Pattern Drafting – glitzparty . studios

Let’s Talk Pattern Drafting – Sleeves (Part 2)

I have a good excuse for missing last week’s post! I had surgery on Monday! While I could’ve probably pushed myself to get something out on Tuesday, I prioritized my health (for once!) and rested up instead. Now it’s… the following Thursday. Happy Tutorial Thursday, y’all!

So, I trust that everyone went out and made their basic blocks last week, because we’ll actually be needing them this week for our sleeve drafting! If you haven’t, mosey on over to part 1 in this series and get that pattern ready!

Now, sleeves are the bane of most people’s existence when it comes to sewing, much less drafting a pattern. Being able to make a good sleeve is a skill that you will never regret honing, so we’ll start with a basic sleeve block, talk about how to adjust some weirdness in the fit that may arise when you attempt to put it on the basic block and discuss a few neat adjustments you can make to get different shapes in your sleeves.

But first!

Let’s Make A Basic Sleeve

Let’s Talk Pattern Drafting (Part 1)

The first time I made my own piece of clothing without a pattern and without modifying another existing piece of clothing, it worked out better than I expected, truth be told. It still felt awful to wear and tugged in all the wrong places, but it was something I could put on. It was this shirt right here.

*Ah, 2003. It was a simpler time for cosplay!*

Looking at this shirt, it’s probably not readily apparent where the flaws are. I know that they’re in the fit of the shoulders and arms, primarily. The sleeves are a little too snug on the bicep, the top of the shoulders is weirdly flat and it’s hard for me to actually put my arm over my head like in that photo. It looked okay and felt terrible, but hey, I made it myself!

So how did Baby Jay at the ripe ol’ age of 14 manage a semi-functional garment? The pattern looked something like this:

Note: This is not a real pattern, it’ll look awful if you try to use it as such!

Now, how do I know that’s what it looked like over 15 years later?

Easy, it’s the same exact pattern I used when making Anders in 2012:

And again with Nathaniel in 2013:

And all of our Attack On Titan jackets in 2014? You guessed it!

What about Kenny Crow in 2017?

And… Leo?!

Okay, but surely in 2018 I did Leo differe–

Nope! Every single one of these costumes started with that same rough shape, even if some pieces got changed around slightly. At this point in my cosplay career, I’m not afraid of making really bizarre patterns or things that are super tightly tailored, but that’s because I have the foundation necessary to tackle weirdness and alterations.

How does one build a foundation?

With BLOCKS of course!

Making Of: Erhardt (Part 1)

When Octopath Traveler came out, I was beyond excited to dive into it and really see what it had to offer. With 8 main characters, it seemed tailor-made for our usual group plus a few of our usual add-on members, but I ended up struggling to figure out which character best suited me and that I liked. Glitz was a shoe-in for Cyrus but despite my appreciation of Therion, I realized halfway into making him that I just… wouldn’t look good. I wouldn’t look decent. It was going to be a hot mess, and it wouldn’t be fun for me as a result.

OPT was really fun and had a lot of really beautiful character designs, so it wasn’t hard to find secondary characters that appealed to me. I initially fell in love with Captain Leon, but alas! There’s no actual art of him, only his overworld sprite. That, coupled with the lack of a confirmed Tressa for our group, left me with the understanding that I would be the ‘can you move so I can get a picture of the Octopaths?’ guy if I were to commit to him.

My second choice went to Erhardt who had a lovely battle sprite and some concept art to base my costume decisions on. His outfit was also a pallette swap of Olberic’s default costume, so any further details I would be able to glean from the more detailed and varied artwork available for him.

Image result for erhardt octopath — His hair is for aesthetics, not practicality!

The problem arose again: would anyone recognize me without an Olberic for context? Thankfully, after making Alfyn, Type09 decided that he wanted to do the Warmaster variant of Olberic, so I set out to finally make my own Octopath costume!