Zelda progress: Side-skirt pattern

I really like the new design that Zelda has in this game. I can´t wait for it to be released! I like how simple the design is, but it still has a few details that make it woth it.

One of them is the painted design on the blue side skirt:

The shame about working with an official image when a game hasn´t been released yet is that if there´s only one image, and you still want to do it...you have to get creative. So, basically, i looked at the design and assumed that that was "about half" of the design, and that it´d only be natural is the other "about half" was a mirror image.

I drew it like so:

Then I doubled it on a piece of thin cardboard, so that the design was complete.  Then I cut it out very very carefully:

You can see in the center, I left an area that has a "square" on it....those sections are supposed to be separate, but in order to maintain symmetry and not have those sections wiggle around, I decided to leave them attached and just modify them late when tracing and painting.


Next, I put the design on top of the blue "half-skirt" section....and secured the bottoms agains slipping with regular old tape.


I traced the design onto the blue fabric with a silver chalk-pencil. They´re handier to use and easier to trace with than regular chalk....

You can only vaguely see the lines, due to the flash lighting......but they were pretty visible IRL.This is the moment when I "corrected" the sections that needed to be separate within the design.

I didn´t want to make any mistakes, so I traced the outline first, once more, but this time finally with white fabric paint. I thought about making the design in really light blue, but ran into the problem of having to mix colors...I DID buy both blue and white, but ended up thinking that the design would contrast better if it were in white; plus, it was really really light blue, right? White can work.

 

You can really see it taking shape here--it´s an eagle! or a bird design, at the very least; just like with bird that accompanies Zelda and is supposed to accompany Link as well. I believe that one of the premises in Skyward Sword are bird races of a sort or traveling on those huge birds from one place in the sky to another.

The design after the first coat of paint. By God, that was like pushing a rock uphill.....it took me really long to do this first "filling" because I had to be extra careful and make all the brushstokes even.

Final result, after a second coat of paint! It looks quite nice. I´m debating on whether I should add an extra coat again or not, but frankly I like this look. It´s opaque, the brushstrokes aren´t very visible, and yet it has a slight bluish tint. I had no idea that the dark blue would show up a bit through two layers of white...it´s a really strong color...and yet, that works. Almost like the picture. I´ll just have to attach it to the brown belt now, after I sew those sides again (made them too wide the first time).

So, what do you think? I had to use three different size brushes to paint this lovely!! (You can see at least two of them poking in corners of the pictures, hahaha) I´m quite satisfied; it´s the most complex design I´ve tried painting for a cosplay so far, considering I had to partially "guesstimate" some of it....