Vampyr Book from Buffy the Vampire Slayer

This recreation of the iconic book given to Buffy (by Giles) was something that I scratch-built for Palisades Toys in 2005. I had never really paid attention to Buffy when I got the call from Kim, asking if I could efficiently build this kind of replica. I said to myself "it's a book - how hard can it be?"... famous last words. They wanted the book to actually be hollow - a keepsake box with hidden hinges that could store valuables, treasure, holy water, etc. So I set to thinking about how I would make it. Here's how a prop replica can go from "idea" to "on your shelf", as experienced by me, the freelancer. Click the photos for a larger version.

The first thing you do is get reference material. Sadly, no one knew who had the original prop (or if it even still existed), and the studio only had a few small hi-res promo shots that featured the book. They are the ones you see on the final packaging. So that meant I had to go from screen caps from the dvds, which I started watching. This got me addicted to the 'verse like you can't even begin to imagine, but that is another story. Going on the data that I was given about the relative sizes of Sarah Michelle Gellar and Anthony Head (and how big their hands would be in relation to a big old leather-bound book), I scaled the initial mock-up until it "felt" right. Totally arbitrary dimensions, but you can only do so much from screen caps.

Next, I started tackling the cover sculpt, as directed by Kim. From the front and back shots available, we could tell the designs were very similar, with the surrounding designs indistinct enough to be open to interpretation. It was agreed that the raised tooling in the leather was most likely a floral or vine-like decorative motif, and we thought it would be cool to add alchemical symbols and garlic cloves to the mix - it's a book on vampires, after all!

The first design was too simple and clean, and the second was a "loose sketch" of something closer to what would have been sculpted. The third photo shows that second loose sculpt with paint, a third idea using a faux-leather pattern, and the raised letters I had cut from plastic card. This process took a few weeks of back and forth designs, and we weren't getting what we wanted as fast as we needed to. Around this time, I had enlisted the help of a few friends who knew way more about Buffy than I did. Jordan and Tom filled me in on the show and general "vibe" of the various characters and props, and Lonnie was going to cast parts for me to be used as paint masters. Lonnie made a breakthrough around this time too, when he identified a similar base book that the prop department used to create the Vampyr book! He also IDed the hinges that appeared (in our examples) on different publications - but the photos gave us much more specific reference that I could use.

It's a Bible from the late 1800's, and this particular model had had some leather grafted onto the spine - a repair job. I checked with the bosses to make sure I could roll the book's price into my quote, and with a green light, bought the book off of eBay. When it arrived, I checked the dimensions against my mockup. To my delight, it was nearly identical - but far too thin when compared to the tome as seen on Buffy. After liberating the front and back covers from the spine and pages, I got back to thinking about the box itself. Since the leather was over 100 years old, it wasn't going to withstand a lot of abuse - in fact, it crumpled when you applied pressure to the surface. Since the prop had very similar designs on the front and back, I picked the piece in best condition and sent it to Lonnie, who agreed to cast the cover in resin.

The original letters that I had cut seemed a little off, so I re-made them. Once I had the resin copies in my hand, I sharpened the detail that time had worn off the leather. I also roughed out the back lettering which would be "recessed" into the leather, which meant I'd cut them out of the back plate (A reverse of what I was doing on the front).

The front design was studied, and I determined that the central design and two border details would need to be joined. These were smoothed into one panel and the edging was made consistent. The letters were glued down, and putty was applied to the edges for a smoother transition and to make it appear like tooled leather. The back plate was cut to match the existing shapes (apparently not as modified by the prop maker) and the "Vampyr" was cut from the interior. This was also glued into place and putty blended all the edges. Once I had the book covers under control, I could easily build the box around them from plastic sheet stock and putty. Once again I just picked a depth that seemed to match the screen caps, and set to work.

The spine was the least documented section of the book, so I took a cue from the cover, and created a shallow patterned rectangle that was repeated six times down it's length. Putty simulated the tooled leather, and joined the plastic card sub-structure to everything else. The covers were tweaked too, making sure that the edges were the proper thickness. There is a small cheat here though, because the top "lid" needs to be sturdy and functional. So it's a little beefier than it should be, but i don't think any one ever noticed. Hehe. My design called for hinges that would sit in recessed depressions inside the box, with the edges close to the "spine". This would allow the top to hinge open and reveal the box, but when closed, would hide the hinges.

Next, I tackled the pages. They were just a layer of putty over the plastic sheets that formed the box, and to be honest, I think they needed to be a little more defined than they ended up being. However, I really liked how my "fabric" edges came out, which mimic the strip that pokes from the edges of the spine on either end, that the signatures are sewn to. I also applied a texture to the front and back covers where I had sanded things smooth, to ensure a consistent "leather" look everywhere. The areas that needed it most were the lettering, replacement front and back center sections, the edges of the book itself, the reverse of the covers that led to the page edges, and the small rectangular strips in each corner of the cover. On the Bible, these rectangles had religious phrases, but for the Vampyr book, they were sanded down to obscure the lettering, and were just made to look aged.

Next, I added in sections to the pages that were where a books spine would have broken, or where it would have been laid open for longer periods than others - it broke up the monotony of the sides. As a goof when making the box's interior dimensions, I made sure a Lightsaber, a Phaser 1, and Indy's sidearm as seen in Raiders of the Lost Ark would fit. So be it Vampyr, Vader, Horta, or Belloq - you're ready. The hinges of the book were constructed from plastic card and a few Wave Option round rivets. I spec'ed this box to have magnets inside the front cover's hinge edges, so that if the side pieces were made from metal, they would actually hold the book closed.

Then the fit and finish was tweaked, and I was done - with a finished master pattern (center). This was molded and cast, and two castings were painted. One was to be used by the factory as the paint master reference sample - all the production pieces would match this. The second one I painted would stay with Palisades for promotional use at conventions, photo shoots, etc.

The paint master was a darker brown than the first two pictures lead you to believe. The third photo is closer to how I remember it looking.

I carefully applied the gilding deco, which wasn't as finely defined or applied on the final product. Such is life. I also designed the box art. These photos are of the art about halfway through the process, while we were still mulling over colors and positioning. I don't believe I had received product copy at that stage either, which accounts for the large blank spot on the back.

These photos are of the first test shot received from the factory, with the velvet-ish lining! I was disappointed to see that the factory had ignored the specs for the hinges to be hidden, but it's wasn't the end of the world, heh. The hinges were metal, and they did a great job with the castings. I highly recommend this prop replica if you can find it. Sadly Palisades is no more - I had a blast working with them on these projects.