off the ground the Pub is)

Just Another Morning At Work

When I came in Felino was squatting on the floor, one knife held ready to throw, and Mya-chama was perched on a table, her skirt bunched up around her knees, tail swishing. They were both glancing intently around the room.

“What in Taill’s name are you doing?”

“Hunting,” Felino said flatly.

“There’s a mouse.”

“How the heck is there a mouse?! We’re four stories up a tree!” I protested.

“Dunno,” Felino said. “Mice are like that.”

“There!” Mya-chama leapt off the table, claws out, and pounced like a pastel meteor. “Got it!” The little grey pest flailed as much as it could with Mya-chama holding its tail.

“Great,” I said wearily. “Now get rid of it. We open in half an hour.”

Felino Insisted He Could Set Up the Holographic Playground

“Are you sure you know what you’re doing?”
“Absolutely!”
“Um… I don’t think it’s supposed to be glowing like that…”
“It’s fine. I’ve set up displays before.”
“Uh… this isn’t a screen.”
“It’s fine! It’s basically the same…….. ooops.”
“Uh huh. Let me go find a flashlight. And the manual.”

Adventures Building the Treehouse Pub

The tree was hollow but it had to be stablilized and lined so it’d wouldn’t drop sap or splinters; that was the first unexpected expense.

Silvercat hadn’t actually planned much and certainly hadn’t budgeted.

What with there being no roads it shouldn’t have been a surprise when the first truck full of building materials got stuck by the river but somehow it was.

The arboreal wildlife loved the cables the contractors strung from the branches for the purpose of bringing up materials and supporting scaffolding.

It certainly wasn’t the first time the company had put in a resin floor and bar top, but it was the first time they’d done it 100 feet up a tree.

Pretty much nobody thought the bar was a good idea – for oh so many reasons – but they all admitted it had style.

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Maa in snow gear sketch

(took me awhile to get around to scanning this)

Cold weather means layers. The layers she’s wearing are:

  • chemise
  • fur-lined trousers
  • heavy-weight tunic with fur-lined sleeves
  • fur-lined boots with ice cleats
  • mittens
  • tail sleeve
  • belted poncho
  • fur hat with drape/scarf (the hat isn’t transparent, I just wanted to make sure it had room for her ears)

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Comic icon tutorial: Speech Balloons 1

If there’s a word balloon in the section you want to make into an icon, you have a few options: you can remove it, you can remove the text, or you can just leave it as is. The last one is usually not a great option, because often the text is too small to read (or there’s just way too much text). I’ll show two ways to include the text or balloon in a later tutorial. Today, we’re going to cover removing it.

a panel with two thought balloons. Brian Braddock is shown wearing safety eyewear and doing something to make a bright spark. The entire panel is magenta.

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Silver’s Ultimate Text Readibility Trick

I’m going to be doing some icon/avatar tutorials, but this one works for any graphics.

Have you ever been stuck behind a truck with a wrap with a super busy background and looked at it thinking, “hope you have good word of mouth, because that phone number is impossible to read”? (this may be an ailment limited to graphic designers) How to keep that from happening with graphics you make? CHUNKY TEXT OUTLINES.

I’ve done literally hundreds of banners for RainbowLists / RainbowFic and I’ve used this trick for every one. Here’s the most basic form:

an ice cream counter with a number of tubs, with one being scooped into a cone. Text reads "time for dessert" in white with a black outline

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