So gruesome you sometimes can't look, so real you double-take, and so essential to the quality of the show that it wouldn't be what it is without them. The make-up effects used in heroes are in a whole league of thier own. From graphic autopsy thrillers to extremely nasty burns, so much of what you see is real-life make-up and prosthetic effects. Heading the team that break bones, mangle hands and scar faces is the shows make-up producer and designer, GLENN HETRICK. He was more than happy to talk to the heroes magazine and reveal some tricks of the trade...
Claire vs. The Garbage disposal
GLENN HETRICK:'The spatial confines that we worked in, the way that we designed that, was very much like a magic trick, because the way it's shot makes it seem like there's no room for us to be there. There are three of us - myself, Brian and Aaron Drainey - underneath the sink. We're puppeteering . Hayden Panettiere, as Claire just has her arm behind her back, and we have the mechanical arm up her sleeve. We make the completely normal-looking arm move down into the sink to grab the ring. The disposal goes of and when we pull it back up, it's completely twisted and destroyed and then it heals and resets mechanically all the way back to normal!'
Claire's Brocken Ribs
GLENN HETRICK:
'When we started the show, hayden hadn't turned 18 yet, and there is only so many hours you can work with a minor. That was a challenge for us. Traditionally, you take someone away and have hours to do the transformation, and then you come back to set to start shooting, but it was counter-intuitive to even concieve the effect that way, because of the time limitations. So on Hayden all the effects were were designed with the quick application techniques. When she pulls up her shirt, there's no blending of a make-up application, because everything your seeing is silicone skin, that goes that goes all the way up under her bra and below the line of her skirt.
This entire piece is a very thin layer of silicone applience with her ribs on a track. If you looked at her off camera, instead of glue and blended edges, you'd find a corset with lace that we just ties up. (It only took less than 5 minutes to apply it to her) We put it on, ties it up, bloodied the ribs and shot the scene. There's a little track the ribs slide along, Bryan Blair designed the mechanics of that effect. The're like resin tracks made of putty that the resin ribs slide along, and there's a tiny cable that allows you to reset it. We pushes it out, then in the shot, Hayden would push them back in. Through the nature of the silicone and the way we cast it, once she takes her fingers out of the hole, it seals up. I believe that Stargate did a 'heal,' but almost everything you see in there is a physical effect, except the removal of blood, which was done digitally.'
The Frozen Guard
GLENN HETRICK:'Syalr has frozen the FBI guard, who falls on the ground and shatters. We built a silicone body, put the wardrobe over it and used a thinned out fibre glass resin over the whole thing to stiffen the wardrobe. Then using a specific colour palette that we approved with the producers, we created these brocken capilleries and veinsin a blush hue, and over that we used muliple layers of different materials to create different layers of ice. Finally we cas the rigid arm, broke it into many sections and then went in and fabricated all of the internal organs because you see a cross section. So it was a combination of a lot of different materials.'
Claire vs. The Garbage disposal
GLENN HETRICK:'The spatial confines that we worked in, the way that we designed that, was very much like a magic trick, because the way it's shot makes it seem like there's no room for us to be there. There are three of us - myself, Brian and Aaron Drainey - underneath the sink. We're puppeteering . Hayden Panettiere, as Claire just has her arm behind her back, and we have the mechanical arm up her sleeve. We make the completely normal-looking arm move down into the sink to grab the ring. The disposal goes of and when we pull it back up, it's completely twisted and destroyed and then it heals and resets mechanically all the way back to normal!'
Claire's Brocken Ribs
GLENN HETRICK:
'When we started the show, hayden hadn't turned 18 yet, and there is only so many hours you can work with a minor. That was a challenge for us. Traditionally, you take someone away and have hours to do the transformation, and then you come back to set to start shooting, but it was counter-intuitive to even concieve the effect that way, because of the time limitations. So on Hayden all the effects were were designed with the quick application techniques. When she pulls up her shirt, there's no blending of a make-up application, because everything your seeing is silicone skin, that goes that goes all the way up under her bra and below the line of her skirt.
This entire piece is a very thin layer of silicone applience with her ribs on a track. If you looked at her off camera, instead of glue and blended edges, you'd find a corset with lace that we just ties up. (It only took less than 5 minutes to apply it to her) We put it on, ties it up, bloodied the ribs and shot the scene. There's a little track the ribs slide along, Bryan Blair designed the mechanics of that effect. The're like resin tracks made of putty that the resin ribs slide along, and there's a tiny cable that allows you to reset it. We pushes it out, then in the shot, Hayden would push them back in. Through the nature of the silicone and the way we cast it, once she takes her fingers out of the hole, it seals up. I believe that Stargate did a 'heal,' but almost everything you see in there is a physical effect, except the removal of blood, which was done digitally.'
The Frozen Guard
GLENN HETRICK:'Syalr has frozen the FBI guard, who falls on the ground and shatters. We built a silicone body, put the wardrobe over it and used a thinned out fibre glass resin over the whole thing to stiffen the wardrobe. Then using a specific colour palette that we approved with the producers, we created these brocken capilleries and veinsin a blush hue, and over that we used muliple layers of different materials to create different layers of ice. Finally we cas the rigid arm, broke it into many sections and then went in and fabricated all of the internal organs because you see a cross section. So it was a combination of a lot of different materials.'