Star Trek TNG Cosplay

This week my work is having different themed costume days so of course I can't turn down the opportunity to cosplay, EVER.  Well one of the days is 80's themed, but of course with my geek back ground and my ability to think outside the box... I'm going as a star fleet officer.  I wanted to do a Next Generation uniform since that came out in the eighties and it is my all time favorite Trek series.  But the Next Gen uniforms are a little more complex than TOS (the original series, for those of you who don't speak in acronyms).

  VS. 

While the original may be much more simple and easy to throw together I still really wanted to go in Next Gen uniform.  Well I believe I found the solution how to make the uniform cheap and it will only take a little bit longer to make than the other.  It would probably only take one night.  I intend to find out just how long it takes.  I've already gathered my supplies in one trip to the store and am going to put it all together as soon as I get home.  I'm hoping to do it in a video tutorial which I will also be posting to YouTube some time within the next week.

Also while I was searching the internet getting good details of the uniforms for my costume I stumbled across this:

I found it on Etsy for $20 and had to buy it.  I'm going to make this later when I have more time but for now I'll work on the quick, easy, and cheap one.