Pyramid Head Costume

So here it is, the Pyramid Head (Silent Hill 2) costume I wore to ACEN 2004. Yeah, that was me. It went over a lot better than I thought it would too. I mean, people were running up to hug me. It was weird. Oh, I've got a lot of stories about the costume. Ask me sometime.

Construction: Cotton for the apron and gloves, hand-stained with acrylic paint, textile medium, and black tea. The apron fit fine, but the gloves were stiff and tight. If I do it again next year, I'm using a more forgiving fabric. The knife is a 2x6, painted with a combination of silver spraypaint and acrylic for the rust and metal. The hood was the fun part: Acrylic plastic bonded with silicone adhesive and finished with foamcore to add thickness and durability.

It was about a month from start to finish, but I don't know how that breaks down on an hourly basis. It wasn't terribly hard work, but there was a ton of it, and a lot of prepwork and finishing was involved--I started with sketches of the character in-game and from there I made tiny mockup pyramid hoods, starting with a 1"x3" model and moving gradually up to a full-size mockup made from poster board. I used that as the pattern for the final build. At one point I was worried that I wouldn't be able to pull it off because I literally need a calculator to assure myself that 1+1 does not equal 3, but just by eyeballing all the measurements and proportions I think I came pretty damn close.

I know the hood has a stupid viewie window thing, but that was convention guidelines. I know most people ignored them, but I'm the type that can't get away with breaking the rules. So I toe the line and this is what I came up with. Plus I could see my feet the whole time, which was rad.

I bought a lot of redundant materials for the costume but it only incorporated the following:

$10 --clear acrylic plastic
$6 --4'x6'
$6 --white cotton
$3 --rubber boots (Goodwill)

Fortunately I had the paint already lying around but I think I would have only spent about another $10-15 on that anyway. All in all, I'd have to say the costume was a success.