Hey, I’m excited for the class. One of the first videos I watched when I became a subscriber was Part 1 and 2. I was really fascinated by Bruce D. Mitchell’s masks and wanted to make something similar myself. I remember sketching out a plague doctor mask I was planning to sculpt at the time though when this came up a much better idea came to mind.
I’ve had a little experience with mask making in the past though this’ll be the first one that I didn’t have to mold first, hot glue or end up covering in faux fur.
I did unfortunately get to a late start on my mask base. I’ve been recovering from complications related to a high ankle sprain and haven’t been able to get to my workshop until this week. I’ve had a sketch ready and I’ve been doing my best to make up for lost time.
My goal for the workshop is to build a dynamic mask of a gargoyle/gremlin creature by adding goggles, removable ears and horns to the base. I'd also like to develop skills I can work into other projects.
Though one of my long term goals for the finished mask itself, is to have it where I can wear it at Anthrocon 2017, and show a generous friend and fan of mine what he allowed me to create.
I was inspired heavily by the masks in the trailer and Miss Monster’s masks, as well as a number of gargoyle statues.
All day today I’ve been sculpting the base in clay and starting on covering it in epoxy. Having had gathered reference images and sketched it out months ago I was able to get started right away. Reviewing part 1 while I worked. Feels weird not having to make allowance for tear duct vision on a mask.
Since I don’t have the time to do any tooling before the class starts, I figured I would get it as far along as I can and tool it as I go. Working on the base, the goggles, horns and ears as I go.
For the character I have been thinking it’d be an ancient stone battle worn gargoyle that had been brought to life as a guardian. Through the centuries he’s adapted but, still continued his duties
This week's been full of challenges though somehow everything worked out and I got it all done. Since I was running a little low on magic sculpt I ordered a second batch and decided to start the week off with making the horns.
After having to cut out the pattern twice on the foam I was able to follow Evil Ted Smith's video instructions and assemble them. Using a cheap yoga mat I think I'll eventually get some higher quality ones later on but, for now they'll look good. I think the texture kinda gives a slight stone appearance though I'll still have to do some texturing and painting later on. Heat forming it I then went and glued it with Barge cement. My only major concern is I feel like I need to stuff them since the foam is so thin. All I have left is to hit them with a heat gun one last time, seal, fill the inside with something both for support and to hold the magnets and to paint them. I don't think these horns came out too bad considering it was my first time working with eva foam in this way.
The goggles were a bit trickier. Originally having had planned to use some lenses from a set of sunglasses that suffered death by my grandmother's crockpot I unfortunately couldn't find but one lens. Ended up buying a set of aviators and spending some time figuring how I was going to break them out. Eventually got them cut to size and I blocked out the eye sockets with clay. I ended up having to rework the sculpt a few times but, I soon found a look I liked. For cutting the lenses I ended up deciding to use my dreamer's barrel sander bit instead of the cutting wheel I had bought since I didn't want to take any chances and it be the wrong bit and I wanted the control that came with it. After around 3 bouts with it I finally got them cut to size and the sculpt went a lot smoother from there as did the sculpt when I added the epoxy in.
I'm planning to start work on the ears next though the size and shape of them made me want to do a little research before jumping right into them. I feel like they might need a armature of sorts to reduce weight and have a more sturdy structure. I figured this was a good point to get to for this week.
Looking great Lindsay! I love that tutorial on the horns too! You could use more of the foam mat to make a base for the horns that will have the magnets embedded. You could also use the base to glue the horns directly to the mask so that you don't have to worry about the horns coming off during a cosplay walk. Congrats on liberating the lenses successfully. The barrel sander is definitely less scary than using the cutting bits!
This week I had a bit of a late start. Despite trying to plan ahead though I did make a fair bit of progress. Made the start of a set of ears and got the chance to play with my heat gun for a bit more. Though I'm going to take Bruce's suggestion and go with freeform and I'll save the eva ears for a future project.
Taking a moment to assess my goggles I added a bit more of magic sculpt to give a flange to attach the magnets into on the goggles and just finishing the edges on the mask itself. After that I pried the mask off the mannequin as did the clay... After digging out enough clay I was able to pop the goggles off. I'm happy to say they popped right off after I got enough clay removed from them. Guess I used enough vaseline afterall.
I also managed to find what I thought at first was the break cable housing at a bike shop though they called it a different name. Though I realized this morning that it's not the right part. I'm thinking I might either incorporate it into this or save it for a plauge doctor mask I've had in mind for the future.
My magnets arrived yesterday evening so I will install them today some time though I did get the holes drilled. though the piece did chip a bit during drilling since it was a bit too thin but, I'm not too worried. I might incorporate it into the design a bit. Now I guess I'll go and continue scraping monster clay out of the nooks and crannies of my mask and goggles, do some patch work on the base and do some texturing.
Here's my finished for now mask. With removable ears, horns and goggles. This was quite a challenge between challenges with getting supplies and my own struggles. Though I really enjoyed it and learned a lot. The goggles really presented one challenge after another. I had originally planned to give it arms and go more complex with it but, I kept running into troubles. The one on the final pic is the third nose bridge I ended up sculpting due to breaks and not getting it fitting to the goggles right. Though it seemed to come together okay. About halfway through drilling the holes to attach the springs I realized what would have been a much better way of attaching the magnets but, it was too late to really do anything. I am tempted to go back and drill new holes, and see if my thought would work. If it does while it still wouldn't help my much where the springs are concerned I do think it'd be closer to matching my initial concept art. I still have some work to get them to sit smoothly and move them where they rest right on the top but, I ran out of time to really fiddle with it this time. Using my dremel I ended up roughing up the horns a bit when I was fixing the goggles pieces. I ended up cutting the horns down so they'd fit rest the way I wanted. Then I went with t-nuts and button cap screws and attached to a set of bases I glued together with barge. When the weather decided to cooperate I, filled in the gaps in my foam work with kwik seal then coated them with plastic-dip so they'd be prepped for painting. I also ended up deciding to place them so only the front section is attached to the mask. I'm planning to have a additional attachment later onto the leather cage. I'm thinking snaps but, I won't really know till I get there. They are removable and temporary. I'm thinking I'd like to replace them at a later date either with just better foam ones, sculpted ones, or even some resin ones though that's something for another time. In the third pic on the bottom row was a bit of a test fitting after I had sculpted the ears in free form air. Speaking of freeform air, that was interesting. It was every different to work with, so soft and snow like I had trouble getting it to do what I wanted especially with trying to get symmetry on the ears. Though I did my best and used magic sculpt to fix the discrepancies. I also sculpted teeth in magic sculpt but, haven't had the time to finish them due to our temperatures dropping. Dremeling the mask itself went pretty well overall though it was pretty nerve racking around the lenses I won't lie. Though luckily it went well.
Drilling for the magnets went surprisingly well at first. I didn't start reversing the polarity till my magnets broke free of the super glue and I had to reinstall them. Though doing the method with the hemostats, shocking it worked well. I only launched one magnet too.
Overall I was pretty happy with it especially the ears.
For the washes I wanted to give the mask a stone look overall. I feel like the character would be one that'd want to appear he'd just walked off of the cathedral in Notre Dame. I also kinda picture the character's even around a while so it'd look very rough and weathered with loads of scratches and carvings. So I decided to give it a wash with a dark blue paint, later I'm thinking of going back and breaking it up a bit with some browns though for the sake of time I went over it with black, putting a bunch on and wiping it off. To dress it up further I also decided to take some of the leather meant for the straps and attach them to kinda mimic hair in a sense. I have intentions to add more later as well and paint them but, so far I think it works alright. It was nice to do leatherwork for the first time. Overall this project's had a lot of first for me, first time working with eva foam, first time working with magic sculpt and free form air, first with leather working. It was a lot of fun and a good challenge I can't wait to make more masks like this in the future and I'm anxious to finish this one up completely. Thank you Bruce for being a awesome teacher and thank you to SWSCA for allowing me this opportunity
Comments
Hey, I’m excited for the class. One of the first videos I watched when I became a subscriber was Part 1 and 2. I was really fascinated by Bruce D. Mitchell’s masks and wanted to make something similar myself. I remember sketching out a plague doctor mask I was planning to sculpt at the time though when this came up a much better idea came to mind.
I’ve had a little experience with mask making in the past though this’ll be the first one that I didn’t have to mold first, hot glue or end up covering in faux fur.
I did unfortunately get to a late start on my mask base. I’ve been recovering from complications related to a high ankle sprain and haven’t been able to get to my workshop until this week. I’ve had a sketch ready and I’ve been doing my best to make up for lost time.
My goal for the workshop is to build a dynamic mask of a gargoyle/gremlin creature by adding goggles, removable ears and horns to the base. I'd also like to develop skills I can work into other projects.
Though one of my long term goals for the finished mask itself, is to have it where I can wear it at Anthrocon 2017, and show a generous friend and fan of mine what he allowed me to create.
I was inspired heavily by the masks in the trailer and Miss Monster’s masks, as well as a number of gargoyle statues.
All day today I’ve been sculpting the base in clay and starting on covering it in epoxy. Having had gathered reference images and sketched it out months ago I was able to get started right away. Reviewing part 1 while I worked. Feels weird not having to make allowance for tear duct vision on a mask.
Since I don’t have the time to do any tooling before the class starts, I figured I would get it as far along as I can and tool it as I go. Working on the base, the goggles, horns and ears as I go.
For the character I have been thinking it’d be an ancient stone battle worn gargoyle that had been brought to life as a guardian. Through the centuries he’s adapted but, still continued his duties
My only major concern is I feel like I need to stuff them since the foam is so thin. All I have left is to hit them with a heat gun one last time, seal, fill the inside with something both for support and to hold the magnets and to paint them. I don't think these horns came out too bad considering it was my first time working with eva foam in this way.
The goggles were a bit trickier. Originally having had planned to use some lenses from a set of sunglasses that suffered death by my grandmother's crockpot I unfortunately couldn't find but one lens. Ended up buying a set of aviators and spending some time figuring how I was going to break them out. Eventually got them cut to size and I blocked out the eye sockets with clay.
I ended up having to rework the sculpt a few times but, I soon found a look I liked. For cutting the lenses I ended up deciding to use my dreamer's barrel sander bit instead of the cutting wheel I had bought since I didn't want to take any chances and it be the wrong bit and I wanted the control that came with it.
After around 3 bouts with it I finally got them cut to size and the sculpt went a lot smoother from there as did the sculpt when I added the epoxy in.
I'm planning to start work on the ears next though the size and shape of them made me want to do a little research before jumping right into them. I feel like they might need a armature of sorts to reduce weight and have a more sturdy structure.
I figured this was a good point to get to for this week.
Made the start of a set of ears and got the chance to play with my heat gun for a bit more. Though I'm going to take Bruce's suggestion and go with freeform and I'll save the eva ears for a future project.
Taking a moment to assess my goggles I added a bit more of magic sculpt to give a flange to attach the magnets into on the goggles and just finishing the edges on the mask itself. After that I pried the mask off the mannequin as did the clay... After digging out enough clay I was able to pop the goggles off. I'm happy to say they popped right off after I got enough clay removed from them. Guess I used enough vaseline afterall.
My magnets arrived yesterday evening so I will install them today some time though I did get the holes drilled. though the piece did chip a bit during drilling since it was a bit too thin but, I'm not too worried. I might incorporate it into the design a bit. Now I guess I'll go and continue scraping monster clay out of the nooks and crannies of my mask and goggles, do some patch work on the base and do some texturing.
Speaking of freeform air, that was interesting. It was every different to work with, so soft and snow like I had trouble getting it to do what I wanted especially with trying to get symmetry on the ears. Though I did my best and used magic sculpt to fix the discrepancies. I also sculpted teeth in magic sculpt but, haven't had the time to finish them due to our temperatures dropping.
Dremeling the mask itself went pretty well overall though it was pretty nerve racking around the lenses I won't lie. Though luckily it went well.
Overall I was pretty happy with it especially the ears.
So I decided to give it a wash with a dark blue paint, later I'm thinking of going back and breaking it up a bit with some browns though for the sake of time I went over it with black, putting a bunch on and wiping it off.
To dress it up further I also decided to take some of the leather meant for the straps and attach them to kinda mimic hair in a sense. I have intentions to add more later as well and paint them but, so far I think it works alright. It was nice to do leatherwork for the first time. Overall this project's had a lot of first for me, first time working with eva foam, first time working with magic sculpt and free form air, first with leather working. It was a lot of fun and a good challenge I can't wait to make more masks like this in the future and I'm anxious to finish this one up completely.
Thank you Bruce for being a awesome teacher and thank you to SWSCA for allowing me this opportunity