For seventeen years Ryan Nixon (Known by the moniker “Stitch”) has been creating custom-made, affordable military costumes based on Stargate uniforms. His screen-accurate work has won him fans the world over. We are pleased to bring him to Dial the Gate to share his story of a United States Navy veteran applying his trade for fans, and are going to geek out on some of the hardware that makes the shows look and feel real!

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TRANSCRIPT
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David Read:
Hello, everyone. And welcome to Episode 282 of Dial the Gate. My name is David Read. Thank you so much for joining me for this episode. Ryan Stitch Nixon, of Stitch’s Loft, he is a friend. We go back 15 years, Ryan? All the way back to the, I guess the first Propworx auctions in Seattle. Is that right?

Ryan Nixon:
Yeah, I think that’s right.

David Read:
Man.

Ryan Nixon:
How you doing, Dave?

David Read:
I’m good, sir. How are you?

Ryan Nixon:
I’m good. I don’t know. My voice is a little off today. So, not good timing, but we’ll make it work.

David Read:
We’ll make it work. Absolutely. How long have you been a fan of this show that we have all rallied around for decades after its completion? How far do the two of you go back?

Ryan Nixon:
We’ve been…

David Read:
And by the way, you’re seeing Ryan peeking behind Ryan here on the screen.

Ryan Nixon:
Yeah, there’s me. So no, no copyright infringement there. That is my photograph. Sorry, Dean, but it was my camera.

David Read:
I’m sure he’s got one.

Ryan Nixon:
Yeah. He did. I took one right after it. We traded cameras.

David Read:
You and Stargate.

Ryan Nixon:
Yeah, 2005. I was active duty in the Navy in Atlanta, and I got the flu. And I was in bed and sleeping way too much, and couldn’t sleep anymore. Ended up turning on Syfy channel, and I saw it. And then I mentioned it to a couple people, and they’re like, “Oh, you’ve never watched that? I thought for sure you’d be all into that.” I’m like, “I hadn’t seen…” I didn’t have Showtime, so I didn’t have…

David Read:
So, you were aware of it, but you’d not watched it?

Ryan Nixon:
Yeah. I think I was slightly aware of it, but I just never watched it, so I hadn’t gotten into it. And then, man, I dove both feet and within a month I was on sgcommand.net and talking to Dan Kim and Dean and all these people. And Dragon Con was coming; I had a month to get ready.

David Read:
So, these are the costume circles and the prop circles.

Ryan Nixon:
Yup. And I hit the ground running, and started going up through the ranks and it was history from there.

David Read:
OK. What is it that grips you about this franchise? What is it that keeps you coming back? Not just Amanda Tapping. Right?

Ryan Nixon:
Right. I think really it was the realism. At that point I had been in the Navy since 1990, so I was pretty deep into my career at that point. And really how much they got right. It just, even from early on in my career, ’91, I was working with the Air Force. We were doing joint drug interdictions in Panama and some of the Caribbean areas. And I was working so closely with the Air Force, I learned a lot about them and we can talk about some of that stuff later. But I literally became almost a translator later in my career, because I had worked with the Air Force so much early in my career. Then later, in ’99, when I was overseas in the Sandbox and we were patrolling the no-fly zone over in southern Iraq, The Air Force had gotten rid of the F-111s, so the EA-6Bs for the Navy had to pick up the role. So, at that point, these navy–

David Read:
These are planes?

Ryan Nixon:
Yeah.

David Read:
OK. Translate for the laymen, folks.

Ryan Nixon:
Yeah. They’re Prowlers. The Navy had to pick up this whole job for the Air Force. So, at this point, we are now working for them. So, it’s a whole different lingo. It’s the military, but the Marines don’t talk the same as the Navy. We can communicate, but you start getting into the Air Force and the Army and these other branches, everybody’s got their own jargon.

David Read:
For sure.

Ryan Nixon:
I literally met this E8 and he was asking me all these questions and he knew the answers. And he’s like, “How do you know all this stuff?” And I’m like, “Well, I worked with you guys a lot early in my career, I just learned it.” I loved the realism, to get back to your question. It was so accurate. And then when I found out they did have all these consultants helping, I really resonated with that.

David Read:
Very cool. I really think that the costuming side of Stargate is something that is not covered a lot in fandom. And there’s quite a few of you. Even when we went to San Diego Comic-Con this year, there were several folks walking around in full garb. And I think that it’s a thriving community overall. Not as much as it used to be obviously, ’cause it’s a show that’s not on the air right now. But I think that there’s a lot there. And fortunately, it’s one of, I suspect, the easier shows to do because you can actually go to a military supply store to get started.

Ryan Nixon:
I think that’s the tough part, ’cause we always joke that the newbies look like they rolled off the Army supply truck.

David Read:
They don’t look like they’ve come through the Stargate on a couple of missions? Need to put some dust and dirt on them?

Ryan Nixon:
Yeah. Some of them are a little rough. You get into the Star Wars things; you start talking about bathrobe Jedis and stuff like that. But everybody starts out. Maybe you can find that old picture of Paul and I. Mine was rough. Mine was really rough in 2005. But that was the thing. We worked together. And being a PR in the Navy, parachute rigger, official titles, air crew survival equipment, that was kind of my niche ’cause I worked on all the flight equipment. So, especially when it came to the F-302s and that type of stuff, I knew exactly what they were wearing. I could tell you the exact nomenclature of the G-suit or whatever. And that stuff was really easy for me. So, it was easy for me to identify what pair of boots those were, Magnums or Danners or whatever. And then, ’05 to ’08 was probably the peak costuming time for us. About ’07 when Atlantis took off and everything, it really blew up. There were hundreds of us across the world, really.

David Read:
That’s so cool. All right. How did you decide to start? I assume Stitch is your moniker from Battlestar Galactica? Is that correct or was that taken from… No, that’s not–

Ryan Nixon:
No.

David Read:
Where does this come from? And how did you start off Stitch’s Loft?

Ryan Nixon:
It came from a nickname. I don’t know how family friendly we wanna? But in the Navy…

David Read:
Very family friendly.

Ryan Nixon:
…In the Navy, there was a derogatory term stitch followed with the B word. Because all the other maintainers, they’re out on the hot flight line turning wrenches and we’re inside sitting by the air conditioner sewing half the time.

David Read:
OK.

Ryan Nixon:
That was always a derogatory term. So, I flipped the script on it and I was like, “I work in the para loft. That’s where all the work is done.” So, I took Stitch’s Loft and I was making my own loft. And I made it possessive with the apostrophe S. That doesn’t work with debit cards and stuff so well but I’ve made it work.

David Read:
Yeah, they don’t like those special characters.

Ryan Nixon:
A buddy of mine came up with this logo for me and he took my actual Naval symbol and put it on a tilt and…

David Read:
Paratrooper.

Ryan Nixon:
Yeah, it worked out and I ran with it. But I started dabbling in ’07. I started making– My first prop was the headset for Atlantis ’cause I wanted something that resembled it and once I saw the real ones, they were so uncomfortable and most of the actors I talked to hated them. They absolutely hated them and they started out really long and-

David Read:
You’re talking about the earpieces?

Ryan Nixon:
Yeah. And they were casting a shadow and then they’re in post-production, they’re trying to take the shadow out, so they started shortening them and Joe’s got one that’s an inch and a half long.

David Read:
They don’t need to be long.

Ryan Nixon:
No, they don’t.

David Read:
They’re just aesthetic.

Ryan Nixon:
But they hurt. The original prop, they really hurt, and I came up with something better and everybody loved them and my reviews go all the way back to 2007 on those. But I didn’t start my business till 2011.

David Read:
OK. How many clients have you had?

Ryan Nixon:
I don’t know exactly. I’m well into probably 3,700 orders at this point.

David Read:
All Stargate? Mostly Stargate?

Ryan Nixon:
Mostly. I would say 85, 90%. Over 3,000, I would say.

David Read:
As we move forward, has it wound down as we get further away from the shows or has it stayed steady?

Ryan Nixon:
COVID really threw a wrench into everything.

David Read:
I can’t imagine why.

Ryan Nixon:
I took a 58% loss the first year on that. And 2019 was my best year, ’cause I had done Captain Marvel and some other stuff. I had some other things blowing up. It kept me really busy, but it was tough. It was definitely tough. It was.

David Read:
Is your specialty screen-accurate costumes tailored to the individual user? Is that what it is that you do?

Ryan Nixon:
For the most part. I call myself a prop and costume consultant ’cause that’s what I’ve actually done on the real movies and sets. I’m not union, but I still work with the crew and I’m a paid consultant basically. So, when you’re coming to me as just a fan or a costumer, then you’re paying me to be your consultant. So, we look at your budget, we look at what ideas you’re having. It’s tough ’cause some people, if they just buy something off Etsy or eBay… they don’t realize how hands-on I am with stuff. I wanna know. What are you doing? What’s your vision? What’s your passion? Is this just a one-time Halloween costume or is this, you’re pouring some money into this. It’s never been about me getting rich or making a buck. It’s always been about keeping fandom alive and doing the best job for a customer that I can. And that’s where I get my pride from.

David Read:
Absolutely. You’re a real fan. It’s like me with this. This whole project is a labor of love far more than anything else. I’m lucky with advertising dollars, but that’s where it stops. I’m never gonna take money from anyone otherwise. But you’re providing a product. You’re providing something tangible and that makes a whole heck of a lot of sense. So, this is really cool, man. Let me see here. I wanna talk about your experience with Amanda Tapping. Can you tell this story?

Ryan Nixon:
Yeah, absolutely.

David Read:
Please.

Ryan Nixon:
Started out mostly as a joke. I had a similar wallpaper on my computer in the Navy, obviously before this was taken. It was one of those that everybody had that was floating around on the internet. It was early 2006 and one of the guys from squadron came in and I was sitting there, literally my feet up on the desk. He saw my wallpaper on my computer. He goes, “You’re such a geek.” And I was like, “Why?” I said, “Dude. I’m gonna be standing in that room in a couple of months.” ‘Cause I was already planning on going to the convention. He’s like, “Whatever.” He kinda walked out.

David Read:
The normies love placing us in a box. It’s the only way that they can deal with us.

Ryan Nixon:
He was like, “Whatever.” And he left. I don’t know why my green screen’s phasing out here. I don’t know.

David Read:
The light’s getting really bright.

Ryan Nixon:
The sun keeps changing.

David Read:
There’s your answer. No, keep telling your story.

Ryan Nixon:
He leaves and I’m sitting there brainstorming and one of the guys that worked for me, he’s like, “Are you really gonna get to see all that?” And I said, “Yeah. We get to tour the set.” I had already got my passport to go to Canada, paid the money for the tickets, I was getting everything done. He’s like, “Aren’t you re-enlisting and you gotta leave soon?” And I said, “Yeah.” I said, “You know what? I should re-enlist in the gate room,” and it was literally a joke. He’s like, “That would be cool.” And I sat there and I was like, “Wonder if I could pull that off?” I was like, “Well, maybe I’d get a hold of Richard Dean Anderson maybe.” I kept brainstorming and I was like, “You know who would really do it? Amanda would do it.” I got it in my head and nobody was gonna tell me no. And I got on the internet and I started figuring out how to get a hold of her and was sending emails and she was overseas filming or doing something at the time and she came back and one of her publicists or something got a hold of her and I feel horrible ’cause I can’t remember the lady’s name, but it was 2006.

David Read:
It’s probably Cynthia.

Ryan Nixon:
Yes.

David Read:
Cynthia Semon.

Ryan Nixon:
I think it was.

David Read:
May she rest in peace.

Ryan Nixon:
She passed away.

David Read:
She did. I loved her.

Ryan Nixon:
She was amazing and totally instrumental in making it all happen. If it hadn’t been for Cynthia, it wouldn’t have happened. She wrote me back and she’s like, “Ryan, this is really interesting. Let me talk with Amanda when she gets back,” and blah, blah, blah. So, I waited a few weeks. All of a sudden, she’s back. She’s like, “Now, can you make this happen?” And I’m like, “Yeah. Sure, why not?” The main thing was I had to find an officer that could actually sign the paperwork. Amanda could host it, but she wasn’t a real US Air Force officer so she couldn’t actually swear me in, blah, blah, blah. So, years ago in the Navy, there was a guy that had Commander Riker from Star Trek do it.

David Read:
Jonathan Frakes.

Ryan Nixon:
He ended up in a magazine with the Navy and they made it a whole big thing and I was like, “No. I’m keeping this on the down-low. I’m just gonna do my thing.” This was a huge deal ’cause then we’re touring the set and everything, so I’m trying to email the convention and let them know what I’m doing and it was a shell game. So, finally, I started reaching out to some officers in the Whidbey Island area in Washington to see if they would be willing to drive into Canada and just somebody for the day. I just kept striking out. So, one day, I went down to Maintenance Control this time for tools, had my Stargate jacket on. I used to wear it every day, just break it in, and Commander May, who’s our maintenance material control officer, he was what we call a Mustang, he was prior enlisted and then became an officer. That dude had more medals– I’m sure you got some of the pictures of him there. He was on the Navy shooting team, this guy had stuff I’ve never even seen before when I met him. He had a really dry sense of humor.

David Read:
Is he the one who was there to swear you in?

Ryan Nixon:
Yeah, he officiated the whole thing.

David Read:
OK

Ryan Nixon:
Signed the official paperwork, and he was a Stargate fan, and didn’t know it. So, he’s like, “Hey, I hear you’re trying to do a re-enlistment.” Somehow the word had got out. I said, “Yeah.” And he goes, “Might be able to help you out.” I came to find out he was transferring to New Orleans before I was even gonna do this. He was leaving, and I was like, “How’s that gonna work?” And he goes, “I’ll give you my number. Let’s keep in touch, see if we can figure this out.” So, he got involved with the emails, carbon copied Cynthia. That man bought his own plane ticket, flew to Canada, got his own rental car, paid for his own hotel, and he was there for probably about 28 hours. I’m not kidding you. He flew in the night before, walked into the hotel lobby, shook my hand, had his uniform in a bag and a carry-on, and he’s like, “I’m going to my room. I’ll see you in the morning.” We did the ceremony the next day. That dude drove back to the airport, flew home.

David Read:
What a nice guy.

Ryan Nixon:
Dude, it blew me away. And not only, he had just moved and transferred to New Orleans and did all of it offsite from Atlanta. So, I was scrambling around trying to get the box done, the flag, everything, to surprise her, and I gave her that shadow box. We flew the flag over the base on her daughter’s first or second birthday, I don’t remember how old her daughter was at the time.

David Read:
She would’ve been young.

Ryan Nixon:
March of ’06 and whenever she was born, you have to do the math. It’s been so long.

David Read:
What a memory.

Ryan Nixon:
It was crazy. Then the official day came. It was supposed to be in the gate room, but then there was some scheduling conflicts, but Amanda’s like, “Nope, we’re doing this.” And she came straight to the hotel and they shut down the meet and greet photo thing, whatever, for an hour or two. Some people went and got lunch and she’s like, “Nope, let’s just do this now.” The emotions, I had probably about 18, 20 people in the room that were friends or people I’d even met that weekend. I just grabbed them and I’m like, “Hey.”–

David Read:
Dan’s in there. I saw a picture of Dan Kim.

Ryan Nixon:
Dan was in there. There was a bunch of people. I couldn’t even name everybody. I had a cake made and I was running around trying to do so much. Amanda showed up in jeans, cowboy boots, and a black T-shirt of all things.

David Read:
You could put the jacket over her.

Ryan Nixon:
Colleen grabbed a jacket or something and threw it on her. I think I swapped the patches out to the captain on–

David Read:
So that they were right.

Ryan Nixon:
Not only were they right, but they were mine. And that way I could… I swapped them off my jacket or something, I can’t remember. Then we did it. Commander May, of course, dry sense of humor. So, we get in there, he hands her the oath, and he’s like, “All right, you’re an actress, you’re great at memorizing stuff. Just go ahead and memorize that real quick and then we’ll knock this out.” And she’s like, “What?” And he’s just totally messing with her. And I know what he’s doing and I’m just like, “Oh.”

David Read:
Some people need time to prepare.

Ryan Nixon:
She’s like, “I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States always.” She’s reading this and she’s like, “No.” And finally, he’s like, “Oh, I’m just messing with you. You can read it.” He’s like, “We just normally memorize it as an officer.” And she’s like, “Oh my God.” She was ready to pass out. So, it was a good tension breaker for everything, and we just did it. It lasted a minute and a half, but the tension in the room, the emotion, just everything. I was so nervous. She was freaking out. And then, when we got done, she just hugged me. She hugged me three times.

David Read:
I remember those Amanda hugs. I agree. Was that your last re-enlistment?

Ryan Nixon:
Yeah, it was. I figured it was gonna be, but I wasn’t for sure. But as it turned out, it was.

David Read:
All right. That’s awesome, man. I wanna move a little bit more into some of the customization that you guys do. You sent me a number of photos of tactical vests. What are the– Is that something that’s complicated to tailor to each individual person? Especially when you’re not seeing them there in person with you. What is it that you do and how do you deal with these things and making sure that they’re screen accurate?

Ryan Nixon:
That’s always been the challenge. When I first started out, it was just friends, and I could meet them at a con and see it and have it in my head. Johnny Rico was the first guy ever, and he’s a big guy like me, and–

David Read:
Joh-… Wait, like Starship Troopers?

Ryan Nixon:
It’s his nickname.

David Read:
I was gonna say, you’re not gonna get that one over on me.

Ryan Nixon:
That’s what he went by online, but John, Johnny’s his first name. He did a lot of handler stuff for Jason, Joe and stuff, especially in Chicago. We became really good friends. We were the first people to do Atlantis costumes and approach Joe Flanigan in 2007. Joe had never seen costumers. He was blown away. We walked up in full grays, full tac gear, and he was like–

David Read:
“You guys are the real deal.”

Ryan Nixon:
He was blown away. Then I showed him my active-duty ID card and I said, “I do this for real.” He’s like, “That’s awesome.”

David Read:
“And you come and do it on the weekends.”

Ryan Nixon:
Joe was blown away. He was completely– As Season Three was starting to film, he gave us a tip. He whispered to me and Johnny, “We’re going all black.” That’s the only thing he told me. Immediately, I’m like, “What? What? What?” We had to wait for the first episode to come out, and then they didn’t even do it till the third one or something. The very next con that he was at, I showed up and he didn’t show up till Saturday night. He goes out drinking with Momoa. They get all smashed. Sunday morning they’ve got the meet and greet, and you could tell he was just hungover. They were rough. They were out all night. And he shows up at 8:00 AM to this Sunday brunch thing, and I’m in full black exactly.

David Read:
Thanks for the tip.

Ryan Nixon:
Yup. And he walks up to me, he looks at me, looks head to toe, just shook his head, walked off and never said a word. He knew. He was just like, “Guy’s got problems.”

David Read:
Tell me about some of your clients. You’ve had adults, you’ve had kids. Tell me some stories.

Ryan Nixon:
I think in one of my videos I said I’ve outfitted everything from a 10-year-old to I think I said 50 at one point, but now I’m 52, so probably into the 60s. It’s been a whirlwind. I’ve had some emotional clients. Things that I wasn’t expecting.

David Read:
Like what?

Ryan Nixon:
Christmas of 2012, it was December 7th literally, I got an email from this guy and he was a CPA out in Colorado, and David was his name. And he had this like nine-year-old son. And he writes me this email, he’s like, “I wanna get my kid a Stargate costume for Christmas.” I’m like, “Bro, it’s December 7th.” I’m like, “Really?” And I was like, “If we’re gonna do this, we need to do it now.”

David Read:
Right now.

Ryan Nixon:
“Today I’m ordering parts. What are we doing here?” And he had ordered some cheap China knockoff jacket…

David Read:
No, you’re gonna do this right.

Ryan Nixon:
…from eBay. I really couldn’t do much for the kid, even with the resources I had at the time, and especially that last minute. So, I said, “Send me the jacket.” They literally had the wrong Velcro on it; it was the opposite side. It was a mess. So, he sent me the jacket. I redid that, put good patches on it, fixed it, adjusted a few things, sent it back. Then I did the task of taking a Blackhawk medic vest and stripping it down to fit a 10-year-old kid. And I’d never done anything like that in my life.

David Read:
Is that Matthew?

Ryan Nixon:
Yes.

David Read:
I’ve got him on right now. He looks good.

Ryan Nixon:
It came out, and being all black it blended nice, and it was a little big on him still, but I knew this kid, he’s like 10, he’s gonna grow like a weed. And I didn’t want it to just last a year or two. So, I left it a little big so he could grow into it and then start expanding it. So, as he got older it’d still work. But I’d never went that deep, and I did it literally in a week and a half. I made it, shipped it. I think I shipped it around December 14th.

David Read:
So, he got it for Christmas?

Ryan Nixon:
He did. And then the dad wrote me this review for my site, and it literally almost brought me to tears because I knew this whole family now after talking with his dad, and that they sat down every Friday night and made popcorn and watched Stargate together.

David Read:
This was their thing. I can relate, believe me.

Ryan Nixon:
Whole thing. And then the things that you did with your family I know about. It really touched me. And then later I found out, I believe his wife got cancer, and she…

David Read:
Oh, God.

Ryan Nixon:
… went on to beat that, and the family went through so much and this continual thing. And then later I have this big picture of Amanda behind the green screen, it’s a big famous one where she’s shooting a P90. And there was a guy on eBay selling these really big prints, they’re 36 by whatever, and I bought two. And I was going to Maryland, and I knew I was gonna see her, so I stood in line for two and a half hours. But I wanted to surprise this kid so I had the second one signed for him.

David Read:
For Matthew?

Ryan Nixon:
Yeah. They were really bad phones even back then in 2012. I asked Amanda, I said, “Can I take a real quick video?” and she’s like, “Oh, yeah.” Half the time she wouldn’t even let me pay for my autographs. There’s numerous times she was like, “No.” I’m like, “No, I’m paying.” And I’d always pay.

David Read:
It’s a nice gesture.

Ryan Nixon:
I just go and–

David Read:
Even the suggestion.

Ryan Nixon:
Don’t need the hassle with the handlers and accounting. No. So, we took a real quick video and she’s like, “Hi, Matthew.” And then my buddy Shane, you’ll see in some of the pictures, snapped a picture of me leaning over the table while she’s signing it. I sent it all to David and then rolled it up and I said, “I got this print for you.” He’s like, “What do I owe you?” And I said, “You can pay me for the print.” Whatever, I wasn’t trying to make money. He goes, “No, let me send you some money for your time.” I said, “Well, I was getting one done too.” I said, “I was standing in line.” I wanted to surprise him.

David Read:
This is not totally altruistic.

Ryan Nixon:
But he told me that kid went in his bedroom and played that video about 700 times.

David Read:
Of course he did. Absolutely.

Ryan Nixon:
It was literally five seconds. He’s like, “Hi Matthew.”

David Read:
The kids getting into it is awesome. I’ve got Sam up here now.

Ryan Nixon:
He came to me, that was July of ’17, I believe. And he started emailing me. And I could tell he was younger by the way he was talking. Finally, I was like, “How old are you?” And I think he said he was 16 or something. I said, “Alright.” And he’s talking about buying a tack vest and a hundred stuff.

David Read:
He’s going all in.

Ryan Nixon:
Yeah. “I’m gonna need to talk to your mom.”

David Read:
Dude, you’re not even old enough to own a credit card.

Ryan Nixon:
I was like, “Do you have PayPal or are we trading baseball cards? What are we doing here?” I was like, “These things are hundreds of dollars.” And I didn’t even feel right about charging this kid full price.

David Read:
No.

Ryan Nixon:
I felt bad. I was like, “This kid’s 16.” I’m thinking back when I was 16, I couldn’t even hardly get a job. I got his mom on the phone. She goes, “Yeah, he’s been saving his allowance. He’s been working, he’s been saving money. He can do this.” And I said, “OK.” I said, “I’m just covering my bases.” And she gave him full permission. I cut him a heck of a deal. But he came back later, he got a full flight suit and everything. And I was like, “OK.” But to see these young kids, that was 2017 and he’s 16 years old. Do that math. The show was up when he was born.

David Read:
If I’m gonna spend– I know, that’s the thing, but if I’m gonna spend that much money on something, I’m gonna want to make sure that I’m done growing for the most part, at least vertically, maybe not sideways.

Ryan Nixon:
Right.

David Read:
Before I spend that much money, because I’m gonna have to buy it again. If it’s something that I want to continue with, otherwise it’s only gonna fit a version of me that’s only gonna last this long temporally.

Ryan Nixon:
That’s the great thing about, as we talk about vests and stuff later, is they are adjustable, but you said, how do you size people? If they’re guys like me and you, we’re not small dudes. And Johnny wasn’t a small dude either, so I actually had to extend his vest ’cause we get so big in the chest and the stomach area. It raises the vest this way on your shoulders. Then your belt doesn’t hit in the right spot. So, I got to the point with these bigger guys, I had to split the vest at the top, put in a spacer, and drop the vest back down so your belt’s hitting you in the correct position. I got a 52-inch chest. I’m not a small dude. I’m 230 pounds, and I got up to 268 at one time when I was injured and retiring from the military. Eating too much and depression, pile it all on there. When I got to the point where I couldn’t even zip up my modified vest, I was like, “OK, we got a problem here.”

David Read:
There’s something I need to do about this.

Ryan Nixon:
Yeah. That’s not gonna work.

David Read:
I get it.

Ryan Nixon:
I learned to look at people, and that was my job too, as a parachute rigger. I had pilots walk in their first day, and I’d hold their hand up and I’m like, “All right, you’re a size 10.” I look at their boots and I’m like, “What are you? Nine? And you’re 42 long.” And they’re like, “How do you do that?” “Well, sir, I’ve been doing it for 18 years.”

David Read:
You take away some things.

Ryan Nixon:
I can guess your underwear size at this point. But in person it’s way easier for me. When I’m talking to somebody on email, I’m like, “OK,” and I send them a little picture. I’m like, “You need to measure here and here and here and,” and then hope they don’t screw up the measurement. But once I get the shoulder to the waist and can judge, and I’ve done enough of them now that I can just glance at it and be like, “OK, I got it in my head where we need to be.” I’ve done hundreds of them, but now we’re to the point where you couldn’t get the vests anymore. Then Blackhawk changed it and they came out with the Elite, like you have on.

David Read:
So, they were no longer being manufactured.

Ryan Nixon:
They stopped making the regular vests. Then they went to this modified one, which was supposed to fit more people, which is great, but it doesn’t look right. It had extra clips.

David Read:
It looks different.

Ryan Nixon:
The pockets were different slightly. The snaps on the radio pockets, they were on the outside, and then they went on the inside and back to the outside, and the Velcro kept switching, and then when they went to the Elite, the back panel completely changed and it switched to this MOLLE setup and they don’t look right. They’re not screen accurate.

David Read:
So, what do you do? What do you do? If the manufacturer– I’m assuming Blackhawk was the supplier for the show?

Ryan Nixon:
They weren’t official. Any time, especially you get into Atlantis where Weir had her Gen3, Blackhawk was actually embossed onto the rifle pad, but the studio covered it up with a strip of webbing. They weren’t gonna deal with the rights or whatever.

David Read:
Yep, exactly. You’re in the Pegasus galaxy. Come on. The only things allowed are like North Face and Dell.

Ryan Nixon:
Exactly. I don’t know how all those little contracts work or whatever. I just make stuff. But they then came out with this, what they call the Elite, which we coined the Gen4, fourth generation of this vest. And they’re totally wrong, so I started doing what I call a conversion. So, I would buy another old Black Hawk vest, it didn’t matter what model ’cause you just needed the back panel, and I’d whack it and I’d cut it at the shoulders, pull off what I needed, throw away or throw it in my pile of parts.

David Read:
You were kit bashing?

Ryan Nixon:
Yeah. It’s about four and a half, five hours to modify, to put it all back together. And then depending on, do I need to make it smaller, do I need to make it bigger, then you’re getting into sizing. And then if it’s a girl that wants a Carter vest, hers was even more modified. I think they did it because of her pregnancies and everything. So, Amanda’s was cut in the back and trimmed and they used different-size grommets. I had to buy a whole other size grommet and redo that.

David Read:
What’s a grommet?

Ryan Nixon:
It’s the little black metal things that are on the sides. The new vests had straps, they didn’t even have grommets with cords anymore. So, that’s a whole another thing you gotta rip apart. And you gotta adjust the pockets–

David Read:
It’s a lot of work, man.

Ryan Nixon:
It’s about five hours so it’s not cheap. So, you’re either buying a super expensive rare vest and paying 350, 4 or $500. The real ones were going on auction for five to eight. And then if you could find a real one out there, they were just as expensive. Or I had to buy two vests, one at $117 and then another one somewhere between 30 and 100. And then that’s just parts, now you gotta tack on five hours of labor. So, now you’ve reached the same price level for–

David Read:
At the end of the day anyway.

Ryan Nixon:
This company is not my friend, by any means. I use all of their stuff because that’s what was used, but we’re not friends. When I call them, they–

David Read:
One of the things that you’ve been known for is screen accurate patches. Now, this is tricky. Do you have, by any chance, examples of these?

Ryan Nixon:
I didn’t send you anything.

David Read:
In person, do you by any chance have any nearby?

Ryan Nixon:
Yeah, I think most of them are right here.

David Read:
Is there any way you could bring them on?

Ryan Nixon:
Yeah.

David Read:
This is a last-minute thing that I asked. I’ve not given him any opportunity to plan for this. But I was like, “I’ve got a series of the patches downstairs that are authentic.” Ryan, can you hear me?

Ryan Nixon:
Yeah.

David Read:
I’m gonna go and get mine. So, there’s gonna be no one on screen for a second here. ‘Cause I’ve got production-used ones and then, sorry everybody. I’ve got production-used ones and I wanna be able to A, B, compare with the ones that you’ve made. Before you show it, which one are you gonna show first?

Ryan Nixon:
Actually, doing one of my newest ones, which was the Daedalus.

David Read:
So, Daedalus. These…

Ryan Nixon:
You got your frame.

David Read:
… are the ones that are screen used here. So, let’s see yours.

Ryan Nixon:
This is the screen-used one just like in your–

David Read:
So, you do have a screen-used one?

Ryan Nixon:
Yeah. There’s my–

David Read:
Pull it back just a little. How do you do that? Is there a computer program that you use to get the threading?

Ryan Nixon:
It’s a lot. I have a patch guy that puts up with me. Even just doing this you’ll see size changes. You’ll be like, “Oh, it’s not exact.” It’s pretty close. I do clean up the fonts. I often say my patches are better than the real ones because they are. They literally are. Production use–

David Read:
They may be higher quality.

Ryan Nixon:
They are.

David Read:
And also 20 years hence, too. They’re probably gonna be made superior.

Ryan Nixon:
It’s how far you clean them up. Where do you take that? When you get into Star Wars costuming and you’re replicating stuff from the ’70s that were wooden chest boxes and that type of stuff.

David Read:
Inferior quality even though it’s screen used.

Ryan Nixon:
And, you know, and a lot of, you get into– The Icarus one. The text down here was horrible because when you start printing– Even my shirt, that type of embroidery, it’s not clean like you would think it would be.

David Read:
Where is Icarus? There it is. Yeah, I see what you’re saying.

Ryan Nixon:
See the R in Force? On yours it’s slightly worse.

David Read:
Yeah, it’s not that– And this is the female size. The female sizes were smaller. You’re absolutely right. Do you have SG patches, Earth patches to show? Lemme see this here.

Ryan Nixon:
So, when you get into that gradient and stuff– I really cleaned up the text and I make it a little sharper and a little cleaner.

David Read:
So, the one that you just pushed forward, is that screen used or are those both yours?

Ryan Nixon:
No, this one’s screen. You can see the frays and they’re always a little more beat up.

David Read:
I see, OK.

Ryan Nixon:
And finding the exact blue, it’s tough. You can only get so close to it and then–

David Read:
There are thousands of shades.

Ryan Nixon:
Oh yeah. It’s tough on here especially see that gradient. I don’t know where all my Earth patches are, but the SG-1, that was a whole mess in itself because there was literally, I think, five…

David Read:
The elements of the chevron?

Ryan Nixon:
… well, there were five different versions too.

David Read:
It ran 10 years. I’m not surprised there weren’t 10.

Ryan Nixon:
There was the pilot patch. This is the replica. I never had a real one, but Justin helped me with this. He had one and we got this one. This one’s pretty much perfect.

David Read:
So, that’s from the Chulak mission?

Ryan Nixon:
The pilot too.

David Read:
That’s what I’m saying.

Ryan Nixon:
The original patches were black and then as you went into some– Even in “The Nox” episode, there’s one shot where they’re all standing there and one of ’em has the black number and the rest of ’em have the silver number. There were continuity errors. There was a lot going on. Both of these I believe were screen used as well. But you can see down here, towards Season Nine and 10, the lines got a little tighter. There’s videos on my YouTube channel about it where we break down different things. It’s trial and error and comparison, and I do all my own art. I don’t copy anybody’s stuff. I’ve always done my own stuff.

David Read:
I’ll put the YouTube link. Your website is right now underneath the description, but I’ll add the YouTube link after we’re done so people can go and see it. U.S.S. Hammond.

Ryan Nixon:
This was one I definitely put some time and work into. This is the screen-used one. You can tell ’cause they always had the cheesy production Velcro half the time.

David Read:
Yep. Tilt them for me.

Ryan Nixon:
To get that perfect–

David Read:
When you turn it, the lightning bolts and the stars pop. There’s a texture there.

Ryan Nixon:
There is, even in the real ones but a lot of times I would enhance that too. I would get a little more. But the red lines in these weren’t great, so I might go a little bit bolder just to get ’em to pop.

David Read:
I see.

Ryan Nixon:
And sometimes they’re a little crooked or not quite straight. And the text, you get those variations, so I try to clean it up and make it just a little bit nicer.

David Read:
Can I devil’s advocate for it?

Ryan Nixon:
Yeah.

David Read:
For a minute there?

Ryan Nixon:
Absolutely.

David Read:
Part of me would think it is not our job to make them nicer. It’s our job to make them the same. What do you say to that?

Ryan Nixon:
The way I look at it is there’s the way it looks in real life and then there’s the way it looks on screen. So, when you’re at a con, you’re in real life. It needs to look as good as it looks on screen. Now, the camera may add 10 pounds, but I’ll tell you, it cleans up a lot.

David Read:
This is true. It’s absolutely true.

Ryan Nixon:
The waist stuff, the colors, the way things look on screen, they’re completely different in real life.

David Read:
So you’re trying to balance the aesthetic of what you’re holding in your hand along with what was the end product on the camera after coloring, after everything. That is fairly inarguable.

Ryan Nixon:
You got post-production, you’ve got cleanup. They do a lot of movie magic. I’ve stood there. And I’ve told this story a couple times, but the first scene we shot in Green Lantern with Ryan Reynolds, and I know he bashes it every chance he gets, but I was put in charge of actually almost directing that scene. Martin Campbell turned to me and he’s like, “All right, how should we shoot this?” I’m looking at my boss like, “Why is the director talking to me? I’m nobody.” and I was like, “Isn’t that your job, sir?” And he’s laughing. He goes, “Well, that’s why you’re here.” The first literally thing I did on the movie was directing Ryan in the ejection sequence out of the F-35. And he’s hanging there in front of a blue screen and doing his thing and I literally experienced the movie magic moment in person. I’m sitting in the director’s chair next to Martin Campbell, we’re looking at the monitor. I’m looking over the top of it watching Ryan flail around in this harness I just spent three days fixing because they didn’t get it right, and he looks like a complete idiot. And then I look through the monitor and it looks totally legit. And I look up, I’m going, “What?” and I looked down. I did this three times, and it just clicked. I was like…

David Read:
Framing, lighting…

Ryan Nixon:
… That’s what they’re talking about.

David Read:
… background. It all comes together. And then the performer in front of it. So, I completely get it, man. That is really cool.

Ryan Nixon:
And the first take was horrible. And Ryan just wasn’t in it. And him and I had had a conversation about skydiving ’cause he almost died. He went skydiving once and he almost died. So, me being a parachute rigger, I kinda tucked that back in my brain one day for a moment of awkward silence. And I pulled it out one day and I said, “Didn’t you almost die?” And he goes, “Oh my gosh,” and I was like his best friend after that. So, we just really bonded in his trailer that one day, and then we were walking to set and I’m like, “Do you even know what you’re shooting today?” And he goes, “No, not really.” I was like, “All right.”

David Read:
“They’ll hand me the sides and we’ll do it.”

Ryan Nixon:
Yeah, pretty much. So, we got him all in the harness and he gets strapped in, and Martin gives him a little pep talk and everything and he’s like, “Action.” And Ryan’s like– It looks horrible. And I’m like, “Uh…” So, Martin yells, “Cut.” He goes and gives him another pep talk. As Martin walks away, I walked over to Ryan and I said, “Dude.” And I put my hand on his shoulder and I said, “Skydiving.” He goes, “Yeah, yeah, yeah. I got it.” And that’s all it took. The next take was perfect. Full panic mode, he was flailing around, looked like a total– way overacting. But when I looked in the monitor…

David Read:
It’s what he needed.

Ryan Nixon:
…that was what was in the movie.

David Read:
That’s cool, man.

Ryan Nixon:
Take number two. We did about six takes and after the second one, I just turned to him, I’m like, “You already got it.” And he goes, “You think?” I said, “Yep.”

David Read:
That’s cool.

Ryan Nixon:
And we got all done, they unhooked him. They unhooked him. They unhooked him…

David Read:
They unhooked him.

Ryan Nixon:
…and I walked over there to get his helmet from him or something, and he literally put his hand on my shoulder and he goes, “Thanks, I needed that.”

David Read:
There you go.

Ryan Nixon:
And I said, take two, I said, “That’s in the movie.”

David Read:
That’s it. That’s cool.

Ryan Nixon:
They rang the bell and everybody tore everything apart and I was just– My boss walks over and he puts his hand on my back and he goes, “You just directed your first Hollywood sequel.” And I said, dude, I was shaking. I was like, “Oh my god. What is going on?” I’m just making stuff and now I’m sitting next to the director. It was surreal. It absolutely was.

David Read:
Your attention to detail isn’t just with costuming, it’s also with some of the electronics. The Lantean scanners are a story. They’re HP PalmPilots underneath, aren’t they?

Ryan Nixon:
Yeah.

David Read:
Is that right?

Ryan Nixon:
HP iPAQ 5550.

David Read:
That’s what’s in here.

Ryan Nixon:
Yep.

David Read:
And then you went–

Ryan Nixon:
You have the dummy one though…

David Read:
I do.

Ryan Nixon:
…that’s the push-button light up.

David Read:
Yes, this is push. It doesn’t light up anymore. I need to open this and switch it up. But little pieces have fallen off. But you make replicas.

Ryan Nixon:
Yep. It took us seven years to finish that.

David Read:
Why so long? Getting it right, or hardware?

Ryan Nixon:
Before I would sell them and they were good enough it took seven years.

David Read:
OK

Ryan Nixon:
Finally, found– I don’t know how he did, but a buddy of mine ended up with the master. He had literally the metal master. What you’re holding up, we had an aluminum CNC’d version of it. Then we were able to cast off of that and make new molds, and then we literally figured out how to do the silicone and fog it and put enough in to make it foggy and not clear, and under pressure get all the bubbles out. Remington, he’s an old…

David Read:
Remington Phillips. SG-1 props.

Ryan Nixon:
…he’s an old master to this.

David Read:
He is indeed. This is true.

Ryan Nixon:
I see your Kino up there on that top shelf.

David Read:
That is screen used.

Ryan Nixon:
Is it?

David Read:
It is.

Ryan Nixon:
He’s mastered those. They’re beautiful.

David Read:
He has.

Ryan Nixon:
Once we got our hands on the master, then I knew for sure we had it. ‘Cause I had all the electronic stuff pretty much worked out. Now it’s just come down to batteries because the batteries are getting so old.

David Read:
They’re getting old. They’re turning into Destiny.

Ryan Nixon:
I got my hands on a couple last year that were brand new in the package. I don’t know how. A customer of mine found a contact over in Germany or something, and he was in the UK and I dropped a bunch of money and bought some more. But they’ve literally taken me years to put them together.

David Read:
I would think at certain point you’ll be able to get something going where you can create newer batteries or have someone create newer batteries that you can fit in there and–

Ryan Nixon:
I did go to Consumer Electronics Show in Vegas last year and got a few contacts. Remington and I are actually working on trying to basically take a stock battery, pop it, and replace the inner cells themselves.

David Read:
Yeah. There will be workarounds, especially with 3D printing. You can fit, as long as you can get a smaller battery. There will be workarounds, for sure. Just have to figure it out.

Ryan Nixon:
Yeah.

David Read:
And not blow up your fingers.

Ryan Nixon:
They’re so temperamental too. If you don’t keep them charged, you gotta do a hard reset every time and fire it back up. They’re a pain in the butt. All the information’s on the chip, so it doesn’t matter, but it resets to 2003 or whatever every time, and–

David Read:
And the thing was, Evil Kenny and a lot of these guys, they needed it for two or three takes and then that was it. Whereas you’re looking at creating essentially a consumer product that people can show off at events and things like that. They weren’t necessarily designed to do that.

Ryan Nixon:
No, and we have all the original files too. I’ve got all of the Wraith popping up, and we’ve got 3D versions of the city and everything that came off laptops that were sold off later, and I put as much on the chip as I can.

David Read:
That’s awesome, dude. Really cool. Where can people get one?

Ryan Nixon:
I gotta try to get a few more. If they’re patient. That is a primo collect– You need to be tech prop savvy and have patience. They’re not a novice collector thing, and now I sell them with a Pelican case and everything. They’re–

David Read:
I’d love to show one off on the show if you could get one to me. I would–

Ryan Nixon:
They’re not cheap.

David Read:
All right. You ready for another Stargate? Do you want another Stargate? Do you think that they should not reboot it? What are your thoughts?

Ryan Nixon:
I’m still worried about Amazon. I really am. I don’t have anything against them, but–

David Read:
Then why would you be worried? Their quality has been hit and miss, let’s just say it.

Ryan Nixon:
It doesn’t matter who it is. It doesn’t matter if it’s MGM, it doesn’t matter if it’s Amazon, it doesn’t matter if it’s Netflix. I don’t care who it is. There’s such a disconnect between fandom and– That’s why Deadpool is so successful. Because Ryan understands the fandom.

David Read:
Yeah. He knows what people wanted, especially for that IP.

Ryan Nixon:
I’ve worked with this– spent six months with this guy. He knows what’s good and what’s not. And to be able to push past all the corporate greed and nonsense, that’s why I was so frustrated with some of the choices that were made with MGM over the years. And now, Netflix being much– Or I’m sorry, not Netflix, Amazon being much bigger, it’s just more… Way too many chiefs and not enough Indians, man.

David Read:
I think it’s just gonna come down to the IP. If you look at Fallout, I’ve watched part of it, I haven’t watched all of it yet. It’s very well done. And that’s an IP where they’re not saying, “OK, here’s a specific story, we’re gonna adapt this story.” It’s an IP where we’ve already got the tapestry, we’re gonna tell a new story in that tapestry. And I think if they could do that with Stargate, I think they may have a winner. But I’m with you. If it’s not gonna be of quality– of course it’s gonna look great, the money that they throw at it’ll look great. But the story has to be of substance too, and the characters do too. They can’t be skin deep.

Ryan Nixon:
My personal feeling is if Brad is not involved at some level, it’s not gonna work.

David Read:
Then don’t do it? OK.

Ryan Nixon:
That’s my own personal take on it. You’ve gotta have legacy characters and legacy knowledge. I could walk onto an Amazon show tomorrow and teach them in a matter of weeks, even how to transition everything. I’ve already made a PVC patch of SG-1. That’s what needs to be on the next jacket, is a rubber PVC patch. We’re done with embroidery. I have those type of ideas. You can come up with another vest. You can update whatever. But there’s gotta be enough fan service to connect those dots. I’ll plug Deadpool again. Amazing movie. Not for everybody, but to have that fan service, to have those moments to where you really break stuff down and you can tie in a Madonna song from 10 years ago from a previous reference…

David Read:
And it works.

Ryan Nixon:
… You’ve gotta be able to do that. The only people that can do that are people like Brad, Robert, that have the knowledge. I could walk in their costume place easy and tell them what to do. But again, there’s such a disconnect. Are they smart enough to go out and to find your subject-matter experts?

David Read:
But also, you wanna do your own thing too.

Ryan Nixon:
Absolutely.

David Read:
And I understand that. I understand the desire that if someone has selected you to do something, I’m not gonna be like, “OK, what they did, let’s continue that,” per se. I also wanna bring my own ideas to it. So, I get it. I absolutely get that.

Ryan Nixon:
There has to be a flow of continuity though. There has to be.

David Read:
That’s true. I agree with that 100%. All right, man. Ryan, I appreciate you coming on and sharing some of your stories. Is there anything you’re working on right now? Anything that we need to keep an eye out for? I’ve linked your website and the YouTube channel below.

Ryan Nixon:
There will be 1,000 people already asking about jackets, but I’m working on it, man. After I lost my jacket gal during COVID, I got one more obstacle I just can’t get over with a fabric issue, but if we can, I’m hoping to spool back up, and there’s probably 150 people on a waiting list right now.

David Read:
OK, so you’re not hurting for it.

Ryan Nixon:
Not that I’m not trying.

David Read:
It’s a supply thing. I get it.

Ryan Nixon:
It is. It’s tough, and there’s new rules and new things, and there’s red tape that you would not believe, and it’s frustrating.

David Read:
You keep fighting the good fight, my friend.

Ryan Nixon:
I’ll try.

David Read:
And I appreciate you coming on and sharing your story.

Ryan Nixon:
Hey, I appreciate the opportunity to talk.

David Read:
Absolutely. Let me wrap up the show here. I’ll be back with you in a second. Ryan Nixon, everyone, from Stitch’s Loft. His details are in the description below. Appreciate you all tuning in. If you enjoy Stargate and you wanna see more content like this on YouTube, click Like. It makes a difference with the channel and will help us continue to grow. Please also consider sharing this video with a Stargate friend. And if you wanna get notified about future episodes, click Subscribe. Giving the bell icon a click will notify you the moment a new video drops. And you’ll get my notifications of any last-minute guest changes. And clips from this episode will be released over the course of the next few weeks on the Dial the Gate YouTube channel. My appreciation to my moderating team. Antony came in today to pinch hit on this episode. So, I really appreciate you, sir. Tracy, Summer, Jeremy, Marcia, you guys make the channel possible. Thanks to my producer, Linda “GateGabber” Furey, Frederick Marcoux over at ConceptsWeb who keeps DialtheGate.com up and running. There’ll be a few more episodes before I wrap up Season Four this fall. Thinking about going into November, we’ll see. Not far beyond the first half, there’s definitely some shows that I want to bring to you guys. But I’ve had some out-of-town work in addition to being on a little bit of a vacation. So, it’s all flowing in the right direction. Let me see here. Just a second. Ryan, Antony wanted to know, what other shows have you done content for, not just Stargate?

Ryan Nixon:
[muted] Ran for two seasons.

David Read:
Revolution. OK.

Ryan Nixon:
That was when the power went out on the whole planet.

David Read:
Yes.

Ryan Nixon:
I was highly involved with the American flag that was on the Patriots that you’ll see in Season Two. And that was a big– But yeah, I did Green Lantern.

David Read:
I think they’re referring to fan costumes. What have you supported in that regard?

Ryan Nixon:
That’s a big list.

David Read:
There’s a lot. So, Star Wars.

Ryan Nixon:
I did the Lost…

David Read:
I’ve seen pictures of Star Wars.

Ryan Nixon:
…Walking Dead hat. I do some X-wing harnesses. I do the Captain Marvel flight suits. I’ve done some one-offs too. People have approached me. I’m like, “Yeah, I’ll give it a shot.”

David Read:
OK, that’s cool, dude. I appreciate you sharing, and I appreciate everyone tuning in for this episode. We’re gonna be bringing up Wormhole X-Tremists later on, actually in less than an hour. So, we’re gonna get over to that. My name is David Read for Dial the Gate, and I’ll see you on the other side.