Mantecoza Steam Horse – Guest Blog by Diane Cook: Part II

Hello! In order to share this fine article with more people, I invited Diane Cook to re-post her experiences in modeling a steampunk style mechanical horse. Diane has generously agreed and offers these reflections. This is part 2:

Most of the horse was now spackled, but there were still more pieces to add. David was not convinced that this model would hold up and the spackle would eventually crack. I tested the main body for pliability by squeezing it slightly. Anywhere that seemed weak was reinforced with pieces of wet muslin coated with carpenters glue. Once that dried, it was covered again with a layer of more newspaper. By doing this, I was able to feather the new skin into the older one. A light layer of spackle was applied and later a thick latex primer.

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Mantecoza Steam Horse – Guest Blog by Diane Cook: Part I

Hello! In order to share this fine article with more people, I invited Diane Cook to re-post her experiences in modeling a steampunk style mechanical horse. Diane has generously agreed and offers these reflections:

Arizona has a small independent film community that relies mainly on volunteers to work on their projects. Last summer, Emmy award winner David Stipes and I met many aspiring filmmakers at Phoenix Comicon.

One project that caught David’s attention was the steampunk fantasy, Mantecoza. It centers on the character of Sebastian King, an average office worker, who is suddenly thrust into the neo-Victorian world of Mantecoza, where he struggles to learn how to be a wizard in order to fulfill his destiny. The realm of Mantecoza presents as an alternate steampunk fantasy reality, which the Wizard of Mantecoza accesses by a magic ring.

After meeting with the creator, Sue Kaff, and looking over the script, David felt more steampunk qualities could be added to the film. His idea was to build a miniature model of a steam horse for a forced perspective shot. Although the model would only be about 12 inches tall, with the camera close to it the model would appear larger and in scale with the live action background.

Inspired by Dutch artist, Theo Jansen’s strandbeest, David created a concept design of a horse powered by steam.

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Phil Kellison makes forced perspective easier

Phil Kellison was one of the unsung greats in the visual effects business. He was a visual effects supervisor and designer long before that position was acknowledged in movie credits. He had an almost 40-year career that ranged from the George Pal Puppetoons to industrial films, commercials, and feature films. He had that unusual aptitude of being both the right-brained artist and the left-brained engineer.

Phil was the supervisor and boss at Cascade Picture of California when I began working there in 1969-70. I learned a lot by watching and listening to him. Phil loved the challenge of doing visual effects in-camera and his specialty was forced perspective (more correctly known now as “mixed scale”.) To market the technique to the T.V. commercial business, he dubbed it “Magnascope”.

The Jolly Rancher as seen through the camera.

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