GhostBusters Zombie Taxi Driver

The Zombie Taxi Drier is only onscreen in the original Ghostbusters for approximately 15 seconds, however it made a real impression on me as a kid. After building Slimer last year I decided to make another Ghostbusters favorite. Having much less time this year I chose the Zombie as it would be fairly easy. All the steps are very easy with exception of the facial sculpt, but don't worry it doesn't have to be screen accurate to be awesome.

• Plastic skeleton
• 5 tubes of Kwik Wood
• white dress shirt
• old pair of jeans
• one shoe
• Members only Jacket
• Newsy hat
• 25 mm plastic eyeballs- https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00EQ28XRK/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o01_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
• silicone caulk
• naphtha
• plastic sheeting
• heat gun
• an old wig.

Definitely the most difficult part of the build will be also the most fun. Sculpting the face. If you look at the Zombie in the Movie he is VERY different from the cheap plastic skull of my Walmart skeleton...but that is fixed with the Kwik wood. You could use sculpy or a number of other putty based epoxies but i like kwik wood. It sets quickly but not too quickly so you have plenty of time to work with it and sculpt your features.

In many ways this is like pretending to be a forensic scultper adding tissue to the skull. use the image from the movie as your guide to build up the brows, cheekbones, and especially the jaw. You will notice that it is much more pronounced in the movie that on your cheapo skeleton. it may take a couple of rounds to get it just right . when you are done with the basic features use an exacto knife to cut out the hollows of the eyes.

In order to better install the eyes you may want to cut a hatch into the back of the skull so you can access the inside for this particular build i didnt need to, but remember it is always an option. Take some of your Kwik wood and knead it until its ready to mold. then create the eyelids on one of the plastic or glass eyeballs. then reaching through the back of the skull push the eye into place so that the eyes look sunken into the skull. From there use a small tool to blend the putty to the outside of the cheekbone securing the eye in place. do the same for the second eye. make sure your eyes have enough white so that the irises are visible when a light is shined onto the face. if the eye itself is too dark there is no point of even doing this setup...no one will see them.

At this point your skull is looking pretty good. Now you want to put on the base coats of paint before the corpsing process (which we will get to later) Using browns, purples, deep reds, and yellows paint what you imagine the rotted muscle, and skin would look like. Try to use gloss colors as it will give it a wet appearance that will peek out from under the final silicone skin layer. Now remember when you are doing this, not everything here is going to be visible in the end product. This is an undercoat...almost like a primer coat . anything exposed after corpsing can be touched up after the fact.

For the time being leave the head off of the body so you can work unencumbered. you will want to try the clothes on the body and pose it similar to what your end product will be . make note of where on the body skin is exposed, because there is no point in wasting materials corpsing body parts no one will ever see. My suggestion is to limit corpsing to the upper chest, neck, hands and foot.

Undress the skeleton and mark off your areas to corpse.

We are going to start with the chest. and shoulders. spray the bones with spray adhesive and wrap the plastic sheeting around the chest, up over one shoulder , down under the opposite armpit, and over the other shoulder. Do this a couple times to build up some thickness and then hit it with the heat gun. Shrink it until it clings to the skeleton. Do the same with the Skull, imagining the shrinking plastic is the top layer of skin. make sure to not coat the eyes or teeth.

On our Zombie,The additions to the skull ave made it heavier that it was before. If you reference the picture you will notice the neck is still very thin. However you will want to add a bit of structure to this to hold up the head.You can either stabilize the spine into the skull with a dowel rod, or mold plastick into the neck muscles as support. Add the Sternocleidomastoids by rolling two columns of plastic place in a v pattern on the neck where the collar bones meet branching out to just behind the ear area of the skull. Wrap in two or three layers of plastic and then shrink with the heat gun. Follow up with paint and or stain and repeat.

Now that the undercoat of paint on the skull is dry we need to make the rotting silicone skin. Take your silicone caulk and empty it into a mixing bucket with approximately 1/2 cup of Naphtha.You are going to want to do this in a well ventilated area and wear any respirator or mask you feel is necessary. You will stir this concoction up until the silicone is suitably thinned that you can paint it onto your skull. Add some red and brown paint or stain until its the proper color for your corpse, and then begin to slop it on. Once you have the coating you want, let the whole thing dry over night. When this dries it will be a thin rubbery skin like coating. So make sure not to cover the teeth or any gaping wound areas. after it dries you can pick at it to give it that rotted skin look. you will also be able to poke wig hairs into the silicone to add the wispy hairs.once dry you can add more coats to reach the desired rot, and then touch up your paint job adding highlights and shadows. You may want to hit the whole thing with a clear-coat if this is going to be outside.

Get your guy dressed and into position, and you're good to go. You may want to either hot glue or staple the hat to the head, depending on where you live. Wind could take it with a good gust. Also if you want you could scavenge an old steering wheel or make one as a prop. Enjoy your own personal Taxi Driver.