Mascot in the making

[SlimsGirl]

Hi Everyone,

I need to pick your brains on a subject that I'm stuck on.

Throughout the years that Team 188, Woburn Robotics, has been involved in FIRST, we've never had an official mascot. In that time, we've gone through a few changes with the name of our team and settled on Blizzard. We've decided on having a Polar Bear as our mascot.

The problem: Do we buy or make it?

I saw a lot of teams out there that had mascots and was wondering how they came to be.

Did you make them yourself? If so, was it hard? Worth the effort? Worth the cost? And what tips do you have for a team that is about to undergo the process? How did you deal with issue of ventilation? Did you use electric fans for cooling?

OR

Did you buy it? Was it expensive? Do you recommend a company to buy it from? Was it custom made? Was it worth the price?

Whatever your answers may be, we'd love to hear it!

[Joe Matt]

Originally Posted by SlimsGirl

Hi Everyone,

I need to pick your brains on a subject that I'm stuck on.

Throughout the years that Team 188, Woburn Robotics, has been involved in FIRST, we've never had an official mascot. In that time, we've gone through a few changes with the name of our team and settled on Blizzard. We've decided on having a Polar Bear as our mascot.

The problem: Do we buy or make it?

I saw a lot of teams out there that had mascots and was wondering how they came to be.

Did you make them yourself? If so, was it hard? Worth the effort? Worth the cost? And what tips do you have for a team that is about to undergo the process? How did you deal with issue of ventilation? Did you use electric fans for cooling?

OR

Did you buy it? Was it expensive? Do you recommend a company to buy it from? Was it custom made? Was it worth the price?

Whatever your answers may be, we'd love to hear it!

The Tiger of course is a tie in, a kick back sort to say, of our high school mascot, JR Tucker Tigers. We were known for being The Tigers with Sparky, but then around 4.0 we started working Sparky into the name of our organization. Now the tiger, the tiger paws, and the logo are the only things we use of the godd 'ole days. The Tiger, as it ties in with the school, is the school's. It is bought, and it took a long time to raise the funds to get it (we aren't a rich school).

[Beth Sweet]

This year we used a sumo outfit (BIG Robotics). It was a costume that one of our kids had used for Halloween a year before. George also had an oversized mullet but I'm not quite sure how that fit in.... But on topic, both were purchased, though not by the team.

[Freddy Schurr]

If you want a team building activity, then should make it,because you have fun and also making something cool. But if you want a kewl-looking mascot,then get someone else to do it for you. We try to make a viking outfit but it look like a karate dude. It got alot of laughs and it cheer us up in the stands.

[dubious elise]

The mother of one of our team members made our school mascot uniform (a raccoon) a number of years ago and very kindly made the robotics team a separate body. Since the other mascot was largely used in the fall for football games, the body was made out of fake fur that was very dense and heavy. At the robotics competitions, however, it becomes ridiculously hot, so she made us a body that was much lighter and out of a very soft velvet or suede-like fabric.

[Not2B]

We showed off our first ever mascot at western michigan this year. Gigawatt is a giant walkaround lightning bolt (Lightning Robotics).

My wife's aunt made it out of that foam you can buy at Joann. Big sheets of it, about 2-3 inches thick. Then it was covered in material.

Make it strong - the costumes tend to get beaten up a bit. We have many repairs to make to it.

We are also going to add a big muffin fan with a battery pack and an on/off swich for the user. It gets hot in there. We also had room for a drink holder inside. (For a beverage with a cap of course.)

I say it comes down to how much money you have. We don't, so we made one for cheap. (The nice ones are expensive... might as well start a couple of lego teams instead.)

[KathieK]

Professionally made mascots are very expensive to purchase, but the quality should serve you for many years. RAGE didn't want to spend that kind of money and would have had to custom-order a costume anyway (not too many red bulldogs out there) so we had a local seamstress friend of mine make the costume body this year and I made the head. This is Sprocket.

I was able to purchase the red fur fabric online through a national retail fabric store chain with a discount coupon (FUR IS VERY EXPENSIVE). I ordered plenty of extra material so that we could make repairs in the future if necessary. The paws are separate pieces and the feet are simply "spats" - covers that slip on over sneakers. It has a strechy nylon fabric liner that the mascot puts on first. The liner has pockets in it where the foam "muscles" are inserted. The liner is great because it can be washed easily! The head was made out of a large block of foam that was glued up for us and donated by a local foam company (foam is VERY EXPENSIVE). I then carved it down to size and shape using an electric carving knife. The foam is very abrasive so don't use a good knife - purchase one for just this purpose since it will quickly become dull! It took a week of solid work on the head to get it to look somewhat like the shape that I wanted. I'd recommend having someone in your school that has carving experience help you with the drawing of the shape and planning for the opening so the mascot can see and breathe. It was a nightmare to do. The inside is hollowed out and a hockey helmet is inserted to give it more stability on the user's head. I then covered the foam with small pieces of fur using a hot glue gun. The eyes, teeth and nose are made of foam sheets I purchased inexpensively at a craft store.
We have 4 team members who are our mascot - we encourage them to rotate out of the costume frequently because it is VERY HOT inside. We are using cooling gel packs in Atlanta to see if that helps. After 20 -30 minutes, that person gets a rest/drink break (drink lots of water to stay hydrated), another person rotates into the costume, one is the guide.

[bradleym1559]

That would be really cool if you could make it yourselves...to really get the team involved. We really should have done that. In the future, when our team name changes we might make our own mascot costume, but for now, being Devil-Tech we just use our school mascot--our school being the Blue Devils. So that worked out, but not as original as we had hoped. Good luck, and have fun!

[SlimsGirl]

Thanks so much for your replies. It's given us a lot to think about.

A majority of the team would like to see our mascot get made by us. Mostly for the reason of it being a team experience that we can all be proud of. There are also members who would rather have it bought to ensure quality and longevity.

We've started to plan out the cost of materials needed to compare the prices. I'm really grateful for the replies that went into detail of how your mascots got made. We were looking into getting foam for the head but there was a concern in regards to fumes? Apparently, newly created foam gives off a particular smell... Did anyone run into that problem?

Again, thanks a bunch everyone, and if you have other helpful comments or anything else to add, please feel free to do so.

[SURVIVORfan44]

SlimsGirl, have you ever thought about the mascot being Sasquatch (sp?) or something? That would be really neat. The abominable snow man from 188? I dunno? Our official mascot is the Indian, but we really don't have our mascot with us at competitions.

[Bcahn836]

We just waited until Halloween and picked a bee costume made for a 5 year old and put it on a noob, who volunteered. Since then we have picked up 2 more costumes around Halloween.

[KathieK]

I didn't notice any "new foam" smell and I'm very sensitive to fumes. However, I would HIGHLY recommend wearing a mask and safety glasses when carving it - it got EVERYWHERE - in my nose, my eyes. And of course, be careful using the electric knife (I slipped once and it hurts when you carve skin). And I am just now healing from the hot glue gun blisters. (The things I do for my team!) Plus it generates a lot of static electricity so I couldn't get it to just fall onto the ground so I could pick it up later - it clung to everything. I tried getting our costume class who makes costumes for our drama club to try and make us one, but the class had been canceled.

[Cyberguy34000]

This is the first year #662 has had a mascot. So we are the Rocky Mountain Rambos. One of the freshmen drew this really amazing picture of this commando guy with a machinegun/powerdrill in his hands, and so we went with that theme. We all wore face paint and red/blue bandanas when we were cheering, depending on which alliance we were cheering for. It was cheap, and it looks pretty cool. I'll see if I can get a pic. But yeah, go for something easy to impliment.

[Lil' Lavery]

We dont have a mascot anymore, but the 2 years that we did we were using the school's mascot. We stopped because it was both hot and heavy, and because its very expensive and its very hard to make sure that it has been taken care of properly.

[mathking]

Our team mascot was made by a parent. But having gone through the process of students making a costume for a school mascot, I found it to be a satisfying experience. (This was a mascot for the basketball and track teams which I coached.) My advice is to consult on fabric and materials with some professionals. We talked to a couple people at the local JoAnn Fabrics who were very helpful in choosing a good fabric that was not too hot and held up well. They also helped in choosing structural elements.