♬ Mermaid Akiko's Lame-O Neoprene/Latex Adventure ♬

[Mermaid Akiko]

Hello everyone! I'm obviously super new to this website, and I'd just like to say thank you for all the awesome info and advice! I would probably be floundering super bad now if not for all this critical information.20925
I've decided to make my own tail after a couple weeks of planning, neoprene/latex. The costs have made me want to cry, but I think this is something I can enjoy for a while, so it's all good.
I've been looking at this (http://mernetwork.com/index/showthread.php?3838-Latex-(slip-casting)-and-neoprene-tail-tutorial) lovely tutorial, and it's been really helpful! But I was freaking out over how much to buy and some issues with how the flukes worked. I'm still not 100% sure on what I'm doing. Maybe like 91%. So I decided to scrupulously document my progress, mostly for the sake of new people like me who want to have a better understanding of what they're doing when making a latex and neoprene tail. I guess I want everyone to see my own trial and error, so they don't have to waste theirs.
So this will be super pic heavy! And also cat pixel heavy because I can not control myself (I'll stop if it gets on people's nerves). It's finals week this week, but in a few days it'll be summer break and I'll be home free for mermaid adventuring for the summer! Look forward to my adventure with you all. 20927

Materials: (updated as I go along, in order of purchase)

1 sheet of neoprene (foamorder.com, ~$60+shipping)
1 Finis Foil monofin (amazon.com, ~$45+shipping)
1.25 gallons RD-407 Mask Making Latex (monstermakers.com, ~$80 including shipping)

[Mermaid Akiko]

209292093020931209322093320934209352093620937

Materials:

masking tape
butcher paper/large piece of paper or papers-taped-together that you can fit your tail, with fluke, on
measuring tape
pencil
ruler



So for starters, I used the super classic How to Make a Mermaid Tail (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xtwnOQg_KH8) vid for the measuring concept. If you don't feel like watching it, a summary is, you put a piece of masking tape down your leg, and measure around your legs every 2-3" along. Write them next to the lines on the tape. Fold your big paper in half along the longer axis, then put the tape down along the crease. Measure out a 4th of the circle around your legs you got, measure it out with the ruler and make a straight line across from the hash you made on the tape, draw a little dot on the end. This way both sides are symmetrical. Connect the dots, then smooth them out just a little. I kind of bsed it from there.
I then unfolded the paper, and eyeballed it onto the other side. I put my monofin down on the paper, where it fit in proportion to my leg tape, and traced it down, making sure it was centered. Then I drew my desired fluke shape, that could fit the monofin. I refolded the paper, and measured a 1/2 inch seam allowance around the whole shape. It should be enough but now I'm kind of worried. I cut the shape out judging only by the one side, and I'm glad, because the side I eyeballed did not match up very well.
20928
So this was my pattern! You can't really see the marks. But anyways. This is what mine ended up like. My fluke is kind of funny but oh well, that's how I want it.

[Mermaid Adriel]

it looks pretty :) good luck!

[Mermaid Akiko]

20952209532095420954209552095620957


Materials:

scissors
spaaaace for a huge sheet of neoprene
soft pencil/tailor's pencil
masking tape
neoprene!
pattern


So when I received my neoprene and latex yesterday, I was hella pumped and started working on cutting out my pattern as soon as I could! 20958
I used a soft 4B pencil on my neoprene since the fabric cover is white, and traced around the pieces. Unfortunately, it didn't fit on as a whole, so I had to cut the fluke along the seam, which was fine. I just made sure to mark out an extra 1/2 inch seam allowance on the edges necessary.
20959
kinda of hard to see, sorry.
Then I cut it out and sewed the edges of the fluke and body back together to finish it off. And then I'm done!
20960
Now I need to get my latexing stuff together and start on that! I'm going to wait a few days until my finals are finished, but I will go hard once I have time. 20961

[Mermaid Momo]

looking good!

[Mermaid Akiko]

Mermaid Claudia and draggersprez: Thank you! I promise it'll get more exciting later.

[Mermaid Lorelei]

I don't know what you're thinking. Your fluke is a lovely shape. :>

[Mermaid Galene]

Thanks for documenting your tailmaking journey, Akiko!

[Mermaid Akiko]

Hoping I'm not spamming by posting so much. Erk. I apologize for using this like a personal diary.
But anyways, I did a test last night with some of my latex and wooow.
I also have an idea that I kind of want validated. First, I did this yesterday:
20988
So basically I just took out a little cup of latex and fooled around with the color I want to use. So I've heard/seen that the colors end up a little darker than when wet and like yeah you could say that for sure. 20990
I thought it would dry white opaque-ish, like cheap stockings, but it ended up more this kawaii snot color as-is. It took just a few drops of paint much darker than I thought it would, even in the cup wet. I have some left over medium purple acrylic fabric paint, so I might just use that very sparingly, since it worked out. Ignore when I stretched it while it was mostly wet, so it kind of collapsed into itself. I won't do that again. It's just so tempting. I'm going to do some more tests today. 20991

Also, I drew some designs today. I noticed the ridges in my monofin are pretty tall, and I thought maybe that would stick through a lot. In addition, I need support for the edges of the fluke, so I thought of sewing in another sort of thickish plastic piece into the fluke, then painting over it.
20989
The black parts being my monofin, and the raised parts of it, and the side black pieces the plastic parts. I'd stitch around all them to hold them in place, and leave my vents in the bottom. But this would mean painting the scales, sewing them together, then putting together my fluke and topstitching it together. Would that look super awful? I think once it was covered, it might not be noticeable, and there's no worries of fraying, either. But would the top stitch look stupid with a seam next to it? Will it not cover as well as I hope? 20983 I can't sew the neoprene together first, can I? Or would that actually be okay? The struggle.

[Mermaid Galene]

I'm enjoying your updates, Akiko! For some reason, though, the photo attachments of your latex tests won't show up.

[Mermaid Akiko]

I'm enjoying your updates, Akiko! For some reason, though, the photo attachments of your latex tests won't show up.

Erk. Fixed, sorry! And thank you so much!

[PearlieMae]

Awesome! I wouldn't worry about posting a lot, it's your thread! My silicone tail journey is over fifty pages long so far!

This will be really helpful as there are many mers that aren't doing silicone. I love how much information you are including!

Good luck!

[PearlieMae]

Also, TELL ME HOW TO POST THOSE MERKITTIES!! :jawdrop:

[Mermaid Akiko]

Awesome! I wouldn't worry about posting a lot, it's your thread! My silicone tail journey is over fifty pages long so far!

This will be really helpful as there are many mers that aren't doing silicone. I love how much information you are including!

Good luck!

Thank you so much! And for the mercat, I go here (http://pixel-dreams.tumblr.com/tagged/emoji) and use the picture from url thing. I found him by searching "cats". I need to lay off, but they're just so cute aghhh. 21002

So I've decided to sew my neoprene together first, after much internal debate. I'm going to hate myself later but dang my measurements were jacked. Ugh. 21001 Glad I did but not looking forward to painting on it. I kind of asked for an opinion and then just decided to so it. haha. I hope this works out, but I'm thinking it'll be better this way. In all technicality, should have fit, but I've never been very good at measuring, this happens to everything I pattern.

[Ashe]

Eeeah! So excited for this one :3 Can't wait to see more!

[Fifi Tigg]

SO EXITED!!! VERY VERY INTERESTED!!!! I'm thinking of making some of these this year but not with neoprene because I will have kids, teens and adults wearing them daily and they wont have enough time to dry. I think I will experiment with some kind of tough material with a small amount of stretch :)
And do you think you could mix the tinted latex and use a piping bag to do the scales straight onto the material or are you using a mold?

[Mermaid Akiko]

Eeeah! So excited for this one :3 Can't wait to see more!

Thank you so much! 21041


SO EXITED!!! VERY VERY INTERESTED!!!! I'm thinking of making some of these this year but not with neoprene because I will have kids, teens and adults wearing them daily and they wont have enough time to dry. I think I will experiment with some kind of tough material with a small amount of stretch :)
And do you think you could mix the tinted latex and use a piping bag to do the scales straight onto the material or are you using a mold?

Neoprene doesn't actually take a long time to dry, the thickness is actually all just rubber. The only fabric is the thin spandex on the top and bottom, so it dries pretty quick. And if it's covered in latex, the fabric won't even be exposed on the outside. tl;dr I like neoprene. The only issue I'm having now is fitting...

[Mermaid Akiko]

211162111721118211192112021121

Materials:

sewing machine
a MULTIPLE spools of good thread
marking pencil+pins

So I was kind of at a loss. I was pretty sure the fitting was off, after I looked at my pieces for a while. I was right. It seems I'm not as curvy as I thought. 21048
But I ended up sewing the pieces first, which will make it more difficult to paint later. Ughhhh. But this is way easier to fit then if it were latex covered. Not really sure what I'd recommend to others.
But anyways. I'm almost done. But I ran out of thread. 21049 I just need to close in the shins a little and sew my monofin and supporters in place. The little horn things will look better when I close off the bottom.
21050
As you can see, I also cut my monofin, using the handy guide (http://mernetwork.com/index/showthread.php?2638-VERY-IMPORTANT-How-NOT-to-cut-a-monofin-shape). I probably would have totally cut a sharp point in mine without it. So watch out. I lined up my monofin by putting a mark in the exact center of the edge, then putting on my tail and lining it up with the center point of the fluke. I had my cool mom hold it place, then I got out and traced the edge that was sticking and cut out the necessary area. I still need to properly line it up. I'll finish my sewing tonight! When I get more thread. 21051

[Mermaid Akiko]

2105521056210572105821059 2105721058210602105721060
I also did some pigment progress. 21052 I decided to use a pipette that I took from my chemistry class (goodbye forever stupid chemistry go titrate your own ideal gas), and diluted some acrylic paints, and added drops with the pipette so the colors will be uniform in the future. Since the latex dried kind of yellowy, I decided to add some white paint too, to see what happened. Conclusion: it lightened the purple, but not the yellow tone. I'm thinking that maybe latex is naturally already white, it just dries darker, no matter what pigments.
21053
Bad lighting but yeah. The end result was 16 drops purple, 25 drops white. I mixed this into 2 tablespoons of latex. From here, I can just use my cool unit conversion skills to find out how much I need for more latex. I'm considering just pouring the paints right into my quart jar so I can close it off later if I need to. But that's probably hard to mix. Hm. I found mixing with a plastic Wendy's knife was convenient and efficient. I also want to add this iridescent glitter to it. I thought mixing it in might work, but it didn't. Most of it isn't visible. I guess I'll just have to get some sifting action going on. I'm officially out of school now so I can being on my latex as soon as my sewing is done! 21054 I do need to finish before band season starts up again. Noooo

[Mermaid Galene]

Looking good!

[Mermaid Akiko]

211222112321124211252112621127 - finale


So I planned on finishing this like 2 days ago but whoops. I went shopping yesterday and bought a ton of good stuff, though! 21132 I also ran out of white thread so that was a hindrance.
The progress I made: I put a hem on the top (I don't think that was necessary but I feel uncomfortable with raw edges ugh) and then I sewed my monofin in place. What I did for the, was put on my tail and line up where the fin would be if I were wearing it, then pencil along the sides. I also sewed a little around the corner, so I could keep my monofin in place, but be able to remove it while I worked on other things.
21128
I decided the fluke looked stupid and floppy, so I bought some polythylene tubing (mines a little less than an inch in diameter) and sewed little pockets to put them in. The problem was, it was really curved in the circular shape, so the areas that point outwards were getting all weird and flippy, so I cut it off just about where my fin ended. Now the top is floppy, but oh well. 21133
21129
I close odd the ends of the pocket. Then I stuck my monofin back in, and glued down the edge just to be secure. Then, I sewed around the bottom, leaving symmetrical vents. It's kind of not symmetrical flop wise 21131 fml but it's not really a big deal in the end.
21130

[Fifi Tigg]

Fintastic :mermaid kiss:

[Mermaid Galene]

Great progress!

[Mermaid Mhara]

I'm loving this one!! Really looking forward to seeing the end result :)

[Mermaid Jaffa]

Ooo! Looking gorgeous!

Was there a reason why you didn't draw up the pattern in two sides rather than four separate pieces?

[Mermaid Akiko]

Fintastic :mermaid kiss:

Great progress!

I'm loving this one!! Really looking forward to seeing the end result :)

Thank you everyone! Your nice comments are such motivation. 21152


Ooo! Looking gorgeous!

Was there a reason why you didn't draw up the pattern in two sides rather than four separate pieces?

Thank you! It's because it wouldn't fit on the neoprene sheet any other way. I guess I'm too tall. Erk.

[Mermaid Akiko]

YOOO so I finished my tail.
21475
Haha kill me look at that fluke it's like the mermaid version of Lumpy Space Princess 21476
So I kind of knew it was going to end up like that, and I was really stressed, but I asked my mom, and she said yeah it didn't look awesome, but it was my first try so I shouldn't be so angry about it. I suppose she's right. I finished last night, and this morning, I gave my tail a little pressure hosing to get the excess glitter and dirt and little latex chunks off. Other than my awful fluke, I think it looks pretty okay! 21477 The last time I tried it on was when it was only neoprene, so I'm looking forward to getting it on now. I'm heading to my friend's house today for an event, and I asked if I could use her pool, so I should be testing my tail out today as well!
While it's drying, I figured I'd write up the rest of my progress. I didn't really take a lot of pictures, unfortunately, because I was so pissed about how this was going (I strayed so far from the original tutorial)
Here we go! 21478

[Mermaid Akiko]

2147921480214812148221483

To pigment my latex, I made a cup of a watered down acrylic mix at a certain ratio that I could recreate (one tbs of water, purple, and white. I got these measurements by pouring one tbs of water at a time into a plastic cup and making a mark on the cup where the water hit, then adding another tbs, etc.)
21484
So I also asked my chemistry teacher for a pipette, and and used it to measure 75 drops of paint to each 1/4 cup of latex. I just tested the amount until I liked the color, basically.
The tutorials all say to do a base coat. Cool.
21485
I did that. I used about a half cup on each side of the scales, and a half cup on each side of the fluke. I just smoothed it on with a plastic spoon. I love how easy it is to clean latex! I just let it dry, then peeled it off my plastic cups and spoons. so easy and cool, less waste. I let the one side dry, then did the other. Cool, I love following directions. 21487

JK!!! EFF THE POLICE Next step was to put down a heavy layer of latex, and put down a metal grate or fishing net, but I couldn't find an okay grate, they were all like hella fancy and unusable, and the idea of fishing netting didn't really appeal to me so I got... poultry fencing.
21488
Yeah that's right 25 feet of plastic chicken fencing. It actually creates a pretty nice pattern, imo, though. problem was, it curved up on the sides because it was in a roll, and the tail was already not level because of the seams from sewing and stuff, so it basically would not stay down. The first side, I just held it into the latex with mason jars and my own hands until it dried enough, and the fencing would stick on the entire surface (would have been a lot easier if I had sewn second, but oh well). 21486
21489
That was really dumb and time consuming. The second time around, which I heavily recommend for those in the same boat I got out my mom's hair dryer and just heated the plastic enough that it could be warped into the shape needed. Wow.
After the plastic had finally stuck to the latex, I realized that it wouldn't give me all the depth I wanted, so I spooned over another layer of latex, and just covered the whole thing, trying to keep the least latex on the fencing as I could. I used my hands. The tutorial said to get a latex thickener, so the slip cast latex is as thick as caulking but I mean like?? I just decided to not do that. Maybe I should have. So meaning when I pulled the fencing off (I did tests, of course) the latex would just settle and be flat again, and if I waited longer, it would just form a skin on top of the grate, and when I pulled it off, the texture would also come off, leaving the flat, uncured latex underneath. So the only solution was to let it fully cure with the fencing on it, then pull off the fencing. Then you got pretty scales!
21490
Actually, not really, since the latex was also on the fencing, when I took off the fencing, the latex that was on top of it stayed on the tail, and I had to clean the scales up, But it was okay.
To do the fluke, I just poured latex on it and spread it around with a crappy paint brush. Worked like a charm for texture, too bad the fluke is so awful.
21491
I sewed my monofin in, since I just don't trust glue, but now it's super obvious and weird and I regret it so hard. AHghhg it's okay though. 21492
I also sprinkled glitter on the wet latex. I realized mixing it in just made it lumpy, since latex is actually pretty opaque. I love glitter! I didn't really want a pearly effect. I wanted like a freaking barbie princess tail. It worked out pretty well with the glitter! It actually sticks well. I hosed it down on a heavy pressure and scrubbed it to get the excess off, so what stayed stays. I wish I had a sealer just for security but eh I leave on a long vacation soon, so that would be impractical to order now.
I think that's it. I screwed up a lot. But it's my first time, so after being really angry with myself, I'm cutting myself some slack. If anyone has any questions, I am the trial and error expert at this now! Mostly the error part. Thanks everyone! 21493

[Mermaid Adriel]

AMAZING JOB! *w*

[Mermaid Galene]

I think it turned out really well! Congrats! If you wanted to de-emphasize the monofin hump, you could paint shadow and highlights on the fluke in a way that would mask the monofin's shape.

[Mermaid Akiko]

SO UPDATE I can't even get my tail on 21501 cries
I looked it up: I rolled it down, put one foot in, then the other, cool, pulled it up, had a really hard time getting the wrinkles out of my ankles, but got it to look acceptable, kept rolling it up, but I could only get it to like halfway over my ass, and definitely way too close to my crotch. What's annoying is that I could see the wrinkle of extra material around my thighs, I know it's long enough to fit over me, but I guess it's too tight to pull up, I could not get it any higher no matter how I pulled or rolled, I even stood up in attempt to pull it up, but it didn't budge. I was kind of devastated a lot. Hrgghhh 21502 I hope these sad hamster gifs will illustrate how disappointed I am in my judgement. But it's really not the end of the world, I'm thinking of picking up some lube at target to try and maybe help? And if that doesn't work, I'll sell my tail to someone who's okay with having things that look bad for cheap, and use the money to help start a new one. Lesson learned here, kids, is that latex prevents some of the stretch in neoprene, so don't get too preoccupied in the fitting, in fact, PAINT YOUR NEOPRENE WHILE IT'S FLAT AND SEW IT LATER seriously you will be a sad hamster like me.
Thanks everyone for your kind comments! This has been quite the experience.

[Fifi Tigg]

Lubrication will work :D
We have quite a few tails just like yours that you think it will never fit over the bootay but with some wriggling for 5-10 mins and lubrication it will go over eventually ;)

[Mermaid Momo]

Have you tried pulling it on again?

[Mermaid Akiko]

Erkk sorry it's been a while. I'm on vacation for a month, and I couldn't bring my tail. But yes, I got it mostly on! I determined that I accounted for too much stretch from the neoprene, when the latex did not stretch as far. So I'm like mersagging right now. My friends call me the straight white boy mermaid. But that's okay, I can swim in it just fine, if not easier than normal, the monofin is really powerful, dang. So basically, I should have fit it after I latexed it. Would have looked better, too. I plan on making another one soon! I think the latex on neoprene method may look less realistic, but it's very reliable and simple, and only cost me ~$300, with a lot of leftover latex.

[Imogen Finnly]

The same thing happened to me and I was so upset I cried for like three days. I had to toss it because it was seamed so tigjt from the latex. Im now doing each side separately.

formerly jayy