My Gamorrean Guard costumes are popular with Star Wars fans, here’s a look at how I make them.

Starting at the feet, these have been sculpted, molded and cast in thick latex rubber then lined with foam rubber for comfort and stability.

They will fit up to size 13 comfortably. The sandal straps are made from closed cell foam skin and painted to look like leather.

The sole is made from more PE foam and covered with a hard wearing urethane goo.


These get one more paint job with an airbrush once the rest of the rubber parts are finished. The new feet are only a quarter of the weight of the old ones and should be quite a relief on long troops.

Here are the hands/gloves I made, they are really comfortable to wear.





They would also be good for other costumes.
And here is the head/mask/helmet


The helmet part is made from a two piece ABS kit stuck together and bogged down the centre then covered by a stretchy brown material outside and lined with foam inside. the detail parts are cast in resin and bolted together through the latex mask holding the whole thing together.

Foam is added to the inside for comfort. the nostrils and mouth and lined with a black lycra.

The mouth is cut open a bit and can bounce open with a slight nod, this way you can make him talk or laugh, a pretty cool effect.

The body is made from open cell foam rubber, cut to fit with the arms added and carved and the belly is a pillow which gives great movement.


It is opened at the back with a zipper and dome snaps holding it all together.

this post is a work in progress, more soon.

We know a collector who loves to dress as Batman for the special kids Christmas party so when his suit wore out I suggesting making a custom fitted suit to replace it.
I started by making a lifecast of him and he loved the experience and likened it to being treated like a movie star.

My first step was to sculpt his brow and get the look of the whole cowl.
I have been given free reign to design my own version of the suit.

I like a scowl on Batman and was inspired by the vision Scarecrow has in Batman Begins.
Next I decided on quite long ears,

This is the rough sculpt of the overall shape.
And here is my attempt to add a bit of interesting detail to the eyes.

This is what I came up with for the nose and cheeks,

my plan is that when he smiles at kids these details will help make the mask look less threatening.
And finally here is the finished sculpt ready for molding.

My muscle suit is made by gluing foam on to a tight shirt, with some carving in situ.

then I glue a 4-way stretch fabric over top. (spandex)

over that goes different sizes of mesh and then I paint it all with latex

I used 6 types of texture on the torso and 2 on the legs

a couple more shots of it all together, looks great all black.

THE BATMAN APPEARED AT THE SPECIAL KIDS CHRISTMAS PARTY.

Then he was commended for his good work by the Prime Minister.

If you want a suit like this, shine a lighted symbol into the night sky….. I’ll meet you on the roof.

One of the more unexpected requests this year was for a selection of ‘bycatch’ to be used in a protest.

We were asked to supply 9 rubber sharks, 3 turtles and 3 tuna for a project Greenpeace are working on.

The shark was sculpted in wet clay and the turtle and tuna were sculpted with plasticine clay.


They were all cast in natural latex and hand painted then delivered by the deadline. Here they all are in front of the Rainbow Warrior mural in the Greenpeace office.

Unfortunately plans at their end have changed and as yet they have not staged the event but I will link a video here when they do.

Here are some shots of a fun job we did for a hepatitis awareness television advertising campaign. Our main involvement was to make a rain rig that could pour blood! This is a special effects artist’s dream job. We made 25 litres of blood and smiled as it cascaded to the floor over 1 to 2 minutes.

Everyone hard at work!
Part of the design allowed us to catch all the used blood so as to recycle it and make cleaning up effortless.
The director chose to shoot on a Phantom camera, which can play back in extremely slow motion.

Chester on the scene.
The blood rig all set up.

What a mess! This is what we live for.

The blood rig in action! A delight to see working and an amazing visual treat for the cameraman.

The end result.

Still crazy busy here but just got time to show a few pics of some recent projects.
A large part of our massive schedule was giant bugs,

These Beetles, Weevils and other insects were made for the Agresearch display at Fieldays.


We also found a spare weekend to make a short film showcasing a lot of the costumes and props we keep in stock.

This is a peek behind the scenes.

After we get done working late at night, we like to jam out a few monster songs on our monster instruments. Here is a sneak preview of the drum kit.

There is a lot to do here now so I’ll get back to work even though this is only half of what we made last month. I’ll get more pictures up soon as well as links to the video and music I mentioned.

This update’s a bit late, but I’ve been all over the place since another EARTHQUAKE hit us on February 22nd. This was a killer, with many lives lost – the whole central city is shut down indefinitely. There are plenty of accounts on the net of the destruction and chaos that happened in the city but here’s how it affected our effects plans…

I keep a lot of video tapes in the office upstairs. In the big shake the tapes all fell out of the shelves, then the shelves fell off the walls which forced the doors shut. The first thing we had to do was restack hundreds of VHS tapes just to get out the door.

Then there was another pile to clamber over at the bottom of the stairs! Thankfully we didn’t have too much damage in the workshop – unlike most of the city we never even lost power or water service, so we remain open and have been filling orders and working on a few new projects.

I wrote about sand sculpting before – we hoped to enter a competition to be held on the beach in early March but it was cancelled. Here’s our team’s second practice attempt just from before the quake…

Also in early March was to be the only New Zealand Weird Al Yankovic concert to be held in Christchurch. I was due to come on stage in a Star Wars costume for his encore, which would’ve been an amazing opportunity for me to meet my accordion-playing idol. Alas, he cancelled because of the quake, so we used state-of-the-art video projector technology to make me feel like I was really there.

Here are some of the things I’ve managed to make recently… a pair of Ninja Turtle masks, one still unfinished. These will be available to collect through our store page.

Here are a few different combinations of our popular skull bead necklaces, also available to you.

And speaking of TMNT, a fan commissioned this pair of Baxter Stockman fly feet so we customized some turtle feet with purple skin and gnarly toenail claws…

But the most obscure movie mask replica request came from a fan of 1983′s “Curtains.”
I know, I had to look it up too! Google it and you’ll find a pic of an old hag mask worn by the killer in the film – compare it with mine. I had to sculpt from reference pictures taken as screen captures from a digital copy of a VHS version! The collector will attach a wig, but I’ll make my own completed one as well.

We have a lot of great projects on now and in the near future with no plans to move from the disaster zone yet. I’ll update with some photos soon, natural catastrophes permitting…