Polynesian Cthulhu Relic

 I just realized that I'd completely abandoned this blog, I haven't updated it since December of last year - and maybe no one really gives a shit anyway, so this is all just for me. BUT, I felt it was time for a quick update as I've finally done a new Cthulhu piece. Inspired by the collectable relics from FarCry 3.

What you're seeing here is Polynesian Cthulhu #1 specifically.

Each one will look a little different, some minor discolouration, maybe some chips, flaws or air bubbles - these are all meant to be by design, making each one slightly unique by itself. They're not meant to be perfect, flawless statues.

I will be doing these a lot differently than how I used to, just as an experiment for now. These are not limited edition, but they are all numbered. I will be making no more than 3 per week, and only making more when the current three have sold and shipped - just so I don't need to make space in my already overcrowded workshop and keep a steadier more reliable, easier to work with production schedule.

They are made from a quick setting concrete and so far appear to be quite durable. Almost 3 inches across at the base. 3 1/4 inches tall. Around 430 grams, the weight varies slightly from statue to statue by around 10 grams it seems so far.

I'm selling them just through Etsy for now, 3 listings added on a Sunday or Monday depending on my time and then I'll wait until all three sell out and make three more and list them for the next coming Sunday or Monday, and on and on until I simply have no time or I go mad, whichever comes first.

They will all be listed separately, so you can see the exact version you're buying, all the flaws and discoloured spots are pictured so if you don't like some aspect of that element, check out the next available listing, or wait until the next round. I won't be doing custom orders or bulk orders or anything outside of this schedule.

This is the plan for the foreseeable future, and might change depending on the number of sales, but this is it for now.

You can visit my Etsy shop to find them, if you don't see them, they're already sold, so wait for the next round.

Pygmy Devil Skulls

Another new prop. Had this one planned for quite some time, just a matter of finding the time to finish them up. I have an initial limited run of 4 pieces, box included with a history of the skulls.

Each on of this initial run is $50 each, the final run will be $60 and limited to only 20 at most (or until the mould is no good). Each skull is hand rotocast and painted and numbered on the lid of the box.

The box itself measures 6 1/2 x 4 1/2 x 3 1/4 inches. The skull is 3 1/2 inches long, 2 1/2 inches tall.

I haven't work out the shipping just yet so it's not for sale on Etsy, only through contacting me directly at themonkeyrodeo@gmail.com.

Albino Cyclops Faerie

Mounted Albino Cyclops Faerie head.

Made of latex and filled with polyfoam and a resin eyeball, the head measures 2 1/2 inches long and comes mounted on a stained plaque with mounting hardware attached. $27.50 +shipping.

A rare mutation of the Seer Faerie, a species with prophetic abilities. It's unclear whether the mutation is caused by a genetic disorder in the parents or something environmental that results in these unusually violent creatures.

While the Seer Faeries abilities are usually limited to minor visions of random future events, the Albino Cyclops Faerie's abilities are limited to only seeing the death of any number of random individuals - it's thought that the constant visions of death is what drives these creatures to madness.

It's also believed that if an Albino Cyclops Faeries prophesies your death, the fate can be avoided altogether by destroying the creature, possibly resulting in immortality.

Wall mounted Pygmy Blood Troll Head.

I came up with the idea for making wall mounted beast heads years ago, of course I never got around to it and since then I've seen several others making them - that's always annoying. However, I finally got around to it, it was mostly the finer details of reproducing them consistently that stopped me from doing it right away.

The biggest stumbling block for me ended up being two relatively simple things, the plaque itself and the eyes.The biggest problem was sourcing locally and then sourcing within Canada online. Neither really panned out in a way I felt would work for me without driving the cost of the final piece up. Then I suddenly happened upon some small plaques that were very inexpensive and it went from there.

As for the eyes, I didn't want to paint them, so I wanted something I could just plop into place. I found some glass black glass beads that would give the troll that soulless look. The tricky part was designing all this to be done with just a single mould with a minimum amount of work involved to reproduce the piece.

So I took one of the stones, glued a wooden stick to it. Because that how you make eyeballs, right?

I made a mould of that and created to silicone copies.

 So I could sculpt around them to create a socket and pull them out without distressing the sculpture.

It worked perfectly. It took less than a day for the sculpt. I pretty much just made it up as I was going. I knew I wanted a fat little weird troll-like head and that was it.

I was happy with the result, and that it didn't take me days of agonizing over details to get it to turn out. From there I made a stone mould, with a flat back to it, drilled a hole in that and the mould was done in less than a day as well.

I thought the best and least expensive material would be latex filled with expanding foam, I'm used to it and I had all these supplies onhand already, so that was a pretty easy choice.

And there you have it. I had minimal cleanup around the edges, no other post-mould adjusting, cleaning or detailing to do, I just had to paint it, glue in the eyes and stain the plaque and mount the sucker. It was a lot more work than I'm making it sound, but it's fairly easy work overall, just takes a couple hours to produce one of these - unless I do them in bulk.

So yes, I am selling these. At the time of posting this I've just made the first prototype one, I'll be running off a couple more and doing a run of 5 for now and seeing how well they sell. Now that I've done the whole process and know my costs, I came up with a price of $40 for each one. Anyone interested can contact me, themonkeyrodeo@gmail.com.

So, after all that, what is a Pygmy Blood Troll? Here's some information on this ugly little critter.

The origins of this vile species is rather complicated. While most all creatures of Demonic origins are peaceful, docile beings, Pygmy Blood Trolls are quite the opposite.

It begins with the Blood Parasite, a leech-like worm that is responsible for most modern Vampire myths. They infect a living host, leaving them mostly dead in all appearances, using their bodies to then feed on blood from living victims. Normally this process simply works with the parasite taking over the internal functions of both Demons and Humans, Humans being much more susceptible because of their weaker physiology.

Demons are more resistant to the Blood Parasite on average, 27% of all Demonic species are completely immune to them. Trolls specifically are immune to Blood Parasite, however one species, Earth Trolls – who can hibernate deep in the earth for hundreds of years – actually absorb the Blood Parasite.

In most cases the parasite is simply consumed internally with no ill effect, however in pregnant Earth Trolls, the fetus is bonded with the parasite, altering its entire biological structure. One Pygmy Blood Troll (called as such since they never grow over a foot tall and most trolls range from seven feet to several hundred feet tall) is a somewhat hazardous nuisance, several are a much different matter. Pygmy Blood Trolls procreate much like modern day rabbits, within months there can be as many as one thousand.

Pygmy Blood Trolls usually feed on smaller animals, but have, on occasion, attacked larger creatures in packs. They are incredibly dangerous in high numbers since their Trolls physiology makes them strong for their size, and very tough to kill. The Blood Parasite physiology makes them very fast healers and immune to pain – it’s is believe the only true method of killing a Pygmy Blood Troll is to decapitate it and burn the body immediately. They will also, like their parentage, burrow deep into the earth where they can hibernate for hundreds of years and are near impossible to find in this state – this makes controlling Pygmy Blood Troll outbreaks a very difficult task and on that must be handled immediately before they either procreate or enter hibernation.

The Witch's Jawbone prop finally for sale.

I started working on these awhile back and things just got really busy with the Halloween season so I had to put it aside, but it's finally done and ready for sale. It's a limited run of 5 for sale, although there's 1 prototype with resin nails that was given to a friend, and two more - one of which I'll be keeping for myself and the second will be held until I decide what I want to use it for, a prize for a contest or something. I don't know yet.

It's a full sized jawbone, moulded and cast in clay from a medical skeleton jawbone, I resculpted the clay jawbone to incorporate the nails and give a more distressed look. The clay jawbone was moulded for the final pieces, which were cast in resin, all hand painted and finally real antique steel nails were driven into it (there were hole already, but the nails are pretty firmly held in place)

The box is wood and glass (I didn't make it, it was purchased), I stained it myself though. The jaw rests inside on a bed of packing moss, with a Certificate of Authenticity underneath it, stating the number of the limited run each particular piece is.

 I haven't sorted out shipping costs yet, I'm planing on making them available for shipping by November 25th, I estimate $30 for US and Canadian orders, overseas will be pretty expensive I would imagine. Each one will have the jawbone wrapped in bubblewrap inside the display case, to prevent the nails from possibly cracking the glass in shipping. And the case itself will be padded and the package marked fragile. I also recommend a shipping method with insurance - it doesn't cost extra, but those methods are slightly more expensive in general.

And as for the cost on this piece, supposing you made it this far and you're still interested, is $75. To order, send me an email at themoneyrodeo@gmail.com, include your address so I can get you a shipping quote as quickly as possible, I will then send you an invoice through Paypal, or through email if you're in Canada and would rather use Email Interact.

And that's it. I'll be posting these on the website later this week as well as on Etsy.

Mummy Head prop

Another prop I've been wanting to make for ages and for some reason it just never happened was a Mummy Head. It seems like every time I have an idea for something, by the time I get around to it I see several others have already attempted it - gets a little annoying because it makes me feel like I'm copying, even though I had the idea long before I saw anyone else's attempt.

The hardest part of a Mummy Head is getting it to look decent, it's not a zombie head. I went though a couple variations, basing my sculpt off a couple actual mummy head images I found, altering where I felt it just looked better.

I has sculpted and moulded it quite some time ago, I even cast it - although it was a pretty rough attempt with a really bad, broken seam. I had brushed the latex in, using up some old tinted stuff just to get rid of it. The polyfoam was kind crap as well, it just kept collapsing, but it worked well enough to make a prototype for painting.

I pretty much did the paint job without really planning ahead. It was several layers, going from dark to light until I felt it was decent looking. The teeth were done quickly with a brush somewhere inbetween the layers on the head itself so they received a little extra "aging".

So that's it. It turned out pretty well I think for what I'd call a "budget prop". I'm planning on making about 5 or so for sale eventually and I'm planning on 1 or 2 "museum" pieces. I'd love to find a cheap bell jar to  display this under - unfortunately that's just one of those items you can't easily find in my corner of the world.

Limited Edition Mummy Hand Prop

I've finally got the Mummy Hand all ready for proper sale. I have 2 versions. There's the "Standalone" piece, that's just the hand itself for $30 (limited to 20) and the "Museum Piece" version for $70 (limited to 10).

The "Museum Piece" includes a stained box with plexiglass lid (so no worried about it breaking in shipping), it's hand stained and lined with Spanish Moss and includes a label on the front of the box indicating the number of the piece out of 10.

The "Standalone" version is just the hand itself, wrapped with gauze and comes with a card indicating the number of the piece out of 20. The hand itself is a latex skinned polyfoam that's hand painted.

A properly coloured picture to show what the hand really looks like, as well as the staining on the box.

I make these to order, so give about 1 week for manufacturing.

If you're interested, you can contact me at: foxhenderson @ themonkeyrodeo.com. Payment can be made through Paypal, or Email Interact if you're in Canada. Right now I've no idea of shipping costs, but I'd estimate around $30-$40 in the US, possibly $20-$30 in Canada for standard delivery. And at least $30 for overseas - at the lowest rate, 4-6 weeks as well.

Spiked Zombie Head Mace!

It's finally done and I'm pretty damned happy with how it turned out.

I will at some point very soon be selling just one on ebay as part of the fundraiser. And I will be selling a limited number, probably 10, later in the summer on the website. Although if you're reading this and you just can't wait, feel free to email me about it. The price will be $150.00 CAD.

It takes a long time to create each piece, there's 10 in total. 8 spikes, the head and the staff. Right now I only have one mould for the spikes, so that's what makes it take a little long - I'll be creating about 3 moulds in for the future ones.

Each spike is embedded in a whole cut in the head, with a small amount of the foam removed, and where each part joins, it's given a coat with latex. That bonds them together really well - however I'm sure if you really want to destroy it you could - why you'd try, I don't really know.

It's about 45 inches long. The staff is 30 inches - and could be shortened for anyone who wants one, but wants a shorter staff.

A fibreglass rod is placed into the latex skinned mould as the polyfoam is expanding, so it's bonded with the staff really well. Enough of the rod is left extending from the staff and them the head is impaled in it, giving the whole piece some stability.

This specific finished piece only had one rod, so it's a little wobbly - however for the movie I think it just adds another level of campiness, so I'm happy with it. For any sold I'll use 2-3 rods to improve stability. Unless people like wobbly.

Painting took place over 2 days, about 3-4 hours in total I'd guess. I wasn't really keeping tracking. I  just used Monster Makers Latex Paint Base and some acrylic paints, works perfectly.

Also, I think for any retail versions, I'll allow for some customization, colours, spike placement, any damage to the head, blood splatter. I kept this one clean and free of damage since it's part of the movie and it will be getting bloody on it's own.

UPDATE: I'm selling one of these on ebay right now: http://www.ebay.ca/itm/111084065279?ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1555.l2649

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.

Making a fake rock

Without a doubt the most boring prop I’ve ever made I think – at as far as descriptions go. There’s a short sequence in Moonshine of the Damned requiring some violence and a rock, so for safety’s sake we’re going fake

It was a pretty simple prop to make as well, finding the perfect rock was just as simple. It was in a pile by the car during a shoot last summer – so it wasn’t like I even had to hunt for one.

First thing I did was give it a bit of a cleaning. Most all of our rocks here are sandstone, not the easiest to clean – luckily this bad boy was granite – at least I think it’s granite, I’m not a geologist. Once it was all cleaned up I made a two part silicone mould – you’ll have to imagine that part, I didn’t take pictures because I didn’t think it’d be that interesting…and it might not be.

Once the mould was done I actually abandoned the prop once the web series was cancelled and only began thinking about it just recently. I had been making some other simple props and thought it was time to crank this out. It also helped that I finally had a handle on painting it.

It was easy enough to cast, but one thing to note about using Flex FoamIt, that I only found out last summer - I don't know how widespread this information is, but I didn't know this - the material, once cured, can sort of shrivel into itself, this can easily be fixed by crushing the piece, squeezing out supposed gases that cause the shriveling effect. So far it's worked well for me nearly 100% of the time.

So, here’s some pictures:

The mould, made of silicone with a support shell.

I bolted it together, seemed the simplest thing to do.

The original rock (left) and the unpainted soft foam rock (right).

The fake rock - the detailing is what helps it, even this doesn't look too bad.

 The original and the final fake rock. Didn't come out too bad.

And here it is, in all it's artifical geological glory. The Fake Rock.

So there you go, a fake rock. It's only needed in a very short sequence, but it's one of those thing that you might write in a script and not really think about how you'll accomplish it, let alone accomplish it safely. This is something I couldn't have done a couple years ago and now it's a completely simple process to create a tiny bit of movie magic.

Chances are when you see the scene it's in, you won't really think "How'd they do that?" Most people will just assume it was a trick camera angle, or some folks who don't really understand FX might even think it's CG - nope, it's a chunk of soft foam. It can be throw right at a person's head if needed and it'll be relatively safe - at least moreso than lobbing a real rock.

Technical Info: The whole thing was done using Smooth-On products. The mould was Rebound 25 with a Plasti-Paste II shell. The rock itself is made from Flex FoamIt V and painted using Monster Makers Latex Paint Base tinted with acrylic paints.

This isn't something I'll ever put on the website for sale, but if you've stumbled upon this and think it'd be a whole lot easier (since the mould is already made) to just buy one instead of making one yourself, feel free to send me an email. I reckon I'd sell it for about $25 - it's a bugger to paint decently and does take awhile. Email: foxhenderson@themonkeyrodeo.com.

Note about cost: Just an FYI concerning the cost of making one of these. It's not too bad, but even using the minimum quantities available of the products, you're looking at over $100.

Painted Zombie Head Prop

There's only so many variations on this title I can do before I start repeating. In any case, I finally got to painting one of the Severed Zombie Head props I'm making for Moonshine of the Damned - and the funding campaign. It was my first time using the airbrush on a prop and using the Latex Paint Base to do this sort of thing, and I'm pretty happy overall with the results.

I didn't have a huge array of paint colours to use, I think I just had 5 different ones to do this. I wanted to go with a dried out look, nothing too spectacular or anything, for my first attempt. I'll probably get more creative as I go.

And since they're latex and polyfoam, I was thinking to make some variations I could cut out certain parts and rebuild them here and there to alter the overall shape and appearance of each head. Some might have some stringy bits from the neck, some might have severe shotgun wounds taking off a huge chunk of the side of their head. Who knows?

So here's a couple pictures, here's an unpainted one next to the painted one.

Some closeups. I did a slight dried splatter look on him. A technique I'll admit to having never really tried before.

Got some major spatter on this side.

And a nice one here. I didn't want to do too much more, thought it might start looking too silly. Although, I do enjoy it when things look a little silly.

So there you have it. A fully finished and painted Severed Zombie Head prop. I will definitely be offering these up for a limited, reduced price pre-sale sort of deal for the fund raiser. As I've mentioned, probably numerous times, I'll only be doing up 10 for the fund raiser and then I'll be only be making several for the web series - but I will put them up for sale on the website around September I think, the price will be slightly more than they were for the fund raiser - so if you're thinking about, better act now or it'll be costing you more and you'll be helping out a (sort of ) good cause.

If you're not sure what fundraiser I'm referring to, click here. And if you're too impatient to go the to website and simply must have one of these bad boys right now, email me.

More Zombie Heads

A small pile of unpainted, latex skinned, polyfoam Zombie Heads made for Moonshine of the Damned. I'm tying to get some of the FX prepped early for the series using what little materials I have lying around. In this case I ran out of polyfoam - didn't have that much to begin with, but what little I had went  decently long way. This was about 1/4 of a $40 kit, maybe a 1/3 at best - so I should be able to get quite a few more from a new kit, especially since I now know the exact amount needed to fill the heads without wasting very much of the foam.

I'm looking into some new zombie prosthetics this week as well, I normally like to master mould them so I can reuse them for the shop later, but in this case I'll just be making them and setting them aside for now until I can master mould them down the road some time.

Still looking to raise money for the series as well, we're still hovering around the 1/4 mark - got a very long way to go yet.  If you're interested in helping out, check out the page I've got set up: http://www.themonkeyrodeo.com/BZK3/

Making a Severed Zombie Head

For the upcoming Moonshine of the Damned, I need to make several zombie heads - so the easiest, cheapest way was to sculpt one. Rather than starting from scratch I use an already made silicone mould from the first attempt at the series, this here was the final product from that mould, a foam backed Vytaflex head. It didn't look the way I wanted it to, so resculpting was necessary.

 I filled the silicone mould with melted clay and resculpted it. I was using Monster Makers clay, that stuff is awesome.

Since it'll have to be a 2-sided mould, so next a dividing wall was built up. I also sculpted in where the pour hole will be - you can kind of see it at the base of the neck here.

First layer of Ultracal 30, first it was brushed on and then anount coat dripped over that.

And then some layers of burlap.

And another thickened coat of Ultracal 30 to give it a better finish, this picture was before I smoothed it all out.

With the first half all done, I started work on the 2nd by cleaning off all the clay.

I added several little chunks of clay to create holes to assist in prying the two halves apart afterwards. I also applied a coating of vaseline to the Ultrcal to make sure the two halves didn't just fuse together.

A mould wall for the 2nd half is built, as well as the 2nd half of the pour hole - it's a little more obvious here.

First thin brushed on coating of UltraCal 30.

Drip coating.

And I missed taking a picture - not that it matters though, it just looks like a huge chunk of gypsum. After a long while of very carefully prying the two halves apart, this is what it looked like. I use wooden stir sticks hammered in around the seam to slowly pry it apart. It worked pretty well as using hard, metal tools can just break the Ultracal sometimes and ruin the whole thing.

Luckily I was actually somewhat smart about it. Because I only had so much clay and not enough to totally fill the original silicone mould, I added in a bunch of old small silicone moulds to add some bulk - this made it easier to remove it from the mould as well since it wasn't a solid chunk of clay.

After a very long cleaning process, the mould was ready for it's first casting.

The intention is to make several cheap, light, easy to paint zombie heads. The best method I could think of was a polyfoam head with a latex skin. Since I was using latex I went with the Ultracal 30 mould - which was awesome since I already have a decent amount onhand anyway.

If you're not familiar with how Ultrcal (or really any gypsum material) and latex work together, the Ultracal actually sucks the water out of the latex, enabling you to create a thin skin. The longer you leave the latex dwelling in the mould the thicker this skin will be. I my case I  need just a thin enough skin to protect the Ultracal from the polyfoam, normally you'd want enough latex to totally fill the mould to create something thicker.

I only have a little onhand so I just did a quick brush on coating to ensure it was evenly coating the deeper recesses on the front of the face, joined the halves together and sloshed around more latex, probably about 500 ml at this point. The latex was drained and I usually paint on more around the opening of the pour hole (again to prevent the expanding polyfoam from biting into the outside of the mould).

The polyfoam will normally adhere and lock into the Ultracal and it's a bugger to paint as well, hence the whole latex skin. I was using a very quick expanding and curing polyfoam (from Monster Makers) so I had to be quick about it, I made the pourhole larger than normal to make sure I could pour the foam in fast enough. It worked perfectly.

And here's the result, fresh from the mould.

I cut off the excess latex/foam from the pourhole and here's the pretty much final piece ready to be cleaned up and painted.

Normally latex can be a bugger to paint, you need to make a toxic concoction to make sure the paint adheres to the latex surface, however Monster Makers has a Latex Paint Base which works beautifully, you can even just mix it with regular acrylic paint to tint it. I've done a small amount of airbrushing with it, but need to experiment further - which I'll probably do with these since they don't have to look perfect, they are just rotting heads after all.

Also, since it has a very thin surface of latex, which keeps it really flexible and tough, and the expanding polyfoam is really low density, these heads are incredibly light and pretty squishy as well, so you can throw them at people without hurting them - if you ever feel the need to throw a severed zombie at someone.

So that's pretty much it. I can make several dozen heads from this, possibly more if I'm careful with the mould so the polyfoam doesn't ruin the moulding surface.

While only about a dozen are needed for a couple scenes in the series and this mould should last for awhile, I'm planning on making these available through the Funding Campaign for about $40, I'll only be making 10 of these for the campaign - more on that later.