Zuul (Ghostbusters Terror Dog)

Two years ago I made Slimer, Last year i made the zombie taxi driver....so this year I decided to Build a terror dog and keep the ghostbusters theme going. You will need a fair amount of supplies and time to complete this project. it took me about 3 weeks from start to finish.

Tools Needed:

1. Drill
2. foam saw
3. Hot Wire Cutter
4. Heat Gun
5. scissors

consumables needed

1. 5 cans of locktite spray foam
2. 1 Sheet of 2 inch thick insulation foam
3. 4 cans of water putty
4. aproximately 7 , 7inch sticks of JB Kwik Wood
5. A Dragon Skull from the Halloween department...i bought mine at target
6. a tub of model magic sculpting foam
7. HDPE plastic for molding horns, and eyes
8. Golf Ball
9. Super glue and accelerator
10. 3 tubes of silicone caulk
11. NAPTHA
12. paint

The Dragon skull is far too narrow, and the eyes do not face forward nearly enough to replicate the Terror dog skull so we need to split the cranium and form it with a heat gun.

• First unscrew the series of 8 screws on the back of the skull two in the top horns , two in the side horns two in the back of the cranium and two under the cheek bone.
• Next you will need to use a small saw or shears to cut the front of the skull from the back to the point directly between eyes.
• Using the heat gun soften the plastic where the blue lines cross the muzzle on the diagram and begin to bend the eye and cheek bone forward and out.
• use a picture of the the terror dog from the movie and use your judgment as to when it has been moved out far enough.
• repeat with the other side.
• Now you will have a sizable gap in the forehead of the skull. To close this off flatten a sheet of quick wood putty and bridge the gap. you may have to use wadded up newspaper or another object for it to hold form until it dries.It doesn't have to be very thick but make it strong enough to be solid.

Now we need to add mass to the skull to fill out the impressive muscle mass of the Terror dog.

The Cheapest and most efficient way i found to accomplish this is to use Crayola Model Magic modeling foam. Its very light, easy to work with and fills a lot of space. Again you will need to look at a photo reference of Zuul to see how the muscles of the face are arranged as you are working.

Mostly you need to build up the Cheek bones , they eye ridges the jaw muscle as that is where we need to add the most mass.

Once you have built up the major areas you will move onto creating the larger horns and the final sculpt using the Kwik wood.

The horns of the dragon are a bit too small for the Terror dog so you need to extend and shape them. For this i used a length of clear HDPE tubing. It melts at a low temp and is easily formed with a heat gun.

Cut the tube to the length you want and heat over a heat gun (use gloves it gets hot).

As the Plastic softens simply twist until the tube is closed off at one end

Continue twisting the tube to create a horn shape and form the open end over the existing horn to fit it to the skull

This forms a fairly tight fit over the existing horn, . later i will secure it better with Kwik wood and bondo.

Now that the Horns and eye inserts are done you want to tighten up your sculpt and secure the horns

. Use JB Kwik wood to seal and form the shape of the skull as well as to make the foam magic additions a permanent fixture.

Create lips, gums, tooth extensions and jowls. Unfortunately there is no real shortcut here and you must use a little artistic talent to get it right. The Kwik Wood dries fairly slowly so you have some time to iron out the kinks while you coat the skull and add detail.

Think of everything before this is as your sketch and the Kwick wood putty is your final coat solidifying your sketch. .

During this step i also noticed the glaring error of the nostrils. I closed up the ready made holes and moved the nose further up the snout to in-between the eyes.

After your sculpt coat is dry its time to tackle the eyes before we close up the back of the skull.

Using the same HDPE pipe i cut a foot length and split it down one side.Then flattened it out into flat sheets of plastic using the heat gun. If you already just have plastic sheets thats great too

Reach in through the open back of the skull with one sheet of the plastic and use a golf ball to gently push it against the eye socket. point the heat gun through the eye socket to warm the plastic until pliable. Push the plastic gently forward with ball and shape it into a dome that protrudes from the eye socket.. when fully formed use super glue or a hot glue gun to secure the new eye sheet to the inside of the orbital socket.

repeat on the other socket.

Then you can spray a thin coat of red spray paint into the back of the skull to coat the back of the eye with a transparent red coating leaving the solid shine on the outside of the eyeball.

OPTIONAL EYE LIGHTING:

In order to light the Eyes up i installed a simple red LED light bulb inside the skull behind the eyes. with screws and screwed a plastic panel over the top to close off the skull.

To create the neck, cut 5 pieces of foam insulation to an approximate size in relation to your skull. You will need to kind of eyeball it based on the skull you are using and match it to your photo reference as best as possible.

Stack and glue these together using spray foam. place a weight on top in order to keep the foam from pushing the panels apart as it expands.

Remember you will be carving this down so bigger than what you need is better than smaller.

Next Place the Skull sideways on top of your stack. set it in the top left corner of your block of foam and trace around the jaw and back of the head be sure that the top of the skull is flush with the top of the cube.

Using your foam knife or hot wire cutter if it is big enough to remove the area you traced leaving a shelf where you can seat the skull. I used Spray foam to attach the skull to the neck and waited for it to dry.

once the skull is seated you can use the hot wire foam cutter to begin shaping the neck and blending the foam into the contours of the skull.

Now comes the BIG Sculpting work.

Referencing the contour of the neck you built, continue that shape out into the shape of the body profile and cut two sections of foam that you will use to sandwich the neck and head. Use spray foam to attach the sides to the neck use clamps if you have them to keep it together. Another good way to temporarily hold foam together is to use long ten pin nails.

Once dry you can use scraps that are the right size and shape, or cut new pieces of foam to fill in the sandwich that is the body creating a solid back, fill in the belly under the neck you created by using the cut offs from the back of the neck curve. flip them so that the square portion is out and carve them to match the profile of the front of the neck.

ARMS:

The arms i used a two fold approach. for the shoulder and bicep area, I glued together 3 long pieces of foam sheet and carved down from there. for the forearms and paws i took a segmented approach. this helped with the contouring of the lower arm. Using the Foam cutter i cut an angle into the elbow and seated the forearm with the upper arm. Again attach with spray foam.

Once your basic model is formed its time to carve and sculpt. Use the Hot foam cutter to begin sculpting out and smoothing the harsh edges of the dog and refine your shapes. always refer back to the photo reference.

But hey....you didnt attach the arms....how does that work....lets find out.

Zuul is big .....really big...How the hell am i going to store this thing.....I need to make the arms detachable.

To do this drill holes into the side of the body at approximately a 70 degree angle large enough for half inch pvc pipe.

Install the pipe and anchor it with spray foam. make sure it comes out about 2 inches from the body.

Next on the interior of the shoulder carve out about a foot long segment to fit a piece of pipe (for strength ) attached to a 45 degree connector.Seal into the arm with Spray foam. once dry the arms can be connected and disconnected to store away during the year. Otherwise there is no way this is fitting in the attic.

Now that the basic form is complete we need to seal the foam for painting etc. I used Rock Hard Water putty (approximately 3 cans). this process fills in the spaces between the sheets of foam and smooths out the form. You can also build up and fill in other areas that need some fine tuning.

Simply mix the powder with water to the desired thickness and spread over the entire form. Its as easy as that.

Once dry you can sand down drips and reduce areas you feel need to smoothed.

For the first layer of paint i used midnight blue and cobalt spray paint and did a quick once over with fast shading.

For the mouth and nose i used wine red , transparent pink and flesh tones to fill it out the fleshy look of the maw.

After the paint dried, I mixed clear silicone caulk into a bucket of NAPTHA to thin it and added blue metallic powder . I then spread the silicone over the entire body adding a skin like layer on top of the existing paint.

I mixed another batch with Various Flesh tones and painted it onto the jowls and gums. once this dried i went back over filling in crevices and adding detail to make it look more fleshlike.

After the silicone dries, use a muted tan or grey spray paint to put another coat of color over the blue, being sure to still let some of the blue show through.

I will be placing mine on the apex of my roof and surround his base with leftover shingles so it looks like he is bursting out of the roof. Once he is actually Up there i will add a photo installed.