Severed/Mangled Hand Prop

Day 5 of shooting got postponed due to rain. It was pretty annoying since it wasn't raining where I was and I made an attempt to salvage the day and it went back and forth a few times until finally I just gave up.

So one of the actors needed to have a copy of her hand made for a severed/mangled hand prop (we actually needed it and a 2nd prop today but I chose to shoot them sort of 2nd Unit, but now I might not have to) and since she'd planned on filming today, she just came by to get this done.

I kinda screwed up with the alginate, I was too rushed and it came out pretty bubbly - but for the very limited screen time this prop has, it came out better than expected.

Julia with her hand in alginate.

I cast the silicone right in the alginate mould since I really only planned on this being a one off - but I'm actually running a 2nd one right now. I let the silicone form a skin on the edges where I knew it wouldn't be solid so I could slop in some thickened silicone (Eco-Flex 30 from Smooth-On) to simulate meaty bits inside the hand. I chose not to go with bone sticking out, just because I don't really care how ultra-realistic it looks, anatomically or otherwise.

Here it is fresh from the mould, still a little shiny and in need of painting.

It wasn't perfect, not by any means, but for our purposes in the web series, it's freakin' awesome. I'm planning on testing some silicone adhesive to glue fake nails to the hand as well.

And if you're seeing this blog for the first time and wondering just what in hell is going on, we're doing a web series - and we're raising money. Follow the Indiegogo link on the right, and feel free to spread the word or even donate something.