Category Archives: Useful Sites

Useful Sites

Friday Rehearsal Reports

First up is a video with Laura Wilhelm, the prop master at Chanhassen Dinner Theatre in Minnesota. In this relatively short video, she gets a chance to show off some props from previous productions, talk about what her job as a prop master entails, and highlight some props from their upcoming production of Fiddler on the Roof.

In this video, Billy D’Ambra, the prop master for NBC’s Chicago Fire, talks about some of his challenges providing props for a show that strives for the utmost realism in medical and trauma-related details.

Tested has spent the last several weeks chronicling the build of a Needler Gun from the Halo video game series by Volpin Props. Now that the project is complete, they have a great post condensing the entire project into one fantastic read. They even have a video at the end showing Harrison Krix in action.

Jesse Gaffney has a neat trick showing how to make slice-able cheese and sausage that can be reused from performance to performance.

I know this trick, but I figured since Popular Woodworking is printing it, other people may want to know about it: how to drill straight and square holes when your material won’t fit on the drill press.

Useful Sites

Friday Link-o-Rama

First up is a really great article on Russell Bobbitt. He is described as a prop maker, but he is really more of a props designer. He is responsible for designing and creating Iron Man’s Arc Reactor, Captain America’s shield and Thor’s hammer, among other things. It’s the kind of job most prop makers dream about. He also does a great service in reminding filmmakers about the importance of physical objects in a world where more and more elements are being computer generated.

If you are a Sons of Anarchy fan, you will enjoy this interview with Bryan Rodgers, the property master on the show. Rodgers shows off some of the fake body parts, foam weapons and other props he has provided for the series.

For fans of the show Haven, here is a nice little interview with Jason Shurko, the property master. The show actually contains a few wonderful little hand-made prop artifacts, which Shurko and his team produce in-house.

By now, many of you must have seen the video of “Tradinno”, a fire-breathing animatronic dragon that holds the record as the world’s largest walking robot. He was built for the German production of Drachenstich, which has been performed in the Bavarian town of Fürth im Wald for the past five hundred years. Check out the video below:

Useful Sites

The Luck of the Links

Happy Friday the 13th! While the rest of the day may be unlucky, at least with this blog, you’re lucky to get a great list of things to read today.

Kamui Cosplay has a great tutorial on using expanding foam for prop making. You can find this stuff in a can at home improvement stores, with names like “Great Stuff” (it’s used to seal and insulate cracks in houses). While it is certainly “great stuff” for some applications, it is a polyurethane foam, so you should only use it in a well-ventilated area and it should be allowed to cure in an area with separate ventilation from where you are working. If you work at home, you especially should not let this stuff cure in your house, where it will off-gas toxic and irritating fumes for 24 hours or more.

Over at Theatre Projects, Jesse Gaffney makes a half-eaten chicken carcass. With just bits of wood, some Model Magic, muslin, and a few coats of latex and Glossy Wood Tone, she comes up with a pretty convincing prop that looks like it came straight from someone’s fridge.

Here’s a great tutorial on turning clear glass into tinted glass. It is not useful for glass jars that need to be filled with water, but it uses nothing more than Mod Podge, food coloring and an oven.

Make Magazine reminds us that it is not only useful, but vital, that we document the process of building our props. Taking process shots is useful not only for your own portfolio, but it can help with the creative process itself. It is also helpful with sharing your work with others, since others can learn from your process, even when you think what you have done is simple or common knowledge.

A book called 507 Mechanical Movements has been around for awhile, and a number of reprints can be found at bookstores and online. Now, you can view all 507 mechanical movements online as well. The website is great because it has animated some of the movements, and has plans to animate more of them. These movements are useful when building moving or trick props, and you need to figure out, say, how to make a prop spin when you pull a string, or how to make a rod move in a straight line using a spinning motor.

Useful Sites

Friday Links on Display

It’s another Friday, and another September. This always seems like the busiest time of the year for the whole entertainment industry. Some of you may have gotten a four-day week this past week, but for most of us, it was an eight-day week. So take a seat, relax, and enjoy these links for a few minutes:

Huffington Post has an interview with props master Peter Bankins. Bankins has been a prop master in film for the past 25 years, working on movies such as Young Guns, Grumpier Old Men, Erin Brockovitch and many more.

On the other side of the pond, Farfetch has a short photo essay called “Our Day With Thomas Petherick“. Petherick is a young prop maker and set designer working mainly on fashion photography shoots.

Bill Doran and his wife created a fairly detailed set of armor and weapons from the video game Skyrim for this year’s Dragon Con. He details the lengthy build process as they fashion parts out of wood, EVA foam, Worbla, resin and more.

Finally, here is a familiar face; I was displaying some of my props at last month’s Burlington Mini Maker Faire. Coffey Productions was going around filming the various exhibits, and shot this video of me talking about my props and my book. Check it out!

Useful Sites

Friday Link-o-Rama

I’m light on words this week because we are in the middle of tech for my first show at Triad Stage, but enjoy these links:

Set decorator Stephenie McMillan passed away this week. She got her start working on films in 1984, with her most notable credit as the set decorator on all eight Harry Potter films. Check out this interview with McMillan from last year to learn more about her work and her process.

If all the glues and adhesives out there are confusing to you, Design Sponge has an “adhesives 101” for you. It does a good job breaking down the major types of glues available and what they are useful for. Of course, you should always test the specific glue you want to use first, but this guide is helpful to give you a place to start.

Check out this massive behind-the-scenes photo gallery of the first Alien movie. The models and miniatures used on that film are incredible.

Kamui Cosplay has a detailed look at how she created some fantasy armor from World of Warcraft using Wonderflex, Worbla, Friendly Plastic, PVC and EVA foam.