Project Wolfie: Part 1 – The Shell

I have been procrastinating on this series of posts for far too long and time to “bite” into it and get this off the to-do list. I worked on this particular Halloween prop for over 12 months and a bit disappointed I didn’t get it completely done before the big reveal at our 2023 Haunted Trail (link here). This isn’t the first time I didn’t get all the finishing touches on a prop in time – quite frankly, I am surprised it doesn’t happen more than it does. When an idea hits me, I rarely know what is completely involved. In the corporate world I had to know the ins and outs of a project before I ever stepped in front of management asking for the big bucks. On the Halloween front it’s pretty much dig in and figure it out as you go. Dream it and then iterate through the design and build phases until it looks like the vision. In this particular case, it all started when I looked over and saw this figurine sitting on a shelf in my den. If you are curious, it is part of an X-Men Wolverine scene.

That vision put me on a long journey to bring an entire new class of prop for the trail. With big projects come lots of design trade offs, execution mishaps, head scratching and compromise. I’ll try to keep you moving and gloss over some of the dead end roads, but it is still going to take some time – like three posts worth of time. As all my projects go, they are primarily meant for fellow haunters to learn what went right and hopefully accelerate their own projects.

Strap in and hit the jump, this is going to be fun!

Let’s start with the big picture – literally ha! The vision was to create a very large and scary wolf to add to the trail. Emphasis on the LARGE part. One thing I have learned in the haunt business is “bigger” directly equates to “scarier” and that is the annual prime directive of the trail – at least for the more mature areas of the haunt. The end product was the wolf, but it was truly the journey that held the most potential – would this approach allow me to get to the next haunt level. Failure – eh, worth it if I learned something in the process, success, well that opened the door to…likely more storage buildings to hold all the props that would follow in its footsteps.

First step was figuring out how big this wolf was going to be. With the help of the small 3d plastic sculpture and a composite of several images found on the web, I came up with a image that I figured would work. Printed it out, gridded it out and then used butcher paper to represent the planned size for the prop.

Added a scaled size grid to the butcher paper and leveraged those art skills learned in grade school to manually transfer the image. This took a bit of time and also had to add in the missing 3D lines that are eclipsed in the 2D model. Thankfully I had the small Wolverine sculpture to view it from different angles. It is key to keep in mind that this started as a planer representation – the implications of that didn’t really hit me until the final stages of creating the shell.

The paper template was complete – time to figure out the materials. In the haunt world, home insulation foam board is the secret sauce. I have used that medium for all my tombstones (link here). From a lot of forum and YouTube research, this looked like a workable solution for this much more complex project. Opted for an inner shell based out of 4×8 sheets of 1.5″ Foamular Extruded Polystyrene Insulation. The board thickness was determined by a design decision coming up.

Although light and manageable, the foam boards are not the cheapest material in the haunt arsenal. All my designs efforts focus on minimizing both cost and storage space. The latter was even more critical with the size of this project. Taking all that into account, decided I would make it with 7 distinct disassembly points; the head, the body, the hind end and then the 4 legs. This layout also allowed me to maximize the 4×8′ board lengths. This shot shows the planned layout.

It would just be a matter of adding layers of foam to get the thickness needed for the full body. At 1.5 inches, it was definitely going to take several to get the proportions right for the length and height of the template. For ease, decided to start with 4 full layers for the main body and then 2 full sections for the backend with a shortened set of 2 to compensate for tapering that would occur on the tail. Two sheets were cut at a time using a hot knife – CAUTION melting this foam results in toxic gasses being emitted – do this OUTSIDE and wear breathing protection!!

Now the reveal on why the 1.5″ thickness was chosen. Two reasons really, all my previous foam projects were made out of that thickness and thus had a lot of leftover pieces available and the second was due to deciding that the inner supports were going to be built out of 1″ PVC and that size connector was roughly 1.5″ thick.

So why an inner support system. I already mentioned that I wanted to reduce the overall storage space by being able to disassemble the prop. By default, that meant I needed to be able to attach them and I am well versed in what can be achieved with PVC. Additionally, I wasn’t sure if legs just built out of the foam board would be strong enough to hold the weight of the body, so I needed a better way to keep it upright. This is when it started getting a bit tricky – especially when working with a 2D image. The head and hind end would need to attach on the centerline of the body, but the legs would be attaching at places farther out on the body. Decided that the extra supports attached to a stand could also attach to the centerline with the thought the legs would help hide the 2 down supports. It definitely took some work to get this all figured out starting with the centerline. The head had not been completely figured out yet (there were early aspirations to animate it), but knew there would be some extra weight there. Added three connection points for the head plus two connections for the support frame (one near the front of the body and one closer to the back of the legs). I also needed to attach the back end which consisted of one leg and the tail. Opted for two connection points there. Each connection point (three for the head, two for the tail and two for the down supports) were given a straight coupler to allow me to connect the mating body part with a straight pipe.

That gave me the centerline support, but now had to deal with the legs. T couplers were added 90 degrees from the centerline at a point that came down in the center of the leg. More 2D image issues as I had to figure out which legs were on which side of the body. By looking at the T connector placed on the centerline below you can tell the first leg to the left and the third leg from the left are on the left side and the other two belong on the right side. If you look close, you can see the T connector for the front right leg is facing the opposite direction and line up with the leg at the bottom. The right rear leg required a bit more creativity as it would actually be coming off the back end and not the body. That is the reason for the extra down section after the right rear leg that then has a 90 degree connector into the back end and then another 90 degree connector facing the opposite direct for that leg’s assembly point. Although likely not needed, went ahead and added an extra length of PVC pipe with a 45 degree connector to give the tail some extra support. I was worried that I would hit it with something and the thinner tail section would snap off without it.

Now the cost equation comes into play. Rather than build each layer up from solid sheets, I decided to use all those left over pieces from my previous projects to fill in the middle layers. I would not be carving that deep into the body and this saved $29 for every layer I could use the pieces on. Simply laid in the various pieces and glued them with Great Stuff Construction Foam Cement (highly recommend getting a spray gun instead of using those expensive single use spray cans).

I added extra foam adhesive between the PVC and the glued on foam pieces to keep the frame solid and in place. At this point I have a solid sheet (on the bottom) and a pieced layer with the centerline frame in it. Now I can add another solid layer on (the other piece that I cut at the same time), but this layer will need holes cut out for the left side leg supports to come through.

Just so happens that the T connector and the 90 degree connector has just over a 1.5″ spacing between them which allows me to perfectly place a layer of foam board between them. This was a test fit below (love it when a plan comes together ha).

I glued the full sheet onto the pieced layer making sure to line up the holes for the leg connectors. 90 degree connectors were then added to each of the T connectors for the left side legs and then used straight pipes to bring them down to the edge of the leg with the straight couplers added.

You guessed it, the rest of that layer was filled in with leftover pieces. Note, this layer on the back end was shortened to compensate for the tapering of the tail.

Same as the second layer, this layer was glued in. Rather than just fill in the gaps next to the frame I went ahead and filled in all the gaps thinking I might have to carve down to this thickness during the sculpting phase – this ensured I didn’t create any holes if I had to cut down to this level.

Next up, a solid layer was added on top.

The end result is one side consists of 3 layers stacked on the centerline. The bottom layer represents the first layer of the right side. Here you can see the two leg couplers flush with the end (2nd layer from the top) and one of the two down supports which is just to the left of the back leg on the centerline layer (4 from the top). The other down support is hidden by the front legs.

Now I had to flip the entire thing over and add the layers for the right side. Note, the head is now facing to the right and the tail to the left – ignore the fact it was still laying on the 2D template which points to the left. Same process as before,

I had to play some games with 45 degree couplers to get the pipe down to where I needed it with the two legs on this side. Once that was figured out, the pieces were glued in to make the next layer, then a full layer added to match the other side. And there you have it, the 7 layer inner blank for the wolf’s body with attachment points built in for the 7 disassembly sections.

For ease, I went ahead and made another template that I could cut into the 7 sections. This way I could lay out each section separately in order to get the pieces to line up individually.

It was time to work on the four legs.

The legs consisted of three layers. Two outer full sections and an inner layer made from pieces. Simply copied the leg templates onto two stacked full pieces and cut them out (heed warnings above).

One of those full piece layers was put up next to the corresponding body position and the PVC connection point was marked. A matching PVC pipe with a corresponding straight coupler was made to fit into the leg at that point. Pieces were then used to complete that second layer of the leg followed by the remaining full piece that was glued on top. This was repeated for the other leg on that side.

The entire body was then turned over and the same procedure was done for the two legs on that side.

Here is what the shell looks like now with the legs attached. Note the far left leg and the back leg are actually off the ground.

The body, the back end and the leg shells were now done. Time to work on the head. The sculpting of the head was going to cut pretty deep into the shell, so other than the centerline layer, the build up was going to use solid pieces. Just needed a couple of pieces big enough for the head and muzzle and then a couple more layers of decreasing sizes to account for the tapering that will occur from the thickness of the body down to the muzzle.

Unfortunately, I did not take pictures of the build up of the head, but the middle layer has PVC Pipe with straight couplers that match up with the three connection points that were built into the body. Note this leg centerline layer was done the same as the centerline of the body – PVC core with pieces of leftover foam pieces to fill it out. Then two solid pieces sandwich that layer, then a ~3/4th layer followed by the final 2/3rd layer that matches up with the body thickness (7 layers).

Here is a shot from the front that shows how the layers stack. Oh, this is a good time to mention the support stand. Basically took the 1″ down supports built into the body, used a reducer coupling (actually in reverse) into a 1 1/2 inch pipe that then inserted into the base which was built also with 1 1/2 inch pipe connected with 45 degree couplers wide enough to insure it wouldn’t fall down on the trail if it happens to be a windy night. I made the down supports longer so the feet would sit off the ground for ease during carving – they were cut down letter in the process so the feet looked like they were on the ground.

Now I finally needed to break down and make separate templates for the left and right side. You probably noticed by now that just using the one side of the template during the shell construction meant I had extra thickness at the leg connection points for legs on the opposite side of the wolf. The left and right side templates also allow me to define the shape of the body that run between the legs.

You can see the middle line that represents the underside of the main body in the template below. The small 3D model was a BIG help in getting that line drawn in the right position.

The inner shell was now done. I wanted to have at least another layer of foam on the outside of that shell that would be a little easier to carve – that pink foam is pretty dense and my initial shaping test attempts took out some pretty rough chunks. While I was picking up the pink foam, this option was sitting next to it – Expanded Polystyrene. Not as dense and best of all .. cheaper. Rather than stack that layer, just went with 2″ thickness option.

Used the template to trace the pattern and cut it out with a hot knife. This product does not release “undesireable gasses” which a very good thing – I still recommend doing it outside and using the breathing filter – why take a chance.

To help the gluing process and keep the Great Stuff construction foam from expanding and making a gap between the layers, skewers were added and a layer of weights put on top – here is what that looked like on this final outer layer – note the scale of the final shell vs the tiny 3D model sitting in the center of the body.

With the desired thickness achieved (based on the length to width ratios of the small 3D model), I could transfer the details onto each side. You can really tell the wasted foam for the opposite legs (see the pieces of foam for the middle two legs that extend below the belly line).

This is a shot from the front that shows the layers of the full shell.

…and a shot from the other end.

To round it out, the right side. Note there was no need to put the white outer layer on the tail or the muzzle as that would all be carved off once those parts were shaped. Just noticed another detail that wasn’t mentioned. The outer shell layer was only added to the outer side of the legs – no need to do that on the inner side as that was going to be mostly shaped off as well.

And there you have it, the final shell for the wolf prop. It would have taken a lot less time had I just used solid pieces for all the layers after the centerline, but it did save me at least 2 full sheets of foam by using the leftover pieces. I could also finally stop hording those leftover pieces – Linda just said “FINALLY!”.

The next phase was the critical one as I had never “sculpted” before. Pressure was on now that a significant amount of time had been invested to get to this point. Stay tuned for part 2 of this post where I’ll take you through the ins and outs of that phase. Hope you enjoyed the insights into one of last year’s signature Haunted Trail props.