Zombie Prosthetic Appliance.

This is the prosthetic we built for Mr. Jimmy (My other half) two Halloweens ago.

We kind of overdo the Halloween thing around here. It's our holiday. I'm going to try to find as many pictures of the build as I can and load them up with explanations as I find them.

The first thing you need to do is make a cast of the future Zombie's face. We used plaster bandages, warm water and loads of Vaseline. Didn't want to rip out those thick and luscious eyebrows, and that's exactly what will happen if you put plaster over unprotected hair. Mr. Jimmy shaves his head so we didn't have to worry about protecting his hairline, but if you have hair protect it! You have been warned.
We put three good layers of plaster bandage on his face and left the nose and eyes open so he could breathe and so he could see what I was doing to him. (He doesn't trust me.... Weird huh?)
Make sure to reasure your model constantly that they are safe. Make them comfortable.
Let the plaster set for 15 or twenty minutes then when it starts to harden up get them to wiggle their face a bit to loosen the mold. It should pull off fairly easily if you have applied sufficient vaseline. Let them remove it slowly as they see fit. No pulling the band aid off quickly here. It's just not the nice thing to do.

We used masking tape to seal up the eye and nose holes on the (Lets call it the face negative.... 'cause that's what it is) face negative after it had cured completely. Then we used plasticine to seal it and smooth out any joint lines around the tape. We used a big soft brush to smear a thin layer of Vaseline into the face negative to act as a release agent. Make sure the layer is thin enough for any detail to show. you don't want to distort it now it will throw off the fit of the prosthetic.

We mixed up a bunch of plaster of paris and filled the face negative up and let it set overnight. The next morning we pulled off the negative and revealed (Lets call this the face positive....... 'cause it's a positive representation of his face.) the face positive.

This is the plasticine sculpt we did. We sculpted it on the positive cast of his face.
Only sculpt out the parts you want to alter. Full face prosthetics are cool but we weren't going for that look here. We just wanted to alter him a bit. Add wounds and rotting. General purification.

We set the sculpted on face into a bag lined box that is a little bit bigger than the face.
We made sure to seal around the bottom of the face with plasticine so it was air tight and no plaster would seep underneath when we poured the next step.
Cover the whole thing in a thin layer of Vaseline using a nice big soft brush. Really important here not to wreck the detail. It's pretty easy to fill it all in with Vaseline. pay attention and use a q-tip or toothpick to clean any built up areas out.
Mix up more plaster and fill the box up with it. Bang the box on the table a few times to get rid of any air bubbles that may be clinging to the plasticine. You can also brush the first layer of plaster over the sculpt pushing it into the recesses to eliminate any air bubbles, then pour in the rest to fill the box. Let it set up overnight.

This is what you get when you take the sculpt out of the new mold. (We'll call it the prosthetic mold I guess.)
You want to spread some thin layers of liquid latex into the spots you sculpted. No need for any release agents, it should come out fine without it. Make several thin layers of latex letting it dry completely in between layers. After five or six layers we added some single layers of torn up toilet paper to give the prosthetic some strength. We did about twenty layers of latex and two layers of toilet paper. It took about two days to layer and dry. Oh yeah.... make sure to keep the edges thin, move the edges of each layer in so the prosthetic won't be thick and noticeable.

After the prosthetic has dried, peel it gently out of the mold. Lay it onto the face positive (all the plasticine has been removed from the sculpting process, so it's Mr. Jimmy again.) so it will keep it's shape. We used acrylic paint and regular dollar store makeup to colour this prosthetic.

We tried to make the wounds look wet but we didn't want them to smudge. We used a varnish on top of the red. Next time I'll use glaze, I think it will be more flexible. The varnish cracked a bit after wearing it.

This is the final piece on Mr. Jimmy. It turned out pretty well we think. Well worth the time and effort to produce it. We learned allot throughout the process. Can't wait for the next prosthetic appliance build.

Mr. Jimmy again from the other side.

What? Zombies totally wear nerd glasses. How else would they be able to see the delicious BRAINZ!!!!
This is my beautiful Mom wearing the same appliance. It fit her a bit big, Mr. Jimmy has a HUGE head, but she still managed to scare the crap out of a bunch of folks.
Mom being really scary. It was weird to see her wearing James' face.

Personalized 3D Cards

Made these cards a long while ago but just found the pics again. Thought it might be fun to re share them with you. I used Heinz Jordan stickers and gel pens.

(My apologies to Auntie J)

Super Auntie!!!

Super Me!

Mr. Jimmy and his awfully grey Birthday cake.

Had to make this one. Doesn't he look HAPPY?

So Fun!
Love making and giving cards.

Mini Stiletto Nails

Made some new nails using large aurora confetti and mini porcelain roses.
I like the stiletto shape, but have to have them short for the day job or I'd break a finger. These feel really short but are about the same length at the tip as my other nails.

Used the scanner to make pics. If I move my hand even a little bit it skews the image. No news on the camera yet.
:(

Inlayed Rose Nail.

Did another rose last night on a practice nail. I think I'm making improvements. It's frustrating not being able to show you step by steps. Here is a scan of the finished nail. I used pink on the nail plate and black sparkles on the free edge. The rose was white powder and then clear powder to cover it and make the nail smooth. I filed it then added two coats of insta dry and some rhinestones. I like this one. The roses are getting better.
:)

No Camera! :(

I took the camera to Bill at The Source today. He's gonna send it away to get fixed. He said the focus seems to be broken. He'll call me with an estimate as soon as he can. Maybe I can use the scanner to do instructions............... I'll figure something out.

Here's a pic of me being exasperated at the camera. Poor poor camera. This face is probably what broke it!

3D Acrylic Nail Art, Rose Tutorial

Trying something new.
I'm still having terrible problems with the camera. Soooo Blurry. I'll have to take it in I think, some things you just have to get a bit of help with and this is one of them. I'm admitting defeat.

I've decided to try to add video to the Blog. Thought it might help with future tutorials. Let me know what you think. I'll add some voice overs and written instruction to help make things clearer. Pictures are great but it helps to read what I did too I think.

I have also just realized that I stopped with the thing a week, week count. I think it's a good thing. I'll just post when I get an idea. It'll probably be more often than four times a month but it will also mean posts at irregular intervals.

So here is the first one.......




Here are the pictures. I'm hoping you can see the steps better by looking at them.


Wet your brush (I used a #6 round sable) with monomer (acrylic liquid) and pick up a small ball of white acrylic powder. Place the ball on your nail. Dry your brush a bit on some paper towel. Push the ball flat with the belly of your brush and then pull it into an oblong shape hollowing out the bottom edge. The outside edge of the petal should be thicker than the inside.

Add another small ball beside the previous petal. Make the same kind of shape overlapping one side of the first petal.

Make a third petal.

The fourth petal will be inside the previous three, with the center outside of this petal on top of an outside petal end. (The middle of the inner petals will hide the place where two outside petals meet.)

Add more petals until there is only enough room left for a little ball of acrylic in the flower center. Add a tiny ball of acrylic to the middle of the flower and with the tip of your brush push a hole in the ball. (Or add a rhinestone.)
Make leaves (one on each side) by placing a small ball of acrylic beside the flower and pulling a line through it with the tip of your brush. You can flatten out your brush and use it to clean up the leaf edges before they harden.

I wish I could get a clear shot of this for you. I added rhinestones and thin white twiggy lines with a nail art brush. I also coated the nail and rhinestones with two coats of insta dry clear polish.

More Nails Pink Roses on Clear Glitter Tips

It's been getting much harder to get a clear shot of anything with my camera. I might have to switch to video for the tutorials if I can't get it figured out. I'll keep trying.

I did clear sparkle tips with dark pink roses on the thumbs and ring fingers and a white rose on the pinkie of my left hand.

I'm still trying to get the acrylic mix right for sculpting flowers. It's pretty easy to make it either too runny or too dry and clumpy. It's going to take much more practice to perfect. I'm kind of waiting for warm weather so I can move the nail stuff to the garage. The smell of the acrylic is strong and it will be more bearable out in the fresh air. Thinking of going to gel nails. No smell, but it looks harder to control. We'll see.

I scored a bunch of new nail stuff from Sally's Beauty Supply in Waterloo last weekend. My Best buddy in the whole world helped me hunt down the shop! I acquired all kinds of polishes and shiny bits. Even got white acrylic powder there. But alas.... no monomer or gel supplies.

This shot is so blurry but I thought it might give you a basic idea of what I did. I sculpted the roses, added a pink thin smile line to the rest of the nails and then covered them in clear acrylic before filling and shaping them. I added lines and dots with my new white striper polish. Cool thin long brush in a white fast drying polish! I also couldn't resist some bling. I added rhinestones to the sides of each nail where the white lines intersect. I finished the nails with two coats of Insta-dry clear. I love the stuff. Nice thick durable coat that dries in literally minutes.

Spring Toes!

Having some camera difficulties lately. I think I have the settings all wrong. Have to find the manual and re read how to set the darn thing up. In the meantime, here are my spring toes. A bit blurry I know. I made my own coloured acrylic powder using eyeshadow powder. Works pretty well.

Matchy Ear Bling

Sorry about the craptastic photo quality. I was all excited to show you these. I'll have to try to get better pics so you can actually see them. I'm pretty pleased with the way they turned out. I made jewlery to match my nails using the same products I used to sculpt the nail tips.

I can't wait to experiment with different shapes and ways to construct earrings, necklaces rings and bracelets. I'm pretty stoked about this
(don't know if you can tell ;P).
They look like glass but are as light as a feather. Now I won't be able to sleep, too many ideas rattling around up there.
Good night!

Spring Nails

Ok, so.....

Still no new craft projects to post. I have been hit by the bad luck buss. Seems to be never ending. A conspiracy of mammoth proportion aimed straight at my crafting time.

I'm sure I'll get over it soon. Latest wrench in the crafting machine..... The fridge just stopped working today. After we purchased about three hundred bucks worth of groceries of course.

But look, My nails are FABULOUS!!!!

I made the flower and leaf canes out of polymer clay and embedded them into the clear acrylic.