Part the second as the shape slowly takes form!

You can now get a better idea of the scale of the shield now with myself holding it. (You'll get a better picture of it soon) Yes it is on the smaller side but the benefit of this while using it is it weighs extremely little and is also small. Easy to carry with you without it getting in the way or as one of the Archers at the park commented when they saw the finished shield they could easily hold a bow with their arm through the shield if the handle had a bigger circle. Always on tap to try and defend against enemy arrows coming in or when someone rushes them.

But onto the actual construction you can see that the 'top' was removed and now the 'bottom' layer of camp pad was cut out. This is the softer foam that would hopefully be more durable while being whacked and smacked by impacts and attacks. And something I know how to paint when we got to that phase. Now with the 'bottom' cut out the next step was to contact cement the two middle parts of the shield onto the bottom to start the assembly process. With that complete we took the handle, that had also been cemented together and taped for extra stability and for use as a marker for us to see where we wanted it to rest on the top and bottom to get the handle shape that I wanted out of it. Not that I really knew what that was this was all experimental at this time. But the handle would not be in the middle of the shield. And we were worried that a stab right in the middle could cause the shield to buckle inwards. So the solution to that was to take our now cut up harbor freight foam pannel and cut out a rectangle that would sit in the middle where the handle was not. Still using only one sheet of the foam! To try and keep the foam all throughout the shield. And with that central part cemented inside it was time to bend and cement the handle into place and then the cementing and sliding on the top with its hole for the handle to come through!