HOME | DD
Ranasp — Leather Mask Making Tutorial
Published: 2006-10-17 23:57:00 +0000 UTC; Views: 132676; Favourites: 1313; Downloads: 1232
Redirect to original
Description
This has been a while in the making, I hope that it answers most of your questions if you want to try making a mask of your own.I took the pictures with the aid of my boyfriend and wrote the text, while did all of the layout, I couldn't have made this tutorial without her, thanks so much!
Related content
Comments: 310
I have no idea what zyohger is, so I looked it up, it looked something like Power Ranger masks but animals? The ones I saw were a lot more...Puffy looking than what leather would typically do. I suppose you could try, or do a variant of it, but it isn't going to end up looking a whole lot like them from what I saw.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Natural Veg Leather Trim piece ( 8 1/2" X 11") sold at Hobby Lobby and Michaels work perfect for this.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
::twitch:: I don't advise buying from Hobby Lobby. You're far better off buying a "grab bag" of leather remnants from Tandy Leather Factory or any other leather supply store that sells scraps of vegetable tanned leather. You can quite easily make domino masks out of many of the scraps for much cheaper overall, plus the odd shapes can force you to be a bit creative with the final form.
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
Hmm I wonder how you would do with a tokyo ghoul mask
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
This is extremely useful and informative. Thank you.
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
Where did you get the leather? I live in Hawaii and have no idea where to get good amounts of it, except online I guess.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
I live near a Tandy Leather Factory so I can just drive down to get more leather, but you can look for online stores or buy off of ebay. You could also try your local craigslist to see if anyone local is selling vegetable tanned leather.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
tandy leather online half a hide of vegtable tanned leather.... a grand total of a hundred and something dollors, not cheap and not that much leather when doing this stuff
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
A half hide is HUGE when you're talking masks. It's not super cheap, but I have yet to find anything of quality that is. You can also buy a grab bag of scrap leather and usually can get a few pieces of decent size to practice with.
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
Do so! Even if you go with a simple domino mask for your first one it looks so much more polished if you shape it like in the tutorial and ends up looking quite impressive.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
It's a very good tutorial, by the way, makes the whole process seem a lot less intimidating.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
It really is one of those things that has a simple foundation but refining it is the challenge.
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
Actually, they're leather dyes, which are shown in Step 2.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Heyo, I'm looking to make a clown nose (note the profile pic) and am questioning how to precut leather so it will form the shape of a ball..i.e., how does a clown nose translate to 2D? Or does it not really matter, when the leather is wet and you cut after the fact? Any suggestions? Thanks! Nice work, btw!
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
I wouldn't say it's impossible, but I'm not sure how it could be made without leaving a seam. You would probably have to make it sort of the way you do a pillow, use VERY thin leather, make two halves of the sphere, stitch them together wrong-side-out, wet them and flip them inside-out so they're correct side out and try stretching it while wet into the correct shape.
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
Thanks for posting this tutorial and leaving it up since 2006. Just finished my Dread Pirate Roberts mask for Halloween and it looks so much better than any of the simple masks available for sale anywhere.
Thanks again, and you rock!
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
I'm glad it was a help! Did you take a picture of your completed costume?
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
This is a fantastic tutorial and it makes the process seem much more realistic and possible. Thank you SO much!
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
You don't get much more real than wet leather slapped onto your face. 
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
WOW very cool thanks for sharing this... cool tutorial...!!!
If you went to all this trouble you can also make a plaster of paris casting of your face and then use that to weigh down the leather on the plaster face casting and wait for the leather to dry as well in fact a dry plaster of paris face casing would help absorb some of the water from the leather and aid it in the drying process.!!!
Thanks again!!!
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
You rock for offering this information up - thanks
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Thanks! The info is out there though, so I can't say I really did anything too original.
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
THANK YOU! this will help so much with cosplaying
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
Thanks! Glad you found it useful.
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
Holy shit, that actually looks quite easy and fun to do!
I've always thought that making leather masks was REALLY hard, but now I really want to try it myself!
Only, the leather! Where can I buy the right kind of leather, and how can I recognise it? Does it always have that beige brown hue? And are coloured/processed leathers out of the question? (I think, yes... but I have a bag full of scrap leather in different colours, and it'd be nice if I could use that. I guess not though...)
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
You MIGHT find vegetable tanned leather that's already been dyed, but I'd worry about how well it would hold its shape if it's already been wet down.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Yeah, I tried it with a small piece and it doesn't work. So I need to find just unprocessed vegetable tanned leather...
Do you know a place where they sell it??
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
The leather factory is the most common place you can find it at, otherwise just google search for "vegetable tanned leather" and you'll get lots of places show up.
👍: 0 ⏩: 0
What I did when I tried this, was make a plaster "lookalike" of me. i got a friend to cut some plaster bandages, dunk in water and cover my whole face in a couple of layers of the stuff (after my face being completely covered in vaseline beforehand. ew :s ). once it dried and I took it off, I closed any breathing holes such as the nose or mouth, and then filled it with plaster, waited for it to dry and voila! a free face to work with~ 
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
The only mild worry would be the wet leather softening the plaster over time, but if you seal the plaster that shouldn't be much of an issue.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
(i dunno why i said to fill a plaster mould with plaster...that wouldnt work at all >.>)
but filling the mould with wax (you can buy a packet of wax pellets which you melt down from any art and craft store) would work well, because the wax would retain its shape, unless in really really warm weather
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
Actually there's a type of wax used for casting jewelry that's very hard and takes a much higher temperature to melt than your average wax, that would probably work best.
👍: 0 ⏩: 1
| Next =>