My Necromancy of Thay Prop/Astarion Build Book Realized I never shared this here. I made this prop when I competed with my Astarion Cosplay. The cover is sculpted using Foam Clay and aluminum foil on book board. The dark amethyst is half of a clear Easter egg that has been sanded with 100-220 grit sand paper with cellophane sheets and fairy lights (the eyes are the same but with Christmas ornaments). The metalwork filigree, the clasps, and the spine/vertebrae are printed and finished by me in resin and PLA. The fake skin look is a mixture of acrylic washes, starting with stippled gloss mod podge to seal the foam, then brown, red, peach, bone white, and a final layer of gloss mod podge with each layer stippled away with a paper towel (different parts for different colors according to the look I wanted in that spot, i.e. the crevices I added black and only used brown, more red for distressed areas, etc.). The teeth are false teeth that I dremeled and glued into the foam clay. The book is 80 cotton cloth pages from India that required no further weathering out of the packaging. I printed my Astarion build book pages one at a time onto the first couple of sheets and used the transparent PNG game text/symbols for 5 of the pages in the middle. I ran 20 pages at a time through my sewing machine, then hand bound the 20 page bundles by hand with heavy duty thread one inch per stitch. I then glued the spine of the pages and the space between the 20 page bundles together with book binding glue, and glued the entire assembly together with contact cement. The back cover is (poorly) sculpted to match the filagree/stamped pattern from the game, with my initials hidden in the design. This book is one of the coolest things I've ever made and I'm currently looking for a good place to display it in my home. If anyone has any questions feel free to ask! I have plenty of progress pictures to document the build process.
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