Trials and Tribulations of Building a Prop

Jack Skellington and Zero the dog. Jack’s head didn’t survive a week and had to be redone with stronger materials. Photo courtesy of Debbie Morrow.

Here is my Jack and Zero made earlier last week. As with my Sleepy Hollowish Pumpkin (SHP), I made Jack out of paper mache, plaster and sealer. Unfortunately, when I was placing Jack’s head on his neck post, I dropped the head.

I noticed a slight crack and thought a little more sealer would do the trick.

A Crack Makes All the Difference

Since my SHP has lasted about 7 years and is still going strong, I didn’t think a little crack would be so devastating for Jack’s head, especially since it was sprayed with sealer. But after a week, Jack’s head was barely holding up.

I decided to make another head using brown lawn bags with my paper mache mix, fill the inside with canned foam, then plaster, paint and seal.

Using the brown paper made a wonderfully hard cast of the head and adding the foam was perfect. It’s had no problems as of yet with the elements and I think I finally got it right.

More photos of Jack and Zero will come later along with step-by-step instructions, so check back again in about a week.