These 3D printed Overwatch Mercy Imp horns are pretty popular. I had a vague idea of using them for a halloween costume and ended up starting early / finishing very late depending on your point of view.
I won’t be going into the 3D print side of the build, just the electronics side that gives a great animated fire effect.
The LED strips are fragile but thin enough to fit into the recess on the horns, almost to the tip. You will need to cut them as they are too long. Mine were 53 LEDs long in the end.
Connect the 5V and Ground wires from the LED strips to the Trinket. Connect the data in wire to pin 0 on the Trinket. Solder on the SMT battery connector.
The recess on the side of the horns was big enough for a 150mAh battery pack which won’t last that long but will do.
Programming the 5V Trinket can be a pain. It uses Arduino code not CircuitPython like the 3V Trinket so you will have to use the Arduino IDE.
Make sure you have installed the Adafruit boards support, and download the NeoPixel library (see Adafruit for details). Configure Arduino IDE to use Trinket 8MHz or Trinket 16MHz and select USBTinyISP as the Tools > Programmer.
Actually programming it in my case needed a very old laptop with USB 2.0 ports on it, nothing modern worked. You might get away with a USB 2.0 hub but I didn’t have one to try.
Connect the Trinket over USB, wait a second, press the button on the Trinket, then choose upload in Arduino IDE. Once updated, connect the battery to the Trinket and hopefully you will get a lovely flame effect on your LED strips!
I recently bought an SGE 400 gas mask. It appealed because it has a nice wide visor so you can see the victim’s eyes plus it had three (yes, 3!) NATO 40mm ports which can be blanked off to give you various options. It also has a really easily adjustable head harness to make getting it on the uncompliant much simpler.
I’d hoped that I could have something that was very quick and easy to switch between rebreather mode (air comes in and out the same port) and normal mode (air comes in one of the 40mm ports and out the exhale valve). It’s not the work of a few seconds but the following gives you these options without any destructive changes.
What you will end up with is the external exhale port blocked off, the external front inhale valve removed, and the internal front exhale valve reversed. Removing the valves can be fiddly but a pair of right angled tweezers helps here.
3D printed part push fits into place over the exhaust. Inhale valve removed.Internal exhaust valve now reversed direction.
You’ll need to 3D print this STL file and glue a 0.8mm thick piece of scrap latex onto the back of (or two 0.4mm which is the standard catsuit gauge). You can just use superglue, we’re not being precious.
I’m not a boy. I’m not even a girl. I’m like a failed version of both.
– Mae Martin, Feel Good, 2020
This is a very personal post and I’m going to lean heavily on Mae Martin for helping me through it.
I have identified as non binary for about four years now. I am out to everyone in my life. But there is still a disconnect between the thing I think I am and the thing I see in the mirror. I was recently told that I’ve always seemed to have been uncomfortable in my own skin and that my kink identity has perhaps been a mask for that? Chasing my puppy identity, the drone, then the rubber doll but seemingly never settling.
And this is not some damascene moment, not some flash of psychologist intervention, not a hypnotic regression to realise I always wore dresses as a child or something. No. This has been a slow burn, a constant gnawing feeling that stops you sleeping. It’s always been there but you don’t notice it until it suddenly bursts forth.
I think of myself being relatively enlightened but I never really got what non binary was. I went through a lot of my life being unhappy with my current body yet unhappy with any other alternative because I thought it was a binary choice – if not boy then it must be girl. And then I saw this.
– Mae Martin, Feel Good, 2021
YES! I thought, that is me, I am just me, I transcend and reject that binary choice.
But here is the problem. I now know me but other people do not see me that way. Yes, those closest to me do, but in a shop or restaurant, or on the phone, I’m still a Sir.
Which brings me to the here and now. I want to boost my femme aspects – if 1 was a boy and 10 a girl I guess I’m aiming for a 5 or 6. Simply taking estrogen might help me but I also don’t want any breast growth. This might(?) change in the future but I can only do what feels right in the present.
Before I continue I want to say this is the experience of one person only. What is right and works for me may not work for you but it might help you to know you’re not on your own.
Sadly there is very little research on transgender medicine and even less on nonbinary folk. So we do our own.
It has taken me four months to find a doctor willing to help (I would not recommend GenderGP by the way) but I have finally started on Raloxifene. This is a selective estrogen reuptake modifier (SERM) which is designed to activate estrogen receptors everywhere but in breast tissue. I have also added in Dutasteride which blocks the conversion of testosterone to DHT.
Even though I don’t quite know where I’m going I’m excited for the journey. I’ll be keeping this post updated with my progress if you want to come on the ride.
Update September 2024: I started micro-dosing Estradiol gel (0.375mcg) around two months ago which gives me a level of around 120pmol/L which is quite low. So far I’ve seen some subtle changes to skin softness, I’m more emotional, and orgasms are quite different! No boob growth. I’ll be re-evaluating where I am in a couple more months.
October 2024: I increased Estradiol to 0.75mcg (one pump) a day and my blood level is now approximately 150pmol/L. I’ve since increased Estradiol to 1.5mg (two pumps) a day and we’ll see where we are next month.
December 2024: My Estradiol levels are at ~350pMol, T is stubbornly stuck at ~19nmol. I have some minor breast development. I think this is mainly fat redistribution as there are no obvious buds (I think). My endocrinologist thinks that the Raloxifene may be keeping the T higher (the same drug class is used in male fertility treatments) and has recommended I start GNRHa which will effectively nuke my endogenous hormones. I’m slightly worried about this as full feminisation is not what I want but we’ll see how this pans out over the next six months.
If you’re in the UK and want to approach non-binary aware gender specialists then I can first hand recommend the following:
Rei is my spirit animal and they’re a pretty popular character to cosplay. It took a while to put together the whole set, including hours of laborious 3D printing sanding and painting the spear of Longinus.
If you love what you see and can afford to chuck some pennies at me, always appreciated but never expected 💖
Social media isn’t like an airport, it doesn’t need a departure announcement.
But I think some explanation is needed in this case as Twitter (I’ll be in my cold cold grave before I recognise its new name) has been my home and community since 2009. It has been fundamental to understanding my own sexuality and gender and with connecting with so so many wonderful people.
And I hate that one individual has decided to rob me of all of this.
Interaction (and I don’t mean just dopamine hits) has been down, and my timeline has been filled with actual, literal fascists. I am lucky in one sense in that my income doesn’t depend on it but for anyone that does my heart breaks to see what it has become.
So what next:
Twitter has all but been deleted. The handle is still there but I am no longer checking it.
Mastodon has been flat but I’ll continue to use it.
Bluesky currently has the most promising community and has seen a big influx recently (November 2024).
Instagram allows me to follow some vendors but the moderation policies are draconian.
Fetlife is ok but the level of creepy comments is unpleasant.
OF/Fansly serve a purpose especially for live streams and video hosting and I’ll continue to use them to post early exclusives before that content becomes available for free here.
The blog will stay and might actually get a bit more attention.
Tailoring content for each platform takes effort and I don’t want to simply automatically cross post either. I don’t know how best to proceed and won’t always get it right but I’ll try my best to continue to inform and help the community that has helped me so much over the last 20 years. x
This is not an exhaustive guide but is a good starting point if you are interested in expressing your inner dolly self. I hope this post will be updated over time as other makers emerge.
Firstly, the assumption here is that you are wanting to take a flat(ter) chest and augment the breast area and constrict the waist. I am absolutely not saying this is the only way – many drones go for a more androgynous look for example – but I like to feel the bounce and overemphasise the hourglass figure in a hyper-femme look. I am non binary and a large part of that for me is being able to “take off” one gender and put on another.
Many female-cut catsuits have a tendency to flatten the chest; although they have extra space cut for boobs the constriction of the latex will still de-emphasise that area. If this is what you are after, then you have a lot of choice in fit, designs, and makers.
However, the “big boob” suit is designed to augment and emphasise the chest, usually with silicone breast forms, although inflatable boobs are also available.
Silicone suits, chest plates and breast forms
If you are wanting to give yourself a more femme figure, especially the chest, then you have a few options before you choose your latex second skin.
Some folks choose a full silicone body suit. There are many different makers available. I have found the suits to be extremely difficult to get into, expensive, and tear easily. If you are wearing a full latex catsuit on top then you probably don’t need to go this route, but if you want to wear more revealing outfits then it’s maybe more useful.
A silicone chest plate is kinda like a binder or sports bra, but with the boobs attached. The boobs can either be filled with cotton (lighter) or silicone (heavier but with a realistic bounce), and come in lots of different sizes of course. Again, there are lots of makers, but I have one from Dokier (eBay or Ali) and I’m actually quite impressed with it and how easily it is to get into. An advantage is that the chest plate will hold the boobs into position and you can then go choose any female-cut of suit, or mini dress, or whatever you like.
Individual breast forms are more commonly used with the big boob suits. These are just silicone separates and are easily available. I have a curved asymmetric pair from Red Rose.
Latex catsuits
Let’s deal with the elephant in the room. Fantastic Rubber were/are the best fitting and best engineered big boob suits but I can no longer recommend them due to the company’s owner. Maybe in time this changes but for now, no matter how good they are, it’s a red line for me. I still wear mine but in a gender fuck-you kinda way. The reason the suits are so good is that they have a dedicated pocket for the boobs, and a halter that goes around the neck which keeps them in a natural position.
Your next best option is Simon O’s big boob suits (male and female cuts). These do come with E cups as the minimum size, and unfortunately are in off the peg sizing only, no made-to-measure (as far as I know). So for me, they don’t quite fit right.
If you prefer Libidex then they provide male suits with breast form pockets, although you need to source your own separately and give them the sizing. The big disadvantage for me is that the pockets are simply open at the back so the breast forms can move around. If they’re combined with a corset and harness then this may not be a major issue for you though.
