Part 5: Sculpting the head

The scary bit. If the head doesn't look good, the whole costume is a waste of time. I was well prepared, would I be able to do justice to that preparation?



Having set the heavy plaster lifecast on a rotating base purchased from a sculpting supplier and given it a rub down with mold soap to help with cleaning once we're done, we start by blocking out the basic shapes. The material I used for the head is WED clay, a water based clay with a few additives developed by the Disney company for sculpting creatures and props, the added oils and glycerine make it particularly smooth and slow drying. The other option for this kind of work is an oil based clay, which doesn't dry at all, but it's generally harder than water clays and has to be warmed before it is workable, so it's much slower for building large pieces like this, and is also far more expensive

A wooden block is incorporated across the eyes of the lifecast, to make sure there is space within the head for the mechanical parts without interfering with the performers face

A metal eyebar rests on the wooden block, the plaster eyes then rest on this bar, helping to keep the sculpt symmetrical and the eyes at similar depths and distance from the centre line. Few creatures have perfectly forward facing eyes, so the ends of the bar are bent a few degrees backwards

Lots more blocking out. WED is a very soft material and can be worked easily with the fingers, so these steps are surprisingly fast

From this point on, it's the slow painful process of capturing the smaller shapes, and keeping the two sides symmetrical. This tends to take much longer than the initial blocking out, and requires a lot of measuring and eyeing up. Perfect symmetry is almost impossible, but getting it as close as possible is important if you want your creature to look real

As the above pictures show, there's also a continuous process of smoothing and refining shapes going on at every step, using the fingers, tools, sponges and brushes. The face piece of this mask will be cast in movie grade silicone and will have very little fur, so it's vital that the sculpt is as perfect as possible

And this is the final sculpt, ready for the mold making process

I'll take some better lit pictures showcasing some of the detail (mainly around the eyes, mouth and nose, most of the rest will be covered in fur) just before I start the mold making process. Until then, this will have to do, hopefully this post has been useful or at least interesting to some of you guys. 

 Next, I dunno, maybe molding? But that's scary, so maybe something a bit less daunting. Ciao for now, don't be a Stranger.