Dinosaur Mask Collage

A compilation of photos to show the stages of making my Dinosaur mask / helmet from the cardboard shell, mesh and final paper mache and painting.

I made this last minute for a fancy dress party with the theme 'Jurrusic Lark' I originaly intended a much more simple design, even a basic box dino but I got a bit carried away in the making process and ended up just improving away from what I intended when I realised I had the materials.

It technically took two days to make, I started two days before the party and actually stayed up over night initialy to get the inital rigid card frame made and layerd with soft card strips for the shape (why I looks so tired in the photos) then paper mache the following day which was luckily very sunny and hot, set alarms to wake up in the night to spray and paint ready for the next days partying! It survived completley unscratched and now sits on my wardrobe when im not stomping around the house.

Very little corrigated card was used for the base frame, stuck together with superglue (I couldnt wait for any other type to dry and the bond was strong enough) and some pinning.

Shape was given with a few sheets of thin a4 card I cut into strips and again super glued in place and some woven through for strength and a support for the next layers.

I recall using two or three layers of newspaper maché across it, they dried very fast in the sun allowing fast work and egg box bottoms for the eyes, they stuck solid in the sockets and pretty much fused with the mache to become very strong when dry.

After that I did the paint job in one sitting, balanced it on a broom handle end, couple of layers of different greens, white on the eyes and cut some card teeth out. Voila!

The mask in use

[link]