Win a Spiked Zombie Head Mace!

I've been mentioning that as part of the Moonshine of the Damned Fundraiser that everyone who helps out gets a chance to win some zombie stuff. Well, I've finally settled on at least one of three possible prizes I'm planning on offering up.

The Spiked Zombie Head Mace is the first prop up for grabs. A limited edition version will be going online for sale later this summer for $150 (this could change slightly), so if you're like it, you got a chance to win this for only $10. Seems like a pretty reasonable trade.

The final prop will be made of polyfoam with a latex skin, it's pretty tough and durable under reasonable use - I wouldn't recommend repeatedly bashing a cactus covered with sandpaper and broken glass though. It'll have a carbon fiber rod in its core to give it some stability. The colouring will differ as well - but that can actually be your choice, as well as the number and even placement of the spikes jammed into the head.

How do you win it exactly? Well, if you hadn't noticed, I'm running a fund raising for a web series I'm doing. Head to www.themonkeyrodeo.com/BZK3 and it'll outline the various ways you can help out and later in the spring I'll be doing a draw to see who wins what stuff.

Some of the other possible prizes will be a bag of Severed Zombie Heads and a foam sledge hammer and hatchet combo or even a collection of body parts. I'll be making a final decision as the props are made and decide what would be most interesting.

If you're interested, you can also email me at brains@themonkeyrodeo.com for more information as well.

Brains, brains and more brains...

We're approaching the 1/4 mark sold of the Brain Keychains, not too bad - but I'm pretty sure we can do better. It'd be nice to have them all sold by April, if not sooner. So here's hoping - with a little help - we can get the word out there.

They're $10 each ($10.50 if you're using Paypal) + shipping 15 in Canada and $25 in the US. If you want one but you're not too keen on the shipping costs, than find a few friends who might want one and split the costs, it's as simple as that. And, if you're on PEI, you can arrange a pickup or delivery, so it's even cheaper that way.

All the funds are going towards the FX budget for the (hopefully) upcoming web series, Bimbo Zombie Killers! Moonshine of the Damned. The FX in this will easily be the most impressive of anything done on PEI - although, that's not really saying too much since I'm the only person doing FX like this locally at the moment.

For every person who places an order, their name will go into a draw to win one of the larger props be specifically made for this series, and there's going to be some awesome one. Could be worth well over $100 retail. And, you'll also get a thanks in the final credits of the series - so snag one of these bad boys before they're all gone, only 200 are ever going to be made and the moulds will be destroyed once I make all 200.

If you've any questions or want to order one, send an email to brains@themonkeyrodeo.com.

Re: Your Brains

So the title was a bit of a lure, but yes, this is about Brains, just not Jonathan Coulton.

In case you missed it, I'm selling only 200 of these custom made, partially eaten Brain Keychains. They're made of resin with a hard gloss coating, hardware included as you can see here. They're probably just slightly larger than the average male thumb, if you needed to know that.

Why am I selling them? I'm trying to raise money for the Bimbo Zombie Killers! Moonshine of the Damned web series I'm hoping to shoot this summer. The funds are going towards the special effects needed for the series.

The details: for only $10 you get one of these bad boys and a thanks in the final credits of the series. Plus once it's all over and done with, I'll be picking a name from those who purchased one, and they'll be winning one of the larger props being made for the series. No idea what it'll be yet, but there's a lot of awesome stuff designed and it'll probably retail for well over $100 or could even be a one of a kind. Who knows. But it will be unique.

To date, 30 have been sold. 170 remaining.

Payment details: Canadians can use Email Interact, everyone else Paypal (Paypal users need to add $0.50 for each brain). Shipping in Canada is $15 on average and $25 to the US. Residents of PEI can just arrange a pickup or delivery.

Questions or Order can be sent to brains@themonkeyrodeo.com

Just let me know the amount of brains you want. If you need shipping or not, and if you do need it shipped, let me know your address. Pickup and shipments will be made every Tuesday. That's pretty much it.

Bulk orders are definitely welcome and encouraged for anyone looking to cut their shipping costs. And please feel free to share this, any help is good help.

"Thing in a Jar", the Complete Collection

With the completion of the 5th and final "thing", an Albino Bilifore Parasite, I'm offering up the "Thing in a Jar" props as a whole collection.

Here's the ugly little sucker before being sealed up in his jar. It's made from 2 layers of silicone, with small beads of Premo embedded between them for eyes. A layer of laxet that's been torn and distressed  finishes it off. The silicone is untinted for a semi-translucent look, the image below was taking during sunrise and gives it a sort of delicate deep fried look, it doesn't normally look like that.

Here he is all snug in his jar of simulated Giant Mountain Troll bile to keep him fresh.

Using silicone to make this and adding on 6 thin tendrils really gives it a creepy realistic look. A lot of other "things" like this I've seen online are usually hard, made of sculpy or latex, tend to be stiff, this method gives a very realistic movement when the jar is moved - wasn't sure if it'd work, but I'm pretty happy with the results. Here's a very quick video showing that off.

And finally, here they all are together. The smaller jars are $20 each, the two larger jars are $25. Normally in total they'd be $110, but I'm offering the whole collection up for only $95. One of the reasons, is because sometimes accidents happen in shipping no matter how well they're packed and the most used method with Canadapost offers $100 coverage - so there's some security in shipping at least. And I would, of course, recommend the faster methods - less handling means less likelihood of damage.

I might at some point create a "Collector's Edition" of this, probably only one or two will be available, but each will come in an antiqued wooden case in which they can be displayed. No idea when this will happen though.

BZK! Moonshine of the Damned $10 Funding Campaign

I'll admit, I do get tired myself sometimes at seeing the endless stream of crowd funding campaigns for amateur web series and literally dozens of other things that may or may not be legitimate. And it's hard to run one, the hardest part are the rewards for donations. I ran one, it did okay, not great. After the site and Paypal took their bits, we hadn't raised as much as I'd hoped.

So I'm doing another one, much simpler - each donation is only $10 and you get, as quickly as I can make them, one of these:

Plus a "thanks" in the final credits and once it's all said and done, every person who donated will go into a draw for one of the larger props from the series, probably worth well over $100.

So, for $10 you'll get one (of only 200 being made) custom made, hand painted partially munched on brain key chains - as well as a "thanks" in the final credit of the web series. Payments (in Canada) can be made by Email Interact ($10+shipping), local orders (on PEI) can be made in cash and pickup or delivery can be arranged.

If you don't live on PEI and are concerned about the shipping costs, than feel free to share this with a few friends, not only will you be helping out the campaign but you'll be saving money on shipping costs if you split it.

Also, they're made from a hard resin and finished with a gloss coating.

Note: While this is open to anyone, anywhere that sees this, the main idea is for local sales in order to cut down on extra expenses. So, in other words, PayPal orders add an additional $0.50 to cover their fees and shipping is additional as well - for this reason, bulk orders by mail are preferred.

To order your partially eaten Brain Key Chain, (or if you have any questions) you can email in your order here: brains@themonkeyrodeo.com.

Demon photo shoots for 2013 and possibly beyond

With a few changes to how I do things in regards to prosthetic makeup, I'm moving into doing some much larger pieces. I'm constructing a much larger foam latex oven this year (hopefully soon) and the photo shoots will involve much more elaborate makeup this time around. Like full head pieces, arm and hand pieces, and other pieces to really demonize people a little bit more.

The previous book contained stuff that was really intended for resale, most of the stuff in the new round of shoots won't be because it's being custom made for each model - although there will be a few of the simpler shoots thrown in there.

I've picked out a small group of both men and women who I will be doing lifecasts of (mostly just their heads, but all depends on what the shoot needs). Because the makeup will be more drastic in obscuring their natural features I don't mind reusing the same people for the more elaborate shoots - plus it'd just be too expensive to do head casts for every single person - plus I don't have the space to store all that stuff.

So what do I have planned? All sorts of stuff, this time around I want to do some more iconic type characters (iconic in my estimation at least). One I have planned is a demon version of Kratos from the God of War videogames - that should be pretty awesome, Kratos is already kind of demonic. I'll be using John MacDonald for that one - if you familiar with my previous shoots and don't know who John is, he'll actually make the original Kratos look scrawny in comparison.

Lara Croft and even Nathan Drake are being planned as well - in separate shoots. Both are pretty easy and I chose them because if you're into videogames they're both fairly recognizable because they keep a consistent costume style and look. I'm sticking with the more realistic human characters, so no, I will not be doing a demon PacMan or Mario, it just seems a little too retarded for me.

I'm thinking a demon Indiana Jones would be cool. I have a friend who's a huge Indy fan so I'm looking to get him to do it, just need to find a really good location for that shoot.

I was toying with fairy tale characters as well, the first I came up with was Little Red Riding Hood as a werewolf - that one seems pretty obvious and logical, if I think of others that work a well as that I might do a few more of these. Could be cool, but offhand I can't think of too many iconic type fairy tale characters who would be recognizable as a demon or without a explanation. I'd like the images to speak for themselves and have, at least, a good portion of the viewers able to recognize the character.

These are all going to require some crafting of props and costumes, I was thinking I'd just buy a couple of the cheap foam Sword of Chaos props for the Kratos shoot, but last night I was thinking they might look a little small in John's hands - until I see them in context I'm toying with making my own.

One of the more intricate, and possibly annoying, shoots will be the Steampunk Demons, it'll feature (all fictional characters) Dr. Mordgog and his two assistants as they travel through time. That'll be a 3 person shoot and could be awesome if I really take the time with the props and costumes. The thing with Steampunk is, if it isn't don't right it looks stupid. You can't just throw on a victorian-esque suit and some goggle and declare you're into Steampunk, you need some crazy assed looking shit to go with it. This is going to be a big one and really hard to do right, luckily I've been planning it for awhile.

Otherwise I'd like to do a demon Samurai (could be awesome or terrible depending on the costuming ideas), might go with a more "Samurai Jack" approach to this one, don't know for sure just yet.

I think a Geisha Demon (continuing with that theme) could be pretty awesome, need a good setting though for this shoot. We don't really have the best gardens that I feel I'd need to pull this one off well.

A Victorian Age Demon, a female one with the huge crazy dress, I think that could look pretty cool.

And one I've been debating about for some time and really need to work on the design is Hellgirl. I made a remake about another shoot I had done where I painted up the model in all red, that she kinda reminded me of Hellboy's little sister - if he had one. Then I thought, why not? I've seen a lot of female cosplayers doing their version of a female Hellboy, but I don't want to do that, it's too easy.

I want to do a fully realized character that would fit into that world, more del Toro's than Mignola's maybe, that could very well be the sister of the Right Hand of Doom. In this case she would be known as the Left Hand of Destruction (tentative name). She wouldn't be an identical twist on Hellboy, other than having horns (of a different configuration) and being red - I kinda think you need those things in order for it to resemble the original. That could be cool.

I'm sure there will be more, I have a few others I'm playing around with to see if I can form them into a decent concept. I'm not putting the same timeline for completion on this project as I was the first, this one is going to take a lot long, maybe 2, possibly 3 years even. Who knows at this point.

Fetal Cthulhu

New for sale, "Thing in a Jar" #4. This particular "thing" was found in the West Antarctic Rift and is described as an "Ancient Species, of Unknown Origins" - technically, while not labelled as such, it is a fetal Cthulhu.

The jar is about 3" tall. The "thing" is made from several layers of a silicone called EcoFlex 20 and sealed in a liquid filled, water-tight jar, they take about 2-3 days to make each one, so the price is a little higher than the usual "things" which aren't as labour intenstive. They're $25 each.

Since the silicone is so soft, this "thing" has an extra layer of grotesqueness to it as it'll wobble and shake much like I would expect a real fetal Cthulhu to do.

Contact me at foxhenderson@themonkeyrodeo.com if you're interested in purchasing one. As I said the turnaround is about 2-3 days depending on how busy I am, but I'll let you know an approximate completion date. I'm hoping to have time through the rest of January to make several so there won't be any waiting time on orders.

I also just noticed, this is my 500th post too. Groovy.

Ancient Species of Unknown Origins.

Because I had some extra supplies around that have a limited shelf-life, I decided to see what new props I could make using them. And what I came up with was a couple new "Thing in a Jar" props.

First one I came up with was this, an ancient species of unknown origins found deep withing the West Antarctic Rift. Essentially, a fetal Cthulhu.

It's made of EcoFlex 20, 2 layers. 1st layer was left untinted so it's slightly transparent - in the future I'll be adding thin strands of red yarn to the inner side of the 1st layer to simulate some veins, should work well I think. Then I added a couple blobs of thickened, black tinted silicone for the eyes - in the future I'll be prefabricated black blobs, probably from Sculpy, to stick in there so they look better. And finally the 2nd layer was slightly tinted with a flesh tone. And once it was all cured I just did a thin layer of latex over it and roughed it up a bit.

For the final piece it'll be housed in a sealed, liquid filled jar, just like the other "Thing in a Jar" props, but in a different looking and sized jar just to have a bit of variety to that line of props.

It's actually a little disturbing feeling to hold. Since the silicone has some weight and it's so soft, it's holds it's shape really well but wobbles around much like what I assume, if it was real, it would actually feel like to hold.

Really happy with how the first test turned out, hoping to source some proper jars locally really soon and get this bad boy online for sale. It'll be more expensive than the other things because there's a more time intensive process to make them.

Top Search Engine Terms of the Year for 2012

I did one of these halfway through the year this time around and it doesn't feel like it was 6 months ago, but here we are at another year end and it's time to round up the thinks that freaks out there search for that land them on my blog.

Top Ten Search Engine Terms.

1. severed finger (along with a dozen or more variations)
2. s (I’m not really sure about this one)
3. fake axe (several variations on this as well)
4. fox henderson (seems logical)
5. monkey prosthetics (which is kind of funny since I would never make such a thing, but both words are relevant)
6. julie laforest (congratulation Julie, you are obviously the target of many a creepy internet stalkers) 7. vampire nose (nothing special there)
8. zombie photo shoot (seems reasonable)
9. monkey rodeo project (a name which hopefully no longer exists to cause confusion)
10.zombie prosthetic (perfectly reasonable as well)

So, those all seem like pretty straightforward search terms that would land someone on this blog. Now for the weird ones. A lot were misspelled or seemed to have odd grammar and whatnot, so what you’re seeing is how I actually saw them in the list.

retro bimbo – I get where this one would lead someone to me and I sort of get what they might be looking for, but it does seem a little bit of an odd phrase.

richard allen poppe – just by placing this here I will incur more hits. He’s the fellow who I had long ago purchased some Lovecraft inspired props from. While I had two more or less decent transactions with him, a lot of people seem to really rag on him on having ripped them off. I can’t say I’m surprised since it did take the better part of a year to get three book props out of him after repeated excuses – maybe they were legit, I don’t know. It’s too bad whatever the reason he’s vanished from the net, he made good stuff

cool forehead prosthetics – ah, that explains why I’m not selling enough, I label mine as “lame forehead prosthetics”. Really, this is kind of stupid

severed finger props – I can only assume the word “props” was added because they were seeing way too many real severed finger

real bone hammer - ? I actually had to look this one up myself to see if it was a real thing or someone out there was just a little creepy. It is a real thing, but also a video game thing

hookers for sale – as opposed to just for rent. I guess someone was hoping to find a Pimp “going out of business” sale

cad finger – I’m guessing a 3D thing or the finger of a roguish fellow

prostetic good - Because for a minute – not sure if there’s more to this or this wasn’t intended to be a search. Also, you spelled prosthetic wrong

things that are 10lbs – sure, why the hell not

troll foot – makes me thing I really need to remake my baby trolls feet for resale.

demons with horns face – nice grammar

male finger – uh, okay

pictures of severed fingers – Okay, there were definitely looking for real ones and that’s kinda messed up

brittleness object – the hell?

sweet hell – ah yes, sweet, sweet hell. ?

monkey head for sale – someone was watching Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom again, weren’t they?

5 piece ear spike project – that seems very specific and I’ve no idea what it is

horrible monster images – hey, I resent that, I make nice monster images, they’re not horrible. Can't tell if they were looking for images of horrible monsters or shitty images of monsters.

real severed silicone finger props –someone is very confused here, I only sell fake props – they don’t actually exist, if you want real props, go somewhere else. ?

how to make a troll in clay – I appreciate the fact people might be looking for “how to”s online, but do they really thing they’d find something this specific? I mean would they have accepted it if it was just a goblin made of clay?

thumbor – I got nothing

well done prosthetic horns – again, mine are all labeled as shitty and will most likely cause gingivitis. I really need to label my stuff better

a severed finger painting – amidst the literally dozens of variations on severed digits, this one actually seems original for a change. They don’t want to see a real or prop severed finger, and not a picture – but a painting of one. Very nice choice. I believe it was Monet who went through a severed finger period.

finger monkey for sale – really? I don’t want to know

hooker hell – I can only assume it would be filled with either gay men or men with only 2 cents in their pockets

men eater monkey movie – this is just an example of random words or bad grammar

double malefinger – I don’t know about this one and I don’t think I want to

best werewolf prosthetic – again, I knew I should’ve went with this instead of “worst werewolf prosthetic”

male to female silicone – this just creeps me out for some reason

It’s a gortch” - Nope, no idea either

hooker man – that just sounds funny. Man-whore is the preferred nomenclature however

movies about hookers – yup, plenty of classy stuff came out of this search to be sure

foamy axe – it probably won’t work well

Why do I have demon ears – I think I posted this one before, it’s awesome.

witch doctor monkeys – hell yeah, that sounds awesome.

brilliant uzukler - ?

As usual, nearly every female I’ve worked with was searched for at least once and sometimes with “PEI” or “Charlottetown” following it – so yeah, some of you have stalkers perhaps. Or you’re searching for yourselves.

Severed fingers and fake axes had, I’d say, a couple dozen variations each. It’s pretty impressive actually.

As well, several variations of prosthetics, types of prosthetics – ears, horns, noses and whatnot. They all seem pretty reasonable.

Overall it wasn’t too disturbing a year at least.

Testing Latex Paints and Missing Fingers

Sometimes there's just so much I want to try to do that my brain can't process it all properly and I end up just doing nothing because I can't sort through everything. Sometimes. Lately my random thoughts have been trying to focus on the various things I want to do for the Bimbo Zombie Killers! web series next summer. I didn't ditch the project, just had to postpone it until certain things were worked out.

One thing I've been planning in regards to the new version of the web series is using more elaborate effects for the zombies - because sometimes zombies are missing parts.

I did a very quick and dirty sort of bluescreen test today, whatever colour I end up using all depends on the location we're shooting. This test was by no means intended as a perfect result of what things will look like in the movie, just to see how simply it can be done. I spent maybe 10 minutes on it, and most of that was painting my finger blue, filming and transferring the footage to the computer.


In the final version I'll be making a prosthetic that would cover that seam between my finger and the blue, to then make it look more rotted or bitten off. Should work just fine and be easy enough. I'm not looking at using it too much, just enough to get some good shots to fill things out.

There will definitely be more tests to come as we get closer to next summer.

And the other things I've been putting off for ages has been making a serious airbrushing attempt on some latex props/costume pieces. I did the Pax Paint thing a couple weeks ago but I have my doubts it'll hold up in the long run and be reliable enough to sell stuff that way so I tried some latex paint base, something I bought long ago and never got around to testing. It was rough and crude but I think with a little work it will be absolutely perfect.

I don't want to post an image of the piece I painted since I'm using the same design for a prosthetic for a photo shoot next week, but I'm going to attempt to paint up a latex mask version of the Dust Troll prosthetic tomorrow hopefully.

For anyone wondering, how the hell you paint latex masks, there's only a couple methods and most a unreliable and one is incredibly toxic (rubber cement method), I'd really recommend going with the latex paint base method. You can get it from Monster Makers and use regular acrylic to tint it and (while I've yet to use it, I will be soon and several sources recommend it) thinning it out with ammonia should you need to. You can stipple it on, brush it and airbrush it. Not sure of the ration, but that's something I think most folks can work out on their own and suss out whatever works best for them.

And I think, maybe this weekend, I'll be doing another shoot that will be themed rather well for this time of year.

Demons 2012 Calendar now for sale

So, I made a calendar.Turned out decent and now it's up for sale. $20 plus $5 flat rate shipping.

Not much more to say about it than that. It features 12 demons, makeup and photos all done my myself with some local models (not actual "models" per se, just some awesome folks who like getting all done up). If you're local (on PEI), no shipping we'll arrange a pickup and you can contact me at foxhenderson@themonkeyrodeo.com if you're interested in purchasing one. Payments can be made through PayPal or Email Interact (preferred in Canada).

A few outtake photos from the calendar.These are the actual images that appear in the calendar, just a couple extras that turned out really well.

"Things in Jars" again.

I thought I'd do up some images of the actual "Things" as they're not totally clear from the jar pictures, which is kind of the point, but from a selling point of view I think some folks might like to see what the "Things" look like.

Freeze Dried Two-Head Faerie

Haitian Bloodworm

Yeti Fetus

I've only made 8 of each for now, we'll see how well they sell and than they'll only be made in a limited quantity. They sell for $15 each, the jars a re pretty high quality 8oz. jars, all sealed shut and coated with wax. The liquid is just water with the smallest drop of acrylic paint to make it cloudy.

Things in Jars going online for sale tomorrow!

Had a decently productive day - I think because I planned on doing way more than humanly possible getting just a bit done that took most of the day made it seem really productive and busy overall.

My main goal was to get the "Thing in a Jar" props done for sale. It's been a long, long, long time coming and they're finally done. Took awhile to track down just the right jar - mainly because I  needed a reliable and consistent source if I end up selling a lot of them.

So here they are:

This here is a Freeze Dried Two-Headed Faerie, found in the Aran Islands in Ireland. This is the only dry one, the other two jars are liquid filled and I thought I needed something a little different.

The Faerie itself was cast in Flex FoamIt X, I wanted it to have a bit of a dry look. I tried regular FoamIt, but it's small so it was pretty fragile and some parts broke off trying to get it out of the mould.

The Haitian Bloodworm, from the stomach of a zombie. This one was pretty simple, just made from EcoFlex 30 *future ones will be done in 20, just because I have a lot on hand for the moment). To cloud the water I added the smallest drop of yellow acrylic paint. I wanted it to have more of a yellow cast, but literally one more drop made it look like orange juice and was totally clouded up. I'm happy with this though. Hopefully the cloudiness will remain and won't settle out, but shaking it up should recloud it.

And finally the Yeti Fetus from a cave in Northern Tibet. This one was cast in resin, SmoothCast 305. I originally was going with latex filled with FlexFoam it, but the thing was so buoyant it was stuck to the lid of the jar, so I opted for solid resin with a painted on latex skin peeled and ripped up to make it look a little more gnarly.

I'm not totally sure of the prices on these just yet. I'm thinking they'll be under $20 though, maybe $15, and I'm looking into finding wooden boxes for selling all three as a set. I might even make them and put it out there as a limited edition set. We'll see how all that goes.

Until I get them on the website, which is going to be overhauled just slightly tomorrow, you can email me, foxhenderson@themonkeyrodeo.com, if you're interested in purchasing them.

A whole bunch of random crap

I've been working on a few things at once, so this post is going to be a little everywhere all at once.

First, I've been trying to do a Demon Calendar, nothing too spectacular, just about 12 new images. I've got 4 done so far and I think about 3 more shoots lined up and I'll see where it goes after that. No idea where I'll be printing them or how I'll be selling them. All I know is, I'm trying to keep it on the non-expensive side.

Here's a few outtake images from the shoots so far:

I've been airbrushing only as well with the makeup this time out. Slightly faster, when the airbrush isn't clogging up - but way better end results, so it's worth it.

Second, I'm hoping to wrap up some new props by tomorrow. You've probably seen them or heard or read about me mentioning them before, the "Thing in a Jar" props. I've been meaning to get around to finding proper jars and finishing a 3rd one and I should have them online by tomorrow night if all goes well.

Third, I've been slowly whittling away at some ideas for the reshoot of the BZK! web series and one thing I really want to refocus my attention on are the FX. I've complained about this before and I really wasn't happy about how I was handling the zombie makeup. That's not to say I wasn't happy with what my two makeup artists, Maggy and Krista, were doing - they were doing exactly what I told them and they did a great job. I'm referring more to keeping things more organized and on track.

As the shoots went by, with each one, the makeup become more and more rushed. That should never have happened and was the biggest mistake (aside from letting just anyone volunteer) on the series. So for next time, we're really going to make an effort that the quality of the zombies is much better and not rushed.

One thing I'll be doing is trying some "out of mouth" dentures. At least that's how I've heard them referred to, they use them a lot on The Walking Dead and it's where you create a pair of dentures that latch onto your teeth, but they overlap your lips, so when a prosthetic is applied over them it can have the lips peeled back way more than humanly possible with series pain or surgery. If that makes sense.

The overall principle behind making them is pretty simple and I reckon I'll attempt a few test pairs over the winter. It should go a long way to really sell the zombie look and I might even be able to offer them up for sale with a bit of work.

Another thing I'm debating about, and again this was inspired by The Walking Dead - is their use of animatronic or puppet zombie heads in the foreground. There were a few shots in season 2 where I noticed in the extreme foreground, so you only saw it's face or down to it's shoulders, a very decayed looking zombie. You really only saw them for maybe a few seconds, enough to really get a sense of the thing,  pretty simple effect and if I have enough of a budget I'll be trying that trick as well hopefully.

Other than that, I'm finishing up my last prosthetic of the year. I'm running low on supplies so I don't want to make another huge expense for myself so I'm doing as much as I can with what I have left and I'm running low on master mould supplies. I've got my 3rd female oriented piece to finish up today and then perhaps a new pair of ears and that will be it for this year.

I've got a few older designs I want to redo, but they'll have to wait for now.

And lastly, while I haven't even started it yet, I do plan on building my foam latex oven this winter. Could be awesome, could be a disaster - I won't know until I get around to it I guess.

Post Halloween Syndrome

For me Halloween is pretty much year round, so it's not so much all that special in the sense of I can finally see people in costume and all done up looking freaky - I see that all the time. And it's not so much a relaxing time of year as I'm busy getting everyone else ready and usually don't really feel like doing that much myself. Although, without Halloween I wouldn't be making as much money, so for that reason, it is indeed awesome. And it's finally over.

This year was a little quieter than last, for a number of reasons. Although I did a higher amount of retail business, which I was rather happy about. Still having trouble really breaking into the wholesale market. I have a couple clients, but I'd really like 2-3 more. I think it would push things over the edge into making the business much more viable in the long run. So I'm starting early to get that process moving forward rather than waiting until next spring.

One of the things I'm doing this year, and I've mentioned this before, is introducing a couple new prosthetic lines. The main one being female oriented prosthetics, since around 95% of my retail business was from women and I've been told by a wholesale client that it's definitely an unfilled niche in the market - I'm thinking it might not be so niche.

I've got my main positive mould done and I'm about to start testing them to see if they'll fit women better than my current pieces - which I'm well aware won't fit them well. These ones are a little shorter in length from forehead to chin, so I'm hoping it'll work. I'm about to line up the first of a few shoots with some new designs over the next few weeks.

Here's the first sculpt, it's already been moulded and I'm doing a silicone master right now. No name for it yet, I'll decide on one once I see it applied as a character I think. Overall I'm happy with the design, I'm trying to make these ones less monstrous and simply more "obviously not human" looking. This particular one will have some chin spikes as usual, I seem to like doing that.

We'll see soon enough if it all works out. And I hope to be trying out the SkullCap Prosthetics soon as well.

I did a few makeup jobs last year and I think one or two even the year before that, but this year was a bit of a bust. I had a lot lined up and pretty much all, but one, flaked out on me and just never showed up. One cancelled, I'm fine with that, but just not showing up I found a little rude. Their loss.

Anyway, the one I did end up doing turned out awesome. I even kinda impressed myself with it. My first time relying totally on my airbrush for all the makeup. Not one bit of grease or creme makeup was used.  You can't really see the details in the picture, but overall it was blended pretty well and looked decently freaky. I used the Borom Demon piece and just did a fleshy colouring with it, some spots and reddish colouring as well, it wasn't too crazy. We went for a more, I guess you could call it realistic look. And he bought a Shrunken Demon Head to fill out the look.

It's been years since I've seen the movie, but this piece unintentionally reminds me of Rawhead Rex.

I'm not cranking out piles of prosthetics a day for the moment, so I can take a bit of a rest and start working on redesigning some older pieces that were never master moulded and creating some new ones. And even working on a few more Demonic Antiquities pieces, first on that list is a Mummy Hand. We'll see how that goes.

Another new line of prosthetics

There's a while backlog of stuff I've been meaning to do this year for Halloween, but life and the whole web series thing really got in the way. Now I have more free time to actually work and I've started working on a couple new things, 2 new lines of prosthetics.

I know I mentioned one of these before, either here or just on Facebook, I don't even remember anymore where I mention things. I really should keep track of that.

Back when I was just buying prosthetics online one thing I encountered that continually annoyed me was the size of some of the pieces. Most of them were way too high on the forehead for the average person to wear without needing a bald cap - however next to none of them ever mentioned that fact so I would end up with a piece I couldn't use on just anybody with having to apply a pain in the ass bald cap as well. And some were just too large for female models or actors so I had to trim them down and try to blend in these massive edges as best I could.

I decided when I started making mine to never do that, to try to stay within a defined area so that nothing but the piece and makeup would be needed. And that they'd be wearable by most everyone - that's pretty difficult since women have small or shorter face, might not seem like it but it's pretty obvious when you try to put an average size prosthetic on them.

This all lead me to two ideas that I'm finally getting around to:

Skullcap Prosthetics
Now there might be a good reason why I've never seen these before, I guess I'm willing to find out the hard way. During the course of doing the first "Demons" book I worked with quite a few bald folks have encountered more since who are interested in this stuff so I began thinking - if there are already pieces out there that require a bald cap why not make pieces specifically for that? Both bald people and those that don't mind using bald caps.

The idea is to keep them fairly small and one two part moulds, I don't want to get into doing 3-4 part moulds. So they'll stick pretty close to the crown of the head or maybe the front or back. This would give a little more variety and dramatically alter the shape of the human head. I'm just hoping I can get them averaged size enough. Slightly on the small size would be stretchable at least to a few sizes larger, that's the best I can think of right now.

This is sort of a top-down angle on the very first attempt at one of these pieces. It's pretty simple, kind of Predator inspired. The holes are obviously for the many various resin spikes and horns I have. I'm hoping if this one is a success, I'll need to try it on a few different people to be sure, then I'll move on and finally get around to creating some big-assed horns. With a large piece to attach them to, it should work. Time will tell.

Hopefully they pan out, could be a decent corner of the market.

Female Only Prosthetics.
As I mentioned earlier on, there's a huge issue and a gap in the market for prosthetics that fit women well. The ones I've tried, full faces at least, tend to be way too long and end up looking sloppy. Or way too high on the forehead - same results.

I wouldn't have thought there was such a market, but I've had more women interesting in doing demon photo shoots than men on average and I've been told my one of my major wholesale clients there is indeed a huge hole in that market no one has yet to really show any concern about. And if this Halloween season has been any indication, he's right. Almost 95% of my retail orders were from women this year.

So I'm hoping to get these started this weekend and online in time for Halloween as soon as possible. At least one of each, all depends since I have to start from scratch and I need to test them to make sure they're doing to perform as intended.

I might even start doing female versions of some of the already existing full face pieces, who knows.

Silicone Zombie Mask

So here's the "Uber-Jesse Zombie" mask that was to have been used in the BZK! web series. I wouldn't say I'm terribly experienced in making silicone masks, in fact this is the 2nd one I've attempted. The other was years ago and was done wrong, as a result it was very expensive (too thick and used way too much silicone) so I never really went back to try again.

I had the idea of going thinner and to re-enforce the entire head, that than just the eyes, mouth, nose and ears - that way I'd be sure it was tough enough. This was confirmed by a couple awesomely helpful guys I met at the CHAC back in April, who really knew their stuff. I wished to hell I could remember their names offhand, but I suck at names.

When BZK! came around again and I was applying for an FX grant I decided to give it one more try and after putting it off several times I finally got it sculpted, I was really happy with the sculpt and finally took to making the mould. Here's where things when slightly pear-shaped. I was using a material called EpoxAcoat Red, which is actually not too bad to work with and pretty fast overall - however, it calls for two thin coats and then you apply a backing materials. The problem was in experience with the Red and it tend to draw up a little in random spot causing holes - which you can fill in on your 2nd coat.

The surface of the mould was great, and fairly easy to clean out. I used Monster Makers clay and about 95% of it just pulled right out. That last 5% was a bugger, but using a head gun and mineral spirits took no time at all.

The problem I mentioned before was the edges of the mould, where the two halves meet. Since it's a bit of a 90 degree angle, in some places the Red just refused to settle in properly and left some open spots. And upon applying the backing, it left other open spots just under the surface. As a result the edge, right were the two halves meet was broken and shipped and just poor in spots. My thought was to just do a 3rd and 4th coat along that seam to really thicken and re-enforce the mould where it needs it most. Next time.

And man, was this thing a bugger to demould. Removing the halves from the original sculpt took 3 hours and there was some damage done to the mould itself. While I hated using Shell Shock (the material I used on the original silicone mask attempt years ago), it was tough and sturdy. I might try it again, not sure yet.

I poured it last night, demoulded (about an hour) this morning and was kind of pleased with the results. There were some air pockets in places where the re-enforcing material didn't allow the silicone to flow around it properly, but overall it turned out well.

I was able to identify problem spots where I'll be re-enforcing for the next one and it should be good enough to sell maybe. I'll be using the original to do a paint test.

Here the bugger is though in all his undead, fleshy looking glory.

 If I do offer them up for sale, it will hopefully be very soon, in a very limited edition (10 maybe?) and at a very low cost. I'm thinking $250 each. These things normally retail around $500-$600 if you've ever seen silicone masks before.

That's it. I've got ideas for a 2nd one, not a zombie, I might attempt at some point in the future, but I don't think I'll get too heavily into doing silicone masks just yet. Maybe another year or two.

Day 5 over and done with.

Day 5 on Bimbo Zombie Killers! Undead in the Water is over with, without too much fuss. It was a bit of a pain to schedule since one actress couldn't make it, but in a way it all worked, because there was no way we'd have gotten it all done and we got done the worst of it. So next time, much easier.

Here's all our crap, you can't see most of it actually, but it's all there. I realized once we got the location I'd forgotten the sledgehammer prop, so thankfully, Julia ran back to Hazel Grove and got it. That was pretty damned awesome of her.

A friend of Tim Wartman's came along as our zombie for the day - it wasn't until I was soaking him in blood that I realized what his shirt said. And even he didn't get the significance right away - but we got a good shot of it, so hopefully it read well under the blood onscreen.

The fake axe in the arm gag worked perfectly, pretty damned happy with how it turned out.

I think John is loving that shotgun, he does look pretty bad ass with it.

Okay, not so bad ass here.

and Tim Gormley showing off one of the props of the day.

Cast shot, from left to right: Mark Wells, Tim Gormley, Tim Wartman, Julia MacDougall, Julie Laforest, Mary Gaudet, John MacDonald and Bill Pineau.

To was the first time I was doing two shoots in one day, luckily the second was too big a deal, but I realized pretty quick how terribly unprepared I was for it. Hopefully it'll all turn out.

And finally, the best line of the day:

And don't forget, we've got 18 days left on the fundraising campaign, we need all the help we can get. There's a link on the right sidebar.