DD Report from the LCP Zombie Walk 2008

I've just returned from attending the first LCP Zombie Walk in Watkins Glen, NY. The Lake Country Players put on a good show and had a larger turnout than I expected for a first-time event being held in the Southern Tier region of NY, especially with the weather we were having up until moments before the walk began. The rain literally stopped for the zombie walk. Those LCP folks have some powerful mojo apparently.

Before I get into showing you the pictures of the event, I'll show you some of the pictures taken while my daughter Kyra and I got ready for our first zombie walk.

Step One: Become a Rock & Roll Zombie.
I used a mannequin head as a base structure to work with in creating my zombie prosthetic. I then used mask-grade liquid latex to build the prosthetic in layers. A prank eyeball meant for floating in a victim's drinking glass was put to alternate use here.

I then painted parts of the prosthetic that would serve as the inside of the wound. I cut a plastic bag to cover the wound area and painted a couple more layers of latex onto the edges. My young assistant helped with drying the latex. Then I removed the plastic bag covering the wound to create an outer flap of skin. A few bits of shredded latex I hung onto after doing makeup work on a sci-fi film over the Summer were added the socket and eyeball to provide ganglia. Then there was a bit more painting of the prosthetic appliance.



My wonderful wife than assisted with attaching the appliance and provided the majority of makeup work once it was attached. Here is the finished result.



Step Two: A Girl and Her Trowel

My wife bought a masonry trowel (no...not a garden trowel!) for our homage to Night of the Living Dead. I used a metal file to blunt the point and remove sharp edges and burrs. I used Cinema Secrets blood gel with a combination of brush and stipple sponge to get it nicely bloody. The blood gel dries hard and has only a slight tackiness once done; yet it washes off quickly with just water. It is easily one of my top ten favorite substances on the planet now.



The next step was to provide the trowel to an adorable little 3 year old ghoul. What follows is the sort of magic that you only witness when a girl gets her very first bloody trowel.





Step Three: Go to the Zombie Walk



I don't have any photos of the walk itself. Only the before and after. Pictures taken during the walk can be seen at Badhammer's MySpace page. Speaking of which, here is Badhammer (far right) and gaggle of other new zombie friends I made at the event.



The zombie walk's primary planner was Beth "Bloody Freak" Clark. She's a regular contributor of articles for Dark Destinations. She is the zombie bride below.



There was live music for the event provided by the members of Technicolor Trailer Park. They sang joyous songs about butts and suicidal bunny rabbits. Pictured below is one half of the music act, Jerry, who participated in the walk as a zombie pizza guy.



During the walk itself, Kyra told me she was having fun. I told her that even though she's 3 and I'm 38 it was also my first zombie walk. Her response was to ask when our second zombie walk would be. I told her maybe next year.

Kyra tied for first place in her age category during the zombie judging. Badhammer walked away with top honors as Best Over-All Zombie for his blood-spewing performance (Dude even had his own zombie soundtrack when he was walking). I took the prize for Grossest Zombie, which I think was a category made up on the spot.

Among our fabulous prizes, Kyra received a zombie Barbie and I got a zombie Ken. Yay!



Of course we'll do another zombie walk.



How could I say "no" to a face like this?



Besides...I've made the mistake of arming her with a trowel.

-Tom G
More pictures of the event can be seen at http://www.myspace.com/lcpzombiewalk