Thread: Shhh....Hell gas station.

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Whew! Barely made it! here it is. My final entry is called the Hell Gas Station.

This is the story behind the scene (details of the project):
I live in the San Francisco Bay Area. When I moved here a year ago I was horrified by the gas prices...little did I know... However, in the past few months those prices have skyrocketed and have become the subject of my worst nightmares. Those bad dreams are filled with Hexxon and Hell gas stations. The prices are quite costly as they include body parts. I have tried my best to recreate one of these gas stations that appear all too frequently in my dreams.



One picture of its creation:
The picture shows a foam skull I used for another prop last year. The wood frame of the pump and chicken wire used to form the "shoulder" area.



Here is the picture with the local paper dated today! 8-12-2008



Another paper view:


Details of the project
I used a combination of recycled props from last year, left over materials from prior house projects, papier mache and bought new materials. I will post construction of the project later.

The list of supplies and cost as best I can gather
1 foam skull (from last year's prop): $5.00
1 fake eyeball (from last year's prop): $0.25
1 1/2" PVC cross fitting: $0.90
1 1/2" PVC tube about 16": $0.30
Pieces of chicken wire: free with rented house
Leftover pieces of redwood from raised bed project: $4.00
Week's worth of newspaper for papier mache: $2.00
Cellulose insulation for papier mache: $0.25
Pint of glue for papier mache: $3.00
Insulation foam: $0.75
Foil tape: $1.50
Vacuum hose: $4.00
Pressed board for sign: $4.00
Frame for sign: $12.00
Photo paper and ink jet ink for sign: $6.00
Lindberg skull teeth: $0.50
Latex paint: Free with house rental
Car: Free with payment of car loan
Aluminium tubine 3/16": $7.00

Total cost of project: $51.45

It was fun!

This is my first time at trying papier mache so I am sure there are better ways to do this. Nevertheless, I had a lot of fun so I shall share and hope to learn more.

Armature: The box
To make the armature I took left over redwood fence slats and screwed them together to make a box. I screwed 4 slats of spare wood (free with rented house) to that box and "framed" them on top with masking tape.



Armature: The head and shoulders
I used a foam skull from last year and sawed the mouth open. Then I hot glued it to a piece of 1/2" schedule 40 PVC pipe and connected it to a PVC cross fitting. Then I took chicken wire and attached it to the box to form the "shoulder" area of the prop. The PVC was attached to the chicken wire with plastic ties. (My helper had a very good time with those). The eye was hot glued into the skull last year.



The armature: ready for paper
I covered the open areas of the box with chicken wire. The arms were made with 3/16" aluminium tubing to give them shape (sorry no pic). Plastic vaccum tubing was slipped on top of the tubing to simulate the gas pump hoses. (seems like my helper was trying to make the same face as the hell pump.) I ran out of chicken wire so I finished covering the gaps with packaging tape.

Ready for the strips!
After I finished the armature, I covered it up with newspaper and masking tape. (The helper was fascinated with the drill.)



Then three layers of strips of newspaper dipped in mache paste made with 1 part flour, 1 part white glue, 2 parts water and salt were placed on the armature.



The shell
While the strips were drying, I took cardboard and drew the outline of a shell on it.



To make the "ribs" of the shell I crumpled newspaper and taped it in to six teardrop shapes. I taped the shapes together in a fan shape and hot glued/taped the fan onto the shell.



The shell armature was then taped onto the pump prop.

Talk about an original idea, how creative is this. I think he came out great & I love the story behind you creating him!! Bravo Girl!

the Muffster

It is time to sculpt details onto the prop. To do so, I went to 3 different Hope Depots in search of cellulose insulation. Third one was the charm! Anyways, I mixed the papier mache paste and added ground chalk to it. I do not know what it does, but I am supposed to add it to the mixture. Then I added the cellulose insulation to the paste and made a gooey mess but it felt good in the fingers. Anyway, the insulation went on the shell and on the edges of the pump to define them.



I also took facial tissues and dipped them in the paste and put them on the skull and shoulder area to give it a skin-like or wrinkled texture. Then I left the sculpture dry. It took several days (the cold, wet foggy days of SF did not cooperate with the drying process).



Those are my dogs in the back. Kahlua (the brown devil dog) and Tembleque (white fluffy dog), but they were looking more like s'mores on that evening.

My gods it is REAL ! Shell's Hell Gas. A nightmare ! Very timely scary scene plistumi !
Not only timely for the scary content, but timely for entry to the contest ! I like your scene.
Alot of creative and hard work, and for your first paper mache WOW Excellent. Love your Helper...you might say she is fascinated with the drill....but I think she was in scary mode herself. Good luck in the contest !

To make the gas pump handles I took some 3/16 aluminum tubing, wrapped it in newspaper, masking taped it, and placed it in insulation foam.



I then wrapped the foam with aluminum foil tape. I left the tip bare because that is the end that would go into the plastic vacuum tube.



The insulation foam goes into the vacuum tube.



A smaller piece of insulation foam is cut, then sliced into thirds lengthwise and wrapped in aluminum tape.



The smaller wrapped piece is hot glued to the larger piece after it has been stuffed and hot glued into the vacuum tube. The smaller piece is bent and glued in a U-shape.

Muffy, thanks! If was definitely fun making the prop. The nice thing is that it is going to snowball into my Halloween display of the year. I just got the plans for a PVC ship and I shall call it the Hexxon-Valdez. Turns out I live on a street called Valdez. (oh, I love the puns!). Dick Cheney will make his appearance as Dr Evil at the helm of the Hexxon... Any ideas will be accepted. I am going to try to get my neighbors in on it too. Oh so little time.

Cylonfrogqueen, the helper loved the drill, but she liked the mache mess even more.

The painting was relatively easy. Well, the big parts. The box is yellow, the shell is yellow, the edges, the head and shoulder areas have a red base, and the display back ground is white. I used water based latex paint because that is what my landlord had left abandoned in a basement corner for me to discover. I masked the vacuum hoses and the eye to protect from the paint.



I then dry brushed yellow highlights on the head/shoulder area and added black to the mouth and sides of the head. Also, I had some left over teeth from Lindberg skulls (thank you RockBottomCemetery for those skulls), so I glued them onto this prop.



I then went to photoshop and made myself a hell gasoline logo. I used a devil design from deviantart and the font I used was Pakenham at 275pt.



I took the design, printed it and cut the letters out to make a stencil. (sorry no pic). With the stencil I drew the letters onto the shell. Before painting the letters, I dry brushed red paint on the grooves and edges of the cell. Then I painted the letters.



To make the $$$$ display, I also went to Photoshop and drew a design trying to simulate those numbers of yonder that were on a dial. I used a font called Rough Typewriter. The font in blue letters is Century Gothic.



Then I printed the design on inkjet window decals that I had lying around for a looong time (~5 years, can't believe they worked). The decal would give it a shine as if it were behind glass. The decal does not stick to the latex paint, so I just hot glued it.



Finally, the head's teeth were just too white, so I rubbed a little of Minwax wood stain to age and rot them out.

The price sign was relatively easy to make thanks to , Powerpoint, Photoshop and Adobe Acrobat. Basically I took the little devil from before, drew a shell with fire underneath it and made the prices. The fonts I used were Century Gothic for the prices and Pakenham for the "hell gasoline". I am sure there is a better way to do this, but this is how I did it:

1) Drew shell/hell logo with devils and fire on Photoshop and saved it as a *.png file.
2) Created a huge slide (36" x 18") on Powerpoint to look like the final design. I saved this design as a *.pdf file.
3) Because the final size of the print is 36" x 18", I had to print it on tiles but Powerpoint does not do this. I opened the *.pdf file I created on Adobe Acrobat and then told it to "tile large pages" on the print dialog box that came up.

The design printed on 10 glossy photo pages which I cut and pasted together. The outside frame is a type of cardboard that measures 42" x 24". I spray painted the edges black and screwed it onto a metal sign post. I then glued the sign onto the cardboard.

That is it!



The final product is this:



Another view: