It was Halloween time once again, and that meant it was costume time. Time to come up with a good costume for my annual work party, where they give out sweet prizes like flat screen TV’s, laptops, iTouches, etc.
After the past few years, where I went all-out and made ridiculous, unwieldy costumes (only to come in behind the folks who did suck-up costumes that looked like products we sell - but at least I’m not bitter!!), it was time to hang up the nonsense and do something fun. Something easy. But more importantly; something that was easy to move around in! Mobility!...and comfort. Comfort was also something I was looking to achieve this year (but I only kinda half-succeeded) on that. Let’s see how I made out, shall we?
Ok, first off, the plan: I was going to be a zombie this year. I know, I know; not the most original idea, but I planned on really knocking it out of the park. Hopefully the judges would be impressed, but only time would tell on that.
Cindy has a lot of experience with makeup, and had actually done a Zombie walk last year. It might even have been the pics of her that inspired me to do the zombie costume in the first place, but I don’t remember exactly when I made that costume decision, so who knows. Anyway! I did a lot of research on-line…which basically consisted of Googling tons of zombie pics to get ideas on clothing and makeup. Something else I stumbled upon; face prosthetics!! These are things which you glue to your face to make it look like you’ve got horrible tears, or missing flesh, etc. I found one company that sold amazing prosthetics, but it was already Oct 4th, so I wasn’t sure if I’d receive it in time if I ordered one (they were in England). I emailed them to check, and they assured me that I’d have it long before Hallolween. Sweet! Let’s do this thing! I plunked down my money, and then turned my attention to other things.
Eye contacts! Nothing helps convey a creepy look like a good pair of costume eye contacts. I opted for a set of bright blues. Not the pretty “oh, what pretty blue eyes you have” kind of blue. Nah, I went with “what the hell is wrong with your eyeballs!?!?!?” kind of blue. Combine that with a nice flared stare, and you’re guaranteed to hold someone’s attention. (As an aside; these were ordered from a company, also in England, and I had these in a week. Why is this important? Stay tuned.)
Ok, so now I’ve got contacts and a face prosthetic on their way. Cindy and I made a couple trips to Halloween specialty stores to pick up specific makeup and costume accessories, and things were looking good. Oh yeah – I’d also ordered a few different kinds of theatre blood. This was the good stuff!
The only other thing needed would be clothing. I figured any self-respecting zombie would have come from a fresh grave. None of this “I was on my way to the store and got bitten by a passing infected person.” Nope, I was going to be authentic. I was dead to begin with, and when I became infected, I had to fight my way out of the coffin and then up through 6’ of dirt and soil. But that meant I’d been buried, right? And if I’d been buried, then I’d have been buried in a suit! So where to get a good suit that I wouldn’t mind then shredding? Luckily, Building 19 had a special on some (ahem) wonderful suits. $8.00!!! I tried finding a dark colored one, but the only size that fit, wound up being a tan color. After thinking about it for a bit, I realized this would probably work even better, as a lighter color would show the dirt and blood better. Sweet! Add to this a dirty shirt ($5) and a rather decent tie ($9), and I was off and running.
Back home, it was time to dirty things up. On-line suggestions said to use scissors to hack slices into the cloth, sandpaper to roughen up the overall outfit, and lighters to burn holes into the material, which could then be worried into bigger tears and such. That all sounded well and good, but when it came time to implement these ideas, I made an interesting discovery. My suit was made out of Kevlar. (No, not really. C’mon…Kevlar?!? I’m just making an exaggeration to prove a point!) I first tried hand sanding the material, but it had no effect. Which I found to be quite surprising. I’m holding large-grit sandpaper, and I’m scraping it across this material that feels quite soft in my hands. But it’s having no effect? What gives?
I then resorted to putting on the suitcoat and pressing backward into the brick wall in my porch. The result? A barely noticeable bit of pilling. Oy!! I even tried dragging it fiercely back and forth over the rough edges of the bricks, but still; nothing much. This was going to be impossible!!
And then it hit me…
I’d been cleaning out my garage the previous weekend and had found a 20-yr old electric hedge trimmer. I’d plugged it and found that it still worked. Hmmm…ok Mr. Suit, let’s see how you hold up against that!!
Amazingly enough, we had success! Ok, so the suit put up a real fight and I literally had to run it back and forth through the teeth many, many times, before achieving the look I wanted. But come on – this is a hedge trimmer, and the suit is only cloth, right? Right??? (I’m still not sure…) Anyway, after many attempts, I did succeed in finally getting a nice, tattered look.A funny side note; when I was doing the shredding with the trimmer, I got a bit carried away on the pants, dragging them through the slashing blades with such abandon that I didn’t pay attention to what I was cutting. Only afterward, when I was trying them on and went to zip up the fly…and the zipper came off in my hands…did I realize that I’d shredded a bunch of the teeth off the fly. Whoops! But some industrial adhesive Velcro saved the day, and I was back in business.
Ok, so the attire aspect is all set. Now I just need that prosthetic to get here. Actually, I’ll save the time and aggravation of the whole story. Suffice to say that while I’d been promised I’d have it in-hand with plenty of time to spare, I didn’t receive it until Thursday afternoon – the day before the party. Talk about sweating it out. Anyway, here you go (it's supposed to be turned sideways, but I can't get the pic to load that way - not sure why.)
Doesn’t look like much, does it? Ahh, but after you stay up late the night before the party and you paint it up to look like shredded flesh, it’s farkin’ awesome! (I should have taken a pic of how it looked afterward, but it was late, and I was tired.)
Which brings us to the morning of the party! First things first; put the contacts in, then worry about the makeup. Otherwise, you’re going to mess things up. Because for someone like me, who doesn’t wear things in their eyes…ever…it takes a bit of time to convince your eyeball that it’s ok for your finger to stick something foreign onto it.
Once that was done, it was time for makeup. “MAKEUP!!” I tell ya, it was quite difficult to get all the makeup done. A long, tedious process which, for the life of me, I don’t know if I could do again. To sit there, for almost two hours, while poor Cindy did all the work. Nothing less than sheer determination got me through it. :-D
Oh yeah – I’d also found (on-line) a method for creating open wounds that looks great. Basically, you pick a spot where you want a wound to go, then apply liquid latex, then a thin sheet of tissue paper. Let it dry, and repeat, for a total of 5 layers. Let the whole thing dry, then tear out some of the middle and push the sides outward to give the appearance of a gaping wound. Paint the inside, let dry, then cover with mineral oil to keep it looking ‘wet/bloody’, and color the outer edges to match your skin tone.
And with that; here’s the final product! (It’s tough to make out, but I did that open wound thing on my left hand - you can see it sticking out below the arm of the suit.)
Here’s a closeup of my face…
And here’s a closeup of me doing a shot of Capt’n in the afternoon, when I’d come back to pick Cindy up to go to the after-party.
Here’s a shot of Cindy’s costume. She was “Little Red Riding Wolf”, an awesome take on the old fable; Little Red Riding Hood killed the wolf when it attacked her (and she carries it’s head in her basket), but she suffered bites and deep scratches during the attack. Unfortunately, the wolf was actually a werewolf, and Red is now beginning to turn. How cool is that!
Here are some close-ups of Cindy’s makeup. You can see her werewolf teeth in the second one…
And here’s our trusty neighborhood zombie, taking the Jeep to a Halloween party. (Loved the looks we got from people as we drove by!!)
What a cute couple!
Hey look, here I am at the party. Kinda looks like the same pose I had when I was doing the shot of Capt’n. Oh yeah, ya see; the prosthetic looked awesome, but I really wasn’t able to open my mouth much at all (for fear of tearing the prosthetic off). Which made eating and drinking (all day long) nearly impossible. But where there’s a will, there’s a way. (Or should I say; where there’s a small necked bottle, there’s a way.)
The winners were announced and I wound up coming in 8th. Not too shabby. Most of the folks ahead of me were the usual product-themed costumes, but hey; good for them. I walked away with a 32-gig iTouch. I’m told it’s a pretty sweet prize, but I know nothing about them. (I’m such a tech neophyte!)
The next day, we had plans to attend a few big Halloween parties in RI, but with the storm that came in, we wound up staying local hitting a local party at the last minute. Instead of putting the face prosthetic on again, I just opted for dabbing a bunch of blood around my mouth, to look like I’d just left the brains buffet table. It still looked pretty good, and there was much revelry and laughter – which I could participate in this time, as I was able to move my mouth!
Here’s a shot from Saturday’s party;
And there you have it; 2011 Halloween costume. It was fun to do, and I enjoyed freaking people out. A number of people told me they couldn’t even look at me, I looked too gross. (Ha! That’s nothing I haven’t heard plenty of times before!) Although, I was also told I looked good with blue eyes. Maybe I should go for this look more often?
Happy Halloween!!!
Fright Hard, Get (scared) Glances!
No comments:
Post a Comment