Wesley Scoggins
Indy Mogul
Wesley's Weekly HOW TO: Fake Teeth
I know that almost all of you have seen it at least once in an action movie fight, the hero pulls back and lays down a devasting blow to a bad guy, sending him reeling, and his teeth flying out of his mouth. Having a characters teeth knocked out during a fight or some accident is a great way to show a severe injury, and a lot of you guys have requested it so I thought I would try to cover this in a really simple way.
For the teeth themselves, there are lots of way to do it. But if you're going to be spitting them out, I think it would be a good idea to carve them out of something that is supposed to be in your mouth (rather than clay or something that you're not supposed to be eating). I found these oval shaped mints that are just about the perfect shape for most of the front teeth, so i'm going to use them, but really, as long as they are the general shape, it doesn't matter if they are perfectly shaped.
I cut one end off, to flatten it (I used a pocket knife for this, since it's kind of soft, another benefit of carving these out of breathmints, but as i've said in other tutorials, if you don't feel comfortable handling a sharp object, get someone to help you, or use a spoon).
I did it a couple of more times, just carving the general shape of the teeth.
Now how to do the effect. Put the fake teeth in your mouth, along with a gulp of fake blood (dyed corn syrup is ideal, but if it says "Non-Toxic" it'll be fine as long as you don't swallow and you washe your mouth out afterwards). Now follow the advice in the BFX Stunt Fight episode, on how to perform a fake punch. Do it the same way, except after the person being punched takes the "hit", have them twist their head away and spit out the fake blood and fake teeth. You don't have to have the teeth perfectly shaped, because generally they will move out of the frame so quickly that only that you're spitting out what looks like a tooth will be discernable by the viewer.
If you're going to show the teeth on the ground, it would be a good idea to carve a more accurate tooth. If you're just going to be showing it on the ground, you can use clay or plaster, since you can just put it in a puddle of fake blood, and it won't be in your mouth. So you can have a vaugely shaped mint for when you spit it out, and when you show it on the ground have a "more accurate" tooth for the close-up after it's out.
Afterwards, just use the bruise make-up and tooth black out from the BFX Injury Make-up Episode, and you've got yourself set.
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