Questions About Modifying a Latex Mask

Blue Leader

Blue Leader

Sr Member
Greetings,

I have a few questions about modifying (or cannibalizing) a latex mask... I've never done something like this before so I'm not sure about how to do a couple things.

I'm working on a Star Wars costume and trying to make it into a certain Star Wars alien. Unfortunately there are none of theses masks available (not of this species), and there's no way I could make it from scratch, so my only other option is to buy a mask with a similar shape and add parts to it, such as new ears, eyes, or whatever it might be, and perhaps even buy more than one mask and cut them up for parts.

Most likely I'll have to glue on some new ears, and other than that I'll need to attach something that resembles a breathing mask, as well as some pieces of cloth, and maybe a few other things. What would be the best way to attach the other latex pieces, as well as a breathing mask (which is made out of hard plastic and painted, and it is a little bit heavy) and the cloth pieces to the latex mask? Is there some kind of glue that I should use, or is there something else?

As for painting the mask, which I'll also need to do, I've read that a mix of liquid latex and acrylic paint works well, thinned out with water. I've also read that mixing Prosaide instead of latex with acrylic paint works-- I suppose this would be thinned out with water as well. Is one way better than the other? Does one work better or last longer or something? And also, should I apply some sort of "primer" to the mask before painting it, or just go at it with the mix of latex/Prosaide and paint? And should I seal it with something after I'm done (like you would clear-coat a hard prop piece with a flat, semi-gloss or gloss to protect it)?

Like I said, I've never really tried anything like this with a latex mask, so I'm not really sure how I should go about gluing things on and what the best way to paint it would be. Any help would be much appreciated.

Thank you.
 
For the glueing of the latex, cloth and mask to latex use Barge Contact Cement. You should remove all the paint from the areas being glued first and rough up the surfaces a bit with some sandpaper. Here is an old thread that goes into detail about using Barge Cement:
http://www.therpf.com/f9/attaching-latex-material-question-40989/
If the breathin mask is heavy enough to distort the mask while wearing, you may need to foam fill parts of the latex mask to support it, or make some sort of support frame that goes inside the mask to hold the weight.
As for painting either mixing latex with paint or Prosaide works well. I personally use Prosaide mixed with the base coat color and paint the entire mask, or area that needs paint. This gives you a flexible base coat, then you can use FW inks or normal acrylics to do the rest of your paintwork over it....as long as you are not going to do thick layers of paint, if so, you might want to add Prosaide to all layers. When you are done you will need to powder the paint with baby powder because Prosaide is sticky! They do make a Prosaide no-tack that dries non sticky too.
To seal You can get a water based flexible sealer to seal your paintwork when done (its like a flexible clear coat) you can get that in gloss, semi-gloss or matte I believe.
Hope this helps! Show some pics of your work, would love to see what you are doing :)

Joe
 
Thank you for the information.

I notice that in the thread you linked one person mentions "shoe repair stores". Is that where Barge Contact Cement is often sold? I can try calling a few local shoe repair places and see if they have any.

Once I put on a layer or two of the paint/Prosaide mix, the rest of the paint can just be straight acrylic so long as it's thin? Good to know. I'll have to keep that in mind.

The breathing mask thing isn't too heavy, but it does have a little bit of weight. It probably wont distort the latex mask, I just mentioned the weight because I didn't want the glue to not be able to support it. But it sounds like the Barge Contact Cement probably would support it alright.

Do you happen to know what kind of shops sell Prosaide? I'd like to find it locally if possible, but while I tried contacting the Prosaide manufacturer through their website about local retailers a couple weeks ago, they never responded. If I knew what kind of shops tend to sell it I might be able to see if there are any similar stores here in Portland, Oregon.

And I suppose I should also ask... What is a good way to remove the paint from a mask? I had thought paint thinner at first, but that might eat through the latex... But I'm not sure.

And yeah, I'll post up some pictures. I do always like to show off my work. Heh heh.:lol
 
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One good trick a friend showed me with latex over the head masks, is that if they are slit up the back to make it easier to put on, take a hole punch and punch a hole and the top of the slit. The rounded bit will prevent it from tearing. But if it isn't slit already and you can get it on, you don't need to add a slit.
 
Latex its self or Copydex , Carpet cement/glue also work very well and I second the previous comments as well,they all work!
 
Thanks Amfx74, I'll check them out. I think there's also a couple local makeup stores-- it seems like I've seen some, anyway-- and I'll give them a shot, too. Never know, maybe I'll be able to find the Prosaide locally.

And thanks for the information, ropsjonnyb. I'll take a look into those, too.
 
I have two other methods of painting latex masks. These two ways are really good if you are using an airbrush.

One- balloon inks and naphtha. I haven't done this one myself, but Steve wang swears by it. Balloon inks are meant to stretch, just think of how tiny it is before its blown up and then how big it stretches and doesn't have a single crack.

Two- a mixture of naphtha, rubber cement and oil paints. Jordu Schell swears by that one. Depending on how much rubber cement to naphtha you use, you can brush it on or air brush it on. Again, rubber cement makes it so it stretches with the material and doesn't crack, or flake, or any of that stuff.

Be sure to be in a ventilated area with both of these paint mixtures. Really with all paint mixtures- but this one is more toxic than others with the naphtha.
 
burr the surfaces you want to stick together, tack them together with a few spots of rubber cement, then glue them together with straight up latex. let it dry overnight. it will be more of a part of the mask. barge or dap contact cement works well, but there's the fumes and the risk that paint isn't going to bond to it.

sometimes i make masks with eye bubbles, and rather than gluing them to the mask, i drill small holes around the edge of the spheres and squirt liquid latex into the holes when the spheres are set into place. after the latex dries they are anchored in place. the same can be done with other plastic pieces.

before you paint the cannibalized mask, may i suggest wiping it down good with a rag and lacquer thinner to remove any sealer that might be on from manufacturing. otherwise you are not going to get good paint adhesion. lots of people swear by the pros aide method, but anything that cleans up with alcohol has my doubts. 60% latex 40% acrylic with a touch of water to taste makes great, cheap mask paint. it takes longer to dry, but i'm betting it will lake abuse better than the pros aide method.
 
Thanks for the feedback, everyone. It's much appreciated, and now I have lots of ideas! :lol

I must admit, it would be easier to use latex for the paint (or "glue", or both) in the long run-- and probably cheaper-- because I could also use that for filling in any seams that there may be. Two birds with one stone and all that.

I did go to a shoe repair store yesterday and ask about Barge (I hadn't seen the latest replies to this thread beforehand). They had a tube of Barge, and I picked it up because it was fairly cheap. I figure if it's not the right one or I decide on something else I can always take it back.
Anyhow, if I do go the Barge route (which I'm not sure yet), I wanted to make sure I got the right one... It says "original Barge all purpose cement" and comes in a blue tube... Is that it?

Someone there also mentioned a product called Freesole from Gear Aide, that they thought might work better because they said it can bend better than Barge? Has anyone used this before? I didn't buy it but I thought I'd mention it...

Granted I don't think they knew much about what I was looking for, considering they're shoe repair...
 
seriously, barge and dap contact cement are essentially the same thing, and i will say dap works better and is cheaper. a tube of barge is about 6-10 bucks and a quart of dap is about 7-10 bucks. barge is more like dap's gel, pending on what you are doing, you may not want the stuff running all over the place.

but seriously... just use latex.
 
From the sound of it, latex may be the best bet for "gluing" things together, so I may just go with that.
Though I may need some glue for the plastic breathing mask that I'll need to attach as I'm not sure that latex would give it enough support (it does have a little bit of weight-- it's solid plastic and has three AAA batteries inside), and I can't really drill any holes in it. So that part may be the only thing that I will need a type of glue for. The rest sounds like latex would work just fine.
 
So this thread is a bit old but seeing as this is about the same mask I figured that I may as well use the same thread...

Anyway, I have the mask put together, and now I need to paint it, but I'm running into a problem. I went with the suggestions of using a mixture of liquid latex, acrylic paint and water, but it hasn't been going well for me. At first the mixture was too thick and clogged up the sprayer, and after a few retries I got the mixture thin enough to be sprayed, but now it's so thin that it just runs right off of the mask... Now it's pretty much just colored water with a little bit of latex in it. So I'm not really sure what to do now. I'm stumped.

I don't have any expensive sprayers, I just have a cheap little airbrush that I bought at Michael's (and have yet to find a use for) and a few aerosol spray cans (they're aerosol cans with a tube attached to the bottom and you screw it onto a glass jar filled with thin paint).

I really don't want to brush the paint on by hand because it would leave brush strokes, and that would cost quite a bit in latex, anyway. Is there, perhaps, something else I could try?
 
it's tricky finding a good balance of paint viscosity and the air pressure out the airbrush. thinner paint, less pressure, thicker paint more pressure, but i doubt you are going to have that option with aerosol cans. you can always flick the paint on with an old toothbrush. it takes a while but gives a natural flecked paint/ skin pigmentation effect.
 
I was planning to do the flicking technique after the base coat, but unfortunately I need to get a base coat on first. The mask is a light skin color but I need to paint it a light purple. The whole thing needs to be that light purple, which is what is causing me the problems.
 
just sponge brush the base coat. might take a a few coats. use a dabbing motion. sometimes i;ll just tear off a peice of upholstery foam and dap on base coats when i don;t fell like fighting with the airbrush.
 
Yeah, I may give that a try. I've been looking at a better airbrush but finding one that can spray a thicker paint, like a paint with latex, has been rather difficult to locate. I've found a few at shops were people have said that they thought it would work, but I would rather know for certain it would work than spend $70+ to buy one and find out that it doesn't work and I can't take it back. >>;;

Is there a good kind of airbrush to use for this, if I did go that route? A decent airbrush could come in handy, anyway, for painting helmets and such.
 
paschee H is a good brush for thicker liquids. i have one as well as a iwata eclipse, which can be a pain to use with latex paints.
 
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