I recently finished up a little personal project that I’ve been chipping away at since February in my vast spare time. It’s a replica of the tomahawk from the video game Assassin’s Creed. I filmed myself building it along the way, and shoved it all into a single five-minute video.

While you can find tons of images of the tomahawk online, a lot of credit goes to MoonLit Props who developed a full-scale pattern. You can see me using it in the video to trace out the pieces.

The blade is made out of MDF and gets its unique shape from the symbol in the game. It took a lot of rasping, filing and sanding to get the bevels right, followed by endless priming and sanding to make it smooth. I finished it off with some Krylon Stainless Steel spray paint, which has a fantastic faux steel look once you rub it down with some steel wool. It also has a wash of black acrylic for shading and some silver Rub’n Buff for highlights.

The handle is simply a piece of poplar cut and routed to shape. The thin strips of wrapping are actual leather, but the handle itself is suede, since I was sticking with materials I already had laying around the shop.

For the emblem carved in the side, I wanted to try out a technique that’s been rattling around in my head; mixing metallic powders with epoxy resin to mimic metal. It did not work at all as I had hoped. I’m glad I learned that on a small part of a personal project rather than relying on it for a show.

All in all, I am happy with how it turned out, and now I have another fun prop to trot out at Maker Faires.