Operation: Facehugger

Ripley's been infected!

Since one Hallowe'en isn't enough for us, it's become a tradition in our group of friends to have a Christmas Eve costume party in honour of Al's birthday. The theme of the last one was 'Sci-Fi', which was an excellent choice! 

Being a big Alien fan, Julie's costume of choice was 'Facehugger Ripley'. She found an excellent jump suit, and all we needed to do was create a facehugger mask...

For a comfy fit, we started with a plaster base, like this:

Once that had completely dried, we hot-glued some fabric straps to the sides, and started applying the critter to the front. For this, we used a super lightweight modelling material (I think it was Crayola's Model Magic). Julie tackled the main body of the facehugger, and I sculpted some creepy grasping fingers.

I think those fingers move every time you look away...

Hello little guy!
And yes, its tail is a rubber snake.

After letting the facehugger harden overnight, it was time to add some colour! The first coat was Julie-skin-tone, which looked suitably creepy on this alien critter...

Be sure to use a wire core for all of your appendages- we got carried away
with the modelling clay and forgot to wire the base of the tail.  A little hot glue,
and we were back in business.

For the finishing touches, we added a sickly green layer, some splotchy red shadows, and covered the whole mask in a final coat of clear gloss acrylic varnish for that creepy moist & squidgy look.

Squidge, squidge, squidge...

Operation: Facehugger was a success!

Now on to the next project...