stuff I did this weekend
Well I found a new timewaster in Torchlighthttp://www.torchlightgame.com/
That ate up way too much time, a fun Diablo clone.
But we did get something done, Rae and I did a ton of work on the Marscon Costuming Demos. We decided we wanted to do a
Stargate Atlantis Wraith Queen lats year. As I did the research, I began to think I didn't have the expertise to do it correctly.
The skin texture, the translucent coloring, and other aspects seemed to suggest a gelatine or silicon makeup. I haven't done those and
don't have the stuff to do them, they would require completely changing/replacing my casting and gluing regiment. But I made
a decision to try it in slush latex, my usual medium.
We cast Jo, our cute little wraith queen and I started the sculpting. My usual finishing techniques, which give a human skin texture,
were not applicable here, so I worked to get the clay model as smooth as possible, then when I removed it from the plaster mold I
grabbed some 400 grit wet sandpaper and smoothed it some more. The latex pour was interesting as the thickness of the mold
varied greatly, some parts should be tissue thin while others are had to be quite thick so it took several sessions and twistings of the mold to get it right.
When I pulled the latex, there was still some roughness, so I hand painted a layer of latex on it to get more smoothness.
The next issue was the translucent nature of the wraith queen skin. This was not a common wraith trait, the queens have
more delicate skin texture. Most fans that try to do this makeup ignore the depth of coloring, it's not an easy thing to accomplish.
What I did was to grab an eyebrow pencil of the right color and draw the veining on the piece before I did any makeup on it.
Then when I was fairly happy with the veining, I coated it with another thin coat of latex to seal the pencil and get som more depth.
The makeup was Rubbermask grease, thinned with castor oil to allow me to do color washes of olive tan tone and green across the
piece, I basically used the green as shadows and the olive tan as highlights. Yup that worked, quite well in fact. After powdering
it down to set it, I brought the gloss level back up with a little KY jelly.
The test application on Jo was somewhat hampered when I found my latex glue had gone south on me, so I wasn't going to get the
perfect seamless look this time, but the magic happened anyway. When we fit the piece correctly and did some cursory makeup, Jo
disappeared. The wraith queen was totally believable, allowing for the seam issue and the flesh coloered neck and hands. This is going to
be the best thing I have done, if I don't screw it up.
Rae is proceeding at a breakneck pace, trying to get 2 complete costumes done in a month, the Wraith Queen outfit isn't a copy
of anything specific as there is no uniform appearance for them, so she is using elements of several and creative ideas from the
team. We are also doing a new Duras sister outfit for nekhochan as she stepped in to be the Klingon in the "creating the.." reprise
and is not the same shape as Amada. The makeup for that was really straightforward, something I do all the time. The costume is
a recreation of the movie version of B'etor with some minor changes dictated by time constraints. It should be pretty spectacular!
This is all being done for Marscon! Be there! Aloha!
That ate up way too much time, a fun Diablo clone.
But we did get something done, Rae and I did a ton of work on the Marscon Costuming Demos. We decided we wanted to do a
Stargate Atlantis Wraith Queen lats year. As I did the research, I began to think I didn't have the expertise to do it correctly.
The skin texture, the translucent coloring, and other aspects seemed to suggest a gelatine or silicon makeup. I haven't done those and
don't have the stuff to do them, they would require completely changing/replacing my casting and gluing regiment. But I made
a decision to try it in slush latex, my usual medium.
We cast Jo, our cute little wraith queen and I started the sculpting. My usual finishing techniques, which give a human skin texture,
were not applicable here, so I worked to get the clay model as smooth as possible, then when I removed it from the plaster mold I
grabbed some 400 grit wet sandpaper and smoothed it some more. The latex pour was interesting as the thickness of the mold
varied greatly, some parts should be tissue thin while others are had to be quite thick so it took several sessions and twistings of the mold to get it right.
When I pulled the latex, there was still some roughness, so I hand painted a layer of latex on it to get more smoothness.
The next issue was the translucent nature of the wraith queen skin. This was not a common wraith trait, the queens have
more delicate skin texture. Most fans that try to do this makeup ignore the depth of coloring, it's not an easy thing to accomplish.
What I did was to grab an eyebrow pencil of the right color and draw the veining on the piece before I did any makeup on it.
Then when I was fairly happy with the veining, I coated it with another thin coat of latex to seal the pencil and get som more depth.
The makeup was Rubbermask grease, thinned with castor oil to allow me to do color washes of olive tan tone and green across the
piece, I basically used the green as shadows and the olive tan as highlights. Yup that worked, quite well in fact. After powdering
it down to set it, I brought the gloss level back up with a little KY jelly.
The test application on Jo was somewhat hampered when I found my latex glue had gone south on me, so I wasn't going to get the
perfect seamless look this time, but the magic happened anyway. When we fit the piece correctly and did some cursory makeup, Jo
disappeared. The wraith queen was totally believable, allowing for the seam issue and the flesh coloered neck and hands. This is going to
be the best thing I have done, if I don't screw it up.
Rae is proceeding at a breakneck pace, trying to get 2 complete costumes done in a month, the Wraith Queen outfit isn't a copy
of anything specific as there is no uniform appearance for them, so she is using elements of several and creative ideas from the
team. We are also doing a new Duras sister outfit for nekhochan as she stepped in to be the Klingon in the "creating the.." reprise
and is not the same shape as Amada. The makeup for that was really straightforward, something I do all the time. The costume is
a recreation of the movie version of B'etor with some minor changes dictated by time constraints. It should be pretty spectacular!
This is all being done for Marscon! Be there! Aloha!