Mossyfox · Transcript · · Updated
Bat Wing Tutorial – Transcript
Video by Mossyfox · Watch the original on YouTube
Summary
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- The speaker explains that the bat wing pattern is just a guideline, allowing crafters to change its shape or dimensions to suit their characters or cosplays.
- Crafters can use materials like a standard 12-gauge craft wire, a 9-gauge wire, or even coat wire hangers for the bat wing bones.
- To attach the bat wings to the side, the speaker uses Velcro on both the wings and a corset for detachability, while noting other options like sewing or double-sided fashion tape.
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Transcript
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Hey there, fellow crafters and bat enthusiasts. Welcome to the official tutorial for your brand new pair of bat wings. Now, I know we're really excited to go ahead and get started on making our new pair of bat wings, but I do encourage you to go ahead and watch this tutorial all the way through. Uh there are a couple of varying uh materials and methods that you could use depending on how you want your wings made.
For example, uh the sleeves that I'm going to be using are technically pre-bought, but you can go ahead and make your own out of a a more sheer material that is closer to your skin color. How you want to attach the wings to your side is also going to come into play. Uh my main use is going to be a Velcro, and it's going to be going onto a corset and also onto a part of the wings, but you could also use something like double-sided tape, or you could
just straight-up sew this material onto whatever clothing you're going to be wearing. The fabric that you use is also going to be a pretty big factor in how the construction is going to go. For instance, this fabric in particular does not have any kind of stretch and is probably the hardest fabric I could have chosen to work with for this. Uh but I would go ahead and use a four-way stretch fabric. My original bat wings were a four-way stretch crushed velvet
salmon pink, which was perfect for replicating that membrane kind of color, especially in the sun. Um and for this, if you use something that is see-through like I did, I went ahead and added fur in order to cover my hands that are around the rods right here.
But if you are going to be using an opaque fabric, you're not going to have to worry about that, and any trim you put over your little arm hole to use later, uh that is will be completely decorative and up to you.
Now, just remember that the pattern for these wings is just a guideline. If you needed to change it to suit your own needs for your own character or a cosplay, you are more than welcome to do so. If you wanted to, let's say, make a harpy cosplay, these would be great for that with a little shape alterations.
You can make them longer, you can make them shorter, fatter, wider. You can change any of the shaping that I've added. Like I said, it is just a guideline, so get creative. I know that you're biting at the bit to get started on making your own wings, so I won't keep you much longer. I just wanted to thank you so much for supporting me and my little crafting business endeavor.
Whether you pre-ordered the wings while I was making them, or you bought them when they were already in the shop, or they were gifted to you, however you came across this, thank you so much. Without you guys, I wouldn't be able to have the coolest job in the world.
So anyways, enough with the blabber. Let's flap on over and get started making your wings. To start off, the most important part of this pattern before you do anything is getting your measurements in order to print it in the correct size that's going to fit you.
When printed at 100%, it's going to measure 19 in from the wrist to the armpit. Now, I'm only 4'11", so you're probably going to need to size up a little bit. Go ahead and take your measurements from your armpit all the way to your wrist.
Once you have your measurement from your armpit to your wrist, go ahead and get your measurement on how far down your side you'd like your wings to sit. Just to explain the pattern a little bit more for you, the dotted line that you see here is going to be where your seam allowance ends. The solid line is going to be where the actual wing is going to be connecting to your arms and your sides.
This portion here is going to be what's covering your hands to conceal the fact that you have hands. If your hands are a lot bigger than mine, which is most likely, you could always just add a little bit onto this just to make sure that it covers your entire hand.
And here we see the general plotting out for the bones for the wings. This goes all the way to the bottom, where you will see about an inch of space worth of fabric, and this is going to wrap around the claws that we make later. Before cutting out your fabric with the pattern, you can go ahead and measure up to whatever clothing you'll be wearing, how long you want it to go down your side.
You can make this portion as short or as long as you'd like. It really is up to you and doesn't affect the rest of the pattern. And right here, I'm just double-checking that my sleeves are in fact going to be long enough for my wings, and we're going to get back into the sleeves in just a second.
Go ahead and grab whatever fabric you chose for your wings. At this point, we're going to fold it in half, and we want to make sure that the wrong sides are in and the right sides are out. This means that the side you want to be showing on the outside is going to be on the outside right now.
Just keep in mind that the fabric I chose is going to be very meticulous to work with since it's semi-sheer, and I'm going to have to match up all of the embroidery of the lace with each other. But, if you went ahead and chosen opaque fabric, you are not going to have to worry about this at all.
Once you have your wings placed on your fabric exactly how you'd like, you can go ahead and start weighing them down. You can really set anything on top just to make sure that the fabric underneath doesn't shift. For example, I'm using these beautiful hooves from Chaos Costumes, and they worked wonderfully.
Now, I'm just going to go around the entire pattern and pin all of my fabric in place. For this part, you don't need as many pins if you're using an opaque fabric or even a sheer fabric that doesn't have any patterns. Uh I'm just doing this meticulously so that all of my lace stays in place.
Once you're done with that, you can go ahead and start cutting out your pattern. Just remember to stay along the outside of the edge of the dotted line, so you have plenty of seam allowance. And I just wanted to add a note right here that I would recommend going ahead and just adding on a little bit of fabric, because it is always easier to cut more off later than it is to add more.
Now that your fabric is all cut out, we are going to go ahead and remove the pattern and get ready to sew. For now, we're only going to be going up the side and up the length of the arm. So, just up the side and all the way until the opening where your hand is going to be.
Unlike most sewing projects, we're going to want the seam allowance to be on the outside, about an inch or so. This is going to give us some space to attach our wings to our sleeves and our bodice. If you're doing this with any kind of stretch fabric, I would highly recommend using a wide zigzag stitch. A zigzag stitch is going to help give your material a little bit more breathing room. So, whenever you lift your arms
and stretch the materials, the stitching will want to stretch with it. If you don't have a sewing machine, you can technically do this without one. You can either hand sew or you can use a very strong adhesive, something like a Gorilla Hot Glue or another kind of strong adhesive. Just remember that doing this isn't going to let your wings be as stable as sewing. You can still get plenty of use out of them, but I
would be a little bit careful just to make sure that the stitching doesn't come apart. Once you've sewn all the way up to the wrist, just go ahead and make sure that your hand can fit comfortably. Now that that portion of the sewing is done, you're going to go ahead and flip your wings inside out. That means that the right sides are going to be facing each other on the insides, and the wrong side will be on the outside.
Once everything is pinned in place, we're going to go back to our sewing machine. And this time we are going to be starting from the top of the wrist cover all the way to the tip. And just like that, we have got the skin for our bat wings ready, and we can move on to the fingers. Here, I'm using a 9-gauge wire, but you can absolutely use your standard 12-gauge craft wire, or if you're on a budget, you can use something like coat wire hanger instead.
All I'm doing here is just measuring out how long my wire is going to be. And once you get that measurement, double it over, and we're going to be spinning that later to make it a lot more sturdier. Grab your craft claw, and just go ahead and thread it through all the way to the tip where it bends.
I'm folding over one of the ends of the wires just so we have a little bit of a thicker area to work with when we start using our drill to spin it. Keep in mind that this is optional. It's just going to make your life a ton easier. So, go ahead and insert the end of the wire and tighten it as hard as you can.
We want this to be nice and sturdy, so when you pull on it, it's not going to budge or come out with any kind of force. Once you're nice and snug, you can go ahead and grab pliers at the end holding the claw, and slowly start spinning this drill.
And just remember that the tighter you spin this, the shorter it's going to get. So, keep that in mind. Once you're happy with how it looks, go ahead and unscrew it from the drill, and you are ready. I just went ahead and painted mine. Ignore the color change.
Next, I'm just lining up where the bones need to be to make sure that I have the correct length and they aren't too short or need any kind of adjusting. I do want to add a note here where I messed up. I would recommend having your bones stop where this line is. If you have them all the way to your palm, you're not going to be able to close your wings easily and have them flap like fingers.
Now, we're going to be adding padding to the bones. This is going to make it a little bit thicker and look a little bit more like muscle. I'm using a half-inch foam dowel that's usually used in construction for saving on caulking, but you can also use EVA foam dowels that are used mostly in cosplay. Really just something that's going to be able to sandwich over your wire.