Looking for assistance in creating a fursuit.

I have build a couple of fursuit heads, a dragon, bat and dutch angel dragon, and the approach that works best for me is to first draw a silhouette of my head from the front and side, then draw the actual head on that silhouette so i know roughly what it looks like from both sides.

I then start with a basic 'frame' over my head which is nothing more then three strips of foam from my nose to the back of my head. (One straight across, from nose, going between my eyes, over the crown on my head down the back, the other two on either sides on my head going from nose, just under the ears, to the back of my head, connecting all 3 there) Make sure you can still easily remove it. This will serve as a frame for you to build on.

I then always start with the muzzle. Just a big square block of foam (both upper and lower jaw together). I start sculpting the part that will be on my face, make enough room for my nose to sit comfortably. Keep in mind that your mask shouldn't rest on your nose, trust me, it's VERY uncomfortable). Make sure your make a cut to pretty much slide yge frame in as well. (Like a carpenter does with a table, the table vas cutouts for the legs, you're doing the same with the muzzle and frame).once your have it cut, glue it on.

Now start 'chiseling' the muzzle looking at it from the side, you can use the silhouette drawing you made earlier to get the proportions right. Now add strips of foam for the eyebrows and start sculpting the actual face (front view).

Add ears, I prefer to use a thicker kind of foam for the ears and cut it in half to ensure that both ears look identical. Add supports on your mask if needed to attach the ears. In order to place then right, study the anatomy of big cats and see where the bar of the ear actually starts. In my case for my bat mask, I placed then pretty much in line with the eyebrows.

You're almost done now, but your mask needs cheeks. Before we place those you need to decide if you want an open or closed mouth, static or moving jaw.

Static Closed mouth; keep it as it is.

Static Open mouth; you need to cut the lower jaw off of the rest of the muzzle, sculpt the inside of the mouth and glue the lower jaw at the desired angle.

Moving Jaw; cut the lower jaw off of the rest muzzle, sculpt the inside of the mouth and do NOT glue it to anything. I'll come back to this later.

So for the cheeks; place some strips of foam out from the muzzle along the side of the face, don't be afraid to use too much. You can always cut away. The downside with using too little is that you have to add more with extra glue, possibly adding 'hard' spots where the extra layer of foam is a bit thinner, and adding to the weight of your mask.

If you chose a moving jaw, cut out a thin strip of foam ( roughly 0.5 cm thick) and attach the lower jaw to the mask. I know there are other ways of making a moving jaw, I have yet to experiment with then though. I suggest looking up other crafters. I particularly like the hinged system, I'm going to try and implement that in one of my future masks.

You're pretty much done now, you can add or sculpt around the eyes a bit for better vision/ shaping the eye sockets. I personally always add a fan into the muzzle so it helps me cool down while suiting. All that's left is covering the mask in tape to get patterns, and sewing it all up :).

I hope this helps a bit, I know I didn't add any sized or anything like you requests, but for me at least it's all freehand like sculpting a statue.

P.s. pardon any typo's, this was typed from a phone...

/r/fursuit Thread