# Dementors



## Tavisteam (Apr 28, 2016)

I can't force myself to stick to a theme - maybe it's because I'm still pretty new at Halloween prop building and I want to try every cool idea I see. But If i were going to pick a Theme, Harry Potter would be at the top of the list. There may be some purists out there who disapprove of me mixing Potter props with the non-wizzarding world, but who wants to clutter up Halloween with a bunch of silly rules anyway? 

So, I have a few Potter props on my wish list, but #1 had to be a dementor! I decided that I wanted him hovering above my kitchen, and as I looked at the position of my lighting, I decided I needed two to fill the space and not block out the light. 

I started with the standard Styrofoam head. I cut the jaw off (sorry I didn’t get any pictures of this), and carved a little rounded section in both upper and lower jaw. I then sandwiched a 3” long piece of 2” PVC between upper and lower jaw to give it that round dementor mouth. 








I screwed 4 small screws into the part of the PVC that would be the front of the mouth at about 1, 4, 7, and 10 O’clock. They only stick in a quarter of an inch or less. These are to represent teeth, but at odd positions to make it look unnatural. I then put a dab of clay on each screw so they looked more like crooked teeth than fangs. 








I shrink wrapped plastic garbage bags on the head with a heat gun. On the first one, I spray painted it gray because several of my reference photos gave their face a gray tone. But the second one I left black and even though they don’t match, I think I like the black better. 

The hands are the basic wire, tubing, and masking tape design, but this time I used some ½ beads for knuckles and I really like the result. They were kind of tough to find but it was worth it. I’m going to try to use them on my skeleton/zombie hands from here on out. The paint job is a combination of gray spray paint and saddle tan. I left enough wire at the wrist to glue them into the PVC arms with gorilla glue. 















I stole the rib technique form Fortinbras79 (thanks!), though I didn’t do nearly as careful a job. Only the center of the rib cage will show through the robe. More Trash bags shrink wrapped to the ribs looked pretty good. Because the ribs end up getting covered with ripped and somewhat see-through material, it really helped to highlight the ribs with a little paint – brown in the low spots and light gray on the ribs. 















I learned on my first one that the sternum is important and a little tricky. When I shrunk the plastic on the first one, the there was an obvious gap where one “rib” (piece of tubing) laid on top of the other side. In other words, the left and right side come together at the sternum, and one piece of tubing will overlap the other. If you don’t do something to build up the one on the bottom so that it looks continuous, the ridge that the overlap creates will be obvious. So, on the second one I used tape and hot glue. This made the ridge much less noticeable. 








I used various trash to fill out the body – pizza boxes, plastic bottles, bubble wrap and Styrofoam, and covered it all in more trash bags and some cheap black fabric I got at Wal-Mart for 2-4$ per yard. It helps to dig through the barging bin. Because of the layering necessary, they took more fabric than I thought – probably about 4-5 yards each. .. and that’s with a first layer comprising mainly of garbage bags. If I’d just used the bags for shrink wrapped skin, and used all cloth for the robes, they might look a little better, but I’m pretty happy with them and the trash bags helped cut down the cost. 
My plan is hang them from the ceiling, so the hoods cover a little too much of the face when they are standing upright. That way, when they are hanging more horizontally, you’ll see a little more (but not too much) of the face.


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## Hilda (Jul 31, 2011)

I LOVE this!!!!
Fantastic job. I want a Dementor!!!!! 
Thank you for taking the time to share your how-to.


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## Chilliboo (Aug 31, 2016)

Wow Travisteam! WOW! 

Like you, I want to try everything and will not have a theme for years. But who cares right? I'm with Hilda... I NEED A DEMENTOR TOO!


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## Tavisteam (Apr 28, 2016)

The dementors kept guard over the kitchen island quite nicely. Good thing we had plenty of chocolate on hand. Oh - and I discovered alcohol works pretty well too!


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## Shadow Panther (Apr 4, 2013)

I am going to steal........I mean borrow your idea. You did a great job!!!!


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## Tavisteam (Apr 28, 2016)

That's what tutorials are for! Good Luck!


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