I don't generally get to spend a whole lot of time making props. I've enjoyed a few I've done, but don't have a lot of storage or wall space to store or display many new ones.
An opportunity started two years ago, however, when our youngest had an ambitious plan to build -- with help over the course of a year -- a Star Wars-themed Halloween costume beginning with an E-22 Shoretrooper Blaster from Rogue One.
We started with some soldering lessons to put together a sound effects box to play recorded "pew-pew" sounds with every trigger press. As a bonus, the included battery box matched the size and appearance of a box on the left-hand side of the E-22.
The trigger and handgrip were fashioned from scratch respectively from aluminum and wood and mounted to a PVC pipe and wood frame that would represent the base of the blaster. An internal spring and microswitch completed the working trigger mechanism.
With a coating in black spray paint, it was already starting to take shape.
To refine the shape of the double barrels, sheets of EVA foam were wrapped around and attached with hot melt glue to add thickness and shape.
Additional foam was added to cover the wood stock and barrel spacer pieces, and successive layers were built-up to add more thickness, ridging, and other details.
Additional details were added with sheet aluminum pieces, brass brads, and screws.
After this point, the project sat fallow for over a year and a half as its instigator found other interests and other priorities took precedence. Momentum began once again, however, after our oldest expressed interest in helping complete the E-22.
So more pieces were added one-by-one to build the scope, light, magazine, and other pieces from more PVC pipe, wood, aluminum, foam, screws, and random scrap parts I found lying around that happened to resemble pieces in reference photos from the movie.
Some curved laser cut pieces added the critical cooling fins to the barrels.
After a base of black spray paint, it was starting to look like a "real" thing.
After adding salvaged strip magnets from a fiberglass screen door that had the right shape for barrel ridges, silver paint was added to "metal" parts to give a more realistic appearance.
To finish it off, some more black paint was added with a small brush for grime and weathering as well as hand-painted details.