Call of the Wild: White Fangs

by Kyle

 

 

 

Hey, and thank you for coming to my True Blood fang tutorial in honor of season 4 of True Blood. This is for anyone who wants to make a vampire film, for a costume party, or for any other thing that has to do with fangs. They're easy to use, they're cheap, and they're quick; real easy. We're going to start it off talking about the different kinds of fangs. First we have, in my last tutorial, Sculpey® III (0:38)...Before it's baked or anything else, it comes off white - too white - for your teeth.

 

 

Next, we have clear nail acrylic. Clear nail acrylic is, well, kind of expensive: it's about $6 at your drug store (too expensive for the amount you get). It comes as powder and liquid and you mix the two, and it gets really hot and hardens. It's not like Sculpey - you can't just throw it on your teeth and your gums and expect it to form (I'm pretty sure it's toxic that way, plus the liquid smells really bad). You have to make a mold of your teeth, which is why this is probably the longest way to make fangs, because you make a mold of your teeth (1:13). And once you put the acrylic powder shapes on there, it hardens and you pull the shapes off like normal. Then you grind the shapes down and you have your teeth. The nail acrylic comes out a little bit yellow, too yellow for teeth. Usually, teeth molds end up being too white. But these fangs are too yellow, so I wouldn't recommend these vampire fangs either.

 

 

What we're going to be using is the best stuff: it is moldable plastic and it's called InstaMorph. You can buy InstaMorph, or there other brands like Friendly Plastic® Pellets or Shapelock...InstaMorph is moldable plastic. It is white, pretty good (1:55). It comes in a container. It pretty much consists of little beads, little white beads. You put them in warm water and they turn clear. And when they turn clear, that's when they're "melted." That's when you can form them, shape them, whatever you want. Pop them in cold water to make them harden again. Once the pellets harden, they're good to go (as your vampire fangs). And the plastic is completely reusable. I have a bunch of messed-up fangs in little balled-up pieces, because you can just pop them in a container and put them back in warm water, and reshape them if you mess up or whatever.

 

That's the thing about Sculpey: with Sculpey, if you mess up, you have to start over, you have to re-carve them and everything. With clear nail acrylic powder, if you mess up, you have to remix and everything. But, with these InstaMorph pellets, if you mess up, you pop them back in warm water, make the vampire fangs again, put them in cold water, and try them out. If they work out, they're good, and if they don't, pop them back in warm water and do them over again. They're completely reusable. So that's why I prefer the InstaMorph plastic pellets. Let's go ahead and get started.

What you're going to need to do first is take a spoonful of the pellets out and drop them into warm water. Once the pellets are clear, that means they're ready to be molded or combined (with something else) or whatever you're going to do with them. So what you're going to do is stir the warm water, because once you stir the water, the beads are going to move around and start sticking to each other. That makes it a lot easier than trying to ball the fang pellets up with your hand or something.

 

Once you have your little clump of pellets, you pull them out and start mushing them with your hands. You keep mushing them together until you get a smooth ball of clear plastic. If there's any white in it, it's not fully melted yet. Just throw it back in the water and let it keep melting...So you're just going to keep mushing the pellet plastic. I like to roll mine into a ball. Once you roll it into a ball, you'll be able to split it in two, because you'll realize that you have way too much to make one vampire tooth. Once it's split, you can just throw one part into the cold water if you want to - I don't see why. Just throw it in the hot water, I would say.

 

 

Start molding your vampire fang from the other pellet lump, the one remaining in your hand, into a cone shape. The cone shape is what's going to go onto your teeth. You're going to take that cone and just pop it onto your teeth. And once you pop it onto your teeth, as with every other fang tutorial, you're going to smush it over a tooth; try to get it into the grooves so that it can lock onto your tooth, and just leave it there. Once you leave it there, you could probably bite down on it a little bit. And once you bite down on it a little bit, make sure that the vampire fang feels comfortable in your mouth. Push it down against your tooth so that it lays flat. Take it off, drop it into some cold water to let it harden, and you're good to go. Repeat with the other InstaMorph pellet portion.

 

 

Once you've done that, you should have big, white, hard clumps of this plastic. And once you do that, you're good to go. This means that you can start grinding down the teeth as much as you need to (I used a Dremel tool and a grinder). You can make some weird-shaped vampire fangs, you can make some spiky vampire fangs, whatever - anything you want. Remember, if you mess up, all you have to do is drop these back into the warm water and start molding them over again. Your fangs should look like any other pair of fangs (5:12): they're white; they're a little bit transparent, which make the fangs good; and they look amazing on film...

 

Once again, they're fangs, so it's hard to talk with them in. You can grind them down as much as you need to before you start talking. Some people even put a little metal bar - I don't know if they use a paper clip or something of that sort - to make a little bar like a retainer which holds the vampire fangs in. They grind down the whole back side of the teeth so that they're able to talk. And it works! I don't know how they do it. If I find out, I'll tell you guys.

Other than that, this is the best way (just described) to make your vampire fangs, I would say. And they're cheap, once again. InstaMorph can be found, people say, at your local arts and crafts store. In my neighborhood, personally, I couldn't find it anywhere. So, I would say go to Amazon.com, or eBay, or somewhere where you can buy it online. I got my InstaMorph container for a good $9. One spoonful, remember, one spoonful of plastic pellets is good.

 

Have fun with your fangs and be safe!

 

 

Video: Halloween Craft - Vampire Teeth

 

About the Crafter: Kyle likes to sink his teeth into many aspects of filmmaking: prop creation, special effects editing, animation, directing, etc. Do you, Kyle...