How to scare up a zombie

This is how you build a better beast.

Begin with one 17-year-old haunted house worker - Keith Reily, a senior at CIVA charter school and an actor at the Haunted Mines at the Western Museum of Mining and Industry. Add one special-effects pro - local filmmaker and maskmaker Milko Davis, 43, whose zombie opus "Raiders of the Damned" was released on DVD last Halloween.

Stir in a makeup chair for 45 minutes with latex prosthetics, airbrush paint, fake blood and... voila! You've got yourself a zombie.

Step 1

The first step is a facial prosthetic to make Reily look a little less lifelike. The "eye appliance" is the most labor-intensive piece of the zombie puzzle. Davis first carved a sculpture of what he wanted, then created a mold from the sculpture, then poured liquid latex into the mold to create a sort of undead Zorro mask that will make Reily look disfigured and rotting.

"It's really simple," Davis says as he attaches the appliance to Reily's face with spirit gum. "All it does is draw the eyes out, makes them look sunken in."

If you're not up for sculpting, Davis says, you can get a similar effect by dipping toilet paper in liquid latex (from a costume shop) and building up whatever kind of hideous deformities you like.

Zombies, Davis says, are fairly forgiving when it comes to makeup. A little stippling with liquid latex and a dab of fake blood can cover up the edges of the mask, and any imperfections look like rotting skin.

Step 2

Using an airbrush, Davis sprays a light coat of green to Reily's face, then shades in with black to bring out the cheekbones and the chin. Finally, he pulls the gun away to spray a mist of black over Reily's face. The harsh lights in the haunted house, Davis says, require a more theatrical, bold approach to makeup than he would use for a movie.

"It will actually show up better under the forced light," he says.

Davis was inspired to get into special effects and moviemaking by old-school films like "Godzilla" rather than modern movies laden with computer-generated special effects. When it comes to zombies, he seeks inspiration from the real world.

"Usually you go to National Geographic to get ideas," Davis said. "They've got some interesting faces in those magazines."

He hands Reily a jar of fake blood and tells him to swish it around in his mouth, then spit it out.

"Kind of want to make it look like you just had dinner," he says.

Step 3

The results? Ghoulish.

"I'm loving this," Reily said. "Anyone who isn't scared by this, they need therapy.

"Urrrrrrrr!"

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CONTACT THE WRITER: 636-0275 or awineke@gazette.com