I guess my fascination for this kind of thing started with the first film I can remember that made me feel scared. As a kid growing up in the 80's the Sunday afternoon staple was to watch Walt Disney films on TV. Nestled in between animal exploitation films such as 'Milo and Otis' and the 'Littlest Hobo' appeared a film that would give me nightmares for weeks. This was Ray Bradbury's 'Something Wicked This Way Comes' directed by Jack Clayton. Other nightmare inducing cinematic moments of my childhood include the child collector from 'Chitty!Chitty! Bang!Bang!, the heart removal scene from Temple of Doom and later on the Alien film's And the preacher from Poltergeist 2. Hell both Poltergeist film's scared the life out of me. I became fascinated with the power that cinema had in creating fear in the viewer. This led me to source films from our local video store that would not only give me that sensation but would allow me to investigate how and why this was achieved. Enter 'Scream Greats, Vol. 1: Tom Savini, Master of Horror Effects'. https://youtu.be/RpWOM2x0AxQ This documentary opened my eyes to a whole new world of horror and special effects and more importantly gave an insight into how some of the old school effects were achieved. I watched this film repeatedly along with films Savini had been involved with. I still can't believe that I managed to hire R18+ videos on my own at the age of twelve. Watching 70's and 80's slasher films at a young age required some crafty planning when it came to my parents. Along with films such as Maniac and Igor and the Lunatics I would hire out other schlock comedy horrors such as Fright Night or Toxic Avenger that I would then show the covers to my parents with a "they are all just kind of silly" attitude. This system worked fine until the day my dad walked in the lounge room just as the scene from Maniac appeared on screen where the drivers head gets blown off by a shotgun. Needless to say and understandably so being a father now myself, my parents started to heavily regulate what I was watching. Unfortunately it dampened my career dream of working in special effects. "What do you want to do when you grow up?" "I want to be a doctor" "I want to be a fireman" "I want to make fake heads explode in a mass of gore on the cinema screen" Although my dream faded a bit it was not forgotten. Over the years I have delved into making various props and blood for my own and friends horror films.
TRICK KNIVES
RIGS AND SYRINGES
BLOOD
Blood! blood! I make blood. Buckets of blood, viles of blood. foaming blood, thick blood. Blood you can eat. Dripping with blood. Blood! Blood! Blood! BLOOD!