Prophet I
In Late 2017 I became inspired to create a ceremonial headdress to use at Burning Man.
I did a quick drawing using Adobe Illustrator to get a rough idea of what I might like, but wasn't sure what I wanted. I only considered this a rough idea and had no idea how it would come together. The color coding was an attempt to make sense of how it could come together but didn't really work out that way in the end. This was about 4 months before Burning Man was going to happen. I then spent the month learning how to craft the thing before I actually started working on it.
Crafting the headdress was quite difficult. The base of the headdress is this Face-shield I got on Amazon, all the pieces are held on top by multiple velcro contact points. This would provide a frame that moved and had a head-adjustable strap, vital to making sure it would be secure on my head and comfortable to wear. It was mostly made out of EVA foam and held together by with glue. I watched a lot videos from PunishedProps and EvilTed on YouTube to learn the ways of foamsmithing.
The final stages of painting and weathering was some of the longer parts. The headdress with a clean fresh coat of paint, looked too new. Doing a black wash over the entire thing was needed to give it a bit of a dirty look. I didn't worry too much about this, knowing the dust would essentially take over once I got to the playa.
In the end, it took about 3 weeks time to create the headdress. Demooping and priming the headdress were some of the most grueling parts. It looks pretty cool though.
LEARNINGS
Oddly enough this headdress didn't communicate the ideas I want. Many people thought I was some kind of fierce tiger or dragon guy/spirit, which is cool but not my goal. In terms of construction I need to work on securing fabric better. I lost one of the red fabric side pieces at some point during the week, they kept falling out and I had to carry extra tape on myself to fix it.
On a positive note, a thing this size made of foam can withstand fairy high winds and isn't too bad to wear while riding a bike. It also wasn't hot and was more like a big piece of shade, breathing while quite well.
Materials
EVA Foam
Various Fabrics
Jewelry Chain
Triangular Metal Jewelry
Modpodge
Barge Cement
Acrylic Paint
Velcro
Faceshield
Will power
Tools
Heatgun
Dremel with various heads
Sandpaper
Large Razor
Heat Gun
Glue Gun
Various Paintbrushes
Patience