If you dig Steampunk and Star Wars, you might get a kick out of this Steampunk Darth Vader Mask we spotted on eBay this week. Pretty impressive, right down to the gear-saturated chest plate!

This Vader mask was sitting on my shelf for about 14 years. It was originally purchased for me on my first trip to Disney World. Rather than get rid of it, I decided to have a little fun with it. I was inspired by some art from The Vader Project, and some other cool steampunk Star Wars stuff I found online.

The mask itself was a Don Post mask. Not the best quality, but not the worst either. It is made of plastic and comes in two parts, the front face mask and the back dome. The two pieces are held together with velcro, wich actually works quite well. I modified the helmet by carving out detail to make it look like brass plate and adding several tacks to simulate rivets. This process was tedious and took forever. I finished it off with a WWI style helmet spike, which is actually a ceiling fan pull chain and an antique paint job.

The chest plate was made from a shadow box frame (8 inches tall x 6 inches wide x 3 inches deep) and a bunch of cannibalized clock, and other device parts. I wired a green LED to a switch in the back that runs on two AA batteries. The steam tank was made from a piece of PVC pipe with a vintage pressure valve inserted into it. There are two holes drilled in the end of the tank which a rubber hose can be inserted into and then into the holes in the mask. I drilled out the spot where the tusk pieces should be. The chest strap and shoulder straps were fashioned from a set of two men’s belts. The total width of the chest strap, including the chest piece is about 53 inches. The shoulder strap is in two pieces 22.5 inches and 18.5 inches in length.

Check out the Steampunk Darth Vader Mask here. (via Ebay)

This entry was posted on March 31, 2008 at 12:31 pm and is filed under Star Wars Art, crafts, steampunk. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.