 |
| Dead donkeys, dog and camels are being used as IED (Improvised Explosive Devices) in Iraq. Soldiers would go to check on the animal and it would blow up. Models like this one, created by San Fernando resident Doug Hudson-a highly skilled Special Effects Artist, aid soldiers in recognizing the dangers signs of IEDs. |
|
|
|
San Fernando resident special effects artist Doug Hudson has worked Hollywood magic for major motion pictures like Pirates of the Caribbean and Signs, and for television shows like Lost, CSI, and the Sopranos. He has created special effects makeup and models for Cat in the Hat, Jurassic Park II and Buffy the Vampire Slayer, but the recent request from the U.S. military was the least expected call that Hudson has ever received. He was asked to re-create the carnage that can be found as casualties of the War in Iraq. “We did one camel, two goats, two sheep, one donkey, four dogs, two severed heads, six skeletons, and four decomposed bodies, twenty two items altogether,” Hudson said.
For Hudson, as he looks upon the paint stained heads detached from bodies and rotting flesh, it looks like special effects he's built but to anyone else's untrained eye, it is shocking. But the purpose for these ghastly props is to train troops and prepare them for what they will come across fighting the war in Iraq. Hudson recently drove to the Twenty Nine Palms Marine Base and delivered his work. In the hills above the base, the Marines had set up what looked like a movie set, complete with production trailers, set carpenters, makeup artists, and craft services. But they were shooting live ammunition not film. “They have a whole fake village set up and expose them to certain things, interacting with real Iraqis speaking Arabic and train them how to decipher what’s a threat or not a threat. They’ve got one room where it’s blood and gore galore. They hire real amputees. (When the Marines) bust in the door and they’re laying there, it looks like their legs are cut off and things like that. The make up artists puts on prosthetic gore stuff on their missing leg,” Hudson said.
 |
| San Fernando resident, Doug Hudson built special effects models that could withstand the extreme weather conditions of the desert. They had to be totally weather proofed and sun resistant. Hudson delivered the models to Twenty Nine Palms military base. They will be used as part of the military’s advanced training techniques to inoculate U.S. soldiers to what they will face in Iraq. |
|
|
|
Events in Iraq prompted the Military to look for innovative training techniques. Animals were being used in IED (Improvided Explosive Devices). "They were leaving dogs on the side of the road. The soldiers would go up to check on the dog or move the dog and 'kaboom,' it would blow up. They were using camels and don-keys too and that’s why we more or less made the donkeys and camels. The first one we did was a dog, that was a training device for the Army and they traveled that around the country. It was made hollow, they have a flash launcher so that for whatever reason, they don't handle it properly, it shoots off a flash grenade,” Hudson said.
The military found Animal Maker's, Inc through the internet. They got an email out of the blue asking if AMI could make the training devices the military wanted. They’d been searching for a while, looking into taxidermy and other options but there was nothing out there. “That’s why they came to a Hollywood special effects company to get the realism. They could get high tech realism that only Hollywood offers There’s not anything like this out there that you can just go buy. That’s why they contacted us, to up the ante in their training. They wanted them to be versatile, they’re going to move them around and figure out their own training routine and how they are going to use each individual piece.”
This isn’t the first time that the military has turned to Hollywood for help. As Hudson tells it, “Back in Vietnam, they actually contracted a special effects makeup artist who trained CIA in how to do disguise kits for their spies.
That was real secret secret, hush hush back then. Fort Knox in Kentucky, they have a big training facility. They basically went to Universal Studios and saw their operations system for some of their attractions, like the earthquake ride and the control systems so they could implement those in the training ground with propane gas fireballs underneath cars. They sit in a command center and control this just like they do at theme parks.”
Doing this kind of work gives Hudson something he doesn’t get from working on a movie or a TV show, “I feel a little bit honored that I was part of the process in helping out our country in the training of our soldiers. I felt I was contributing something.”
|
