Cosplay creator wins Winnipeg Comiccon award

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This article was published 02/02/2022 (1556 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A Minnedosa-based cosplayer celebrated attending his first Winnipeg Comiccon by taking home the Best in Show at the expo’s 2021 Masquerade Competition.

Randy Collen’s massive cosplay armour measuring more than seven feet in height was inspired by his love of the tabletop game “Warhammer.”

Collen has been playing “Warhammer” since he was 12 and his passion has now spanned 20 years.

“I’ve been a nerd pretty much my whole life,” he said with a chuckle.

The “Warhammer” creation marks his first major cosplay creation.

The initial piece of the marine’s armour was a helmet Collen built about a year ago.

“I had the helmet for the longest time and then I decided to bite the bullet and make the rest of the suit,” Collen said.

The timing was just right to begin the immersive undertaking — the pandemic limited Collen’s ability to go out and he had recently gone through a break-up.

He was looking for a way to occupy his time and creating the “Warhammer” cosplay proved to be the perfect activity. Collen added his main hobby is woodturning and he was able to draw on this experience when tackling the creation of the “Warhammer” armour.

“All of this different hands-on stuff, they all have inter-relatable skills,” Collen said.

He was able to “cram” the armour out in about nine weeks tirelessly working day in and day out.

“I was working eight hours a day on it, so I put in like 500 hours or more,” Collen said. Each day he was able to learn something new and adapt the project based on knowledge he gained.

The “Warhammer” cosplay was a major undertaking, he said, and he is grateful for the support he found in the cosplay community.

“I tend to bite off more than I can chew. I don’t do things in half measures. It’s usually all or nothing,” Collen said. “There’s a lot of very friendly people in the cosplay community who have all the information posted. They don’t hold anything back, they share everything.”

Cosplay community members were willing and able to share tips and tricks on bringing his vision to life. The initial design specifications were provided by a cosplayer from Denmark and additional information was shared by a British cosplayer.

“They helped me out a lot,” Collen said. He would also turn to videos online to help figure out how to complete aspects of the costume.

He noted that the specific armour he created had never been constructed before, based on his research. Collen took the designs from his fellow creators and had to completely re-engineer them to make his vision work.

The cosplay was mainly created out of foam floor mats, the type of floor coverings often seen in gyms. It was the perfect textile to work with because it is a malleable material that can be cut and bent into any desired shape.

“There was no lack of supplies. Canadian Tire has stacks and stacks, they sell it by the hundreds,” Collen said. “It’s a very versatile material and it’s super lightweight. That was the biggest reason that it’s used.”

Once he created the shapes of the armour he carefully glued pieces together to build the cosplay out.

One of the most challenging aspects was figuring out how to properly seal the foam before painting it. He opted to use a Plasti Dip to seal the armour giving the cosplay the appearance of a shiny coating.

The details of the costume were for the most part made of thinner layers of craft foam.

The final touch was adding spray paint and airbrush to colour the costume.

“The main colours were laid down with rattle cans, and then I go down and lay out the details with the airbrushes,” Collen said. “The main armour build was the biggest part, all the decoration was just icing on top of the cake.”

The finished product came out weighing around 60 pounds. Collen stands at seven-foot-one when wearing it with a width of three feet and depth of two feet.

The cosplay armour was inspired by the Horus Heresy civil war in “Warhammer 40,000,” the most popular miniature wargame in the world.

He has always loved the game and the unique, giant galactic armour worn by the space marines.

“I always thought they were awesome,” Collen said.

He enjoys the time period of Horus Heresy because it is an interesting event to explore in the storyline.

“It was a massive civil war in that universe; it’s a set of armour from one of the legions that fights,” Collen said. “It [the cosplay] is an army that I play on the tabletop and it was a specific unit that I really liked the design of.”

He roughly based the design of his cosplay on these models with modifications from others carefully added on bringing all of his favourite bits from the game together.

The 2021 Winnipeg Comiccon marked the first time Collen has attended the expo. He participated in the cosplay competition on Oct. 30. He was able to walk on the main stage of the expo along with others to show off their incredible and unique cosplay creations.

“It was interesting. I couldn’t see [anything] when I was on the stage because of the lights in your face and wearing the helmet,” Collen said.

“I had by far the biggest costume there.”

Anyone who participated in the competition received a set of professional photos, which was a highlight of the event.

Collen wore the armour around the convention for about an hour or two, but it was difficult to wear and explore. The armour proved to be extremely hot because it is insulated and heavy to walk around in.

He added he had a friend walking with him to help navigate his way around. It was a neat experience because he was constantly being stopped for photos.

“I couldn’t move five feet without a photo being taken,” he said.

Collen currently has no other plans for his cosplay but has a couple of ideas stewing in his mind.

“It was a lot. It was a huge project. I didn’t realize how big it was going to be until I was into it and I was already into so I figured go big or go home,” Collen said.

He is considering taking the “Warhammer” armour to other conventions, especially once “Warhammer” tabletop tournaments are once again possible in Brandon.

“I would love to take it to a big one in the States or Montreal or Calgary, but I would have to drive it the whole way [due to the size of the armour],” Collen said.

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