Sculpting Majora’s Mask

Skull Kid was my very first costume, and wasn’t even intended to be a costume at first. I had simply wanted to recreate the titular mask from my favorite game in the Legend of Zelda series. From there, it just snowballed into an entire costume.

Majora’s Mask was sculpted using Super Sculpey polymer clay. First I drew out the mask, careful to capture the proportions and symmetry. On top of this, I tightly packed aluminum foil to create the inner cavity of the mask, just a bit less than the outer edge of the drawing. This was moved off of the sketch, and a thin skin layer of clay was placed over it and formed into the base heart shape of the mask. The eyes were then shaped on top of the drawing with clay, then transferred onto the clay base. The horns were added similarly. A long, thin tube of clay was rolled out then laid down to form the outlines around the eyes and face. A thin rectangular strip of clay was used to encircle the horns as metal ringlet shapes to add a bit of realism. For the final step, the details were carved in - the double row of holes were added (a little askew), and the surface was textured in a combination of natural wood and wear-and-tear. Once I was satisfied with the sculpt, the clay was baked to solidify.

Painting

The mask was hand painted using acrylics. First bright, vivid base coats were laid down. I tried to give it a tribal feel to it, so I kept the lines looking a bit rough an unpolished. Following the basecoats, various black and brown washes were applied to get the mask looking properly worn and dirty which really brought out the texture.

Strapping

The Super Sculpey ended up being rather heavy for a mask, so to get it to stay put it needed a bit of compression and friction. Two bands of wide elastic were cut and sewn together to create a form that fits snugly around the circumference of my head and also supports on top. These were secured to the mask with super glue. EVA foam spacers were glued in to support my forehead and chin such that the mask balanced flatly. These were carved to more ergonomic curves with a dremel.

Eyeholes were drilled through the mask at the two natural holes between the mask’s eyes. This is completely unnoticeable from the front, and although they are much closer together than my eyes, they are pressed so closely to my face that there was, surprisingly, an adequate field of view.

After this was all confirmed to fit properly, the inside of the mask was painted black.