Hair Punching
Hair Punching is usually the final touch made to the pieces before application. Never would appliances be hair punched once applied as this is very dangerous.
Materials:
-Pin
-Pin Vice
-Hair
Different types of hair such as human and Yak hair can be used according to what is most appropriate for the
appliance/ sculpture.
The needle used to hair punch with, can be made from a standard sewing needle. To create the needle, the eyelet of the needle is ground down at an angle, leaving the eyelet open, creating two points. The shorter point holds the hair and the longer point pierced through the silicone in which the tip of the hair folds back on itself and traps itself within the silcone.
When punching hair, the key to achieveing th edirection you want, is to insert the hair at this angle. The flatter you angle the needle, the flatter the hair will lay.
McLaughlin, T. 2014. Polyfoam + Silicone. The Puppetry Journal, 65(4), pp. 24-27.
Dave Malinowski
Dave Malinowski has worked on many films where he hair punches prosthetics for other makeup artists who make and apply the prosthetics. He has worked witht he like sof Duncan Jarman, Mark Coulier, Nick Dudman and Krystial Mallett.
Orange, B.A. 2015.
Hair Punching Samples
Hair punching silicone was my preferred material to work with. You can feel the cap plastic layer puncture which helps you to gage how far in you need the needle to go. It was a fairly simple process as the hairs lay at which ever way the needle was angled at.
Hair punching gelatine was strange and slightly more difficult as there is less transparency to the piece to know whether you are going to punch through the other side or not. This still worked successfully and I would do this if neccessary in the future.
Hair punching foam was difficult as it stretched as the needle was trying to punch through it. This meant I couldn't precisely ounch hairs where I wanted them. Foam is also completely opaque, so there is no way of seeing how far in the hair has been ounched.
Definition of a Hair Puncher
Ruskai, M. & Lowery, A. 2010,