Dexter: Blood Slide Case

rabbit4x said:
I was thinking of using the real blood approach since it's the only source that will make the prop pop. I was asking around and apparently my friend's roommate took a certified program to draw blood so I hope I can get my own blood. If not, I will ask my doctor to let me keep a vial of my own blood next time I see him. :)
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I think real blood would turn brown eventually once the blood cells die...
 
Arafinwe said:
I think real blood would turn brown eventually once the blood cells die...
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The iron in the blood oxidizes, that's why it turns brown. I 'm pretty sure the slides in the box are not prepared at all. They would have another slide on top or a cover slip - neither are visible. The drop of blood is huge on the slide and is bigger than a cover slip so it would have to be a double slide smear, but they are single layer in the prop.

Your blood on a slide would be brown and would also separate and leave little squiggles in the drop. It wouldn't look like the prop.

If your going to make a smear slide put your drop on the slide, put one edge of the second slide or cover slip down outside the drop and slowly lower it at an angle. You'll mess up a few until you get it right.

Laffo.
 
The clasp on the screen used box was the original that used to be sold on that one website, it was just moved around. I actually bought one from them and was called 2 weeks later and informed that they had been discontinued.
 
At this point I've gotten pretty into the idea of making the thing. Hunting them down is fun but even if we found the original place the prop guys got it from and all that I'm still hunting down raw parts and probably cannibalizing another slide box or 2 for parts rather than buying it. Plus from what I understand the plastic ones preserve the slides better so we're gonna have a hell of a time finding the right one b/c most people wouldn't even use them anymore.

@Laffo: On the show, when he pulls out an old one that's pretty much what it looks like. It looks pretty when you have that row of red going down but I'm just gonna fully commit to nerding out on this and go with the real thing. Oh and by the way he keeps it between two slides on the show. It's part of the difficulty I understand some people are having because they're finding slide boxes where the slots only fit one slide. It's why I thought I might have to get the slot pieces custom made.

And thanks for the advice on slide placement.
 
Laffo - Thanks for the tips on the blood slides, all good points I wasn't aware of.

In the show, they do use two slides stacked on top of each other and I have a few pics of that that show it.

A normal slide box could fit two slides stacked on top of each other?
 
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Risu said:
It's not nearly accurate enough to justify charging 4 times the price of the originals.
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"Not nearly" how do you figure??? This is not "an original", it's 100% custom made from scratch...Can you make a better one? I'd like to know how I didn't do nearly good enough...
 
It's all in the corners for me, sure it's impractical to do it at home, but it's there on the original and is a big part of what differentiates the original from all the other wood boxes that can be had. Don't take it so hard, it's not a personal attack. I'd love to be able to do work like this, but I just don't have the tools to learn how. All things considered it's a great item, just not accurate enough for me to spend that kind of money.
 
I've found a couple of custom woodworking places near my house so at the moment I'm working on contacting all of them to see which place I'm gonna go with to get the pieces cut (then do the rest of the work myself). Been doing the measurements and I think I can fit all 50 double-slide slots into a pretty normal sized box. All the designs I have look like it should work and be really screen-accurate. I'll have workshop space pretty soon so hopefully I'll be able to just order raw wood and do all the cutting myself to keep costs down in case it turns out to be worth it to do a run.

As for the blood running, maybe if you got the circular slide stickers and put that between the slides? and then there's the question of whether or not that would make the slides too thick to fit in the slots (VERY doubtful, but still possible). All the slides came in the other day so I'll start testing some different methods of getting it to look right.
 
Adam H said:
As for the blood running, maybe if you got the circular slide stickers and put that between the slides? and then there's the question of whether or not that would make the slides too thick to fit in the slots (VERY doubtful, but still possible).
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Honestly, I think if you just use the Kyro Corn Syrup/food coloring mix they used on the show's slides, you'd get the correct looking circular shape without it running orr shifting. Real blood is much thinner and runnier, and changes shape/size as is slowly dies and dries out. The corn syrup will gel and retain it's shape and color.
 
Do you think if I let the blood slides sit flat for a while that after the blood is dry it would retain its shape? I'll be totally honest with ya I'm more committed to using real blood than I am to finding an easy way to do this whole thing. As it is I feel bad not doing the work of cutting the wood but the only real thing keeping me from that at the moment is lack of tools so it's not that bad.
 
If you put a circular drop of real blood on a glass slide and let it dry without putting anything on top of it, it'll retain it's circular shape. However, you'll have a rusty brown flakey circle of dry blood that will crumble into dust the moment anything touches it. Even putting another slide ontop of it will distort it and make it look weird. Trust me, if you want little circles of blood like Dexter has, you can't use real blood. It just doesn't work like that. Sure, you can preserve blood samples for microscopic viewing inbetween two slides, but they wont look like red circles, just milky rust brown smears that go to the edges.

But by all means, go to the drug store and buy a packet of lancets and band aids and experiment. You may end up with something that looks interesting. It just won't look like the prop.

Besides, if you used real blood and ever happened to accidentally fall into the ocean with it, you'd have sharks all up in your grill. ;) :lol
 
There is a seller who currently has an auction running that is just an unmodified slide box that has a few blood slides in it and hand written victims list. The slide box is the $10 box you can find on ebay and the seller's last auction pulled in almost $150!

I guess inaccuracy doesn't matter to some buyers.

There is another seller that modified the slide box, but his last auction of $89 didn't sell, so it's re-listed at $59 with zero bidders at the moment.
 
rabbit4x said:
There is a seller who currently has an auction running that is just an unmodified slide box that has a few blood slides in it and hand written victims list. The slide box is the $10 box you can find on ebay and the seller's last auction pulled in almost $150!

I guess inaccuracy doesn't matter to some buyers.

There is another seller that modified the slide box, but his last auction of $89 didn't sell, so it's re-listed at $59 with zero bidders at the moment.
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At least I am honest about what I make and sell on e-bay. These guys are just riding what I started and doing it badly.
 
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