Patrick Kiely: You’re very welcome to Cork Creative Kristie and Justin. So Kristie and Justin, we have met before during the rewarding and uplifting feel the force festival in Dunmanway in June, 2024 for our listeners.

Can you tell us about mummy head studios? How did it come to be? Why did you name it? Mummy head studios.

Kristie Davison: It started because, I’m a printmaker. I tried trained with my bachelor’s degree in Atlanta, Georgia. and I did all my etchings and my prints with mummies, everything was mummies. and that was basically, it was an idea that women were always covering ourselves. We always have clothes, makeups, everything, so you never really get to see the real person.

Because we’re always covering ourselves to be something else that society says we should be. So all my work was the unraveling of a woman taking the mummy wrappings off. And one of my friends said to me, you should just be Mummy Head. And it stuck as a nickname kind of thing, so I labeled everything Mummy Head in my work.

And so that’s how we ended up using Mummy Head Studios, because that was just a continuation of my artwork on.

Patrick Kiely: Very good.

How did you found Mommy Head Studios then?

Justin Walter: So that, that kind of started in a roundabout way with our son, like our son Corbin. So when we moved to Ireland, he had to pick classes and because he was late coming in, there was a DCG class.

And he had never heard of that because they don’t offer classes like that in the states in school. And so I told him, I said, If you go do that class, I’ll go get you a 3D printer. And so then, our 3D printing side started from there, where I was printing stuff at home with him, where he was getting excited about it, and then I was trying new ideas, and then, I wanted to do a charitable thing, dressing up as a Star Wars character and going to children’s hospitals and stuff like that. And that’s where it really started, the building process started going. And I had Noidoo, who the 501st were. I never met them before, so I thought I was the only guy doing it.

And then I came across Shane Murphy, who’s a big guy, does a lot with the 501st, and we started talking. And so I was like, okay, great, I’m gonna start making all this stuff. for my outfit and then I started getting calls. Hey, can you make this for me? Palpatine’s cane, for example, we’ve cast and mould that because Shane needed a new one.

So now I’ve got other people reaching out, that do different cosplayers. Like, can you do this? And while I was watching some videos or some other content creators about what they were doing, they had a contest one day to submit a helmet. And the rules were you had to pick one of five Star Wars pilot helmets, but it couldn’t be Star Wars.

So, I turned mine into a Maverick helmet. Full oxygen mask and everything. And a friend of mine who works in the prop industry over in London, another, prop guy, he saw it and he had gone to Makinarium. And he had showed them the work and make an area, they’re very, they’ll start with classes and they’ll have, a very limited amount, but it’s by invite only because they want to see people know the work because it’s also secretly an audition because they’re looking for people who do good.

And then when they have a film come out that they’re suited for. they may reach out to ’em to come and, do that, but it’s also getting to work with masters in the industry.

Graham McCraken, who taught me moulding, has done everything from Dune, all the life size or orthos and the. all masters of the air that just came out.

He did all the propellers and all the stuff for the aircraft with another company. And then jet Cooper, who does all the designs and digital design, sculpting for everybody from Harley Davidson to. So we got to learn with them and Amanda, the owner and the CEO, she’s an amazing sculptor with clay.

So we got this wealth of knowledge from getting to spend time with them. And while we were there, I showed them Christy’s artwork and then they called and invited her. To come out to the studio as well. and so we went back again and it was.

Kristie Davison: Yeah. All the collaboration between that and the training and getting more and more into cause play and then movie props and then understanding this and then finding out also I could take like my art degree.

and then we could mix his talents with 3d printing and then my art degree and then we could have a studio and Collaborate with others to make more products.

Justin Walter: So we started pushing the boundaries of what you can do with the technology One of the things I you know for when she’s printmaking She’s etching steel or metal plates and it takes up to a month to get an etching done I looked at the technology for laser cutters and I said, oh we can use that Do your base etching into there and then let’s see if it works So we called somebody who has a laser cutter turned out at work and here we are eight months later now All the print makers are all making laser cuts on the metal with that and then they go in and touch it up and stuff Like that, so they gave us a really unique way of being able to take stuff and push the boundaries of how it’s done, but they’re also at the same time learning from like when they see us doing these things that they weren’t doing in the studio because they never didn’t think about it or they haven’t come across it yet.

So it was just this sharing of idea and I think every artist and every person we got to work with from illustrators To prop makers to animatronics people set up and set designers and sculptors and make an arium I mean we still talk to them daily like even if we’re not on a project together And then we come up with little projects that we’re gonna do together in a future

Kristie Davison: collaboration in that blending of talents We thought we should have a studio To where we could be the ones that could help resource for other people and do our own work as well.

Justin Walter: And the film industry seems to be changing ever since COVID. It’s, people are getting Star Wars fatigue. They’re getting Marvel fatigue. And now you’re starting to see that shift where they’re ramping down Star Wars production. Not as many as often. And now they’re starting to ramp the Marvel ones up.

So, as far as Disney goes and then Netflix and the streaming services are coming out with more of their own movies and it just creates an opportunity for it. And us being here was unique because they just opened the film studio here. So I was like, Oh, well, great. I can go. If a crew needs a prop or breaks a prop, I’m here.

Either I can make one for them or they can come use the equipment and make it themselves. Hey, there’s the shop, go for it. And, that was the idea behind it. And then we found out after being over at Macon Airm, that was very much their thinking as well, because a lot of the film industry is actually moving to Ireland.

from London and everything is going in America, they’re going to Toronto. So a lot of the film industry is leaving Hollywood and going to Canada a lot. Is moving over here from other parts of Europe. We were in this weird way ahead of the game, as we were told by the people over there, but we’re, we’re here for whenever they need stuff.

Patrick Kiely: What you do is inherently tactile and that you’re making models, you’re making 3d moulds, they’re something that you can physically. Touch feel it’s there and it’s present on set. Would you think that some of the fatigue about Star Wars and some of the fatigue about some of the later Marvel movies is because they deviated from that and they went to a virtual production and everything seemed a little bit less because it wasn’t the authentic kind of lived in.

You couldn’t taste the sand anymore, so to speak.

Justin Walter: I can speak to that where I’ve seen a prop that was made for a movie and a lot of time and energy was spent on it and it looked better. But in the end, they swapped it out for a CGI version of the prop. That the actor was holding in their hand, which I understand why they did because it’s more cost effective But the part was already made but they can manipulate it easier And so the technology on that side is changing the film industry a lot I understand why a lot of the film companies are worried about AI and being able to generate that stuff I can tell you that you can tell When an actor is actually physically holding something and when they’re when it’s put on screen I mean even if you think back to the Matrix that was mind blowing When that came out and when I was a kid The Last Starfighter was amazing and then I went back and watched it recently and I’m like Terminator 2 as well I was like, oh my god

Kristie Davison: and

Justin Walter: that was realistic looking to us back then and now today it’s but today

Kristie Davison: Yeah

Justin Walter: Doing the prop making ruined movies for me because when I’m watching the movie, I was like, Oh, now the Millennium Falcon, all I see are printer parts and plumbing parts all over the set.

Our business is okay because we don’t just do the movie prop cosplay stuff, right? There’s always somebody who wants to dress up whether for Halloween or for cosplay, so. There’s always business there, but our thing is about doing, mixing all art, like, I mean, we do rugs, we, Tuft and Rugs, My oil

Kristie Davison: paintings, printmaking.

She does

Justin Walter: oil paintings, she’s done portraits for people in the community here, and then, I learned weaving from a Navajo lady, in Arizona, a famous Navajo artist, I started learning that, and then we came here, and weaving was, It’s a part of the old culture that’s it’s sad to see it dying, but it’s nice to see places like, Letterkenny starting to build it back up.

So I think in the end, people appreciate the old way of doing things more, even though they can create anything on a screen, you can’t really sell the story if you’re relying solely on that.

Kristie Davison: People still need that.

Justin Walter: They need that. They need to see, they need to, even the artists, I can tell you a story about a certain artist who swing, swings a hammer.

In a specific movie and the first prop that was made was a little too light So they had to go in and put some tungsten powder in it because when he was on set he was just doing this with it And he was like wait, i’m not supposed to be doing that because it’s supposed to be heavy so You know and I think with the cgi stuff or the technological stuff it gives it away too much sometimes the old ways are the better ways, which is why people always eventually they may go away, but Right before something disappears You Somebody rediscovers it and starts doing it again.

Patrick Kiely: So we’ll stick with the, the analog a little bit, and we’ll travel back in time a little bit.

And, we could record an entire podcast for sure, based on just your first answer there. But you did mention in a previous conversation that we had the story of how you both met and who that particular matchmaker was, and we’ll delve into this straight away.

So could you tell us that story, please?

Kristie Davison: Okay. I mean, I could just start that I was a huge Smashing Pumpkins fan from a very early age. I would say young age, but

Patrick Kiely: since GISH,

Kristie Davison: yeah, so we’re talking early nineties. and, yeah, I’ve just followed the band all the way. Into my adulthood forever. So as I got older, you can be more involved and you can buy VIP events and, do the fun things.

And so I started doing that and my brother lived in Chicago. So I went to visit him. And Billy Corgan has a tea shop there. And, so I would go there when he’d have special events. So I got to meet him a couple of times and got things signed. And he was very nice. And then he would see me more and more because I was going to VIP events and concerts and he’s just like, Oh, Hey, there she is again.

And I’m like, hello. but he has been friends with him forever.

Justin Walter: Yeah. So my mom, Billy, she didn’t even know he was a musician. And she always said, Oh, you’re a creative person. You should do music. And he would laugh it off, but you know, she’s known him for years and years. I mean, and then I had met him quite a few times growing up.

I served in the military and I served overseas and I came home and Billy and my mom were together. My mom told me to come up to LA to meet up with her. And so when I walked in, it was her and Billy were having lunch. So he’s like, Oh. I don’t want to know anything about over there, but how’s things going?

And I said, they’re all right. And then I was like, I’m just doing my own thing right now. I’m taking a break from everything. He came out to Arizona and we spent some time hiking and just in the mountains and then it turned into, I want to come write a new album in this tiny town of 10, 000 people and I’m going to bring the whole band.

And I was like, Oh, there’s noise ordinances and there’s no way possible to make this happen. And he’s like, figure it out. So I figured, I found an old IMAX theater that had just gone out of business and it was right in the middle of an outlet mall where all the shop. And so for three months, we recorded the album Oceania in there.

And I’d go outside and people would be like, Oh, who’s playing in there? That’s great. And I’m like, Oh, it’s just some guys practicing for Battle of the Bands. And really it was, Smashing Pumpkins are in there for three months. And, he moved me to Chicago and one of the interesting things is, I’d be up at Billy’s house where I’d stay up, I’d stay at his house and I was out cutting grass one day and, I leave to go out and her friend are peeking over the wall, to the house.

Like, I don’t see them. And then she’s at the tea shop. And I’m going out the back door, she’s coming in. So there’s always this kind of crisscross. Even I first went to the army in Georgia and that, and she was in college right down the road and we ended up at the same party. In 1996 and didn’t find us out till we were looking at old pictures.

Oh, I was there too. And I went through a divorce and I swore off relationships of any kind. I was just happy being by myself going, you know I was going to school full time At you know after I retired out of the military and then I was working for billy and I would do Anything and everything from most of it was setting up his vip shows Which consisted of three songs?

Q and A session before a concert for a limited amount of people. So it was very chintzy set up by the way, the people that were doing it before. So he wanted me to fix that. And so as time went on, I got, I started thinking about certain cities. We went to like in Chicago, I rented the planetarium for 500 and we put all the fans and bean bag chairs laying down with the lights off.

Yeah. And Billy playing music while the star maps were playing. And it was just the most magical experience. I

Kristie Davison: didn’t get that one.

Justin Walter: I had

Kristie Davison: him in Dallas. So, like,

Justin Walter: and that was how it came to be, too, because Billy then started making me like a little cast member in Pumpkin Land, and he was constantly putting me on videos like Facebook Live, when it was only celebrities, there was plenty of things where he’s interviewing me and making me do gag stuff, just like Doug the tour manager did.

She commented on something one day and Billy goes, Oh, I know her. she’s a great girl. You should meet her. And I was like, no, And then like, we had met in person way

Kristie Davison: by there. It was like,

Justin Walter: but then we like, there was something that Billy wanted done for artwork. So I reached out to her cause he said, Contact the girl.

And then more and more, our friendship grew over time. But you know, we were,

Kristie Davison: you were so busy on tour with her. Yeah, I was on tour with her. I had two kids to raise. I was on all those tours from,

Patrick Kiely: I’d say 2012. Overlapping orbits of Billy Corgan and eventually you sing. Yeah, and eventually.

Justin Walter: Oh, and like, and Billy’s one of her top five.

That was a joke. One of the top five celebrities she would leave me for. Valentine’s Day, I showed up at the house with Billy, and so Billy’s like, sitting in a, it was me, Billy, and a professional wrestler showed up at the house. So there’s pictures of the kids with Uncle Billy playing Xbox and, playing Halo together.

It’s a lot of

Kristie Davison: fun.

Justin Walter: And I actually left them, to settle down with Christy. And he goes, well, I knew it was going to happen. I was like, well, it’s your fault. And he’s like, I know. But it got to a point where it was like, Hey, I’m in my forties. I don’t want to be the touring guy. I don’t even like music enough to want to be doing this.

And Billy always used that to his advantage too, because he knew that there was loyalty there and there was trust there because I wasn’t a part of that one. But Billy gave me the greatest gift ever twice. he helped me readjust when I came home from Iraq. And honestly, I think if it wasn’t for him, I probably wouldn’t have been around.

The second greatest gift he gave me was Kristie. So, and it was a lot of it had to do with, The not wanting to be with anybody and there was a lot of conversations with him like, look, you need to learn to trust again, you need to accept this gift and you need to be able to, go and experience that instead of just shut everything off and go about your day.

So, honestly, he was definitely, the big proponent of that.

Kristie Davison: you couldn’t have told 15 year old me that, yeah, Billy Corgan would be the reason why you have a husband.

Patrick Kiely: And Justin, you’ve mentioned your careers in the military and law enforcement before when we had studios. and with your creative work now, and I don’t want to be too reductive here, but those sectors don’t exactly scream creativity to me.

I mean, it’s more structured. did you find creative outlets while in your careers there? And do you think the discipline and structure serve you now in the creative work that you do?

Justin Walter: So I served in two branches of military and then federal law enforcement, so it was a very rigid structure, right? You wouldn’t think about the creativity within the military, but there is, because the best soldiers, even the guy, and I’m not talking Medal of Honor winners, but the people who, Find ways to make things work and especially when you’re deployed far from home and we used to have barbecues by procuring meat While everybody else is eating in chow hall We’re having a big old barbecue outside and everybody’s like where are you guys getting this stuff?

So there is creativity That’s created because of the necessity So they teach you to follow a set of checkpoints in your in your thinking process Right or a chain of command and But when you’re thinking things through and planning, you become hyper planning, which is part of the creative process in the sense of if you’re planning on a piece, okay, I’m going to move from this stage to this stage.

I’m going to do this. I don’t know how I’m going to do this yet, but I’m going to look into it. But there was also, hey, you need to think outside the box because sometimes the situations you found yourself in following that line would not necessarily, have the outcome, the desired outcome. So the generally the people who had amazing careers and still do to stay in the military, the people that do think outside the box, it’s all about problem solving.

And that does go hand in hand with it. Now, would I have ever cosplayed or dressed up as anything in the military? Absolutely not, because I was already in the best cosplay uniform there was to make. But when I got out, that kind of started to, with Billy, that he was a big proponent of He could see it in me with what I was setting up for him for VIPs, but he would draw it out of me more.

And then when Kristie and I were together, it would, she would draw it out more, my way of seeing things is I see an object and I think what it can be. So what, and she’ll tell you, this used to drive her nuts. We went to a stone quarry once and I saw a single rock and I was like, They built this massive patio out of thick slab granite with black, washed pebbles running in between it off a piece of a black obsidian that looks like a black waterfall between granite rocks with cedar fencing.

So I made a Mr. Miyagi looking Japanese yard in the middle of Arkansas. That everybody loved, but for me it was, I have this in my head. I always stare

Kristie Davison: at something and I immediately go, oh no.

Justin Walter: And I go,

Kristie Davison: I was like, what are you thinking? Because he’s got that, the military sense, but it’s also work ethic.

And finish the project and get things done. So I see that in him when he works. That he can’t. Not just stop, it has to be completed and get the task done, get the goal done. and I think that has a lot to do with your military training too. That too, yeah. Here’s the goal, here’s this object that’s creative, and it’s made me creative and inspired me.

How can I get to that goal with this object?

Justin Walter: And that’s exactly it, because I’ve had people 3D printer since moving here? And I’m like, what? Why can’t I have one? Or, you can’t do that project because it’s going to be impossible, and I’m like, watch, and I find a way to do it, and I get real creative, in the end, it seems to always work out,

  but sometimes

Justin Walter: it’s a lot of trial and error, but in the end, if my goal, if I see that image, the end goal, I see the image of what I’m trying to create, I will get there no matter what and I think that is probably the strongest thing that came from the military.

Like you always You know if the mission’s before you everything is about that mission And so I guess I kind of work that way, you know Sometimes I won’t get on a prop until it’s due two three days before Which is insane because there’s a lot of work to do you print and then you have to sand and then you have to paint But I will leave just enough time It’s like I need that pressure of being short on time to really achieve the amazing pieces.

And I can spend months doing a piece that comes out beautiful. But the ones that I do in shorter notice seem to come out the best. because I’m not stopping. She’ll go off to bed and I’m still up till 3 or 4. I’ll be up sometimes until the sun comes up the next day. And she’s like, have you slept yet?

And I’m like, nope. And I’ll go sleep for an hour and get up and get right back into it. And then when it’s done, I’ll have a nice week to relax or a couple days off. And it is fun because we get a lot of questions for random things from, doing the prosthetics for dog. I get a call from the vet.

Hey, do you have a thing called the 3D printer? We have some dog, we have a dog that needs some back legs and I’m like, okay. And so we’ve been working on this project. That one’s taking a really long time because we want to make sure everything’s done right with that one. But,

Kristie Davison: And source out the right people.

Today

Justin Walter: I’m down the, like I said, today I was down the junkyard looking for a switch from an old machine because it has to do with a prop from the 60s and I’m trying to make it as accurate as possible. And inadvertently the gentleman there says, you can make anything? And I said, yes. And he shows me a piece.

He goes, because we can’t buy these anymore because they don’t make them. But there’s a lot of people who need these parts. And I said, oh, I can make that all, it was just a simple 3D print. That’s the fun part. So that’s the fun part that, like, every day it’s something new. Whether, there’s a gentleman up in Cary that wants, wanted me to recreate a Neolithic stone that has a map of the stars in it.

Because the environment is wearing it away, erosion is wearing it down. And so he said, can you save this or, so I’ll go up and scan it. I can make him a fake boulder if he wants, but I can at least give him the digital scans. and do stuff like that. So for me, I like saving history. So that’s what really gets my juices going and stuff.

Patrick Kiely: And Christy, the pieces that you displayed at Feel of Force and that you’ve developed with the Maconarium at Pinewood Studios, they’re startlingly detailed and creative. I really advise anyone who hasn’t to look at Mummy Head Studios Instagram page to see some of these. How did you come to that design work from your printing work, as you said already, and how did you end up working with the Maconarium and at the Pinewood Complex?

Kristie Davison: well, I got, invited to Makinarium because of Justin’s experience with Makinarium. he had shown them my artwork, my paintings and my etchings and stuff. And so when there was a space open, they emailed him and said, Hey, would she like to join? So I went over there and did that. It was so much fun because they challenge you, they hand you something and they go, okay, here, everybody gets the same item, but now you have to do, you on this like you have to make it special and different from everybody else and you shine yourself on that So when they gave us the like Elvin blades and stuff and said here make it and that was

Justin Walter: designed by Jack Cooper Yeah, he did the design

Kristie Davison: for it. And so with mine, I had so much fun with, it was Phil, wasn’t it? Yeah, Phil. Phil is their head, painter.

Justin Walter: Painter.

Kristie Davison: Amazing master at his craft. And, I said to him, I want more than anything to do a chocolate version of it. I don’t know why, but I wanted to do a chocolate version of it.

And they had just finished a specific movie that had a lot of chocolate. So he said to me, I still have some like you want to so then he trained me on this huge industrial compressor and painter and all that stuff and he was an amazing instructor so he taught me how to do that we did the chocolate blade and then I painted the handle to look like a Cadbury wrapper so that was like so much fun to do and then the other one I wanted to do like a Complete opposite, have nothing to do with each other.

And I made it look like bone. But the fun thing is it looks like bone, it looks fragile, and then you grab it, it’s won , it’s like . It’s like this rubbery silicone or it was resin actually. Yeah. It’s just like this wonky little thing, but you look at it so delicate, you want to like grab it and, but that is the most fun, I think, is having one thing look one way.

Yeah. But, and then reality, when you grab it, something properties completely different. That just, I don’t know, it just excites me. I love doing stuff like that. So, I see what

Patrick Kiely: perceptions and expectations.

Kristie Davison: Yeah. Yeah. it’s just the fun bit of it.

Justin Walter: It did. It came out looking like scrimshaw. Like you’d see the old sailors making a walrus bone.

I mean, it came out. Just absolutely amazing. I just

Kristie Davison: want to do more and more of that

Justin Walter: and They were so enthralled that even Phil came over there says, okay now you have to teach me how to do this because I can’t Do

Kristie Davison: it was so funny. Just go over and he goes looks at me. He’s like, I’m just don’t mind me I mean he was like this close to my face.

He’s like don’t mind me I’m just watching what you’re doing so I can see what you’re doing And I’m just like, okay, yeah, that’s fine. And I was like, I know you’re just being cute, but like, I know you’re an amazing painter and thank you for the compliment. But, there’s a humility

Patrick Kiely: to admit that though.

And that’s how everyone gets better. You can, you learn off other people and when you stop, I think is when you might as well. That’s when you can declare yourself dead. I couldn’t imagine

Kristie Davison: not. learning. Like I just, I can’t even imagine somebody being a master of something because there’s always something you can learn from somebody else because they do something a little bit different.

Everybody has their own little unique characteristics about themselves or how they work. And to just watch everybody and learn that excites me as well. That inspires me. Sure. They’re like, Oh, I never thought about doing it that way. Or, and then you start working your own process and doing your own stuff.

And that’s the greatest part.

Justin Walter: That’s Makinarium in a nutshell too.

Makinarium, nowhere in America would you ever be able to walk into, say, Warner Brothers Studios and go learn from the prop masters in the prop shop, like Adam Savage and those guys. Like, well, they’ll do their shows and stuff.

That door doesn’t ever get opened. And Amanda, the CEO, and what she created, what Makinarium, they have one rule, and the rule is no egos, because they really got, you get tired of that in the film industry, right? So she surrounds herself with people who aren’t like that. and I swear, like you may be out there two weeks, you may be out there two days, but when you’re leaving, you start getting emotional because it’s, they have such created this family atmosphere that they just don’t, you don’t want it to stop.

And that also furthers the creative process too, because there’s times I’ve been working on stuff here at the house and I reached out and I’ll send her a message or I’ll send any of them a message, say, Hey, can I, I’m trying to do this thing and I’m trying to figure out. I’m not having success doing it this way.

And they’re like, okay, here’s try this, and this. and. if they don’t gate keep. on the information. and I can say that wholeheartedly. ’cause being a huge Star Wars fan, I’ve got to see things that any Star Wars fan would get their left leg and all their arms and to see it all.

Could it swap up for a

Patrick Kiely: C3 P one

Justin Walter: I, and I mean, all the way. and they’re. Makin Air is responsible for hero props, so, I mean, Kylo Ren’s lightsaber, I got to sit there and hold his actual close up lightsaber, all the lightsabers,

Kristie Davison: Rey’s,

Justin Walter: and so when you walk in, they’re all on display there, and it’s just, you’re in this moment of history.

Patrick Kiely: But it’s how they build that team as well, and you’ve spoken before, when we discussed it before about how they put together teams and the approach they take to team building to foster that collaborative. Can you speak a little to that?

Justin Walter: Here’s a prime example. So when Christy got invited to go, I wanted to go back because there was a certain part of mould making that I wanted to brush up on.

So I wanted to spend a little time with Phil or Graham. Focusing on the fiberglass aspect just to refine my skill set. And when Amanda knew I was coming, she looks at people’s personalities and the skill sets that they have, and she brings them in at the same time. And so like everybody there was great, but particularly I have a friend named Gary and Gary used to be a law enforcement officer in the UK.

And he suffers from post traumatic stress disorder very much like I do. I’m at a stage where, it’s very different for me as a soldier than what his is for him. But Amanda had worked with him before and he’s an amazing prop maker. Amanda thought we’d work well together, and Gary and I hit it off, and Gary and Kristy hit it off, right after making it, he came here, and so now he’s coming to Dublin with us.

Kristie Davison: Amanda knew, she knew that we would make a really good team, the three of us. and

Justin Walter: it works too, because I noticed like in the States, we have access to mental health, and it’s not even about mental health, it’s, I think there’s a stigma to it. Where they think it’s like, oh, you’re going to the asylum to talk to somebody.

No, sometimes you just need to talk things out just to get it out of your system. And that’s really where it comes in handy. But over here in Ireland, I find that there’s not as much of that infrastructure set up for that. So I talked to other soldiers daily or Gary, so we’ve created this little network of people dealing with this.

And then, and we’re all creative people, it turns out because when, especially with the PTSD, when you’re doing these creative things, I can tell you when I’ve sat there and do weaving, it completely shuts off that part of my brain. It is gone. Like, and I am happier, lighter. It’s like the same kind of focus that I used to have when I was doing a job in the military.

Is required of me in this moment that I’m doing this and it drowns out all the noise And it’s the same for Gary my friend another soldier I was with in Iraq is now doing murals and he is he was a truck driver And now he’s doing full on murals in the states and using laser technology to paint them I think what it

Kristie Davison: does is it creates a hyper intense focus.

So when you are just focused on, like I said, here’s the project, here’s the idea, here’s the inspiration, here’s the goal that you’re trying to go to. When you have that PTSD and the mind is racing and you can’t, and you get in a rut and you can’t get out of that. that creativity and then having other people that you can lean on to work on that creativity together.

Your mind starts racing in such a positive way  and your focus is on the goal and the teamwork rather than what you’ve been going through and all of a sudden you forget. And all you’re focused on is this team and making this work. And I, think that’s why the three of us work so well together. It’s just that intense concentration, of, the goal.

What, here’s what we want it to look like. How do we get it to do that? and the collaboration, the brainstorming and all that stuff. Gets all that excitement and creativity rolling.

Justin Walter: Exactly. And it’s like, I may not be good at, a painting technique or something, but I’m really good at fiberglassing or doing this other aspect of it.

So when someone’s struggling there, I can jump in and it, and that, that does operate just like the military. you have a guy who’s a radio man, you got a guy who’s a rifleman, a medic, and when one’s in need, you jump in and pick up the slack for him. It’s very much like that in this. In the artistic sense, too, I’d say from the military aspect, we’re trained to react a certain way all the time.

And when you’re trained the way the U. S., the way I was trained, there is no turning it off for the rest of your life. I walk down the street and I watch people’s feet and I get in step with them. Like I, even little things like that, right? Now I get to use the things that I was trained to do, whereas when you’re not doing something, it’s like, You have all this energy built up because you’re trained to do all these things and there’s no outlet for it.

But now all of a sudden you’re getting to use those same skill sets just in a more positive way or in a different type of environment. and I think that’s, that was key with making Makinarium. Amanda is really good about putting the kind of people together that not only Helps them achieve what they’re achieving or working on but it also helps the other people too and it and I’m and I’ll never say this Yeah, it goes back to having no ego and just learning and

Kristie Davison: boosting each other

Justin Walter: It truly is a family that I will never forget and never you know, if they call me tomorrow Can you come do this, for us, we’re shorthanded or there’s no pay.

I, in a heartbeat, I would do things for them because they would do it for all, everybody else, and they have. So that’s the kind of, we, that’s what we like about the art community and we find that. The same way here to, within that community,

Patrick Kiely: the structure in terms of how they build team building.

That’s around Amanda. Or is that around how she puts structures in place to, I suppose, to, I suppose we an S. O. P. Or so to speak, or is there a particular method or approach that she follows to. Create teams to work so effectively together. Or is this just down? She’s just a phenomenal reader of people.

Okay. So she is, she’s definitely an

Justin Walter: amazing profiler for you, but she’s also, good people, drawing good people, right. And even if they have to dig for him a little bit, who you surround yourself in the foxhole is, exactly how creative. Or successful you’re going to be right.

And you always want people that prop you up. Otherwise, if you’ve got people holding you down or holding you back, nobody will get anywhere.

Kristie Davison: She’s just an amazing team leader. Just, she knows how to run her business. She’s been doing it for so long.

Justin Walter: And I’ve been around a lot of celebrities in Hollywood, in other situations, and I’ve never seen anything like what she’s built.

and I really hope they do more, and I know they’re, they would love to do more and reach more people. I think there should be a branch of Makinarium in every country, where there’s filming going on, or there’s artistic people, because it just makes people a better artist too. they, can pull stuff out of people that I think people didn’t even know they had themselves sometimes.

and I even see that with myself. There were things I didn’t think I was capable of and just with them, now I’m, oh, I’m knocking stuff out that I, a year ago, I never would have thought I could do.

Patrick Kiely: It’s a powerful testimony to community and the reinforcing nature of that collaborative community.

You’re based in , your family are very much following in your creative footsteps. Your daughter was displaying her art at the Field of Forest Festival as well. how much support do you think you get from the creative community in West Cork?

Justin Walter: In West Cork, it’s great. It’s so for friends in the States, I describe West Cork as being like Texas, right?

You can

Kristie Davison: but

Justin Walter: most of Texas doesn’t have the oil, but it’s like, it’s like its own being and its own, like, there’s Cork and all over the Republic of Cork, but there’s West Cork, which is completely different than, growing up in Cork City or being around, spending plenty of time in Cork City.

Then when we moved down here, it was you can come down here and do whatever like the lady who owns the junkyard. She lives up the road from us and she comes in and she goes, why do you want this piece? And I tell her, she goes, you’re absolutely mad. And she goes, and then two days later, did you finish?

I want to see it. Like, so there is a very supportive, everybody’s supportive of you, not just the art community. But I think we’ve met a lot of artists since being down here and I tell them all the time, like we tell them all the time, if there’s anything you need in our studio or our space, come in and use it.

You’re more than welcome to, and vice versa. They’ve invited us out to things, out in Ballet du Havre, and the pottery maker, Jan. Just

Kristie Davison: walking around the studio. Skip market.

Justin Walter: Yeah.

Kristie Davison: I mean that alone, you stop and talk to them about their artistry and their trade or whatever. The amount of information they have, they’re just amazing human beings.

And then you tell them what you do and they’re just like, Oh, I have an idea. And then you just start talking to each other. Next thing you know, you have a partnership and, working on something together. And that I don’t think I would have ever found, in the States because. Or even, I guess, anywhere, because there’s a lot of gatekeeping.

Sure. Versus here, I feel like there isn’t. Like, I feel like there’s much more of an open mind of community to help each other out, because we should.

Justin Walter: Even down to techniques. And we really should help each other out. Even down to showing techniques that they use, that most artists would keep to themselves, like a magician, in the States.

there’s a lot of the videos that you see, like, of people building props in the States, but they don’t They always fast forward the video to a certain point, because they don’t want to give away the one thing. Here. We go to somebody, well, how’d you do that? Oh, here, me show  you. How’d you do that?

Oh, come on over. I’ll show you. from the guy who owns a lumber mill, wants to start doing stuff with me with resin tables cause he’s never done it. So I’m like, okay, come on over. We’re going to, and now we’re pouring resin tables with them. there’s a whole like spend your money locally.

We will buy all of our, Supplies or anything that we’re building a hundred percent even if I have to pay more money for it I’ll buy it from a local artist because it also supports their business and it keeps them going and that’s These communities need that and I think they need more of and I think please don’t I’m not trying to offend anybody But I think Dublin and the people with the purse strings forget about a lot of us out here When really I think there’s there needs to be more support for those communities out here doing these types of things

Patrick Kiely: I don’t think you’ll find any court person will object to criticism of Dublin at any point.

  Sure.

Patrick Kiely: Can you walk us through a typical project from conception to realization? I’m thinking of some of the pieces you showed, the Batman cowl with the blacker than black paint that you had at Feel of Force. But the level of detail planning and execution that goes into something like that to give us an indication of when to give the listeners an indication of how long or what goes into that.

Sure.

Justin Walter: So that specific helmet that you’re talking about, the original design file, like how it was drawn up, like you said, there’s Star Wars fatigue and everything. So then you get guys who create mashups like, hey, let’s make a Batman Mandalorian. Combo and there’s different content creators and artists that we’ll go to and we’re like, oh, let’s try This will be a new project and fun to do so that particular file say came from a company called a designer his Website is called Nico industries and he’s a digital sculptor.

So while he’s not so much a 3d printer Or a prop maker. he is, but he does the sculpting of the clay files, right? And then he’ll make the CAD files so that you can use it in a 3D print. So when I see something like what he did, I went and printed it. And then I sit there and I look at it and I think about, okay, what am I going to do with it?

And the helmet sat there for a couple, I’d say two, three weeks. It did. Until I was trying to come up with, I was going to make it unique colours. And then I saw somebody playing with phantom black and I was like, Oh no. So now I’m going to take this design. And I’m going to put my own spin on it and add to it and use some really, like I use some really expensive paint just to change the look of the way that the piece would have looked, one way and by doing that with, using that specialized paint.

It completely changed what the object was to me. And that’s how I see things. When I look at doing pieces, the Wolverine helmet, same thing. I got, I printed it with texture and I got it to where it had no lines. And, most people they’ll go on, they’ll do their sanding and their preparation of it.

But I take it to, The same level of prep that an auto body worker would do if he’s fixing your car. So I’ll go, I’ll spend probably two days sanding a piece all the way, up to 2000, 20 or 2, 500 grit sandpaper just to get it right. And then I’ll go seek out the right colour and I will sit there and look at swatches and books and the paint guys, the, I go to the automotive store and they love me because I come in, they either love, if they’re busy, they don’t like me so much because I’m sitting there going through the catalogue with them for a long time, but they love when I come in because now even I go to the auto body store and they’re like, When they see me grabbing stuff off the shelves, what are you buying today?

or what are you making today? I say, I go to CH Marine. A lot of my accents for these pieces come from the boating industry. The boating yard is the best place to get stuff for props. And so I walked into CH Marine and they know like everybody’s in there buying boating stuff and they’re like, okay,

Kristie Davison: what are you up to?

Justin Walter: We don’t, need to help you. We’ll let you just do what you’re doing. And. the concept really goes from, I start with the model file and then think about the finishing process. And then it just depends how I want it to end up, and if I have to say and everything off and start all over again, I will until I see what it was that I saw in my head.

And then I stop. And she’s very much the same way. There’s pieces that I’ve made. And she completely takes them over because she sees them as different like the job

Kristie Davison: Like the job of the hunt

Justin Walter: right the I think you saw that in the forest That was her paint. That was something I was making and I said, no I’m painting and she was no you’re not

Kristie Davison: Yeah, I took it.

Justin Walter: So

Kristie Davison: I saw it sitting there. I was like, no, you don’t understand I know what I want it to look like just let me do it I have to have it and then when he was doing something else. I actually ran into the paint room and I You Started painting and he comes in and he was just like, needs to be a little bit darker, but it looks great.

Justin Walter: And so there’s a lot of that concept too. So we’re, I mean, With all this we’ve had to learn a lot of stuff very quickly so and I’m talking everything from Arduino and coding for certain types of electronics for certain outfits to CAD and fusion and I’m you know, I’m Fusion and she’s knee deep in a Z brush where yeah So there are models that we’re doing our own creation.

Our son is like excellent AutoCAD. And so he designed stuff and our daughter is great at the digital sculpting and drawing and the, she’s

Kristie Davison: good at the storytelling and the storytelling, so creative with that.

Justin Walter: And so that’s where it’s, I may not be good at something, but I go to my son.

Hey, I need you to design this. Cause he’ll do it in five minutes and it’ll take me five hours. But then on the flip side, he’s like, I don’t know how to paint this, or I don’t know how to do this part of it. Or how do I get these to stick together?

Patrick Kiely: And a multidisciplinary household.

Justin Walter: Exactly. And it works well and they think, if somebody’s buying this piece, we don’t just see it as like something they’re going to wear, if they’re wearing it for cosplay, they don’t need it to the extreme, but we want to design the things that people want to put up on the wall that they want displayed, the stuff that reminds them of what they were feeling when they were watching that scene in that film.

So for me, that’s where a lot of my concept process comes from, that thing that they haven’t seen before. Or they have seen it a million times, but it’s never been that tactile or it’s never had that exact look to it. So a lot of those helmets that I’ll do, I’ll only do them one time. I won’t make, I won’t do it 15 times and for 15 different people.

I may make a Wolverine helmet 15 times, but there’s going to be a slight change in every one because I also do gear it towards the person and what their vibe is and what they’re looking for and customize it to them. But,

Kristie Davison: and you never know when a skill that you think is useless all of a sudden rears its head that, Oh, I can do this.

Patrick Kiely: The nature of a skill is no useless skill. It really,

Kristie Davison: because like I, I used to work on old cars. And with my dad doing bondo and painting and all that kind of stuff I had no idea that now I would be using that skill On props and so he would like if you have this little area It’s not looking right and I was just like i’ll just I got it and i’d do some, Auto body, filler on it and sand it down and then hand it back to him And then he’s really good at the water body painting and weathering So then he’ll come to me for the detail to be like I have these props fine little areas and then I’ll get out like the pinstriping, brushes out and I’ll do the fine stuff on.

And

Justin Walter: a lot of that has to do with like stuff times when I was in the military, just my gear. As it, the wear and tear in the different environments, I know what it was like. And I know, so you see people paint scratches on helmets all the time. And I look at them and I’m like, I wish they didn’t do that because if that guy dropped the helmet, it wouldn’t get scratched.

It would have a dent here and it would be here. So I take a lot of that and put that into my pieces where the, the, weathering or the scrapes and bruises of some superhero,

Kristie Davison: it would be actually, you

Justin Walter: know, Where it is, it’s like

Kristie Davison: like the where would be where you were grabbing it all the time Eventually, it starts to get soft and it starts getting shiny.

But instead it’s all like, they would grab it Chop it up. And I’m like, no, that’s not really what would happen. And that’s I think that’s why I like working

Justin Walter: on museum pieces stuff for museums because I can see it You can go and see the original piece and you can see exactly where the where was you can see exactly all of that aspect And I think that’s where Honestly, if I didn’t have to make a movie propaganda and all I was doing was making pieces for museums I would be so happy.

Patrick Kiely:  is getting a studio space and there are more heritage and historical sites opening each year and the preservation of artifacts is something that you’ve spoken very eloquently to already, and it presents that authentic and tactile experience for patrons and the public. Is this something that 3D scanning is going to enable more in the future?

Is this the direction it’s going to go?

Justin Walter: Oh, absolutely. I’m going to bring up my friend Gary because there was an Ogham stone that was just found. It was found in England. And, you go up to the museum, national gallery in Dublin, they have the Ogham stones there, but this one was a very small one.

And the museum wanted it recreated so that people, one could hold it and two, so that they can have it in their gift shop because it was a smaller stone. But Gary used, an older style 3d scanner that wasn’t maybe it wasn’t, the detail wasn’t there. So he had to do a lot more of the work and the product.

You couldn’t tell a difference between. His stone that he created out of resin and it was a piece of sandstone that he was copying You know replicating and it went it was great. Like I’ve been to the church. I go up to Cashel quite a bit I’ve scanned that stone sarcophagus that the king was in and particularly the little faces on the wall That are starting to wear away with weather.

Those are the kinds of things that I love going and scan because I could pick up all of those details. And some of them, I can even rebuild quite a bit to what they would have looked like, through a weather progression, there’s ways to go back and look at that, but do the 3d scanning stuff that’s key because, The museums do it.

I know a lot of museums in the States use them. They think only the archaeologists know how to use those things. But I think the archaeologists know how to scan them for their inventory. But I think of it in the sense of not only can I make them a replica, Of the piece, but then I, I would do it for free for all the museums, as long as I got a copy from my own library.

But what you do then is you take those scans and you build an online digital display because sometimes people can’t get to a museum or they want to see this stuff and they live on the other side of the world and they can never afford to go. So now that gives museums the ability to sit there and put an entire exhibition on display that’s fully representative and down to the minuscule.

Markings or even down to something as thin as a hair on these scans and they can build an entire, exhibition that they don’t necessarily need people coming in the door, and I think that’s, I think that’s key because it also preserves our history. In multiple formats, too.

Patrick Kiely: Indeed. In Ireland, we have a long and proud history of exploding our history or doing other ill advised stuff to history, be it the forecourts or something else.

So anything to preserve is always welcome, for sure. Exactly.

You’ve mentioned Comic Con before. It’s on in Dublin this August, and you’re very much going to be there. It’s not San Diego, I appreciate. But, what opportunity does it present you to showcase your creation skill set and network with peers?

Justin Walter: It’s actually really is because just the last two that we’ve been to and we didn’t have our booth there In fact, we have a booth now because a lot of the people that we met there seeing our work hey you guys need to be up here and have a booth and eventually hopefully next year We’ll have our own displays like everybody else You know We have some projects that we want to build for display there for next year Being a comic con for us.

It gives us a time to show our wares and have them there, in between projects, it brings money into so we can do other projects because, right now I’d say most of the projects that we do are the events that we do fund further projects. it lets us reach more people. After the Dunmanway festival, we were having an idea of, maybe working with autistic children because I, met a lot that came up to our booth and they really broke out of their shell and they really started to come alive when they saw, Oh, and I know how you did this and it’s these settings because that’s the way they communicate creatively and whereas maybe, They have a hard time adjusting in certain scenarios and situations when it comes to that.

There is imagination and design level skills there that are beyond it. They just don’t have anybody to show it here. But I would love to have a class where we can have a couple of printers in there and the kids can come in and they can, I can show them how you design, you slice them, why you slice them certain ways, and for strength, what the different materials are, where you would use them.

Have them print something and then take it from there and go to like the next step of the sanding part the finishing part The paint and how you know Christy teaching or the painting part of Gary or anybody else? I would love to be able to work with them and take it from a concept idea They have to a finished product that they can Put on their wall, wear, share with anybody.

Kristie Davison: That’s what Comic Con does is it opens that door. It opens the door for people to come and they can disguise themselves and they can just be who they want to be for the day.

Justin Walter: And I think Comic Con is good for people doing things where there’s no judgment. Sure. And people aren’t being judged on who they are, what they look like.

They’re just all there doing the same thing.

Kristie Davison: But it also inspires the kids.

Justin Walter: And that too,

Kristie Davison: It inspires kids to  see the adults, the older people seeing that they’re holding on to this enjoyment, this creativity, and they’re pushing it and loving it. Then you get kids who are inspired and they grow up, and who knows what they could do, with the knowledge we have, and then they take it and take it to a completely different level.

That’ll blow our minds.

Justin Walter: And then they realize there’s no embarrassment in doing these things because I think we all get to a certain age where we’re like, nah, we’re not doing that anymore because that’s embarrassing. and I do a compelling job at a hot right about now. But I think that’s like the best part of it.

I think, I really do think that’s the best part of Comic Con, that side of it.

 Yeah.

Patrick Kiely: So I think you put on a compelling case for a course and a website to allow people to gather and share this expertise folks. I mean, do people have a place for that for the rest of the year outside Comic Con where they can go and share their knowledge, undertake a course.

Justin Walter: I would say the only online one I’ve come across that’s actually really great. Cause they have all the people in the industry, Stan Winston’s school is one that you go to.

Kristie Davison: I mean, well, they’re the world’s best of the best, like 30 years of experience working on the sets, like that’s the place.

Justin Walter: But you only get so much through watching the videos, but at least you get the first rundown from the people who did it. And we’re talking about everybody from Fawn Davis on down are teaching different courses and whether it’s, doing moulds and making, the fiberglass shells to using AI generator of tools to create a character and a storyline and how to model your character based on a prompt, basically in the end of, at the end of the day, everything that you see in a movie starts as a little one paragraph prompt.

Okay. And so it comes from a book or a script or. And then your imagination has to set in and make it reality. We would love to do more. I wouldn’t be so bold as to say, I know everything. Cause I, what’s the saying? I like, I’m a Jack of all trades and a master of none, but that’s better than a master of one,

I could do a little bit of everything, but we w we would love to do stuff like that.

I know there’s places that Stan Winston school and it’s fairly inexpensive. and then I know throughout the year. If a live course pops up, if you’re a part of the Stan Winston School, you can get, access to it and then you pay the class fee.

Kristie Davison: And even YouTube, if you find one person who’s very good at something, usually they’re pretty honest and open with you.

You can just contact them and say, Hey, I tried what you did, but I’m missing this aspect of it. A lot of them will actually help you in, in, in an, individual base, one to one base.

Justin Walter: The problem with YouTube is I find a lot of these people are sponsors. So when it comes down to 3d printing technology.

I bought a printer that I’m still waiting to be delivered a year later, and somehow the YouTuber got it for free because he called them, and, oh, I’m a YouTuber, and, so I feel like the sponsorship side of YouTube has taken away a lot of that stuff. But, for anybody wanting to start to maybe get a good grasp on it, stay in Winston School.

If they want to put it into practice you just gotta, you gotta find little community events and there is, you can reach out to us. I’ve offered plenty of times, if people want to do something, I’d be more than happy to show them what we’re doing or teach them. And like I said, that stands.

Kristie Davison: Yeah, and we’ve always said, if we don’t know, we’ll tell you who does.

And we will gladly put you in charge with them because they’re the people we’re learning from as well, that just have a master in what they do. True.

Justin Walter: So you have to pay it forward because if you don’t, the art just disappears for a while, withers on the vine. Exactly.

Patrick Kiely: So,  well, that’s a very fitting conclusion point.

I think folks, thank you so much for your time. And for such an interesting conversation, you can find all the links to what mummy head studios do and what great work Kristie and Justin are doing with the podcast notes. Thanks so much for your time.