Keep in mind, these were sized to fit a 10 year old. Perform a free-transform to stretch it to completely fill the canvas. Back in the papercraft image, select the surface you wish to enlarge and paste it in the new canvas. For instance, each side of our head measured 16.25 x 16.25 so we set the canvas size to that for all surfaces on the head. Next open up a blank Photoshop file and set the canvas size to exactly match the dimensions of your surface of interest on the costume. Once you settle on your image, open it in Photoshop. It took some time to find one that had a high enough resolution to not lose its definition when blown up to 18x its size. As previously mentioned, we used a high resolution papercraft template as the sorce image for our Minecraft Steve. You are now ready to start cutting cardboard. The scale factor can then be applied to all of the dimensions from the papercraft template. The thought is that the body portion of the costume is supported by his shoulders, and as a result the shoulders of Minecraft Steve need to match this height. Our scaling dimension was measured from his shoulders to the ground. Since this costume is for my son, we took our key scaling dimension off of him. Once you've gathered the dimensions, you will need to then determine your scale factor. It will also serve to provide the 'skins' for your boxes. This will give you every dimension you will need for every component to the body. Step one is to search for a high resolution template. There are, however, hundreds of papercraft templates out there on the web. The problem with Minecraft Steve is that there really aren't any action figures to measure (at least not in my house). And to do that required a complete set of dimensions. To make ours truly to scale, we were going to need to make our own boxes. These were most likely made with pre-existing cardboard boxes. I've seen lots of pictures of Minecraft costumes where the head is too small compared to the body, or the arms are too large compared to the body and head. I've found that one of the keys to making a great costume is to have it scaled correctly. Materials you will need: * cardboard sheets * Photoshop - or similar photo editing software * sheetrock screws * liquid nails * tape - masking and scotch * 3M spray adhesive * Velcro * Gorilla Glue * scrap foam (like the kind used to package computers or appliances) Tools you will need: * color printer * straight edge * utility knife and Exacto knife (with lots of replacement blades) * screw gun/cordless drill Step 1: Gather Your Source Images After 2 weeks, 10 sheets of cardboard, and many late nights, it's safe to say that the results exceeded our expectations. Our primary goals for the costume were (1) to make it as close to the actual game character as possible and (2) allow for the mobility that will be required during Trick-or-Treating. He wanted to make it as recognizable as possible to the most number of people. After careful consideration of all the possible characters and skins, my son settled on 'Minecraft Steve'. The pixelized, blocky look of all of the characters make them perfect for construction out of cardboard - which happens to be free and plentiful.
The simplicity in particular is what made this a logical choice for this year's costumes. While I'm not much into gaming myself, I can definitely appreciate the virtues of this game - namely the simplicity and open-ended creativity that it offers. until now! Thank you Minecraft! Our kids, like millions of others around the world, are obsessed with all things Minecraft. Our vision of what would be awesome and their vision of what would be awesome has never aligned. Sadly, this has fallen on deaf ears year after year after year. For years we have been trying to convince our kids that Halloween is all about making your costumes, not buying them.