[Terra]

Here's a quick tutorial on how to make some realistic eyeballs. After a while I won't be able to update this thread with lessons learned so please go to my album for the latest corrections and updates: Halloween Forum - Terra's Album: Tutorial: Realistic Eyeballs

This all started because I needed an eye color that I couldn't find available on the web so I made my own. Since I was in Photoshop, I made 90 more. heh. Okay, here goes the tut.... get your wine out

The Skeleton Store sells these nifty clear eyeballs. Here's a picture of them inside a skull and a link to the website where you can get them. They are $4 a pair: Pair of Blue Eyeballs at Skeleton Store | Plastic Skulls and Bones, Skeleton Props

Unfortunately, the color is wrong for the prop I was building. Fiddling around with it, I made a neat discovery. The pupil pops out. Cool!

On the back of the pupil is the painted-on blue iris. So, I carefully scratched it off trying not to scratch the clear plastic.

So, off to Photoshop I went. I made a High Resolution .jpg file of 90 normal and monster eyes. They are a collection of human, reptile, bird, fish, mammal and custom weird ones (monster) I found and compiled from taxidermy sites and other pictures of pupils on the web (credit to Eye Makers for some of them). The available file size is a perfect fit for the inside of the pupil on the Skeleton Store eyes. If you want them bigger than that, I still have the original Photoshop file so I could send you the file of just the eye you want and you could resize it yourself.

If you have a web site and can put up 'Terra's Halloween Eyes .jpg' on the internet in it's full resolution and size, that would be GREAT! I will link your site to this tutorial. EDIT: Whoo Hoo!!!! Thanks to Larry you can now download the file:

http://www.halloweenforum.com/special/TerrasHalloweenEyes.jpg

Here you can see the cornea sitting over one of the pupils on the paper. The eye on the left is the original pupil that came with the eye.

You will also notice that I painted the white of the eye. Further in this tutorial I explain how I did that.





Continued next post......





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[Terra]

I am using the very light green/white eye for the prop I am building. Cut the pupils out of the printed sheet of paper. I took a Sharpie and rimmed the outside edge of the pupils to give it a dark ring. The model I am basing my prop on had that dark ring on her light eyes. I think it looks pretty good. Place the cut-out pupils into the hole in the eye and pop the cornea back in place.

For my eyes, the cornea didn't quite reset back in place and so I didn't trust that they were gonna stay in there. I got out some of my thinned clear gloss medium paint and carefully painted a rim of the gloss paint around the edge of the cornea and the white of the eye to hold it in place. I guess you could try glue too. I was afraid of doing that in case it hazed out the cornea.

This picture also shows the final paint job I did to get the clear part of the eyes more white and more shiny.

For giggles, I put a few of my 'Halloween Eyes' in the eyeballs.

The scale of the eyeball is slightly bigger than my own eye.

I can see!

Okay, if you want to paint the clear part of the eyeball to a realistic white color, mix white acrylic paint with gloss medium and a little water. Do about three coats. You want the paint to add subsequent translucent coats of white to keep that 'jelly' look to the eye.

With a thin brush, I painted in some blood red color for the veins.

There is a yellow cast to an eye so I mixed a very translucent blend of yellow and white and painted it from the back to the front but not going all the way to the pupil.

Then using just your gloss medium thinned with some water, do about three coats of clear to give your eyeball a wet look.

Thanks for looking at my tutorial. Now, go have some wine!




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[mickkell]

Nice work terra,very helpful.

 

[nightrideproductions]

Wow, much better colors and texture than the other pupils. I love 'em. I'd love to put them under the Resources link on my site. Ill send you a pm.

 

[Mr_Chicken]

Oooo....this might be exactly what I need! What's the (approximate) diameter of the eyeball?

 

[Terra]

Thank you Nightride! I sent it off to you

Mr. Chicken, they are 1" in diameter.

 

[Frankie's Girl]

These are just gorgeous! Beautiful work and thanks so much for making them!

 

[Terra]

Thank you to those that offered to post my .jpg picture. I found if I saved it to my files and then brought it up in my picture viewer and then printed it, it came out the correct size (fills a whole sheet of paper). If I just printed it from looking at it on the internet it was too big. Dunno why, these things confuse me.

Here's the link and thanks http://www.halloweenforum.com/special/TerrasHalloweenEyes.jpg

 

[larry]

That is amazing. I added it to the forum also:
http://www.halloweenforum.com/special/TerrasHalloweenEyes.jpg

 

[creepycathy]

looks great!!

 

[Ghost of Spookie]

I've seen the clear blue eyes in the past and passed on them because they weren't what I was looking for. Now after seeing what you did, I'm seeing the possibilities in a new light. Beautiful job as always. Thanks for making the high res images available too. Great tutorial.

 

[Raised by Wolves]

Great Info!!

 

[voodoo willy]

Sweet!!! Great TUT.

 

[Baron Samedi]

Another great tutorial...
Thanks Terra!!

 

[Terra]

Thanks everyone. You are the best

 

[1971Mach351]

absolutely amazing Terra, you inspire me to take on more and more great projects.

 

[Terra]

Thanks '71.




I was asked in a PM if the light from an LED would emit through the eyeball. I thought to myself, "Good question!" So, here are the results:

In the first picture you will see the little prop I used that had some LEDS in it (was the only LED I could get my hand on). The second picture shows that the light shows the eyeball off well and enough light goes through the eye itself to make the eyeball glow red.

I was curious to see how much light emitted through the eyeball itself. So, I wrapped it up in cloth so no light would go through the sides. Glows pretty good

The back of mine is painted so if you cut out a little hole in the back I bet it would put out a whole lot more light, by the way.


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[DawnDead]

Terra, your work is always amazing!

 

[Lurks in the shadows]

Suuure... make a bunch of much better looking iris prints available right after I make a couple of eyes!

Guess I call them practice and print out yours!

Thanks, T!

 

[partsman]

Here's another set of iris images that everyone can use that I made and am posting with Terra's permission: