Robbed by a Pirate in New Orleans!

Posted on June 17, 2013 at 7:01 pm by Doktor Leech

I was robbed by a pirate while I was in New Orleans this weekend for the Bram Stoker Award Weekend/ World Horror Convention.

I should explain.

MadDoktor

The World Horror Convention is a trade show, more or less, for folks involved with scary stories. Writers take meetings with their agents; writers pitch projects to editors; writers read for other writers. For most of the weekend, everyone is on their most professional behavior, looking all business-like and serious… with the exception of the Masquerade Party on Friday night. I need little excuse to dress oddly so it didn’t really matter that the prize for the best costume was a Kindle. I lie. When I learned of this prize, vowed to win it. The game was ON.

I developed a costume to express “Doktor Leech,” the personna I’ve adopted for my posts at DailyNightmare.com. I acquired a genuine Mad Scientist coat, technically a “Howie Coat” of black twill from Gentleman’s Emporium. On my hands, I wore my riding gauntlets from back in the day when I rode a Harley. My blast goggles were lovingly hand-machined by the folks at Got-steam.com.

But the bloody apron was the key to the whole costume.

MadDoktor2

I work at a high school where one of the teachers runs an innovative science elective based around Forensic Science, sort of CSI-High. Students learn biology and chemistry and… well, they also learn a fair bit about decay and fingerprints and death. The crime scene dioramas they come up with would make your hair curl. I enlisted the demented enthusiasm of these juvenile bloodstain experts in making my costume.

I got four clean white aprons and divvied them between the two classes. This is the introduction I gave to my young assistants:

“This competition among the Forensics classes is to use your knowledge of blood spatters to create a gory apron for use in a Horror/Steampunk costume. The winning group will be awarded a pizza lunch and the aprons will be evaluated according to both their theatrical utility and their forensic accuracy.

The character I’m creating is a Victorian era “mad scientist” who dabbles in then-popular practices of magnetism, mesmerism and of course, vivisection. Victorian scientists were crazy about vivisection, the act of cutting open creatures while they were still alive to see how they worked. The stains on this apron likely come from such grisly experiments. A couple points come to mind that may influence your creations:

• Since the vivisection was performed on specimens that at least started out the procedure alive, the spatters should be consistent with that state;
• The Mad Doctor has likely been at this awhile so perhaps he started with smaller creatures and moved up to larger, more complicated ones. Humans? Probably.
• The tools used would likely be a surgically sharp scalpel but probably a bone saw as well. Punctures, cuts, hacking all would leave different kinds of marks on the apron;
• Bodies are filled with all sorts of fluids not just blood. Would any other juices have soaked into this apron?
• I suspect that this scientist has used the same apron for many experiments so consider if there is “old blood” in addition to fresh stains.;
• The scientist is probably working over an operating table which would likely influence what parts of the apron receive what kinds of stain;
• Remember this is a costume that I will have to wear around during a Masquerade Party. It wouldn’t hurt if it looked cool as all heck.

Make your choices. Do your best and be prepared to explain why you made the marks you did. I look forward to what you come up with.”

In the end, ALL the aprons were impressive so I bought pizza for both classes. I could only take one to New Orleans so I selected the one that had the most detail. On the apron I wore, the students used “blood,” tea and finger print powder in order to simulate the “other fluids” encountered during the Mad Doktor’s investigations. They also figured the Doktor might have gotten his fingers bloody and thus wiped them down the sides. These young Quincy’s also assured me that there were stains consistent with punctures and sawing and more processes than I cared to imagine. Most importantly, it looked cool as heck.

ThatBloodyGuy1

Once I got to NOLA and WHC2013, I acted the part of a horror professional all day, then just in time for the masquerade competition, I transformed into the Doktor. In my opinion, there was no contest. A couple men wore t-shirts; a few women wore corsets. I was ready to win… until two guys walked in dressed head to toe as pirates in full regalia. They were simply jaw-dropping. I grinned and made the best of it, but I knew it was all over. I danced, I flirted — who knew that blood was sexy?– and I had a great time anyway.

Though I didn’t walk away with a Kindle, I did get a bit of a reputation. For the rest of the weekend, complete strangers referred to me as “that bloody guy.” And that was kind of a success.

Posted in Creepy Crafts, Doktor, Events | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

Gray Cakes in The Depressed Cake Shop

Posted on June 10, 2013 at 6:00 am by Elsa L
from Miss Cakehead's Depressed Cake Shop

from Miss Cakehead’s Depressed Cake Shop

I read with interest about The Depressed Cake Shop’s upcoming pop-up bake shop event. The cakes on sale will all be grey on the outside, with colours revealed on the inside. The event will take place August 2 – 4 in London, and the organizers are encouraging others to schedule pop-up bakeries of their own anywhere in the world. (Please note: in the US, the cakes would be GRAY with COLORS revealed on the inside.)

The point of the event is to raise awareness of the effects of depression and mental illness. As the original article notes, and the National Institutes of Mental Health confirm, one in four people suffer from mental illness at some point in their lives. The goals of the Depressed Cake Shop are to open up conversations and to raise funds for mental health charities.

Why are the cakes grey? There is room for interpreting this color choice. Certainly, shelves full of gray cakes will create a striking image, suggesting that the impact of depression is significant. Another point is that, for those suffering from depression, the world turns gray. It’s hard to experience fun and joy when depression is weighing a person down. Finally, the colors inside the cakes suggest hope, which may be hidden underneath depression or hard to locate– but the idea that hope exists.

I like the idea of using food stuffs to express complex ideas, like the conversations that could arise around the topic of depression. Food is almost always more than simply fuel. It’s a way to show creativity, innovation, individuality and love. Why not show a little love and bake a gray cake.

Posted in Elsa, Food | Leave a comment

Screamshaw.com — Etched Bone Bling

Posted on June 8, 2013 at 6:56 pm by admin

screamshaw
Bones are great. They keep vertebrates erect, provide a handle when consuming meat but most importantly, perhaps is that bones just look cool. They’re like tiny sculptures hidden away in flesh. Humans have used bones as jewelry probably for as long as there were bones and humans. So I was delighted to come across Screamshaw.com at the Ann Arbor Mini Maker Faire.

The name harkens back to that age-old artform of scrimshaw, artful engraving on bone and tusk. Screamshaw, I suspect uses more 21st C techniques though the guy at the booth claims they’re made under cover of night by a zombie horde. I cared little how they were made because these boney bits were cool as heck. Note: these images are in fact engraved into the bone, not simply printed on top.

screamshaw2

The images available are quite bone-appropriate, too. I was initially struck by the mermaid skeleton since it echoes the nautical origins of scrimshaw, but the image recalled a bittersweet summer fling I had with a Fiji mermaid as a youth, a doomed relationship I’ve never quite recovered from. Luckily, I found the dancing skeleton image. It fit with the ossuaic medium and expressed my dance-on-the-grave joi de vivre. At the booth, I was able to augment my bone and thong necklace with other bits of bling including some hammered pennies and bone beads. Dig me getting all tribal.

Screamshaw.com is a local business (Dearborn Heights, MI shout-out) but through the website they ship everywhere. I had to stand in line to purchase mine which suggests that all the cool kids will be wearing bone this year. Make sure you insist on genuine zombie quality; insist on Screamshaw.

http://screamshaw.com/

Posted in Art, Other Haunts | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Nightmare #331: The Needle and the Conqueror Worm

Posted on May 16, 2013 at 4:48 am by The Grim Gnome

(Male, 30′s) I was staying at someone’s summer home, a sprawling house with multple floors. It looked out on landscaped terraces leading down to a lake but there didn’t seem to be any way to get out of the place. I was trying to sleep but some one much younger than myself was practicing bass guitar in the room above so I got up and wandered the house.

On the main floor of the place was a laboratory, sort of an industrial waiting room where workers stood around waiting for the shift change. It wasn’t clear what they all did. They were bored twenty-somethings, leaning against the furniture and counters. One of them seemed to recognize me and we spoke amicably. Another worker was edgy, clearly a dangerous jerk. He carried a hypodermic needle with him that he threatened to jab into people, his thumb on the plunger. Sticking out of his upper arm were spare needles. He didn’t seem to notice or care that they were skewered into his flesh.

He tried to bully me the way thugs on a playground would. I wouldn’t have any of his stupid threats so he stabbed me four times with his hypodermic, each time injecting something into my arm near the wrist. I demanded to know what it was. He was coy. “It’s nothing yu need to worry about, old man. Just cholesterol.” I didn’t believe him. but he didn’t tell me anything more.

Then, the flesh around the holes began to swell up. The holes grew large something started to poke out of the hole. It looked like a bead, a shiny black bead but eventually, a centipede poked its head out of my arms and wriggled, trying to get free. It squirmed and squirmed and finally used its hundred of legs to pull itself out of my flesh.

It was just the first. Soon, dozens of centipedes, hairy ones with thousands of tiny legs crawled out of the wounds on my arms, one by one, dropping to the floor.
Just when the waves of insects seemed to be slowing down, another large bead appeared in the one of my arms. It was the staring black eye of a larger bug, and pushed its way out. It was larger, hairless, hard round segments and thousands of legs. They followed like the poison inside me was evolving different kinds of bugs. They streamed out of my hand and fell to the floor.

The thug with the hypodermic needles seemed to find this hilarious but I was worried what kind of creature would follow after the centipedes.

What creature would crawl out of my flesh next?

Posted in Grim Gnome, Nightmares | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Nightmare #330: The Inky Blackness

Posted on May 14, 2013 at 4:47 am by The Grim Gnome

(Male, 30′s) I’ve been having trouble sleeping recently. I’ve been waking up in the middle of the night worried about work or life. So when this dream started, it just felt like I’d woken up again. In the dream, I was in bed next to my wife and it was the middle of the night. What had woken me up was the sound of someone rummaging around in the kitchen which is just next our bedroom. It didn’t sound like whomever was out there cared or even knew there was anyone else alive in the house. It was the sound a leisurely ransack, knocking over a dish, banging into a pan. Why would someone break in to go through our housewares?

I was terrified to get up which is strange because I usually feel quite at home in my own house, even in the middle of the night. I looked to see if I could see the invader but the door to the bedroom was closed. It never gets closed. I thought, I should at least make some kind of noise so the invader knows there’s someone here. In the dream it was hard to move but I picked up a book and threw it at the door. It collided with the wall but made no appreciable sound. That should have been my clue that this was a dream. I picked up something else, a round tray and threw that. It also was silent. That should have been my other clue because that tray wouldn’t have even been in our bedroom.

Finally I decided to get up. My stirring woke my partner who was immediately concerned, mostly that I was awake yet again. I got up and opened the door. There was nothing. I went over to the kitchen. No one. I checked the back door and found it was unlocked, open. Outside was dark, but a clear empty dark. It was the Inky Blackness. I don’t know exactly what was so scary about it, but I was extremely glad there was a door between me and it.

I accused my wife of leaving the door open. We fought a bit then I looked at the door leading down to the basement. It too was dark. I turned the light switch on and it did no good. It was like a wall of darkness, of emptiness, hungry annihilating blackness. The Inky Blackness had gotten inside the house and had filled up the basement.

I finally woke up as I prepared to step into the basement, into that dark, just to see what was going on.

Posted in Grim Gnome, Nightmares | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Motor City Nightmares April 2013 — Some Snob Highlights

Posted on April 28, 2013 at 1:41 pm by Doktor Leech

Being a horror snob makes me a freak, not only among those Upstanding Citizens who view horror as morally suspect, but also to some degree among average horror fans. MotorCity Nightmares caters primarily to those average horror fans, eager for celebrity autographs and mass market darkness, but I was glad to find more than a few delicacies that suited my refined sensibilities. I confess I only had a couple hours to take in MotorCity Nightmares, and I spent them all in the merchants room. I did not even enter either of the screening rooms. I missed the concert and VIP party. Heck, one could argue I wasn’t hardly there at all, but these were a couple highlights I’m glad I didn’t miss:

• Great Lakes Association of Horror Writers — Full Disclosure: I’m a proud member of GLAHW so I had to stop by and give the gang a bit of grief. I even parted with actual cash to purchase a copy of David C. Hayes’ American Guignol, if for no other reason than it allowed me a chance to pontifcate snootily on the proper pronuciation of Guignol (“geen yoll” btw) a snobbish pretension that drew jeers and heartless comparisons to Alex Trebek. Seriously, I look forward to reading this collection of short pieces inspired by the French Grand Guignol school of over-the-top gore and pathos. David, you had me at “Ubu.”

• Donald England, Illustrator — I chatted briefly with Donald and purchased one of his “Lunchtime Sketches” – small pencil sketches done during his lunch breaks. (What image? Dr. Zaius angrily clutching a human doll) I bought it both because it was a fair rendering using modest materials but also to remind me to be creative on a daily basis, even if I have to sandwich in time between bites of a sandwich. A daily sketchbook or journal, kept diligently, keeps one’s craft warm under the fingers. Of Donald’s other work, I particularly liked his pen and ink drawings which share the same grace and sensibility as Bernie Wrightson’s illustrations. He does commission work; I wonder if he’d design an Xmas card for Elsa and I.

• MeatSpider Studios, sculpture — I was really taken with MeatSpider’s Lovecraft inspired sculpture. Sure, I don’t much like Lovecraft’s writing, that over-wrought pseudo-pretenious prose but I adore all the mythos trappings. In particular, I loved MeatSpider’s relatively tasteful mono-chromatic idols from the Cthulu cultists. They displayed a gentle sense of design, convincing texturing and aging and generally felt like some bizarre ancient artifact. As I recall, the pieces seemed rather reasonably priced as well, so I’m at a loss to figure why I didn’t purchase one.

• Gutter Ghouls — I grabbed their CD “MotorCity Murder Billy” and on first listen it’s good, hard psychobilly. Folks, there’s a reason they call Detroit “Rock City.” The Gutter Ghouls were playing the party later Saturday night and from their site, they’re playing lots of dates over the next few months.

• Motor City Haunt Club– Love haunted attractions perhaps so much you run one in your front yard? So does Motor City Haunt Club. They have monthly meetings, often a hands-on how-to, and they run The Haunted Garage Sale where folks sell haunting props. I really like their logo too, for what it’s worth.

• Wicked Celebrations — Need a hearse but still have a pulse? Call Wicked Celebrations to book a plush six-seat ride complete with wet bar. Prices seem competitive with a boring old limo, but who’d want to ride in one of those?

I chatted with lots more folks and stuffed my goodie bag with lots of wonders in the brief time I spent at MotorCity Nightmares. Next time, when I promise I’ll spend more time, maybe I’ll need to rent that hearse to help cart everything home.

Posted in Art, Disections, Doktor, Events, Great Lakes Association of Horror Writers, music | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Revisit the deep-seated fears and anxieties of the 1970′s in Scarfolk

Posted on April 24, 2013 at 12:24 pm by Elsa L

Scarfolktourism1

Do you dream of traveling beyond everyday life to exotic locations?  Would your ideal vacation include a time-travel option as well?  If you are looking for a quirky and unusual destination, consider a visit to Scarfolk.

With the click of a mouse, you can access the strange and compelling village of Scarfolk, a small town located somewhere in the north-west of England which has become stuck in time, specially in the 1970’s.

Richard Littler is the self-appointed town mayor and, as designer and writer of the website, he presents the town’s artifacts for consideration.  Through a spot-on series of public announcements and advertisements, the viewer becomes fully aware of the dangers that lurk seemingly everywhere in this quiet little hamlet.  From the consequences of not learning to swim or speeding to the threat of imposter parents or thought-detector vans, these PSA’s succeed in capturing the low-level worry and daily trauma that pervaded the culture.

 scarfolkwatchyou_0

The fonts and graphics found in the Scarfolk documents are both cheery and eerily familiar, like those Earthshoes hidden in the back of your closet or that photo of your father in a leisure suit.   The content shimmers with the haunting, dark humor we’ve come to expect from the British, reminiscent of the cringe-inducing bits of ”Monty Python’s Flying Circus” and the mock-educational series Look Around You.

After the publication of her short story“The Lottery” in 1948, Shirley Jackson noted that, in addition to hate mail, she received requests for more information, specifically on the location of towns that engaged in these practices.  Some people wanted to visit those places and observe the local rites.  The village of Scarfolk is frightening in a different way, and now that the archives are being made public, we can visit often and marvel at how far we have come– hopefully.

Posted in Other Haunts | Leave a comment

“Hemlock Grove” – Netflix Original Series – Not “Snob” but Not Bad

Posted on April 21, 2013 at 6:45 pm by Doktor Leech

“Hemlock Grove” the new horror-flavored Netflix Original Series premiered this weekend and I was transfixed this afternoon while I watched the first five episodes. The dialogue is snappy, the acting is at times inspired, even if the setting is a bit familiar. In short: if you’ve got access to Netflix streaming, clear a good chunk of time to watch it. Sure, sure, sure, it’s probably not “snob horror” in its purest sense but dammit, if you read The Dailynightmare, I bet you’ll find it fun.

As I continue here to wax eloquent about the virtues of Hemlock Grove, I bet there will be SPOILERS GALORE. Fair warning.

“Hemlock Grove” is Netflix-only, so rage, rage against the dying of the light if all you have is cable. Yup, Netflix is now producing original content, in case you haven’t heard. “House of Cards” with Kevin Spacey premiered several weeks ago (I loved the stylish soliloquies of the main character and the heightened political storyline seemed fitting of Shakespeare) and in mere days, new episodes of “Arrested Development” (maybe the greatest contemporary sitcom) will also arrive on Netflix streaming. “Premiere” doesn’t feel like exactly the right word because Netflix releases every episode, that is, an entire season at once with its new content. An individual viewer must steel themselves to exercise more personal willpower than I did because Netflix isn’t going to dole out individual episodes like spoonfuls of methadone or old-school broadcast TV networks. Frankly, I love consuming series based narratives by “power discing” that is, waiting until they come out on DVD and then watching them in a marathon session, sometimes with eye drops and pots of coffee. Netflix with their original content allows me to indulge my habit while potentially being the first one on the street to enjoy the series.

And there’s much to enjoy in “Hemlock Grove.” Trust me. Remember, the first couple episodes of any series have to accomplish a bit of narrative heavy-lifting by establishing the settings and relationships. The flashbacks were necessary but they’re such an awkward device, IMHO. Regular readers of The Dailynightmare know that I am impatient snob but I can tell you the moment I decided I’d invest the next several hours with “Hemlock Grove.” The scene that hooked me was a simple dialogue between a young girl who described herself as “a novelist” and a young newcomer to town who she suspects of being a werewolf because his index and middle fingers are the same length. Their exchange seemed leisurely and character-driven and as the series progressed, I found many scenes that felt similarly well-composed. I am violently allergic to vacuous “TV-speak.” At the risk of speaking ill of the Glorious Dead, I think I prefer the dialogue in “Hemlock Grove” to that all-too-witty repartee of “Buffy the Vampire Slayer.” (Start addressing those death-threats and poison apples, all ye Whedonistas) I am very interested in tracking down the novel by Brian McGreevey to see if it contains similarly delicious prose.

Sure, the setting is familiar if not well-worn but I chose to view it in terms of homage. One way of viewing the conceit of the “Hemlock Grove” is “House of Dracula” set in a small town high school. Er, sort of. All your favorite classic “monsters” are here in more or less clever guises. My favorite is the Frankenstein’s monster clone, a handicapped girl named, appropriately “Shelley” who writes messages in a florid prose reminiscent of the style of the original, epistolary novel. The tortured Van Helsing surrogate, Clementine Chasser (from the French for “hunter” I suppose) is quite lovingly portrayed by Kandyse McClure. There’s even, sort of, a Renfield character and who doesn’t love a psychotic kook now and again?

And werewolves. I love werewolves. Watch a couple episodes to catch the nice transformation scene, one with an appropriately gross stinger. I confess I have an almost prurient interest in Romany culture so when the family of a werewolf character was depicted as “gypsy” the politically-correct bristles along my spine primed themselves to be outraged… but to be honest, there is more romanticism and exoticising fantasy applied to the oligarchic 1%-er Godfrey (god-free?) family. It might not be great werewolf culture — such products might not exist yet — but at least it’s not more mindless zombie-crap like “The Walking Dead” let alone vampire drivel like that slickly polished, soft-core soap opera that is “True Blood.” (I really AM trolling for hate-mail, aren’t I?)

Given the series was produced by Eli Roth, that purveyor of wholesome family entertainment, I expected a somewhat coarser sensibility. Sure, there’s a breast or two, a bit of gore and puke, intimations of incest at least in the pilot, but honestly, it’s all pretty tame. The only real shock I had was when I realized that screen hotties, Lili Taylor and Famke Jansen had both been cast as MOTHERS. Yikes, when exactly did I get old? Seriously, it’s best to view “Hemlock Grove” as perhaps a “gothic thriller” than strictly “horror.” Though I’m a snob, I think I know enough to apply the appropriate set of criteria when evaluating a cultural product. “Hemlock Grove” feels like good TV. By contrast, say, “Twin Peaks” felt a bit like David Lynch — let’s be clear here, a director whose films I revere like few others– acted like he was slumming it a bit, talking down to his TV audience. Suffice to say, Eli Roth won’t condescend to many readers of The DailyNightmare.

I can’t comment on the entire 13 part series since I’ve seen less than half of them except to say, I’m already blocking out time to watch the rest. It might fizzle into stupidity but I spent the entire afternoon in “Hemlock Grove” and I didn’t think I wasted my time.

Posted in Disections, Television | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

BUGS! – An Analysis of Fear at Home

Posted on April 20, 2013 at 8:44 am by Elsa L

Centipede2

When the Doktor and I refer to our house as being “lightly haunted,” we are not referencing the fellow pictured above.  (Click to view a larger image– I dare you!)  His occasional appearance in our basement, or that his colleagues, could no longer be termed a “surprise.” During our years of inhabiting this house, we have witnessed only a handful of creatures from the spectral realm, but these creatures, the common house centipede or Scutigera coleoptrata , have had a larger presence.

When this fellow and I crossed paths in the other night, I steeled myself and attempted to analyze the sensation that threatened to overwhelm my reactions.  Let’s just call it fear, for simplicity sake.

My first impulse was to run away, to hurry back upstairs where drier, warmer temperatures and brighter lights seem to discourage visitations from arthropods.  However, I made myself stand still and observe the creature and my reactions, a decision made possible by the fact that the insect sat motionless on the basement wall.  The cold column of discomfort that settled in my spine, the shivers of repulsion — oh my, what exciting sensations.

Having managed the inclination to flee, I then had to squash the impulse to murder the house centipede. Having attempted such crime in the past, I can assure you that it is usually less successful than one would like.  These many-legged critters are swift and acquainted with defensive maneuvers, which can result in an embarrassing miss.   At the best of times, it’s difficult to deliver the decisive hit needed to obliterate the entire insect.  Leaving half a bug writhing on the floor is truly disgusting.

My final psychological move was to attempt to view the creature as friend.  Indeed, this is most difficult step of all, one motivated by knowledge gained in a gardening seminar a few years ago.  The house centipede is an insectivore, meaning it kills and eats other insects; his menu is made up of even less desirable household arthropods: bed bugs, termites, cockroaches, silverfish, ants and more.  In other words, the household centipede is a good guy, in spite of appearances otherwise.

I held my fears in check long enough to take the picture and then I fled upstairs to a strong cup of tea and a snuggly blanket.  I must admit that I was impressed with my own bravery, although I’m not sure the Doktor shared my sentiment.

What makes your spine tingle or your skin crawl?  Some people think ghosts are creepy, but I think several creepier things exist, close at hand or under our feet, going about their existences, unaware of our intentions or our emotions.

Posted in "What We Fear" | Leave a comment

Making Funny Faces at Home – Plaster Facial Casts

Posted on April 14, 2013 at 12:43 pm by Doktor Leech

It’s been a week now since Elsa’s “Best Date Ever” and we figured it was good time to rekindle the magic of that experience… and cast some more plaster heads. We left StudioFX101 not only with plaster casts of our faces and the original algasafe mold and “mother” but we also we able to make durable silicone molds of those faces that we could use to make a whole army of us’es.

As expected, the fragile alginate originals had shrunk and crumbled during the week in a way that looked pretty cool but which rendered them useless. Note the three inch gap between the hard plaster “mother” mold and the now-shrunken alginate head.

deadalginate

The guys at StudioFX101 had a several great ideas about attaching handles to the faces. One was to use large washers to anchor the handles and another was to bend the shafts of the screws to diffuse the forces caused by lifting the heads by the handles. We assembled our materials from what we had on hand.

materialsprepped

We chose to tint the plaster with a bit of dry tempera paint. Elsa chose blue which looked a bit ghastly and I chose red which looked… frankly it looked delicious, like soft-serve strawberry ice cream. We followed directions, more or less, but our plaster was far thicker than what we used last week. We used a disposable brush to ease it into the molds’ details.

hisandhers

Before long, the plaster heated up which indicated it was curing. Once it cooled, we demolded.

DemoldingElsa

So maybe we weren’t exactly as professional as the guys at StudioFX101 and perhaps there were a couple mistakes made, but before long we had a couple more heads that might not be perfect but were quite good. I mixed up a dab of plaster and patched the pinholes in the casts.

hisandherscomplete

When, oh when will this madness end? I dare not guess. I know the next step for me, though is to start sculpting a mask on my new pink head. To be honest, I was a bit afraid of messing up the original cast. I’ll sure post my progess. In the meantime, I intend to try applying some weird paint effects on the, ah, “test” cast, the one that turned out looking less like my beloved Elsa and more like a zombie with decaying flesh.

Posted in Art, Creepy Crafts, Eye-Gore, Halloween | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Best Date Ever–Face Casting at StudioFX101

Posted on April 7, 2013 at 7:17 pm by Elsa L

– by Elsa L.

What makes for a memorable date experience? For me, the best dates are unique, perhaps extravagant and indulgent outings, where I get to experience new sensations while bathed in the attentions of my loved one and possibly attendants. The very best dates conclude with baubles or other memorabilia that recall the outing so I can savor it repeatedly.

twocuties

Last Saturday, my Beloved Doktor took me to Studio FX 101 in Troy, MI where we spent the day in a spa for special effects. To remind me of the experience, I left with not only a plaster cast of my face but a silicone mold with which I can make many more. I will replay this date for a long time to come.

When my beloved Doktor asked me to participate in this experiment, I mean, date, I agreed without hesitation. We are both fans of the show Face Off, and I knew he’d extensively researched the processes involved. I prefer an experienced partner when seeking new experiences. We were greeted by Nick and Mark, the enthusiastic and personable owners of Studio FX 101, upon our arrival and welcomed with coffee and  bagels before getting down to business. The shop is bright and tidy, and the team rigorously follows safety measures which made me relax thoroughly and enjoy the day. A skin test with the products assured me there’d be no adverse reactions, and a thorough presentation of the procedures let me know exactly what to expect.

My beloved Doktor could barely contain his enthusiasm. Grinning somewhat uncharacteristically with that newly shaven face,  he was hardly recognizable– even to me. The Doktor volunteered to go first into the “hot seat,” or as I can verify from personal experience, the “cool-and-oozy-then-warm-and-heavy seat.” He was swathed in plastic, and his hair, eyebrows and eyelashes were covered with thick cream conditioner.
IF

Then I got to pour mold compound down the sides of his head and over his face. Nick made sure the nostrils were kept free. Suffocation can so ruin the romantic mood, I find. Alga-Safe starts out only slightly thicker than milk but almost immediately, the liquid transforms into increasingly thicker versions of itself.

IF

We used our hands to move it around my sweetheart’s face covering the entire surface and scooping the dripping substance from his chest back up to the top. Do note: the human nose is ingeniously designed for this activity. Drips naturally cascaded around the nostrils.

IF

After the Alga-safe set up, we applied medical grade plaster-laced bandages over his now unrecognizable visage. Once the plaster cured — a mere 10 minutes at most– we gently freed him from his cocoon.

IF

As he cleaned up, our instructor mixed up plaster and filled the mold.  Soon enough we were admiring the resulting cast.

IF

After a pizza lunch, it was my turn. My eyes were closed through the process which heightend my other senses. The alginate running down my face was the first bizarre sensation; it felt really cold!

IF

I had wanted to maintain a slight, enigmatic smile for posterity but I lost track of that idea pretty quickly. For a few minutes, I was strangely occupied with keeping my eyes closed. Very soon, however, the weight of the alginate made it clear that opening my eyes accidently wasn’t possible.

Janaljasafecomplete

In preparation, we’d learned a few hand signals which I used in response to questions, and I also had a pad and pen where I conveyed my concerns such as when my nose felt runny. I wanted to blow out hard but I didn’t want to puff crudely into an unseen face.

IF

I also was concerned about my ear getting covered, but the instructor assured me that my orifices were safe. While my mold cured around my face, my beloved murmured reassuringly and the time passed fairly quickly.

janplastercomplete

When the mold was removed, it felt like getting a really intense facial treatment! My eyes felt somewhat sensitive to light for a few minutes, and my hair was, frankly, kind of disgusting. The heavy coat of conditioning cream that kept the alginate from sticking wasn’t all that difficult with soap and water in the utility sink.

janmoldaftercast

Once the mold was complete, it was time to cast my plaster double. A handle was added to the curing plaster to made it easier to pull from the mold as well as to carry and display.

Jimcastingprocess

jancastcomplete

As an unexpected bonus, we were able to make silicone molds of our plaster faces. The Alga-safe used for the initial mold is somewhat fragile and capable of making only a couple casts. Silicone is far more durable and allows the opportunity for multiple casts in a wide variety of materials. Silicone is a two part material and we added a bit of color too, blue for the Doktor, red for me. Before we applied the first layer, the mixed silcone went into a vacuum that sucked out any air bubbles that would create pinholes in the cast. Then we poured on the first layer.

siliconeinprocess

The first coat of silicone looked particularly cool over the plaster faces.

siliconefirstlayer

After the third layer of silicone and the hard plaster “mother” mold we made around it cured, we demolded our faces.

jimsiliconecomplete

You might ask what a girl would do with a plaster cast of her face. The best date I had last year with the Good Doktor was to Theatre Bizarre. Though we were adequately costumed, we want to up our game for this year. A plaster cast of our faces will allow us to make form fitting masks and prosthetics that fit far better than any off the shelf false face. StudioFX101 offers sculpting sessions for just this kind of custom creature-making.

My plaster face sits on my dining room table, a memento of an unforgettable date, and every time I walk past it, I imagine the fantastic, personalized mask I’ll make using it. And sometimes, I think of the fun I’ll have with the Good Doktor this year at Theatre Bizarre and at numerous conventions where cosplay is encouraged. The VERY best dates are the ones that lead to MORE remarkable dates.

Posted in Art, Creepy Crafts, Other Haunts | Tagged , , , , | 1 Comment

Skull Studded Wedding Cake

Posted on March 22, 2013 at 6:37 am by admin

skullcake

Lot’s of marriage vows use the phrase “Til Death Us Do Part” but that usually gets underplayed at the reception… not with this cake, festooned as it is with skulls. I’ve linked to this wonderful shock-food site previously and it’s becoming one of my regular haunts.
EvilCakeHead.com is on the forefront of what I take to be an innovation in contemporary art. Dada took aim at the institution of high art with its timeless masterpieces. Performance art was one, rather rarified and boring, result. Works that are edible yet aesthetic masterpieces accents the transient, time-bound nature of reality while celebrating that impermanence. With Cake! I find these “dark” themed cakes particularly poignant. They are a memento mori that is joyous, rather than brooding.
And of course, they’re just cool as all hell, ain’t they?

Posted in Art, Food, Other Haunts, Party | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

HOW TO: Pop-Art Morticia Addams

Posted on March 3, 2013 at 9:54 am by Doktor Leech

morticia

I’m still buzzing from my recent visit to the Rustbelt Arists Market in fashionable Ferndale and the stencil art of Jerry Shirts particularly stuck in my craw. He’s a regular there so check out his reasonably priced creations. Eyegor got me a tile of Hunter S. Thompson that now sits atop my dresser and reminds me every morning to be just a bit more reckless.

I’m not usually hip to Pop Art for some pretty egghead reasons but Jerry’s stuff made me wish I had a couple artsy representations of a few horror icons from my youth. So I took matters into my own hands and ended up with this portrait of Morticia Addams. I am pretty certain this technique is NOT how the pros do it, so Your Mileage May Vary.

I found an old greyscale image of Carolyn Jones as Morticia Addams on-line. She looks oh so young… which makes me feel oh so old. I ran it through an ancient version of Adobe Illustrator. The feature I used was “Live Trace” and I fiddled with the parameters to get a lightly stylized black and white image. If I had access to a high quality color printer and for that matter, if I knew how to do anything useful with Illustrator, I would have turned it into a poster and been happy. If I wanted to make more than one, I would have been tempted to cut a stencil from acetate or poster board. One complicating factor for making a stencil of this image is the large number of “islands” cut-aways with nothing to hold the piece to the larger stencil. I supposed I could have made two, over-lapping stencils to handle the problem… but I didn’t.

I hooked my computer up to a projector and traced the image by hand onto a piece of bead-board plywood I had lying around. I thought the texture would look cool. Then I took a crappy brush and some dollar-store black paint and roughed in the piece. I stayed just shy of the edges then I let that dry overnight.

mortoutline

The next night I took a moderate quality, flat shading brush and painted up to the edges. Wow, I was impressed, if I do say so myself. I did little more than paint by numbers and, if I squinted, it looked like Morticia. More or less.

If I had wanted a simple black and white image, I would have printed it out on my laser printer so I figured I’d make her lips red. Same brush but I used some fancier paint — the label says it’s “Ruby Red” Textile Airbrush Paint — Lord knows how it ended up in my paint drawer. Felicitously, it was slightly translucent which means the pencil marks at the edges of her lips still show through a bit which gives a bit more pop. Wish I could take credit for that.

For a contrast, I chose green, in fact the same bilious green I had left over from the Creepy Doll Mask I painted last fall. I wanted to add some texture to offset the harsh high-contrasty black on white so I overlaid layer and layer of narrow brush strokes. I had in mind the woven rattan of that chair Morticia always sat in, while Elsa notes it also reminds her of the roses Morticia would decapitate. Sure, whatever. The halo effect is caused by, d’uh, using a thinner, more translucent paint closer to the head and using darker paint toward the edges. It takes on a sort of holy icon feel that I didn’t intend but is kind of cool. St. Morticia of the Thorns.

In retrospect, using scrap beadboard was probably reckless (thanks Hunter S.) but for the most part, it works. Up close, the piece is a jumbled mess of textures but at about five feet it coheres into a pretty seamless image, despite the fact that a bead groove neatly bisects both of her eyes. Yikes! I now have plans for a whole wall of Pop Art icons commemorating the Scary Women of Horror. I just need to find an empty wall to hang them on.

Posted in Art, Creepy Crafts | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Butcher Billy’s Posters of Real Life Super Villains

Posted on February 19, 2013 at 8:43 pm by Doktor Leech

ButcherBilly'sMansonasJokerJust this week, I complained to a co-worker about how much more exciting my life would be if I had a villain to combat. Presumably life would be SUPER exciting if I battled a SUPER villain. These gorgeous depictions of real life evil folks portrayed in the style of old school super villains snapped me back to my senses to realize that large-scale nastiness doesn’t happen only in comic books.

Brazilian graphic artist Butcher Billy has created posters for various Legion of Real Life Super Villains that are stylish and smart. My comics background, as fitting a culture snob, is mostly with underground and small presses so the subtlety of these comparisons is probably lost a bit on me. Manson as the Joker is apt, though perhaps a bit safe while Zuckerberg as Loki strikes me as fresh and quite insightful. The whole series lovingly quotes the rendering of earlier comics — is it “Silver Age?” — and pre-digital printing techniques while maintaining a clever critical edge.

These images recall that age-old question about the social utility of metaphor, of whether we tell stories about figures slightly stylized and separate from the mundane in order to cope with realities that are too horrifying to look at straight on. Good metaphors, seems to me, can be invested with social meaning from many different contexts and end up even richer. All that high-fallutin’ theory aside, these posters are quite fab.

Posted in "What We Fear", Art, Comics, politics | Tagged , , | Comments Off

Cool Stuff: SpeedCult Detroit Metal Goods

Posted on February 17, 2013 at 1:28 pm by Doktor Leech

MetalSkullBonesEyegor, Elsa and I strolled the ever-amusing Rustbelt Artists Market in fashionable Ferndale yesterday and I stumbled upon SpeedCult Detroit. Where have they been all my life? I remarked to the statuesque Betty Page behind the counter that it’s like a candy story for grownups, or at least grown up guys who are fond of wrenches, machine oil and speed. The stall presented a bewildering variety of precision cut steel, sporting logos for bands and instruments, tikis and zombies, devil-girls and man-caves and of course, hot-rods and stock cars. I particularly liked the firepit ringed as it was with pitch-fork cuties and stylized flames but I walked away with a Skull and Bones and a Beware notice for the toolshed. The photos don’t give adequte sense of scale but these chunks of awesome are about a foot across. The raw metal pieces run $10 a pound but other pieces are polished and powder coated in lusciously lurid colors. If we hadn’t been heading over to One-Eyed Betty’s to eat, I would have weighed myself down with a wrench rack. I suspect I’ll be purchasing many more items now I know my heart’s desires exist in 1/8 inch steel.

SpeedCult is at the RustBelt every weekend but also ship their goodies from their webstore. If you hit their website, check out the NatGeo video about SpeedCult “amusement park.” They seem like fun folks!

metalbeware

Posted in Art, Other Haunts | Leave a comment

Action Figures of US Presidents as Universal Monsters

Posted on February 1, 2013 at 3:18 pm by Doktor Leech

BarackinPackage

Heroes in Action toys have produced a series of action figures that depict various Presidents of the United States in the guise of Universal Monsters. They’re reasonably priced at $25 a piece and though they’re good for a chuckle or two, it looks like a bit of thought and artistry went into the production, from the painted concept art to the sculpt of the likenesses. My personal favorite is Barackula though Bill Clinton as a Wolf-Man is pretty delightful too.
Barackula

WolfBill
A couple years back I remember a garage kit of Mount Rushmore depicted with the Universal Monsters. I think I like the implicit satire and critique of these action figures a bit better.

http://heroesinactiontoys.vpweb.com/default.html

Posted in Art, Toys | Tagged , , , | Comments Off

Even Creepier Baby Dolls

Posted on January 26, 2013 at 3:31 pm by Elsa L

If you consider “maternal” and “scary” to be closely related concepts, you should check out fine artisanship of BeanShanine on her site The Twisted Bean Stalk Nursery.

Zombie baby by BeanShanine

Zombie baby by BeanShanine

BeanShanine takes the already creepy concept of reborn babies — life-like dolls that are popular with collectors– and customizes her dolls with sculpted fangs, baby teeth, altered skin tones, and new eye colors. The result is startlingly realistic baby vampires and baby zombies.

Vampire baby by BeanShanine

Vampire baby by BeanShanine

As with any successful idea that pops up on Ebay or Etsy, one can find other presentations of reborn baby dolls made creepy. For her surperior craftship, however, BeanShanine wins the disturbing dolls prize hands-down.

Find BeanShanine on Etsy, Facebook, eBay, and YouTube, so you can nurture those scary maternal instincts.

Posted in This Just In | Tagged , | Leave a comment

Confusion 2013 – Immortal Fun

Posted on January 22, 2013 at 10:36 am by Doktor Leech

CthuluConfusion2013

Elsa and I hit Immortal Confusion 2013 last weekend and had a blast. A high point for the DailyNightmare horror-snobs was probably the 7 foot tall statue of Lord Cthulu that graced the Great Room. It’s likeness also adorned the badges. I didn’t dare touch it for fear of dispelling the illusion but its patina resembled lightly aged bronze.

There were plenty of intriguing and informative panels on speculative fiction as per usual. Some topics like “The Old Evil” surely bumped up against horror, though folks tended to use the up-market phrase “dark fantasy.” Potayto-potahto, IMHO.

When we left, our arms were laded with books and faces were beaming with smiles.

Posted in Disections, Other Haunts | Tagged , | Leave a comment

This Just In – Coffin that Plays Music FOREVER

Posted on January 14, 2013 at 10:46 am by Doktor Leech

This high-tech-ish coffin that serenades the corpse during that oh-so-boring after-life period — sparks a couple initial impressions:

• Can’t wait to see what kind of advertisements will be inserted between the tracks, given that advertising seeps into every crack;

• How will DRM handle this perpetual playlist? Given that listeners apparently “license” music instead of “purchase” it, would it be absurd to expect licensing fees to erode ones inheritance?

• The gleam and gloss of the casket is an intriguing aesthetic choice. It resembles a rocket ship more than a pine box IMHO. Are were really that freaked out by the notion of decay that we need to seal up our remains so thoroughly?

• The blond model cements the resemblance to a shiny automobile and of course, reminds me of the mind-blowing pin-up calendar I received as an Xmas gift from Polish coffin manufacturer Linder. Note that autoshow models rarely are depicted as DRIVING the vehicles they present… which makes me REALLY want to see a corpse inside the coffin, embalmed with a grin of satisfaction as it rocks out to the tunes.

Posted in music, This Just In | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Movie – “One Day” – Classy Creepy Short

Posted on January 13, 2013 at 10:33 am by Doktor Leech

It’s probably best not to say too much about “One Day” (2012), a short film by Korean director Duc Nguyen, except that if you like what we like here at the DailyNightmare, you’ll love this very visual, very moving tale. I’ll be on the look out for more by the director and his ShadowPlay Films.

Posted in Movies | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment