How to make a super soft bendy kagune


So you wana make some tentacles huh?
Since a lot of people have asked since seeing my kagune (and even before I'd barely started!) heres how I made mine. As with everything I do here, this is not a how-to, if you follow this directly you'll end up with the same issues I did. Learn from my mistakes children. Learn!



Alright, so the material of choice is pool noodles right? Those are too expensive for a tramp like me. Idk if its cause I'm in the UK and swimming isn't as popular here but they seem to be harder to get hold of...at least cheaply anyway. They're mostly sold in sets of 3 or 5 which is really annoying. I went with these 'Climaflex Pipe Insulation' tubes. They cost 92p, winning. You can get thicker ones, I'll get into it later since you're not really winning with these..if you can get something thicker or stronger (like those damn pool noodles) do it. You will save yourself trauma. I got four of those anyway and some garden wire (the green one) that costs like £7-£8. I then stole chicken wire from my mum..that stuffs expensive, like £16?? something redonculouus.

Before we begin, this is to make bendy kagune, if you're not bothered about it bending save yourself time and tears and make it with card /foam etc.

So step one is the worst step - covering the garden wire with layers of chicken wire to make it stronger. Again here, if you can get stronger wire - DO IT! then you don't need to scratch yourself 5000 times.
Step two - shoving the garden wire through each tube (leaving enough for it at the end to form a kind of holding point which will come into play later). That takes us to the image on the right. I then added more wire around the two tubes on each side so they held together (I stole this wire from a friend..its about £7 a roll and again..not thick enough)

Step three - cover that in something strong that will hold it together and lay flat against your back. I used foam and then held that in place with some resin repair tape. Its about £2 a pack and you only get a metre but wow that stuff is strong and and I have no doubt it would of fallen to pieces without it. I punched a hole in the top of the foam to stick out the green garden wire. In the end I actually didn't use this for its intended purpose which is to have something to attach a harness to, but you may still want to do it to secure it to you better.



I attached a make shift harness as I went along to check it was working, here you can see I used the green wire to thread straps through to go over my shoulders but as I said...I changed this at the end.

The next bit it where it looks really confusing cause I started covering before I'd made it structurally sound. Don't do this, have patience.

On the bottom left photo I have added some more foam around the base of each leg and glued it to the back piece of foam, this is to help hold the legs up better. The longer and futher down you put the foam the better chance it has of holding up but it will hinder the bendiness.

Next you want to get really thick webbing and glue this about a third of the way down each top leg(?) then wrap it around and glue it to the back piece, leaving enough to make a belt to go around you. This is my first point of attachment to my body and is done before covering. This is really impossible to see in any image but basically you're gluing a belt to it so you can wear it and by gluing it part way up the legs its gonna pull them into your body more so they're not flailing off into space.

Next you wana cover these in some kind of fabric, you could chose red fabric here and paint it, or chose a patterned lycra and leave it at that. Since I wanted scales I decided to cover it with black lycra (stretchy stuff) to keep it all in place and then cover that in scales later. I also added wadding in places down the legs to make them chunkier, its upto you how much you wanna add.


Next I added another strap which went around each leg which you can see top right (patterned webbing) These are partially covered with scales but can see be seen when finished. This strap is actually elastic so it can be pulled really tight and help hold the bottom legs in. Both straps went around my middle.
Next up I sewed the lycra up and now is the point you can go scale crazy.

So basically cut out scales for 500 years and glue them on.





Heres a shot of it in progress, you can see that its drooped considerably. This is because I chose a patterned pleather to make the scales with. It's really soft and a lovely base colour but obviously reaaaally heavy. I knew this but I still liked it so whatever. I'd recommend something lighter! The upside is its easy to paint ontop of.




Here it is covered but not painted with the straps. As I said before you can still see the bottom ones but since Kaneki wears all black this isn't really an issue.


 Next is painting. I wanted to combine two types of kagune I've seen - The scaley one and the one that is black and red toned down the sides. The ends of his kagune are much darker so all that section is painted with a ready mixed black paint. Then there are blackened areas down two of the sides.



I made the centre darker too to mimic the fact they are protruding from the back.


Here you can clearly see the blackened stripes before they are blended in. I also then went over the whole thing adding in red and blending out the harsh lines. The last step is adding highlights!


This shows the back when its on





Costest with finished costume. I cut slits down the side of my jacket to thread the straps though. Both fasten round my waist, another point of attachment would be good though! 




Here's a photo from the day I wore it, I've put it up so you can see a little something extra I did on the day. I added elasticated wrist cuffs with invisible wire on to help hold it up. I found this was handy not only to pose but also when walking round the con. It meant I could pull them into my body and not bash into everyone!



Annnd thats it. Thats how I did it! If you have any Q's drop me a comment! Good luck with your kagune!





2 comments:

  1. Heyy, I just came across this tutorial and I LOVE IT! I'll be cosplaying Rize Kamishiro from Tokyo Ghoul and this tutorial is soooo helpful!! Thanks so much for posting this! <3

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  2. Im prolly gonna cosplay kaneki from tokyo ghoul so TYSM this tutorial was very helpful

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