S.E.E.S. Evoker (Persona3)

Finally done. God. The thing took over a month to complete. You have NO IDEA just about how many complications I got while making this.
First, the base shape made out of clay deceided it would be fun to curl while drying. I had to spend extra time equalizing boths size back in a straight shape using sand paper and restauring the original thickness with more clay.
Second, after shaping the thing with more clay on the clay base, it deceided this time to SHRINK. I had to fix that as well.
Third, I had just finished perfectly softening it with sand paper when I realised that my silver paint was almost transparant while applying the first layer. Ugh. It needed me to apply over 15 layers (no kidding) of that paint to completely and evenly cover the clay. Of course, 15 layers of paint litterally ruined the fine sand paper job I had done.
Fourth, once the paint had completely dried out, not only did it left a uberly sticky feeling, but I noticed that the paint had a pearl finish instead of a metallic one. Not cool. To remove the stickyness and give a metal-like gloss, I had to put about 4 to 5 layers of extra-glossy varnish.
Fifth, for some unexplained reasons, the content of my entire bottle of china ink deceided to dry out to a jello-like texture. I still have no idea how this happened as it was hermetically closed overnight as usual, and the day before it was perfectly fine when I used it to write the SEES logo...
Sixth, I got the shapes out of fake leather for the handle, but when gluing them on, I came up with the problem of finding something to hold the thing down on the sides of the handle relief while the glue dried. So I ended up gluing a cm, applying pressure with my thumb for half an hour, gluing another cm, pressing down again for 30 mins... Extremely time consuming.
Seventh, some of my unused clay rot the day after completing the evoker... again for some unknown reasons as I've had it for well over 2 months and it had stayed perfectly fresh, but somehow rot out of nowhere overnight, leaving a quite awful smell in the room and being decorated with many classy fat black fur spots. Ew.

Having known that the thing would have brought me THAT much trouble, I highly doubt I would have made it, and being the main part of my cosplay, I also highly doubt I would have made that cosplay.
I think I better hide it in my camera bag until we get to the con, knowing how much of a bad-luck charm it is, I don't wanna end up being spotted by some kind of freak paranoid person in the metro who deceides to call the police on me, and have to explain half a bazillion times in a police station that it is not real and why I'm carrying it, ruining my entire week-end.

The screws weren't much of a problem to put though, and I had expected it to be the hardest part. Except for one that made a small part crumble because I had applied too much pressure (and that was easily fixed), they all went in nicely. I also countered the 15-layers-of-paint-scrapped-my-sandpaper-job by using the uneven surface to create an old-and-used feel using black paint.

About the clay: I used Plus clay. Remembering my years of high school in which's art classes' unknown clay was pretty atrocious to work with, I was quite surprised by the strenght and malleability of this product and I am definately going to stick to it. I'm also planning on using it for Marth's armor (yes, it's that strong!), about 1 1/2 cm thick and mixed with matte varnish instead of water will prove to be the best thing to use. Mixing varnish to clay hardens ALOT the clay (making it stone-hard and almost impossible to break with a non-abusive usage), but takes more time to dry.