Posts tagged "paper mache":
Paper maché Anubis mask
I made this paper maché Anubis mask for Halloween 2017, for my ancient Egypt-themed Halloween party.
My main goals for this mask were to make something that would be wearable for all or most of my party; I wanted to figure out a way to make a large paper maché mask like this that allowed me to hear very well, see very well, and have good air circulation. I’d never worn a full head mask like this for my Halloween party, and I know from experience with my big Mardi Gras skull masks that seeing and hearing can be a challenge! Read more…
Cleopatra headdress
I made this feathered Cleopatra headdress for my lovely fiancée for our ancient Egypt Halloween party in 2017. I neglected to take any pictures of this thing while it was in progress! I was so rushed in the last week leading up to Halloween I just didn’t have time to document my process. But I’ll explain how I made it.
Making a foam board Egyptian sarcophagus
I made this standing sarcophagus for Halloween 2017 — basically a big selfie booth! Here’s how I did it…
I started by planning out the dimensions of the sarcophagus in Photoshop. The red and cyan boxes represent 30″ x 20″ sheets of foam board, and the grid is square inches, with dotted lines to denote feet. I don’t have a Photoshop template for this stuff; I just wing it and lay out and measure whatever parts I think are going to be important. You can see that my design was 6’2″. I built the sarcophagus at this size and later decided to add three more inches at the bottom, for a total of 6’5″. Read more…
Paper maché ancient Egyptian canopic jars
I made these canopic jars as decorations for my Halloween 2017 party. Canopic jars are a set of four jars with the heads of Egyptian gods on top, and they were used during the mummification process to store various organs. I’ll let Wikipedia explain more about them rather than try to write about them myself. I wanted to make these for our ancient Egypt Halloween party to use as decorations in our mummification scene. Read more…
Paper maché pickaxe and shovel decorations
I made these here pickaxe and shovel decorations for the entryway into our Egyptian tomb Halloween party. They were super quick and easy! I didn’t need to make them sturdy at all, since they were just for display, and they only needed to last one night, so I was able to cut a lot of corners! I didn’t take any photos of my steps (I was in a huge hurry for all these latest Halloween projects!), but they’re pretty easy to follow; check it out…
Paper maché scarab beetle decorations
I made these very quick and easy paper maché scarab beetle decorations for my ancient Egypt Halloween party. They were a breeze! Check it out…
I started with these plastic bowls from the dollar store — four for a buck! I cut one of the bowls in half to make the head and back end of the scarab beetle. One half would be the head, and I cut the other half in halves again to create the division between the wing coverings.
Paper maché Necronomicon sculpture — part 2
This is part two of two of my paper maché demonic book project. See part one here.
Making the 3d “BOO!” logo
To create the “BOO!” logo in the mouth, I started out by printing several copies of the logo (designed by my friend Jon Morris) at the actual size; I’d planned out my sketch for the face along with the logo in Photoshop so I’d be able to plan all of these parts to fit together the way I wanted.
Haunted book paper maché sculpture for BOO! Halloween Stories — part 1
I made this paper maché haunted book sculpture for the cover of the 2017 edition of BOO! Halloween Stories — a comics anthology that I’ve been doing with my friend Jon Morris off and on for about fifteen years. The cover is usually just a regular illustration, but this year Jon had the idea to have me sculpt a demonic book — you know, like the Necronomicon or whatever — and then photograph that for the cover of the digital comic. This was an insanely fun project; here’s how I did it!
Three-headed paper maché dragon sculpture! — part 2
This is part two of two of Isabella the dragon! See the first part here.
The sea serpent’s bodies and heads and fins and other various parts were done, but I had to do some other steps before assembling them. It made sense to switch gears here and work on the pedestal and tray area, to figure out how they’ll fit with the dragons.
Three-headed paper maché dragon sculpture! — part 1
This was an incredibly fun commission piece I got to work on! I was contacted by a member of the Crewe of Columbus, a Mardi Gras crewe in Mobile, Alabama, and asked to make a sculpture of one of their parade floats — a very charming three-headed sea serpent(/dragon) named Isabella. The sculpture would have a serving tray area on top and be the centerpiece on one of the buffet tables at the group’s annual ball. The client sent me tons of photos of the Isabella float and asked for a sculpture that was approximately 40″ long from head(s) to tail(s). I couldn’t wait to get started!
Magic the Gathering cosplay — Avatar of Woe: scythe
After I finished the Avatar of Woe’s helmet, I moved on to her scythe.
I drew the shape of the Avatar of Woe’s scythe blade onto foam board and cut it out with an X-acto knife.
Magic the Gathering cosplay — Avatar of Woe: helmet
Another fun commission! This client wanted to cosplay the Avatar of Woe card from Magic the Gathering, and she hired me to make this custom horned helmet and scythe.
Making the basic helmet shape
Paper maché baby chicks! — part 2
This is part two of two of my paper maché baby chicks project; see part one here.
Making the chicks’ legs and feet
This was a fun challenge: I wanted the legs and feet to be hollow and removable, so when my client received them she could add a lot of coins in the legs/feet for weight and then insert them back into the body, so the chicks would have a nice solid heavy base. Without this weight, the chicks would probably fall over, and if I added the weight permanently while making the sculptures, the shipping cost for the chicks would go way up. Read more…
Paper maché baby chicks! — part 1
Another fun commission project: three big paper maché baby chicks!
I was contacted by a wonderful new client at Canadian Crane who commissioned three sculptures of these cartoon baby chicks that their company has in some of their marketing materials. They sent me a pic and I started planning…
Paper maché cupcake sculpture!
I was commissioned to make this cute paper maché cupcake sculpture, and it was a lot of fun! I’m so used to doing monsters and skeletons and stuff, this was a really neat diversion. The cupcake was to be used as a decoration in a tradeshow booth with a couple signs on it with logos and messaging, and the whole thing is painted in the client’s brand colors. Here’s how I made it!
Twin paper maché skull masks
A new project, a new experiment! I received a custom order for a pair of twin paper maché skull masks; the request was to base them on the design of my first Mardi Gras skull mask and keep them more or less identical, and there was a very short timeline to get them both done. So, I decided to try a reusable base! This was a first for me.
Luckily I have that article about how I made that first Mardi Gras skull five years ago; otherwise I probably wouldn’t remember how I did it! Of course it would be impossible to get these new ones exactly the same as that one, but I’d do my best to get them close. Read more…
Wolf skull mask — part 4; making the ears
This is part 4 of my paper maché wolf skull mask; see part 1 here.
I wanted to give my wolf skull some ears; I had this idea because in researching wolf skulls I realized that basically all carnivorous mammals’ skulls look almost indistinguishable, and the main different from one mammal head to another is the ears. So my hope is that adding ears will help people recognize my skull as a wolf (or at least a dog! I’ll settle for a dog!). Read more…
Wolf skull mask — part 3; painting, etc.
Painting the wolf skull
Before painting the wolf skull mask, I applied a coat of gesso over the whole thing. Gesso is a thick white paint-like substance that can help smooth out any imperfections in your paper maché surface. In this case it really helped smooth out the teeth in particular.
Paper maché wolf skull mask — part 2
What big teeth you have!
Hooboy, the teeth were one of the hardest and most time consuming parts of this whole mask project! Like I mentioned in part 1, the four big fangs were made out of foam insulation tubing and masking tape; those were pretty easy. I tried a few different methods for the other teeth; I’ll spare you my failures and just show you where I ended up…
Paper maché wolf skull mask — part 1
I made this here paper maché wolf skull mask for Mardi Gras 2017! It’s got detachable ears, a movable jaw, and it’s one of my most lightweight and comfortable skull masks yet. It was a lot of fun to make; here’s how I did it!
About Manning Krull
How to make a 4-foot paper maché alligator
My violin skull mask, Mardi Gras 2015