Adam Savage Learns about Prop and Animatronic Restoration!
Adam Savage visits the workshop of Tom Spina, where Tom and his team have made a business repairing, restoring, and preserving iconic props and artifacts from our favorite films and television shows. Adam and Tom discuss the restoration process, examining animatronic puppets from Rick Baker’s studio made for Gremlins 2!
7 thoughts on “Adam Savage Learns about Prop and Animatronic Restoration!”
Leave a Reply
One Day Builds
Adam Savage’s One Day Builds: Life-Size Velocirapt…
Adam embarks on one of his most ambitious builds yet: fulfil…
Show And Tell
Adam Savage’s King George Costume!
Adam recently completed a build of the royal St. Edwards cro…
All Eyes On Perserverance – This is Only a Test 58…
We get excited for the Perserverance rover Mars landing happening later today in this week's episode. Jeremy finally watches In and Of Itself, we get hyped for The Last of Us casting, and try to deciper the new Chevy Bolt announcements. Plus, Kishore gets a Pelaton and we wrack our brains around reverse engineering the source code to GTA …
One Day Builds
Mandalorian Blaster Prop Replica Kit Assembly!
Adam and Norm assemble a beautifully machined replica prop k…
House of MCU – This is Only a Test 586 – 2/11/21
The gang gets together to recap their favorite bits from this past weekend's Superb Owl, including the new camera tech used for the broadcast and the best chicken wing recipes. Kishore shares tips for streamlining your streaming services, and Will guests this week to dive into the mind-bending implications of the latest WandaVision episod…
One Day Builds
Adam Savage’s One Day Builds: Royal Crown of Engla…
One of the ways Adam has been getting through lockdown has b…
Making
Adam Savage Tests the AIR Active Filtration Helmet…
Adam unboxes and performs a quick test of this novel new hel…
Making
Weta Workshop’s 3D-Printed Giant Eyeballs!
When Adam visited Weta Workshop early last year, he stopped …
One Day Builds
Adam Savage’s One Day Builds: Wire Storage Solutio…
Adam tackles a shop shelf build that he's been putting off f…
Show And Tell
Mechanical Dragonfly Automata Kit Build and Review
Time for a model kit build! This steampunk-inspired mechanic…
GREAT Video
‘well spotted, sir – just like her outfit’
tom is a man after my own heart.
Very interesting, makes me wonder if there have been improvements to making these kind of props that don’t deteriorate like this, or is latex still the only way to do this kind of work?
Tom is awesome. We had him on our podcast a few months back. Check out episode 191 if you’re interested. Link on our website: http://www.regularjoes.com
I’m so glad that there are people doing these restorations so caringly and that these iconic pieces aren’t just left to rot.
It still saddens me that the foam skin on Stan Winston’s T-Rex from Jurassic Park just completely disintegrated in storage – probably not helped by the hundreds of litres or water it soaked up during filming 🙁
This restoration seems to replace latex material that has already broken down with other substances like cotton and resins. The original latex is now brittle, so the props are no longer flexible. I’m curious as to whether the remaining latex is stabilized somehow – perhaps infused with resin like those anatomy cadavers – or will the material continue to deteriorate over time? Perhaps sealing a gremlin in a vitrine with dry nitrogen gas and UV-filtering glass prevents further breakdown, or perhaps the whole structure must be replaced with a more durable material, like a petrified tree or a fossil bone.
I appreciate the effort and talent on display in these restorations; I just wonder if this is a stopgap measure and the ‘intact’ portions of the props will crumble away over the next twenty years.
I’m curious about the critter shown at 10 seconds into the video… It looks so familiar, but I can’t quite place it. It almost looks like one of the “mutant” creatures from that movie “My Science Project”. Do you (or any other commenters) know what movie that critter is from?