Handmade Iconic Skull Mask Death Costume for Halloween

Years ago as a child, some of my earliest memories were of Halloween and dressing in homemade costumes. My parents never had a great deal of money but they always tried to make the holidays fun and exciting. There were so many years we would go to a local store that would have Halloween costumes, and it was always exciting to see this scary masks, the dark and creepy clothes, and all the props or accessories that went with them. Yet most of these costumes were so expensive that we never really had the money to buy something like them. Every year we would get a makeup kit, throw on some old clothes that we had distressed or in some way changed to look the part of whatever costume that we could dream up. In keeping with that tradition I wanted to try to do something I've never done before which was create my own mask and costume from scratch.

"Handmade Iconic Skull Mask Death Costume for Halloween"

Step 1 Materials

Most of this stuff I already have on hand but there were a few materials I had to buy next to those are the prices I bought them for.

Materials used:

Plaster of Paris (4 lb bucket was $5.79)
Johnson & Johnson Hospital grade rolled gauze
Vaseline with cocoa butter ($2.00)
Sculpey polymer clay bake to harden ($4.79)
Measuring cup
Water
16 oz. disposable plastic cups
Disposable paper bowls
Latex disposable gloves
Scissors
Wax paper and/or drop cloth
Hair clippers or bald cap
Q-tips
Disposable spoons
Sand paper (it helps to have several grits ranging from a very heavy grit to a very mirror fine grit)
Body filler, hardener, and spreader
Oven and baking sheet
Pencil
Primer paint
Airbrush and paints
Fine paint brush
Dremel with cutting discs
Sharpie with fine point
3M super 77 contact spray glue
T-shirt fabric
Razor blade
5 yard bolt of cheap black fabric ($5.00)
Sewing machine with black thread
Grease pencil (or in a pinch you can use a sliver of bar soap it will mark fabric the same way)
Piece of string

Comments

[somewhiteguy]

Awesome ible. Easy to follow. I'm not a huge costume person, but this seems like a lot of fun and decently easy. Mardi Gras, here I come!

[LifeWarrior]

I wasn't real sure about what to do, but I wanted something cheap that I could do in a few days for my brother's Halloween house warming costume party. This seemed like it would be easy enough and if it didn't go as planned after shaving my head I figured hey Uncle Fester, Sid Haig, or Mr Clean. It would be great for Mardi Gras though, thanks for the reply.