With both Zombie Day and Halloween drawing closer, you’re going to need some gruesome wounds, stat! I hinted at my own wound-making recipes in a past post, but now all shall be revealed!

My favorite way to make nasty-looking wounds is with unflavored gelatin. It doesn’t necessarily have to be unflavored; if you want your wound to have different colors from flavored gelatin that’s up to you! (You should bear in mind though, that colored gelatin will probably stain your skin.) The great thing about this method is that you can use various additional media to create many different textures, and you don’t need any special glue to attach the wound to your skin. Just glob it onto you while it’s still wet and let it dry on you; it will stick by itself.

Take some cotton balls and get them wet with hot water. Stir it around to sort of break them up. Add the gelatin. How much you add isn’t that important, it will just make the texture a little different, so you can experiment. It’s better to add too much than too little, because without enough gelatin, the cosmetic won’t solidify or stick to you.

Once you have the gelatin stirred in and it’s cooled down enough to handle, glob it onto your skin and sculpt it with your fingers so that it looks how you want it to. The cotton balls give it kind of a fibrous, lumpy texture. Once the wound has dried and solidified, you can add makeup to it. Paint it to match your skin tone, then add blood, bruise colors, or whatever other colors you need. You can stick in things like pins, bolts, or other hardware, fake eyeballs like in the awesome droopy-eye wound shown above, fake knives or other costume props, or sew big uneven stitches into it.

When you’ve finished with your creepy shenanigans, the wound will peel off with a little effort, or you can try dissolving it off with water.

You don’t have to use just cotton balls, either. Try using corn flakes, tissues or toilet paper, shredded paper, or anything else you want to experiment with! All of these media will give you different textures, so think about how you want your wound to look before you make it. You can even try mixing different media together.

Similar types of wounds can be made with latex glue, or liquid latex that’s safe for use on skin, instead of gelatin. That might not be as cheap, but it depends on what’s available to you. Here’s an Instructable for using latex and toilet paper. It will also give you some good ideas about shaping wounds and creating additional, realistic textures.

You can also make great wounds using marshmallows. Just mash up some marshmallows with your fingers, and shape them to the size you want. These ones are cool because they remain soft and gushy while still maintaining basically the same shape. You should mostly paint them and decorate them before you put them on, and you have to glue them on with latex glue or spirit gum. Once they are glued on to your skin you can add some of the messier effects like blood.

Speaking of blood, I’ve given this recipe before, but it bears reiteration. It’s simple! Just mix together corn syrup with enough red food coloring to get the shade of red you desire. Common additional ingredients are cocoa powder to make it darker and to give it a realistic brownish color when it dries, peanut butter to make it thicker, or liquid soap to make it slimier.

What I have yet to figure out or find is a recipe for realistic-looking fake pus. On the other hand, maybe that’s just a bit too gross.

As a bonus, here’s some instructions from Indy Mogul on how to make a fake brain!

With the contest to join Dr. Horrible’s Evil League of Evil rapidly coming to a close, I thought it would be fun to post a few of our favorite submissions.

The winners will appear on the Dr. Horrible DVD which will be released in time for the holidays. And for you procrastinators, the deadline is Oct. 11, so you still have a few days to submit your application.

It’s great to see all the fans dressing up in Evil Costumes and having fun. Great job, Everyone!

The Vicious Viceroy

The Cutinator

Mr. Miserable

The Pocket Paradox

Evil Chassy

Captain Shrovewreaker

Harry Potter characters continue to be a very popular choice this Halloween. But for people who want their costume to be extra awesome, I’ve found this tutorial on Instructables about how to make a wand that lights up at the tip! Everyone else with their plain-old-boring wands will be totally jealous!

This is where you can find the instructable.

The basic premise is that you build a wand with a LED in the tip, and a simple circuit connecting it to a battery and a switch. You can turn the light on and off whenever you need to–but be sure to say the spells Lumos and Nox when you do it! It’s simple and brilliant.

Sometimes, a costume is more than just the clothes you wear. Sometimes, a costume is less than just the clothes you wear.

Makeup is something we haven’t talked too much about around here. That’s because makeup is usually an accessory to the costume, something that finishes the costume to make it more complete. It’s not often that a costume is defined by the makeup alone—but sometimes, it can be.

The brilliance behind zombie costumes is that you can wear whatever you want—or just whatever you normally wear. If you had really turned into a zombie, that’s what you would be wearing. As far as costumes go, it’s about as simple as it comes. It’s the makeup that’s really the costume.

To be a zombie, you’ll need pallid, sickly-looking skin. Maybe with a bit of a greenish tint to it. You’ll need at least one wound—that’s the zombie bite that turned you. And if you want to be really dramatic, blood splatters are the way to go.

Fake blood can be easily made by mixing corn syrup with red food coloring. Adding a little cocoa powder to the concoction will give it a darker blood color and ensure that when it dries, it will look just like dried blood.

Making your wounds takes a little more work, but it’s so much more fun. There are plenty of recipes for this kind of thing. I’ve done it with cotton balls and gelatin. I have a friend who made amazing realistic-looking zombie wounds with marshmallows. You can experiment with other textures too, like tissue or corn flakes. The wounds can be glued on with latex (the kind they use in theater to attach fake beards and the like), and painted with makeup and fake blood.

You don’t have to wait until Halloween to do this, either. Grab some friends and make a fast and fun zombie film. Or better yet, participate in one of the many zombie walks that occur every year across the country! Zombiewalk.com is a good resource for finding one, or organize your own in your neighborhood.

Having been deemed as the writer with the most costuming experience, I am here to share with you–

A Short History of My Own Costuming Experience.

Part Two: College

The next few years saw a little improvement in my costume-making skills. Of the sewing I did at this time, my creation efforts were mostly redirected to making normal clothing, and I only made three real costumes during my years of college. One was a cosplay of Victoria Everglot from Corpse Bride, one was a Queen of Spades costume, and the other was a new, more awesome pirate costume.

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Here are some amazing costumes made from duct tape! And yes, we’ve blogged about duct tape costumes before.

These particular costumes are modeled after the characters Mal and Kaylee from the TV show Firefly. In one of the episodes, Mal and Kaylee go to a fancy shindig all dressed up. It’s remarkable that a costume made from duct tape could look so similar.

The costumes’ creator posts about his efforts on Fireflyfans.net.

I decided to enter the “Stuck at Prom” contest sponsored by the company that makes Duck Tape. In this contest, high school students from all over the country create prom outfits using duct tape. Ten finalists are selected from all of the entries, and online voting determines the winner. To demonstrate my devotion to Firefly, I created my duct tape ensemble inspired by Mal’s tux and Kaylee’s dress from Shindig. These outfits made it into the top ten.

I used over 20 rolls of duct tape, and had to overcome laws of physics (all those ruffles are heavy!) as well as wear the outfit in Phoenix summer temperatures exceeding 107 degrees.

Wow, great job! I hope you win.

You can see all of the Top Ten finalists at stuckatprom.com.

UPDATE: Watch the video HERE.

Remember these guys from Sesame Street? Yip yip yip yip…

Well, thanks to Instructables.com, you can learn how to make your own Yip Yip alien costume! They offer a step by step guide using fleece, sponges and mesh. Looks great!

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BugsandFishes is a top-notch maker who blogs daily about her crafts and creations.

She’s just published some photos of her new felt masks and disguises. They look great!

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WTF Costumes has some great costume photos on their website.

Check ‘em out: www.wtfcostumes.com.

Duct tape has so many uses, and can solve all sorts of problems. So should we be surprised that it’s also great for making costumes?

Take a look at Kimberly Timmons and Christian Price as they attend their high school prom. Wow! Using over 50 rolls of blue and silver tape, they created costumes that rival the elegant dress of Cinderella and Prince Charming.

Kimberly entered a contest sponsored by the Duck brand duct tape company, hoping to win the $3,000 prize. According to GTR News, her dress weighed a hefty 25 pounds. Let’s hope she wins.

Looks fun, but is it painful to take off? Fortunately for Kimberly, she planned ahead. By sticking two pieces of duct tape together, she was able to don the dress without having it stick to her skin.

Apparently, duct tape costumes are immensely popular these days. Many duct tape companies and organizations sponsor these artistic contests. Check out more great pictures from ducttapeclub.com and ducttapeguys.com.

Are Star Wars fans synonymous with steampunk fans? Two worlds of the imagination couldn’t be more far apart than those two, but it seems that someone thinks they belong together.

In an unlikely marriage of these non-realities, a fan decided to make a Darth Vader steampunk getup for the tech/futuro-curious. According to the creator, this is a first time with anything Steampunk. Not bad on the bids for being a first timer, eh? Here are the words of the creator:

Welcome to my first venture into the art of steampunk. This Vader mask was sitting on my shelf for about 14 years.

It was originally purchased for me on my first trip to Disney World. Rather than get rid of it, I decided to have a little fun with it. I was inspired by some art from the Vader Project, and some other cool steampunk Star Wars stuff I found online. The mask itself was a Don Post mask. Not the best quality, but not the worst either. It is made of plastic and comes in two parts, the front face mask and the back dome. The two pieces are held together with velcro, wich actually works quite well. I modified the helmet by carving out detail to make it look like brass plate and adding several tacks to simulate rivets. This process was tedious and took forever. I finished it off with a WWI style helmet spike, which is actually a ceiling fan pull chain and an antique paint job. The chest plate was made from a shadow box frame (8 inches tall x 6 inches wide x 3 inches deep) and a bunch of cannibalized clock, and other device parts. I wired a green LED to a switch in the back that runs on two AA batteries. The steam tank was made from a piece of PVC pipe with a vintage pressure valve inserted into it. There are two holes drilled in the end of the tank which a rubber hose can be inserted into and then into the holes in the mask. I drilled out the spot where the tusk pieces should be. I am not going to permanently affix the hoses to the mask or the tank, in case the buyer wants to change them. The chest strap and shoulder straps were fashioned from a set of two men’s belts. the total width of the chest strap, including the chest piece is about 53 inches. The shoulder strap is in two pieces 22.5 inches and 18.5 inches in length. I did not cut any holes in the shoulder strap. I will leave that up to the buyer to measure. A lot of time went into making this piece. It would be a great start to a cool costume for either roleplaying or a convention, or just use it as a nice display piece. Dragoncon is right around the corner. Good luck and happy bidding!

Although this piece isn’t the caliber of some of the more focused steampunk DIY we’ve seen on the site, it’s on target for a first timer. Check it out and make a bid if you dare show your face at a fan fest any time soon.

In the first segment exploring this topic, we discussed the questions that most would-be DIY’ers may ask themselves when deciding just how much they want to make their own costume. Ultimately, we stressed thinking outside the box and being as creative as you can be. Once you’ve crossed that road, you just have to execute.

So what happens when you’ve got the ideas? You’re not short on inspiration, but short on direction… where do you go from there?

Well not to be a dead horse, but preparation is key. You need to know what you’re going to use, where you’re going to get it from, and how to plan to use it properly.

Materials make the outfit

Taking a nod from Tobey Maguire in the first Spiderman movie, you should have already planned everything out. But now you need to know what to use. Depending on what you’re making, you can find most of your needs at a fabric store. However, the right material will be essential.

Some costume designers get real clever with their getups, and move outside the typical reaches of fabrics. This Big Daddy for example really called for more heavy duty and artistic production. Whatevier your choice, remember that the dfference between going big or cheaping out can make or break a good outfit.

Get some expert advice

By expert advice, we don’t mean go have a pro costume maker tell you what to do. That would eliminate the fun and excitement behind the whole process. What’s more important is that you find those who have some know how and that they give you ideas. You want to go into your first costume making experience with the varying options that are out there. It’s one thing to not try something, it’s another to never know it was an option.

So what does that mean? It means you can talk to anyone you know who has expertise in any type of costuming. Try theater friends. Maybe you know people into cosplay. Find a crafty friend, an artistic professional, a web celeb who has made their fame on making cool things. They’re everywhere and they love to talk about themselves.

Time to begin already?

Well, there comes a time when you can plan no more, and it’s just time to get ready and down to it. Check all needful things off the list. Sketches? Check. Ideas? Check. Materials? Check. Supplies? Check.

What else is missing…

As for right now, you’re ready. If you’re planning early enough in advance, you already know you’re going to be running into some issues and you have time to make mistakes. We’ve given you all we know in terms of plans and ideas on how to get things done in the pre-phase.

If you’ve made it this far, you are surely ready to get some DIY costume making under your belt. Stay focused on your goal and you may end up the guru you thought you could be.

Bonus Ideas

• Check out Instructables for some ideas on how to make some convincing effects and elements
• Try Craft Magazine for clever spins on ideas you already have.
• Take your questions to forums. If you’re going Cosplay, you have a number of specific sites just planned out for you. Cosplay.com has one of the most active cosplay forums online.
• Also try your questions at Yahoo! Answers. You’re likely to find all manners of ideas.
• Plan to show off… look for groups, events, and other exciting reasons to get your costume noticed. If you have a firm deadline to work for, you’ll hit it. You also can afford the captive audience. Kostume Kult is great for news here, and soon we’ll be covering the Burning Man festival.