Facebook

I’m not talking about everyone’s favorite social network but rather a concept taught to me in the early 1980’s by a theatrical make-up professor at Ferris State University. This concept is easy, cheap and best of all something you will find very useful when designing and building your Halloween props especially character/creature based props.

You will need:

A Three Ring Binder
A Three Hole Punch
Plain Paper
Scissors
Glue Sticks
Marker
Old Magazines

Working with papier mache means that pretty much nothing in our house gets thrown away, rather everything is stored until it comes time to turn it into a creepy Halloween prop. Magazines are a great resource for making props because I roll them into tubes to make armatures for bones, fingers or pumpkin stems , all very useful but before you commit them to your next prop take a moment and cut out any inspirational photos. Great inspirational photos are those that show the aging process, wrinkles, make-up schemes from movies, animals or anything else that strikes your fancy.



Once the photos are cut from the magazine I use a glue stick and mount them to the pages in a three ring binder.



To keep everything nice and tidy I created different categories within the book.

Cartoon/Caricature
Males
Females
Children/Youth
Facial Hair
Anatomy
Animals
Robotic/Cyber
Ethnic
Make-Up/Effects
Expressions



The Facebook is very handy when designing or sculpting a prop and while it’s true that you have instant access to images via an internet image search there is an advantage to having a good quality hard copy photo that you can reference any time or any place.

Ask your friends, family or coworkers to save their magazines for you and remember the best sources for good photos come from magazines such as Entertainment Weekly, People, Us and National Geographic but take a pass on the glamour magazines because most of those photos work really hard to cover up all the interesting details such as wrinkles and texture that make the pictures worthwhile.