How to make a scary mask with your own hands?

2024 Author: Sierra Becker | [email protected]. Last modified: 2024-02-26 03:46

Masks and costumes for Halloween, unusual, strange and frightening, are not only a tribute to traditions, but also a way to show imagination, inventing and creating an original carnival image. How to make a scary DIY mask for Halloween? In the article we will list a few simple ways.

A simple cardboard mask

How to make a scary mask with your own hands from cardboard? The easiest way is to cut out a goggle mask with holes for the eyes, and then paint or decorate. This is the best option for a children's masquerade look, for example, if a themed party is planned at school: a cardboard glasses mask will not be too intimidating or repulsive. In addition, you can do it with your child. For this you will need:

• Cardboard and colored paper.
• Glue.
• Markers or paints for coloring.
• Soft elastic band or ribbon.

First of all, you need to choose an image for the future mask. For Halloween, a mask of a spider, a bat, a pumpkin or a funny ghost is perfect -Casper. You can draw a mask template on cardboard yourself, or you can print it from the Internet. Then everything is simple: the cardboard template is carefully cut out, painted or decorated with colored paper elements. Optionally, you can decorate the mask with sequins, sequins, appliqués and more. On the sides you will need to make holes into which the tape or elastic is threaded.

Volumetric Cardboard Mask

Making an ordinary goggle mask voluminous by adding cardboard or papier-mâché details to the product is another option on how to make a scary mask with your own hands (see photo below in the article). For this you will need:

• Draw (print) and cut out the templates of the mask and volumetric elements.
• Papier-mâché pieces, if any, make ahead of time and dry well.
• Glue or staple all parts of the mask, make side holes.
• Colorize the mask. If there are papier-mâché elements, they will need to be primed and dried again before painting.
• Thread ribbon or elastic through the side holes.

Volume masks: what can be made from?

The original voluminous mask that covers the face completely or only half looks really impressive. Creating such a product will require patience and accuracy, it will take a little more time. How to make a scary mask of this type? There are several ways available.

1. The mosta common and affordable technique for making a volumetric mask is papier-mâché: gluing a product from pieces of paper.
2. How to make a scary mask yet? An interesting option is a voluminous mask made of fabric shreds. This technology is similar to papier-mâché and allows you to show your imagination using fabric blanks of different textures and colors.
3. The most modern, original, beautiful, but also the most expensive material for voluminous masks is plastic or polymer clay. The main condition for working with such material is strict adherence to the technology for creating the product described in the instructions.

Regardless of what material you plan to make a voluminous mask, most likely, you will have to start work with making a base from plaster or plasticine.

Mask base form

Why do we need a shape for a mask? And is it possible to do without it? You can often find a description of the process of making a papier-mâché volume mask, which is made directly on the face. This method, of course, saves time, but sculpting and drying the mask is not very convenient. Also, a plaster or plasticine mold can be replaced, for example, with a hockey mask or an inflated balloon.

You can make a more accurate base shape from plasticine: either sculpt the head of the character whose mask is planned to be made, or make an anatomical cast from the face.

However, experienced craftsmen advise not to be too lazy and before making a terrible mask, make a plaster mold. Such a basis canbe used several times, besides, the plaster mold is suitable not only for working in the papier-mâché technique, but also for making plastic masks with subsequent heat treatment of the product. There are two ways to make a plaster mold:

1. Make a cast of the face using cooking foil. Carefully pour gypsum into the resulting mold, avoiding deformation of the foil, and allow the gypsum to harden. Remove the foil after drying.
2. Another way is a little more difficult: make a plaster cast on the face. It will not work to make such a base form on your own, you will need an assistant who will impose a plaster mass. The impression is made in the following order:

• First you need to remove the hair under a bathing cap, fix the shape of the eyebrows with a gel or wipe it with a damp bar of soap and smear the skin of the face well with a fat cream (children's or Vaseline will do). Next, tubes for a cocktail are inserted into the nostrils (the ends of the tubes must be wrapped with gauze or cotton wool). This will allow you to breathe freely during the procedure.
• After all preparations, all that remains is to sit comfortably on the floor, fixing your head with wet towels or an absorbent cloth so that the plaster mass does not drip onto clothes and onto the floor during application.
• The assistant should quickly apply a thin layer of plaster mass, starting from the middle of the face to the edge. Liquid plaster can be replaced with plaster bandages from a pharmacy, then they must be applied after cutting into pieces and soaking in warm water.
• When the surface of the plaster mold hardens, the assistant can carefully take the impression. ATthe completion of the form must be aligned along the edges.

What materials are needed for a papier-mâché mask?

Papier-mâché, that is, modeling from "chewed paper", is an affordable, convenient and inexpensive answer to the question "how to make a scary mask with your own hands." To work in this technique you will need:

• Paper sheets. Ordinary junk magazines, newspapers, flyers, paper napkins, etc. will do.
• Glue. It can be PVA glue or wallpaper glue. But since the mask will be in contact with the skin of the face, it is best to prepare a paste from flour and water (at the rate of 1: 2).
• Fatty cream or oil to lubricate the base mold. This will allow you to easily remove the finished product from the mold in the future.

Papier-mâché mask step by step

How to make a scary paper mask with your own hands? The procedure is quite simple:

• A layer of lubricant is applied to the base form - fatty cream (Vaseline, vegetable oil).
• Paper sheets should be torn into small strips and soaked in a container with paste, the thicker the paper, the longer.
• Paper strips are glued onto the base layer by layer, gradually forming a mask. It is important to apply each subsequent layer evenly, without air bubbles and unevenness.
• During the modeling process, the mask can be fixed with one or two layers of bandage or strips of soft fabric, laying them between layers of paperstripes.
• Dry the mask for 2-3 days at room temperature. After drying, cut the side holes for the elastic (tape), align the slots for the eyes, nose, mouth.
• The mask needs to be removed from the mold, primed and painted. To paint a paper mask, regular gouache or oil paints are suitable.
• If desired, the mask can be decorated with bright details (feathers, sequins, elements of fabric, metal, etc.), thread the elastic (ribbon) through the side slots.

Heat-treated plastic mask

Plastic, which hardens after being heated at high temperatures, is a material very popular with people who are passionate about needlework. However, working with it requires strict adherence to technology and safety rules. For this reason, you should always start the process of creating a mask by reading the instructions on the plastic packaging. It is especially necessary to remember that for different grades of this material, the technology of work and the processing temperature may differ. How to make a scary mask from polymer clay (plastic)? To create a mask from this material you will need:

• Set of colored plastic with instructions.
• Dishes and a stack (knife) for work.
• Container with warm water.
• Oven (stove oven).
• Plaster mold for the mask.
• Decorative items (optional).

Important! Do not use utensils for food purposesthermoplastic work. After work, the oven must be thoroughly rinsed with water and detergent.

Making a carnival plastic mask is carried out in several stages:

• Gypsum mold smeared with oil or fat cream.
• The pieces of material are softened according to the instructions on the package. For faster heating, it is often recommended to use warm water or the non-hot air of a conventional hair dryer. Of these, a mask is applied to the plaster base.
• It is important to avoid getting dust, small debris, hair or thread on the softened plastic.
• When sculpting on the form, you must immediately cut through the nasal and eye openings of the mask. For a beautiful snug fit of the mask to the face, you should try to create a smooth transition to the plaster form, nullifying the plastic mass in the eye area and along the edges of the mask.
• All slots, including holes for the elastic (tape), must be done before the plastic is completely solidified.
• If desired, the mask can be immediately, before heat treatment, decorated with heat-resistant parts made of metal, glass, stone and other things.
• Heat treatment is carried out in strict accordance with the instructions: a plaster mold with a molded mask is placed in the oven, preheated to the recommended baking temperature. The product is aged in the oven for the time specified by the manufacturer, after which the mask should gradually cool in the oven.
• Important! The temperature of the oven must be constantly monitored. All grades of plastic may begin to melt and releasepoisonous smoke if the temperature in the oven reaches 170-175˚C. If this happens, you must immediately turn off the oven, open the doors and windows for ventilation and leave the home until the final weathering.
• Repeated heat treatment of plastics is allowed. After complete cooling, the mask can be supplemented with sculpted details and baked again.
• The cooled product is carefully removed from the mold. The finished mask can be primed and painted, decorative elements can be glued on.