Learning prosthetics

So been very busy lately but I've started a new project learning to make prosthetic's. As halloween is fast approaching I thought this would be awesome to go to parties / work with if it can master it.

So to start with I've been watching a lot of guides from Stuart Bray - including signing up for his E-lessons. I ordered / brought the starting materials to start the first step modeling the mask:
- Plasteline Clay
- Clay Tools
- Lighter Fluid
- Vasaline
- Hard Plastic Brush / Sponges
- Plastic  / Clingfilm

So the design I settled for was a traditional walking dead style Zombie because I'm being cliche and  I get enough werewolf-ness from LARP so I wanted a different monster.
I penciled in a shape on my mannequin body - it would of been easier to make a plaster cast of the front part of the face but I'm low on time to get this done.
Using the plasteline I blocked out the basic mask shape and started to bulk out features such as bones and eye sockets which you can see here:

So next up I wanted to add some wounds to my zombie face (so if anyone asks I was in a fight with a werewolf) so I could gore it up a little.
I started removing areas of clay to create an indentation for the deep wounds. This was followed up by texturing the bone and muscles i wanted on display.
Once I was happy i tore pieces of clay up and blending it on top of the marks to create the torn skin.
This was followed by a lot of blending and smoothing.
While I was wrapping up I used the Vaseline to make the edges thinner so it would blend in better once I ran the mold. 

So as you can see its not very neat so I spent the evening textured the skin to make it a bit more life like (or unlife like) using various materials including sponges and brushes on top of plastic to change indentations and pore textures. Once I was happy I finally cleaned up the edges with the lighter fluid ready for casting.

So this is the stage its at right now, figured I'd type this up while I was waiting for the lighter fluid to evaporate before finally details and starting the plaster mold.
Once I've made the cast of this part I will start modelling the jaw and teeth.