Posts tagged "paper mache":
Home-made Jason Voorhees mask!
I made this very quick and easy Jason Voorhees mask prop for Halloween 2019. Sure I could’ve bought one for a few bucks, but it’s always more fun to make my own, and I like for all my Halloween decorations and props to have a really rough DIY look to ’em.
Making a paper maché rifle and gun rack prop
I made this paper maché hunting rifle and gun rack as a wall decoration for my summer camp slasher movie Halloween party. It was easy!
I started by doing some image searches for old hunting rifles, to get an idea of the shape and size. I found an image I wanted to use, scaled it up in Photoshop and printed it out as several pages, then taped the pages together and cut the rifle shape out.
Paper maché axe prop
I made this here paper maché axe prop for my 2019 Halloween party — theme to be announced soon! It was really easy; here’s how I did it…
A little background: you may remember I made a way-oversized axe prop a while back for my Axe Man skeleton costume (why would you remember that?). So I’d already learned a few lessons from that project, and I decided to do this one a little differently. Along with being oversized, I intentionally designed that axe to be a little bit exaggerated in its proportions; almost a little cartoony. Read more…
Love 2 make new Friends
It’s June, and that means Halloween preparation is well underway! This here is the very early stages of making a dozen paper maché severed heads!
I’ll post a few pics of the heads in progress below; full article coming soon!
Skull mask with dancing skeletons, part 4
This is part four of my skull mask project with rotating gears and marching skeletons. See parts one, two, and three.
Installing the hard hat
Almost all of my big paper maché masks are mounted on a hard hat. Hard hats are great because they’re cheap and they provide a lot of comfort and stability in a big mask. I usually saw off some parts of the hard hat for each mask depending on its shape, in order to reduce weight and to help the hard hat fit in the mask as well as possible. Read more…
Skull mask with dancing skeletons, part 3
This is part three of my skull mask project with rotating gears and marching skeletons. See parts one and two.
Building the skull shape
In part one I built the whole mechanism with the gears inside of a big circular wall; this would become the outer wall of the skull mask at around ear-level (not my ears, the skull’s ears — uh, wait a minute…). Read more…
Paper maché skull mask with dancing skeletons, part 2
This is part two of my skull mask project with rotating gears and marching skeletons. See part one here.
Dancing skeletons
I drew all 29 of the dancing skeletons at a larger size (about 6″ tall) on sketchbook paper, keeping the designs as simple as possible since I’d be re-painting them by hand at a much smaller size. I scanned ’em and cleaned ’em up in Photoshop, reduced them to about 2″ tall, and printed them out. Read more…
Skull mask with dancing skeletons, part 1
Welcome to the newest installment in my ongoing quest to kill myself with overly complicated art projects! For the 20th anniversary of my skeleton group I decided to make a paper maché skull mask with moving parts! Yikes! The mask has a crank and gears and 29 little skeleton figurines representing my fellow skeletons; a sort of best-of selection of our skull masks and skeleton outfits over the last two decades. Here’s how I made the thing!
Experiment time: paper maché versus plaster cloth
I’ve always used paper maché for my big masks and sculptures, and although I really enjoy the paper maché process it can be very time-consuming. A friend of mine mentioned that she recently tried plaster cloth — aka plaster wrap, plaster of paris strips, craft wrap, etc — and she said it saved her a ton of time. She’d made a couple Halloween masks with the stuff and they definitely looked great; she said she was so happy with the results that she’d never go back to paper maché. Huh! I was skeptical, but intrigued.
Paper maché wolf mask
I made this oversized paper maché wolf mask for Halloween 2018! It was a rush project without a lot of planning, and I took a lot of shortcuts, but it still came out pretty cool (but, uh, way bigger than I was thinking)! Here’s how I made the thing…
Giant witch statue! — part 1
My fiancée and I made this giant 8-foot witch statue for our 2018 Halloween party! This is by far the biggest thing we’ve ever made. It was a great learning experience. Here’s how we did it…
I used my fiancée as a model for the witch! I had her pose with a broom and I took pictures from various sides to use for reference. Read more…
Making a paper maché kitchen knife
I made this paper maché kitchen knife prop to go with one of my evil gingerbread people that I made for Halloween 2018!
I actually did another fake knife project several Halloweens ago, but the goal of that project was to create lots of knives very quickly, and I knew they’d be hanging up high enough that no one would get a good look at them, so they didn’t need to be perfect. Read more…
Paper maché gingerbread men!
I made these evil paper maché gingerbread men (excuse me, gingerbread people!) for Halloween 2018. They were easy!
I started by designing a basic gingerbread man shape in Photoshop so it would fit on a sheet of 20″ x 30″ foam board (aka foam core). I printed it out as several pages, taped ’em together, and cut the shape out.
Another giant paper maché lollipop
I made this giant paper maché lollipop with a spiral design (the one on the left, duh) as part of a group of giant candy decorations for my gingerbread house Halloween party. Here’s how I did it…
Jack o’ lantern lollipop prop
I made this big jack o’ lantern lollipop decoration (the one on the right, duh) for my Halloween party in 2018. It was easy!
I started by drawing the shape of the jack o’ lantern on a piece of foam board and cutting it out with an X-acto knife. I then traced and cut out two more copies, for three total.
Paper maché peppermint decorations for Halloween
I made these oversized paper maché peppermint decorations as part of a set of giant candy props for Halloween 2018. Here’s how I made ’em…
I gathered materials to make three peppermint candies at the same time. I cut out six 12″ circles, two for each candy. See my article about drawing precise circles! I cut the circles out with an X-acto knife.
Making a giant paper maché lollipop
This giant paper maché lollipop was the easiest project in the world! I made this along with a bunch of other types of giant candy for my gingerbread house Halloween party. Here’s how I did it…
I started by searching Amazon for “inflatable ball” and bought the cheapest one I could find in the 15″ – 18″ range; it turned out to be a globe, which is kind of funny because the last time I ordered inflatable balls it was to make two paper maché globes!
Hansel and Gretel light-up oven prop! — part 2
This is part 2 of my paper maché oven prop for Halloween 2018; see part 1 here.
Making the fake flames
Making the fire was an interesting challenge! I needed to find a material that would be translucent enough to diffuse the light properly, and also rigid enough that it could stand up in the oven. One thing I thought of ahead of time was that if I curved the material for the flames, that might help it stand up better; think about holding a piece of paper vertically and curving it a bit so it’s somewhat rigid. Make sense? More on this coming up.
Hansel and Gretel light-up oven prop! — part 1
I’m making this big light-up oven prop for my haunted gingerbread house Halloween party in 2018! It will eventually be a lightweight wall hanging with some battery powered lights and one Hue light inside. So far so good! Here’s what I’ve done so far…
Building the oven base
First I designed the basic shape of the oven in Photoshop — it’s 40″ x 30″; I chose this size out of convenience because it allowed me to base the design on two sheets of 20″ x 30″ foam board connected side by side. Read more…
Giant scary clown Pez dispenser — part 2
This is part two of my giant scary clown Pez dispenser project! See part one here.
Making the evil clown head
For the spooky clown head, I started by cutting a panel of foam board that’s the same size as the top panel of the Pez dispenser body (see part one), to use as a base for the head, in order to ensure the head will fit nicely on the “neck.” I built the rest of the head onto this panel.
About Manning Krull
How to make a 4-foot paper maché alligator
My violin skull mask, Mardi Gras 2015
Three-headed paper maché dragon sculpture