The Hunter.
Please bear with me as I share with you my craziness ;P Thank you.
My fascination with the Yautja began of course when I saw the Original Predator on betamax. From then on I was hooked. I love Arnold, but deep inside I was always rooting for the Jungle Hunter. Then came Predator 2, and it dragged me further down the rabbit hole ;P I wanted more...then came AVP, requiem and predators, and though a lot of critics weren't too amazed by them, I didn't care, YAUTJA on the big screen...I took it all in.
My "1st" build was actually about 17 years ago, back in '99, for a University parade. Suffice to say, it wasn't the most flash of costumes. But I loved it and loved making it. I always promised myself I would do a better one in the future, and I guess that 'future' is now or never ;P A few months ago I started brainstorming, which Predator should I make? They're all great, but see, I love making my own characters based on a certain IP/universe, then putting my own personal twist on it. I.e., I'm also a big fan of Star Wars, but I would never cosplay Vader or Boba Fett, i'd rather cosplay as an unknown sith or jedi, or as an unknown mandalorian, that way I could make up BG stories on my own for my characters, and not sort of embarrass myself because I couldn't pull off Han's signature wink. But that's just the way I am. So it had to be a custom. My very own Yautja
And for good reason too. See, I'm ethnically Southeast Asian(Malay race), but I call New Zealand, home. Being SEAsian, I'm short(not saying all of us are, just on average ;P). Like 5'6" short. Even if I plan to add a total of 4-5 inches to my suit, I would still be less than 6'0". When I told a friend of mine(he's 6'1") my plans of making a suit, he actually said, "That's cool, but how you gonna pull it off, you're short?" *sigh. But I won't give up!
Predators live on the planet called Yautja Prime. Pretty much like how we have latinos, blacks, caucasians, asians and of course malays around our world, why couldn't Yautja Prime be the same? I see the Elder predator and his crew(pred 2) as sort of latinos or afrikans. Scar, Celtic and Chopper, first time I saw them, thought "these young bloods are buffed as..." probabaly "Viking like danes". So, I thought, why couldn't there be like pygmy(sort of) malay warriors?
So my plan is to build, Isubomo, the Oni/Buhal'ra Yautja :P
​
Oni is Japanese and Buhal'ra is Filipino(warped) for Ogre. He's a Yautja from a place on Yautja Prime where the hunters are a bit shorter, but faster, and a bit more athletic too! Basically, he's like Manito (Ernie Reyes jr.) in the Rundown, where he takes on the Rock or Mad Dog (Yayan Ruhian) in the Raid: Redemption(if you haven't watched this, you should!). Both small, but quick and deadly. His Bio mask below has elements and is a play on the traditional Asian demon/ogre masks.
Bio Mask concepts. Started off with dozens, but ended up with these 2 designs. Finally went with design B for this project as I didn't want it to be overly complicated compared to the face itself. All elements inspired by Southeast Asian themes.
It begins! Day 01. After securing my 'bust' unto the wooden base and 'bulking' it up with foil, laid down the first bacth of clay. Approximately 2 hours in.
Day 02. Made the whole head more 'compact' and started on the crown. Happier with the overall shape.
Day 03 onwards. Sort of lost track of time. Happens when you're having so much fun ;P About half an hour everyday for a couple of days. Wanted to see how it would look with teeth. Was deciding between the traditional 2 upper teeth or the AVPish 4. Went with the latter. Sculpted the teeth using Fimo clay then hardened by baking.
Mandibles! Ecstatic to have reached this stage!!! It's looking more and more like the Predator I want it to be! Still needs a lot of work!
Ran out of the grey oil based clay. Scoured everywhere for it, no luck. Fortunately, I found this nicer clay from Shona Lyon (Thanks Shona! You're awesome :D) and it made so much difference! She sent me a proper sculpting tool too! Used to work with just chicken wire. I'm counting weeks now, lol. Slow process as I can only work on Isu after the kids have gone to bed. Yep, it's official, I'm calling him Isu, short for Isu'bomo :D
Almost there. I sort of had to 'redo' the whole sculpt as I wanted, er needed to cover all the grey clay. Tedious, but loving every minute of it! I especially liked doing the textures for the whole head and the wrinkles/folds of the cheeks! This hunter is in his prime, sort of past middle age, an elder if you may and I wanted to show his age.
Happy to cast! Finally finished the sculpt!!! It's been so much fun, but ultimately, can't wait to cast this baby up! :D
*Side note: I haven't really made a cast alone. I had only ever done it twice before, both 15 years ago and both times, I was just assisting. Was really proud (and surprised) of what I was able to do, and I was really scared of casting Isu. I was afraid I might make a mistake and all those weeks of hard work would go down the drain. So I tried asking around for help from people who had experience, but unfortunately, what they were asking as a fee was way, way over what I could really afford.
Making the card wall. The sculpt sat for almost a month while I looked for people with experience that could help. I was out of luck. It was do it on your own or fork over a large sum for professional help. So gathered enough courage and confidence, watched youtube videos, read articles, tons of instructions and started the next leg of this journey. The clay I used was nice to work with, definitely, but it wasn't hard enough to use a clay wall. A friend I made on the Predatorium forums gave me a tip: Playing cards make an awesome wall.
Ultracal 30 time. Beauty coat, next image at 5 coats, and finally stopped at 14 coats. I know it's not pretty, but was really proud, first time making an ultracal cast alone! :D
Unto the other side. Did the same thing for the back and left it to dry for about 48 hours. Now came the time to pry it all open and see if I've made a successful mould. After what felt like an eternity, and more than once thought that the whole mould would break apart, success! As expected, bye-bye sculpt, but got a good mould!
The thing with Latex. I love it! Always have, when I popped open that cap and that smell hit, reminded me so much of what I loved doing years ago, working as an apprentice at a special make up and effects studio back in the Philippines. Latex in this image is about 8 coats thick now, letting some of it pool, especially around the spikes as I wanted them sturdy and solid. When I felt it was thick enough everywhere, stuck the 2 pieces together again and 'closed-up' the seams. Funny thing, is I forgot to 'plug' the cracks and during the first pour or slushing of the latex, almost all of it came out. I'm still picking the dried up latex off one of my favourite pair of pants.
​
Another note. Latex more than a millimeter thick takes a helluva long time to dry. The seams were deep in latex on average 5mm thick. Took a whole week before I was confident on opening it up.
HAPPY Days! Literally. Jumping. Off. The. Floor. Nothing like pulling a good, perfect latex replica of your sculpt out of a mould. I love this so much! :D
Bio Mask Go! While waiting for the latex to dry, couldn’t keep those itchy hands on working on something, so I started on the Bio Mask. I already made the wire base before I casted the head (this was during the time I was looking for someone who would ‘help’ me cast and I wanted to keep doing something productive with this project), but since the clay I used wasn’t really a hard clay like Chavant, the wire base is a product of ‘eyeballing’. Might not be the best idea (as I would find out a few weeks later), but at that moment, it was. I tried following my concept as close as possible, but realised that what you sometimes put on paper does not automatically translate 100% to 3D. But I love how it came out though! Last image, I’m about 60% done, still need a lot of ‘bulking’ up and fine detail, just ran out of Chavant because I used about a quarter of my stock on…
Dreads! It wouldn’t be Predator without the dreads! So started off with packing foam I found lying in the house somewhere and taped them to use as the base. When I started sculpting unto them, found them too soft, bendy that any melted Chavant I put over it would just break when it solidified. So I stuck some wooden barbecue sticks into it and it made it a lot better. Made a mental note to self though. Just use a straight metallic/wooden pole that’s solid and hard enough to support the whole thing next time.
< Image directly on the left shows the first finished sculpted dread! Made it a bit different from the regular Predator dreads you see in the 1987 and 1990 version. Wanted it to look more organic, like real dreads instead of smooth, tentacle-y that we’ve grown used to. Originally, also wanted to make it longer than what it is, but then I realized if I was going to tie the dreads up in a top knot, having it too long might be problematic. So kept the length of the longest at 57cm. Ready for casting!
​
​
Funny Story... see that crack in the first pic? There was another like that further down and those cracks happened mid cast. There was actually already silicone over those parts. I had the dread standing straight on it's base, with another BBQ stick, about 10 inches long through it to help support the weight...Thing is, the base where the bbq stick was also skewered through wasn't deep enough. Didn’t really help as it was my first time using Silicone. Ever. As I was pouring the silicone (started from the tip and let it drip down), didn't factor in the silicone becoming heavy at the top, and that just brought whole thing down. Mid cast. F**k me. Our house is small, and where I was working, at the edge of the dining table, I had paper/plastic to cover the table, but not the carpet below that. Didn't really think I would need to, until I was seeing this sculpted dread, all covered in wet Silicone, heading for the carpeted floor, in slo-mo. My lovely wife is gonna kill me. little bits of my life flashed before my eyes...Instinct kicked in and I grabbed it. The force of it cracked it in 2 places as I struggled to get it back upright again whilst trying to catch bits of silicone glop touching the floor. Anyone that's worked with silicone prolly knows how uncomfortable it is to the naked touch. (Sorry, didn't have gloves >.< again, didn't think that would happen.) I'm not just gonna give up and chuck all that hardwork because of 1 single mistake. I was going to try and salvage what I can of the situation, my hands were all covered in goop anyway. So I stood there, holding the dang thing for about an hour and a half, waiting for the silicone to dry enough that I can place it somewhere without the goop transferring to anything else, and peeled of the silicone off my hands. Yep, silicone dried on my hands..(this was already 3am, mind you, and my mind wasn't really working 100%)
Anyway, wrapping up, 'dripped' a 2nd coat on it and that's what you see above.
First Foam Dread Made the ultracal backing, poured in the foam (Flex foam it IV, main supplier in NZ ran out of III, IV's the next highest in density, and apparently way higher tear strength too...) and tadaa!!! Those cracks actually helped! It has this 'segmented' effect now that I've always liked in some Predator builds!!!
< Drying pooled latex is really long...so I moulded the shortest/smallest dreads..
I had the idea, what if I used a PVC pipe wider in diameter, put the dread in the middle and pour silicone into it? Wasn't keen on making ultracal for backing. And when you're putting the silicone mould back into the ultracal backing, it has to be precise too..etc..there must be an alternative..So I tried it. And it worked great!!! No extra process of ultracal backing, no strapping the 2 halves tight, etc..light as too..definitely gonna do it again for the 3rd dread!!!
And then there were 3. The only hard thing about it was pulling the silicone mould the first time out of the tube since it's perfectly the same diameter as the tube itself, and suction, etc... Once that's done, the other hurdle was trying to put the empty silicone mould back. Then someone told me about Cling Wrap. It is amazing. :D Just wrap it with 1 layer of cling wrap (this seals the seams too!!!) and put it back. Haven't tried putting cling wrap on the inside of the tube before pouring silicone, but def works when putting it back. If you're still having a hard time, if you have some excess at the most bottom part of the sil mould, tie the end and 'pull' the whole mould through the other end. With the cling wrap, it should pull easily!!! Below are the 3 moulds, the top one being the culmination of what I learned as I went along.
^ And here's all 3 after I've poured the foam used up about 135ml of foam (60ml part A, 75ml part B) for all 3..At this point, 42 down, 36 to go...been able to do atleast 3 per night for a couple of nights now...
Please Bear with Me. Over the last few weeks, I've been trying to get past a hurdle with the project, which, to date is I personally believe one of the hardest.The 'custom/DIY projects' gods have been really good and supportive up to this point, I hope, from here on out, they will still 'bless' me with their good graces and guidance.. ;P
So I was planning to make another latex mask, but this time with resin underskull/undermask built in. I've learned the hard way. Don't make it directly inside the mask. Most, if not all of these stuff, first time doing it. I'm a total noob. I poured the epoxy resin straight into inside of the mask. All was good, up until I was laying out the the 3rd coat. Made the 3rd batch the same way I did the 1st 2, in disposable plastic party cups, mixed well, but instead of pouring it in again, I was using a brush to dab and trickle few amounts as I laid down the fibreglass cloth mesh..after about 8mins, I started to feel the cup of mixed resin getting warm, really warm..I took little heed and went on, but after about 30 seconds, heat was just unbearable in my hands so I poured it all in where it pooled in one large spot on the back of the head. Cup wasn't even out of my hands when the inside of the mask suddenly smoked. It was "dude outside smoking a cigarette on a cold winter day" smoke. I thought the whole thing was a goner.
When the smoke cleared, I was left with a very thick, uneven surface where I poured the smoking resin, but thank God the latex survived, so did the mould. I wished the problems ended there.
I just wanted to trudge on by taking the whole head out of the mould and see how well it would fit my head. 3 hours later and I'm still at it. The resin had moulded itself so well to the mask and the mould that I couldn't take it out without cracking the undermask. Worst case, I totally crack all the resin undermask, but atleast save the mask. Had to use a small crowbar to pry the back part out. Seriously ready to bash the Ultracal mould in..But finally..
Total damage assessment: Numerous cracks in the Ultracal mould. Still pretty intact, but any thing like this happening to it again, it's not gonna survive, casting just latex would be fine. The back part (where I'm holding) is so thick and hardy that it can take quite a hammer beating, but the 2 layers of epoxy resin around the crown and the face are partially and wholly destroyed. The only plus side, the latex on this 2nd one is way thicker than the 1st one that there aren't any rips/tears, even during the amount of stress it went through trying to pry it all out...
Sweet, Thick, Resin. Major repairs underway. I couldn't take the whole resin underskull out, it would have been all for naught if I did and well, lots of it were already 'stuck' to the latex anyway. So all I could do is repair. After I was happy with the repair (mended the resin in the spikes/crown area, kept 2 layers of resin from the upper mandible up) It was time to test it out how it fits. Shoot. It's not even getting past my temples. Had to destroy the resin that was in the jawline that separates the neck from the head. Lterally spent about 8 nights, around 3 to 4 hours each night, just sanding, and trimming that underskull to fit my already small head. Each night, I sand and trim..and Try it on and each night I bleed, literally, from scratches and gashes I get from it still not fitting..finally, on the 8th night, I don't get a scratch! But what I do get is a pain on my forehead. The mask finally gets past my temples, but stops at my forehead because the edge of the mask where the snout is, is hitting it.
After a few more nights of sanding, i finally realized why it was still too small. The back part of the skull was still too enclosed. see the bottom of the skull right exactly where it meets the top of the neck? That's the point where the resin ran down to. That thick, pure, solid resin.
Had to hammer 5x 1mm nails about 4mm deep, then use a hammer and chisel with great, great effort to finally knock these out..Yeah, didn't have a drill or dremmel..the thickest that came out was about 16mm thick, and that wasn't actually the thickest yet. It's still on that head. My realization was indeed correct. After taking that chunk out and a littel bit more sanding to smoothen it out..
Rawr! It finally fit! Still a tight fit and a lot of more sanding still, but Oh God, Finally... I've measured myself again with it, and it's added another 14cm to my height, so I'm 5'9" in it now! (5.97 to be exact!), So I only need atleast another 2-3 inches in the feet area (going for a pygmy predator, remember? ;p) Thank you Custom Gods, for helping me keep my sanity through all this, I bet there are still more to come, but I welcome thee with open arms and an open mind!!! I've certainly learned a lot!
The Experiments. Sooo...updates. Went on vacation to visit my sister in Canada, first time there, and I must say, it's a pretty cool place! Cool as in awesome of course! Managed to grab me some more flex-it foam IV as the NZ distributor ran out, which means I can make me some dreads again, hurrah! Before I left though, I managed to do 2 things, which, ultimately will not be part of the final build, but rather, experiments in which my knowledge of having done said experiments, will have progressed. (okay, I tried to do some stuff, but wasn't happy with the final outcome, so I'll chuck it to experience and call them experiments ;P) First up, the lower mandibles. Wanted the whole thing light so as not to deform the latex head in time, so tried making a silicone mould and used resin to cast. This is your regular run-of-the-mill resin, so it hardens, dries longer, so had no choice but to cast it in solid resin. Though it came out beautifully, it was still too heavy for my taste, so will most likely use polyurethane resin, which dries in minutes, so you can do a slush casting, which hopefully, will make it lighter as it will be mostly hollow.
​
Second experiment, bio mask. remember I mentioned when I started to work on the bio mask sculpt, the wire base was all eye-balled? I think I did an okay job of eyeballing, but just to be sure, before I get into finer details with the sculpt, I wanted to make sure that the current progress isn't too far off in terms of dimensions and proportions. So cast we go!
Bio Mask, Fail? And..it don't fit. Lol. I knew it wasn't really gonna fit perfectly, would be surprised if it did (good surprise!). But goal was to see how 'imperfect' the current bio mask sculpt was so I could make adjustments before it was too late. Looks good though, if I say so myself ;P I'm pumped again!
Stay tuned for more!
This is my continuing saga, and though it is slow going, I humbly thank you for your interest, I promise to see this through to the end! Will be updating this every so often, or whenever i've accomplished something, so hope to see you again soon!
P.S. I got featured in NZ Herald, and I sound funny ;P My claim to fame! LOL :D Was fortunate enough to get featured as a reporter got interested enough to push my story through. Nothing like this has happened to me before, so I was a nervous wreck! :D http://www.nzherald.co.nz/entertainment/news/article.cfm?c_id=1501119&objectid=11620179