How to build Vi hands from League of Legends

I have gotten many request to make a tutorial for how I built my Vi hands. As always my documentation skills are not sufficient, but I will try to cover this build as best I can with some simple hand drawings. There is also a part two where I upgrade the hands.

These are my hands (a little flat at this point in the build)

Photo: Pål Andresen

I made my hands based on the concept art and not the in game model, there are some differences and in the end I thought these looked better. 

To make the build easier I divided the hands into four parts as shown under. 

Photo: leagueoflegends.wikia.com

The core is the bottom base with the pistons and "the tube" where you put your hands. The core is attached to the knuckles, where all the electronics are hid. All the fingers are attached to the knuckle. And on the back there the pressure gauge is placed. 

I will also try to explain the mechanics of the fingers and electronics. 

Core
Foam mat and cardcoard for the base, and a cylinder for where your arms will go. 

 Details

The pistons are made of several sized cylinders inside each others (like toilet paper cores)

Knuckles
In one of the picture above you can see an early stage of the knuckles. These are made out of Styrofoam and cardboard. In principle I used this shape to build it. 

The red circles are "those small white dishes you get at a cafeteria". Gotta love recycling. 

Fingers
I wanted the fingers to be able to move. To make it easier for me the thumb is static. My idea was very simple, a finger with three hinges and a fishline attached to the first joint. The fishline ends in a metal ring so I can control it with my own fingers. 

So I made eight cardboard fingers as shown under. At every joint there is a spring on the underside and a elastic band on the over side (as to stretch the fingers out automatically) 

Above the hinges I glued on a bit of folded foam mat painted gold. 

The fingers are attached to the "knuckles" using contact glue and hot glue. 

I move the fingers by pulling the metal rings that are attached to the fishwire. I have tried to illustrate it better in the picture below. 

And here are the metal rings in the "hand cylinder." I also glued in a small plastic tube for a "handle", makes it easier to operate the hands.  

This video shows the principle of the mechanic of the finger movement

The back
The back of the hands are made with a cardboard base with foam mat pieces on top. 

The foam pieces were covered with filler, then painted. 

I was mening to cast the blue crystal in epoxy, but I didn't finish the mold on time. That will come in the next iteration. 

The pressure gauge is made with a paper needle and and a nail. The "glass" is simply a circle cut out from the lid of a take away sushi box. But any transparent plastic will do. Around it I have just used a strip of foam.

The electronics
In the hollow part of the knuckles I hid a battery and lined up four red and a blue LED in series with a switch on the front. Gives a little extra while standing on the stage in the dark. 

The result (after upgrading, more info under photo)

Photo Joacim Schwartz

There are several things I will upgrade in my second iteration since I'm wearing this at NCC. I will build up the back of the hand, it is a little too flat now. I will also improve the fingers and all edges. And finish the mold for the blue crystal. 

So Check out the upgrade tutorial

Also Ryan Brandt made a genderbender version of Vi and posted a youtube video of his experience and thoughts about the build process. Might be useful to get a few more pointers to ass even more details. 

And who knows, maybe I can get it to steam ;) 
Update: Yes, I got it to steam