Thread: Props made from foam & latex...

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I am looking to start the hobby this winter here in Pittsburgh of creating foam props covered in latex & painted into some wonderful warped brings. I am on a limited budget as most probably are. One idea I had was to shave my body & get a swimming cap & goggles & strip down to some slicked & lube myself entirely in Vaseline. At this point I would have someone spray me with spray foam insulation where I stad in some decent position that would be some what easy to maintain. One sprayed I would stand in front of a large fan to dry faster.
Now, for some creative folks with more experience prop building, is this feasible or could I get jacked up?

I guess as I type this out I think doing an arm or leg would be best to test the process.

Do a web search on "life casting", there's a better way of making a mold of yourself. You could also search Craigslist for used mannequins, and pull a mold off one of them.

You dont want to cover urself in vaseline. My friend did it for a 50s school dance wayyyy back in the olden yrs. He just slicked his hair back w/it. He said he spent the next week shampooing his hair like 6 times each nite until he finally got it out. He said he would never do that again. I wouldnt want to wear a vasiline suit for a week until you take your 100th shower w/dish soap. Or ruin your towels/washcloths etc, trying to wipe it off. There are much better ways than that to make props, although I give you an A for offering yourself up as a prop mold lol. I thought about doing it w/old clothes/duct tape then cutting the clothes off. Its just easier to make life size props out of newspaper or bag stuffed plastic bags/duct tape and then add some beat up clothes for effect.

I could definitely see how the Vaseline could be a pain to get out, however you're not going to need to use globs of it. Just a thin film, and that should come off with an auto mechanics hand cleaner. I agree that the stuffed clothes dummies are easier, but there is nothing realistic about them. Duct tape dummies are better, but still you don't get any exposed body parts (like arms or legs) they rely on long pants and sleeves to cover the duct tape. What do you do if you need a victim in short sleeves or a dress?

I've been life-casting for years and I've heard a lot of horror stories... Plaster on skin, no release agent, silicone that didn't cure... Stuff like that.
But you win the prize Dr. Phibes!

DO NOT try to encase yourself in spray foam! Your post shows that you don't even know what spray foam insulation is made of!
First, it won't work. You won't create a usable mold of yourself.
Second, just how would you get out? Razor knives?
Third, spray foam, (1 part polyurethane), doesn't dry. It cures using the moisture in the air.
And lastly, if the foam is strong enough to be used for a full body mold, it'll be awfully difficult to inhale.

Do as Pat-F said and learn to life-cast.
Then find an assistant, you'll need help with bigger casts.
Buy the right materials or you won't get the results you want and you could hurt someone.
This is not a cheap process. But if you make good molds, you can get many, many castings from them. So...
Learn to make good molds.
Start small. A full body cast is very difficult. Start with a hand, work your way up to a face-cast, then try a head-cast.

Just remember... You can do it cheap, fast, or right.

Ditto what Lurks in the Shadows says. You have no idea what dangerous chemicals are in those products. Even vaseline is a petrolium bi-product. I wouldnt slather it all over my body, not even in a tiny film. I would use olive oil first bc its more natural.
As for spray foam has all sorts of danger/warnings on the label! Your not supposed to even touch it w/ur fingers, not to mention the smell of it. Your not supposed to breathe it either. It has dangerous/caustic chemicals in it. You could actually be poisoned putting that all over ur body. But it might get you in the evening's news as for 'look what local person did' as they were rushed to the ER for poisoning/decon.
If it has to be a life mold, there are books on how to do that safely.

I can't agree with what Lurks in the shadows's said more strongly.

I work in the film industry, and have done a lot of lifecasting. When it goes wrong, it can get extremely dangerous. There are a number of concerns with your idea of using spray foam: The fumes, heat from the chemical reaction, being encapsulated and it taking hours to free you, etc. The list of risks could go on for days.

If what you need is a full body lifecast (the most difficult type to do), find a professional who has performed many. We can be easily bribed with free beer or shiny objects. You can also learn yourself, but an unsupervised first-time full-body lifecast is still risky.

If what you need is a dummy body, there is a safe, cheap, and easy solution. The only downside is you don't get fine surface detail, but you do get an accurate body form.

1: Have your subject wear tight, formfitting clothing. (unitard, tights, etc)
2: Wrap their body in cellophane, tight enough to prevent wrinkles and accurately show their body shape, but not so tight as to cut off circulation. Be especially careful around the head, and do not cover the nose or mouth.
3: Wrap their body in one or two layers of duct tape. This provides the structure for the body form, and the cellophane will prevent the tape from sticking to your subject. Be especially careful around the head, and do not cover the nose or mouth.
4: Carefully cut down the subjects back, back of the head, back of the arms, and back of the legs with scissors. Cut through both the cellophane and duct tape, leaving the subject and their clothing intact.
5: With the subject released, they should be able to slide out of the body form.
6: Stuff the body form with any material (newspaper, foam, old fabric, etc.) and seal the seams up with more duct tape. At this stage you can also insert an articulated armature, wire, wood, chains, etc to provide internal support/pose-ability/strength.

This type of dummy is a great starting point for creating props, or using as a life form for creating costumes or creature suits that are custom fit to an actor.

Hope that helps, and be safe!

VexFx, nice write up. I've read about duct tape dummies, and thought there could be a better way. What I've seen hasn't been very realistic. When you do a life cast, how durable is the mold? I've been toying with the idea of a library of molds that members of the forum here could borrow or rent for a small fee. I just don't have the skill or resources to create it right now.

A duct tape dummy will give you a good basic human form, but no real detail. It's a good starting point, but far from a finished prop. Though you can put some clothes, gloves, and a mask on one and have a passable prop. The accurate anatomy they produce really sells as a real person. Often many dummies are ever-so-slightly off, and never feel real. Their value lies in how fast and inexpensive they are to create, and their accurate anatomical proportions.

Mold durability depends on a number of factors:

Mold size.
Mold material type. (silicone, stone, fiberglass, etc)
Number of pieces to the mold. (2 piece, 3 piece, etc)
Type of material being cast into the mold. Molds that are being used to run silicone or gelatine will last longer than those used to cast something like foam latex.
Type of object being molded. Objects with a lot of undercuts can put the mold under a lot of stress when de-molding. This shortens mold life.
How may casts the mold is expected to produce.
Detail expectations. Over time, some detail will be lost. Your threshold for what is acceptable can determine how many casts get run.
Storage conditions.

With molds that require a long life, you can spend extra time in the molding process to make them more durable (more keys, more reinforcements on the mother mold, seam reinforcements on your glove/detail mold, handles, pry holes, etc.), but this often adds a lot of time and cost.

Typically molds are not kept for a super long time, because they take up valuable shop space. Once a project is over, the molds get destroyed or chopped up for filler. Now some "utility molds" (a nicely sculpted hand, a good generic head, etc.) will be kept until the mold no-longer produces acceptable castings. For example, a good head mold can run a clay casting that can be used as a starting point for a new sculpture, saving a lot of time.

We've made some molds last for years, while others only last a couple weeks.

A full body life cast would produce a very large, heavy mold. Large/heavy molds are solid and logically more durable, but more prone to being dropped (it happens), which greatly shortens their lifespan.

For a full body I would typically mold the exposed surfaces (those not covered by the character's costume) individually (hands/arms, head, chest), and then do a basic mold on the body (any simple method will do), and combine the resulting castings to create the final body. This way you can retain the important details with smaller silicone molds, and do your big low-detail molds in something less expensive. It all really depends on what is expected of the final product.

Hope that helps!