I've been asked to make two Sacred Cow masks for our production of Joseph and his Amazing etc..  

 

I am at present sculpting the head in clay, with the intention of casting a two-part plaster mold. After that, I will use that mold to cast a hollow all-around mask that will sit over the actors' head.

 

Well, that's the plan, anyway...

 

Trouble is, I have no idea what kind of material to use for the final mask. It needs to be thin and light, but strong and maybe a bit flexible. It has to be able to be formed in a plaster mold, and easily released. Also, I will need to be able to glue ears and horns on it easily. The whole finished mask will then be spray painted with gold paint.

 

If anyone has done this kind of job before, I'd be very grateful for some clues and hints.

 

Thanks.

 

Kurt 

 

The ONLY things I can see now that you can use would be MASK LATEX.  But again it depends upon what plaster you're using.  As long as it's NOT PLASTER OF PARIS - the WORST, the WEAKEST and the most difficult to work with of all plasters available.  ESSENTIALLY you should use White Hydrocal (or perhaps a white pottery plaster) or Ultracal 30.  BOTH these products are US GYPSUM products but are often available world wide. FINDING them might be an issue but if you are in the US then not a problem.  There are other products outside the US that are used. I'd have to do a bit of research to find the names for you though.

 

At any rate, you can ONLY do something flexible from a rigid plaster mold.  And the ONLY thing sensible and reasonable enough to use IS mask latex made specifically for making masks.  You can cast it rigid enough for it to hold it's shape in most cases - the longer you leave the latex IN the mold (filled) will allow it to get thicker.  Usually a couple of hours or so and then pouring the excess back out into the bucket for later usage, then drying it overnight - 24 hours - will do the trick.  The only other problem will be with painting it gold.  LATEX usually takes rubber cement paint best but creating gold Rubber Cement based paint might not be easy.  YOU CAN use a medium brown color as a base color to paint the latex mask with once made - which will seal the latex mask, and THEN apply the gold spray paint over that.  You might have to touch it up somewhat - as the gold has a tendency to rub off, flake off ANYWAY off of most things you paint with it.  BUT you could seal it after painting with a clear acrylic or lacquer sealor.

 

IF you had done the mold in SILICONE you could run a thin, slush cast resin in the mold and had a rigid casting in a plastic type material but that's not going to be very flexible.  I STILL say the best thing is to do a LATEX mask that's sufficiently thick enough to hold it's shape and be light weight enough to do what you need to do.  THEN you can also even do the horns and ears in latex as well - they actually CAN be then sculpted into the main sculpt and the horns can just be finished to look like whatever you need the horns to look like.....rather than add them after the fact.  LATEX masks can accommodate a wide variety of shapes and just as long as it's run thick enough, it will hold it's shape very nicely.

 

Just remember the rules of thumb - rigid into flexible, and flexible into rigid.  THAT is the ONLY way even with a two part mold....although you could do a one piece as long as you can get your armature and the clay OUT of the mold once cast (a coating of release agent would help in that regard).  Just depends upon what you know how to do and how you plan to do it.

 

If I can be of any help don't hesitate to respond to this message or PM through the system of this board and I can advise you directly.  Good luck

 

TonyDi, Director

aka FXMan

S.A.P.S.E.M.A.

(Society of Amateur and Professional

 Special Effects Makeup Artists)

 

 

 

Having said that, I think I may rethink the mold and do it in silicone. I didn't want to go that route because of cost, but it would be a waste of money to use a lot of plaster, only to ruin the finished product.

 

Hopefully, a resin cast will not damage the silicone too much, as I only need to make two masks.

 

Thanks again.

 

Kurt 

 

Well the silicone is definitely the way to go.  The resin wouldn't damage the silicone especially in only two runs.  BUT it depends upon the silicone.  MOST silicones will survive the heat of resin curing.  BUT you can assure that it's optimum properties are sufficient by buying the proper silicone.  Don't know what you have available to you over in Australia.  Now I DO have access and some friends there who might be able to fill me in as to what's available and/or what they use for similar things in their business.  If you can get products shipped in from the US or if there is an Australian distributor for SMOOTH-ON products - you can use DRAGON SKIN which will serve you as a mold material (you'll still need plaster or plaster bandages as a mother mold to help the otherwise flexible silicone hold it's shape).  OR if you can get SILICONE, INC.'s GI-1000 silicone this is one of the best for this purpose.  There are others and again, most silicones SHOULD stand up to a simple two-run of resin without breaking down.  So you should be good to go in that regard.  Then too, there are many other silicone products you can use from RHODIA as well - and they may be more accessible.  But too, it's a matter of checking with your local special effects makeup suppliers or shops there to see what they use.  I also like POLYTEK's Platgel 10 - which is a 1:1 silicone that is GREAT for both silicone gel-filled appliances as well as a mold making material - without the deadener - which makes it soft for use as prosthetic material.

 

Hope you can find something local but most of the big suppliers in the US will ship worldwide.  Good luck with it.

 

TonyDi

 

 

But they didn't mention overlaying the mold with plaster bandage. That's a better idea than I had. I had planned to cover it with straight plaster. Thanks for the tip.

 

My only remaining problem will be to get a uniform thickness when I slush the resin into the mold. The guy mentioned brushable polyurethane, and that sounds like a good way to go.

 

Cheers,

Kurt

 

I can make the mold of the clay head in Hydrocal. And I can make a slush casting by pouring resin into it and then pouring it out again.

 

BUT, I had another idea, and I thought you could tell me if this is feasible or not. This is just to save money by not buying silicone. 

 

WHAT IF, instead of joining the two halves of the hydrocal mold back together, and then pouring a resin cast inside, what I do instead is, leave the two halves separate, and pour the resin into each one separately? Then, stick the two halves of the mask together later with more resin?

 

 

Now, I know you said the rule is, "rigid to flexible, and vice versa". But the cow head is turning out with no undercuts at all, sort of like a football with dents, and so I think, or hope, that I could carefully prise the fibreglass mask out of the plaster mold, if I use a good release agent.

 

Only thing I don't know is, how rigid would a thin fibreglass mask be? I'm guessing it would have just enough "give" to lift out of the mold with a little bit of persuasion. Or it might just snap with the slightest stress. I don't know.

 

What do you think?

 

Thanks,

Kurt