Jonathan Moffett (00:00.226)
Well, Halloween is right around the corner. Can you give us any clues as to what you're going to be this year for Halloween? How can you ask me that? have to! Everybody's going to watch this and go, why didn't you ask? You have to ask. Welcome, Mythfits.
Jonathan Moffett (00:37.294)
Hi there guys, it's the Myth Fits again. My name is Kari Byron. And I am Tory and I cannot believe that this year is almost over. We're already in the fall. Can you believe this? This is like my favorite time of year. I am a big Halloween fan. I know you are as well. It's also your birthday month. My birthday falls on the day before. I'm October 30th. So Halloween was always, it was like a double party because it was like.
My birthday was on the 30th and then the 31st was Halloween. So it was just like, just all go dress up, haunted houses, haunted yards. It was literally my favorite holiday of the year. I always love your costumes. You do a group costume with your wife and I imagine your kid this year, right? Yeah. Well, last year we went as, you know that show, the docu-series on Netflix, Chimp Crazy?
yeah, I was going to mention that. It was awesome. So my wife went as the crazy lady. I went as a chimp. And then I think our daughter, we dressed, she was a chimp as well. That was a really good costume. I saw that I was dying. It was so funny. I loved, I love how my kid was, you know, getting into Halloween costumes when she was little. And there was that transition where it went from like, you know, she would come up with what she wanted. One year, she, you know, early on her first one that she wanted to create was
It's like, mommy, I want to be a pink lemur and I want us all to be pink lemurs. remember that costume. I can't buy that costume. So I had to make it all. And it was when we were filming. at night, I would come home with just, had bats and bats of pink fur. And I was just trying to, I was watching American Horror Story every night. I was so tired and just like sewing and sewing and sewing and sewing. And I made her this cute little costume and then made one for me. like the
Fur was everywhere and I was like sneezing and there was pink fur in my nose, pink fur all over my house. And then, you know, slowly turned to princesses. And then after princesses was my favorite time when she's like, ready to be scary. I loved scary time when she started getting zombie-ish. She wanted to be like a scary clown with me. Like it was the best. I loved doing family costumes. I was really impressed with that. The, the lemur suit though.
Jonathan Moffett (03:03.724)
Like you built two perfectly cool looking lemur suits. Like the fact that you made her one and then you made one for yourself and they matched, was like, wow, Carrie, you got some sewing skills. Yeah, I walk around the neighborhood, she wore this lemur costume all the time for that whole month. Like it was like lemur That's so cute. Lemur month. Yeah, but now she's a teenager and I'm like, what are you gonna be? And she's like, me and my friend are gonna do a group costume. Like, that's so cute. What are you gonna be?
I think we're gonna be Ratatouille and I'm like, oh, that's adorable. She's like, yeah, but we wanna do like slutty Ratatouille. Oh God. No. Stella, I don't know, I think I'll be a chef. Get ready, buckle up, teenagers man. I'm like slutty Ratatouille, what? Oh my God. When I was a kid, getting ready for Halloween was like my favorite time where it was like all summer I would be building all these props because every year I would do this haunted front yard.
And still to this day, I have friends who come up and go, dude, when I was a kid, your front yard traumatized me because it was so good. Like we got so gory. And as we kept building and making and sculpting and whatever, our skills just got better. So it got creepier and creepier the older I got. And one point my dad was like, okay, this is getting too good. Like it's really starting to affect the family because you walk out and there's like this bloody little kid like.
with a knife, you know, I all these crazy things. But I remember there was this one father, he lived in the neighborhood and you know, the kids were like all hiding, they were little and he was like, there's nothing to be afraid, come here. Stop acting like a little scaredy cats, get up here. And we had this, I built this giant like dog house. It was like a dog house, but I put a ramp going through it and then I took a werewolf mask and attached it to
a skateboard. So when you walk up the stairway, this giant, you know, this wolf, werewolf would pop Ted out of this door. And so the father's like, there's nothing to be scared. And so we released the skateboard and then the door opens and this giant werewolf pops out and the guy jumps in like into our bushes. And we were just like, gotcha dude. Like, yeah, there's to be scared of. I took like a plaster cast of my mom's face.
Jonathan Moffett (05:28.846)
I was doing the same thing with the front, the front, like little front gateway. then the gold Carmelo whole like, like when you get the Carmelo, the candy bar, they were in like these little gold kind of packets. So I took those and cut those out, cut out the eyes and made glowing gold eyes on this mask. And then just a bunch of sheets kind of around it so that as you walked in the gate and you pulled open the gate, it pulled a string and
ghost mom would come straight at you and like made people run away. It was like, yes. One of my favorite years is when you did my Halloween makeup, right? And you made me so scary as a zombie. My daughter cried and I had to change my costume. And I know that you love special effects makeup so much. When was it when you were a kid that you realized that this was kind of a direction you wanted to go?
I think, I mean, ever since I was a little kid, like my dad was a sculptor and so he brought home clay and I would, you know, sculpt and we started making little masks and then that just grew into bigger masks. And then it was just like, you know, go to the library, pour through any kind of makeup book I could find. But I remember the one kind of big inspiration was I was in high school taking a film course and the teacher brought in
this, he recorded a special on 60 minutes and it was about this special effects makeup artist. And that blew my mind. And I was just like, who is this guy? How do I get to do what he does? And so when we did the makeup for you, was just, even though it wasn't like very good, it was so fun to be able to use the makeup skills that I had learned to.
do on Mythbusters. Yeah, I know who you're talking about. And funny enough, we have this in common. Because when I was a little just a touch younger than you, but it made a difference at that era. The making of thriller. my parents thought it was too scary for me. And they weren't gonna let me watch the video or whatever. like, you know, I'm a crafty little kid. So I snuck
Jonathan Moffett (07:42.102)
behind the couch and watched the making of thriller. And it didn't scare me as much as it inspired me. was like, this is a job. This is the coolest thing I've ever seen. He's making Michael Jackson and all these actors into zombies and like the makeup's so cool. And like all the prosthetics they would glue on their face that I saw this and was just like, So I feel like that you and I were both inspired.
by this man into wanting to get into the careers that we got into, which really led to being on MythBusters, which actually leads us to this conversation on this podcast right now. To your point, the cool part about this whole thing, it's like full circle, right? This guy inspired both of us to get into the industry and to be able to meet him and then become good friends with him. It's still, I still to this day, like the little nerdy 12 year old in me.
just goes, I can't believe that I know this person, like that we're friends. Like I still geek out. So coming up after the break, this podcast is not for you guys, it's for us. We're gonna fan out hard over the legend, Rick Baker. Yeah, I mean, he's won seven Oscars for makeup. He worked on Star Wars. He worked on Planet of the Apes. He worked on King Kong. I mean, those movies go on and on.
He did the Michael Jackson video. I mean, American Werewolf in London. there's just I mean, you can't name them all. There's so many Octoman. Hey, hey. Yeah. Long career. I'm excited to talk to him and ask him like all of my questions. How about you? Like I'm like I fanboy out on him all the time. So I'm going to try to keep it contained. Try to keep it together. All right, guys. You're in for a treat.
Jonathan Moffett (09:47.842)
Welcome back Mythfits, our next guest. We are so excited to have him on. He's a seven time Oscar winner, special effects makeup genius, and a good friend of Mythbusters, Rick Baker. Rick, thank you so much for coming on. You know, I must like you guys, because this is my Halloween prep time, you know. if someone comes and sees shitty stuff on Halloween from me, it's your fault.
come on. can blame us. Well, let's drown you in flattery first, because I don't think Tori or I would be here right now if it wasn't for you. You are part of both of our origin stories, because the making of Thriller, which you clearly were a big part of, was what made me want to get into special effects and which it also made me somebody who
looked forward to Halloween to do crazy, crazy makeup. like, because of you, I got my internship with Jamie Heineman and then MythBusters happened and now I'm here today. Yeah, don't blame me. When John sprung the making of Thriller on me on the day that we're going to take Michael's life cast. So, you know, and that always looks horrifying. And he said, you know, by the way, there's going to be a film crew and we're going to do a whole making of. And I said, no.
They go, this always looks horrifying and Michael's so shy and I don't know. And he's like, fuck you, we're going to do this, you know? And I was not happy about it at the time, but I'm so happy that he did do it because like you, so many people have come up to me and said, when I saw making a thriller, I decided I wanted to be a makeup artist to do special effects and that kind of stuff. the first time we met, we were all at Comic-Con. were we threw a Mythbusters party.
And I remember Carrie and I showed up and we walked in and there was like some B celebrities there or whatever. But I look over and I see you and I'm just like, oh my God, it's Rick Baker. And I remember Adam going, do you wanna meet him? I'm like, absolutely. And so he took me over and you like put your hand out and you're like, hi, my name's Rick Baker. I'm a special effects makeup artist. And I was like, yeah, no shit. Like you're the reason I'm in this industry.
Jonathan Moffett (12:09.142)
And I just, I remember that moment, I fanned out so hard. And it was just like meeting your heroes. You've been one of my favorite heroes and just, you're so generous and nice. I just, I don't know, I appreciate you and our friendship. And it's just so awesome to have you on here. But who are you again? Hi, I'm Cory Fulici from the show, this one show called Mythbusters.
I remember now. Clearly your creativity has created innovations that just have lasted on and on and on, at least in practical makeup effects. One that really, really impressed me when I was young was American Werewolf. That was the most amazing transition. And I was wondering if you could give this fangirl some behind the scenes on how you created that amazing sculpture. My second movie was Schloss.
which was John Landis's first film. Have you I have seen Schlock, yes. I actually have a VHS copy. Yeah. During the time I was making up Schlock, John as Schlock, he was telling me the whole story. He'd already written American Werewolf. It was my next movie is going to be American Werewolf in London, this movie that I'd written. He was telling me the whole story. And it's like, I was fascinated, but it's like, you know, can you just shut up, John, and let me glue your face on, you know? And he would act it out. And know, John's hyperactive and really difficult to make up.
But he told me the story and he says, I want to do, says, it doesn't make sense to me that if you were going to, if your body was going through this metamorphosis into a whole different creature that you would just sit in the chair like Lon Chaney Jr. and be really still until it all happened. And he goes, I want to show the pain. I want to show the suffering. I want him to be nude and I want him to be able to move around, you know? And it's like, how would you do it? And I go, I have no idea.
I would love to do it. That sounds really cool. And he also said, want it in a, it's not gonna be horror movie lighting, it's gonna be in a brightly lit room, like in a real apartment. It still holds up too. I watched it recently and it's like, one, it's a perfect, I think it's a perfect horror movie, because it's like horror and comedy, but the effects still hold up. I cringe, mean, even when I first saw it, there's things that I cringe at that I would love to have been able to do already. Like what?
Jonathan Moffett (14:34.786)
You know, this stage, we storyboarded the whole transformation. And John was really smart. He's a smart filmmaker. And I said, know, some of these makeups, especially when he's got the stretched out body and stuff, go, that's going to be, you know, six hours if we're lucky, maybe more, you know? And he goes, well, what I'm thinking, he goes, we'll shoot the whole movie. We'll have a wrap party. We'll keep the set lit. We'll come back after the wrap.
with a small post-production crew, you could spend 10 hours doing a makeup and then we shoot that shot and then we come in the next day and shoot the next two shots or whatever it is. So it was all planned out and like, know, David Naughton is basically hairless. So, and he gets hairier through the course of transformation. So when we were storyboarding, I said, John, let's work backwards. Let me glue the longest hair on him first. We can shoot that. I can trim it and pull some hair off.
Then we shoot that version. Then I trim it some more and pull some hair off. That'll be much more time efficient, you know, because if I did the other way, I would have to glue short hair on, then remove everything and then glue, you know. So we were, you know, had it all planned out, but we decided that we would leave the face for one of the last things because that was going to be the big dramatic change. So, yeah, so his face didn't change much. His body changed first. And because the wolf had a big mane of hair around his neck,
because I had a dog at the time named Bosco that had a big mane of hair around his neck that I was looking at and that's what I kind of did, you know. But there was a stage early on where his hands have changed, his torso has changed, and his face has changed just a minor bit, but he's got a big ruff of hair around his neck. And I remember vividly that day, I got him made up and David wanted some fish and chips and he got a...
pint of lager and fish and chips and with his stretched out hands that we had, you could just hold it with his thumb and he's there with his big chest and a rougher hair around his neck and this thing eating fish and chips and I go, this looks so stupid. I go, this stage is so stupid looking. I go, we're done for. It is a stupid looking stage but it's only on there shortly, know, short amount of time. But if I had to do it over again, I would rethink those stages, the early stages.
Jonathan Moffett (16:58.104)
Hindsight's wonderful, but I think you pulled it off in the time. mean, everything from how everything pulses and just like the fact that it's bright is, it was revolutionary to see. I feel like the internet has changed everything. It's really brought it into our own homes because I watch those makeup tutorials for monster makeup. I follow you and watch the crazy stuff that you do. And there's all, mean, I think there's all these professional tips like the ones you were just talking about, like.
painting latex onto different textures and using that for molding your own face. So when you're doing your Halloween makeup, are you doing things that regular people can DIY? Like, do you have any tips for other people doing Halloween? You are the king of the Halloween costume. Your Halloween costumes are legendary. I feel like we should do like a real quick clip. When the podcast comes out, just do like a
a series of your makeups because you make up your entire family. You're all in on it. And like you were saying earlier, it takes months to prepare for Halloween night. Yeah, it's out of control. It's, you know, as soon as my daughter, my first born daughter, Veronica was born. I made her up, you know, so they would actually go to school and makeup. So one year she goes, I want to be Marie Antoinette. I went, Marie Antoinette, go.
That's going to be a hard costume and a hard wig. And he goes, yeah, ranch what out with my head put back on. So I said, all right. Yes, you can do some stuff pretty cheaply and reasonably, which is what I did on this one. I actually just did a poly foam, piece of polyurethane foam that I scissored out to make a little bit of a ledge here and another one over here. And I coated it with some silicone, platinum-cure silicone.
built up all the junk that was in there. You know, in the case of her going to school in the morning, again, we had to get up early to make her up and I didn't want to just pour pea soup on her outfit, you know, so she would smell that all day and all that. So for the vomit on her, I actually just colored some latex, poured latex all over that thing and put some chunks in it, you know, on her costume. And then that sets up and then it's permanent.
Jonathan Moffett (19:16.234)
I love how supportive your family is of you and how you involve your family in your Halloween traditions. I mean, I was so sad the moment my daughter got to high school and all of a sudden, you know, she, like you said, had her own opinions because always growing up, we did buddy costumes like Tori I'm sure is going to do with her daughter. And once my daughter started getting into scary was so exciting for me. And that's when I showed her what, you know, the appliances and the prosthetics look like she had a real messed up grill when she was a
little thing like really messed up teeth and the dentist gave us, you know, the casting of her teeth. So we made, you know, it's not that hard if you go to the craft store, we made like a little mold of the jacked up teeth. And then I made a jaw for her that was exposed because she wanted to be a scary clown. So we both dressed up like scary clowns. Then a nuclear blast went through the two of us. And so we were both just really awful, just gnarly bloody clowns.
And she went to school that day. And my most proud moment is when she came home and she's like, mommy, I made a first grader cry. Like, yes. Like, because it wasn't that hard to do, I feel like I inspired her to keep doing some like kooky stuff from then on. Like, is there anything that you can do like that that's kind of easy? I need some inspiration basically. What can I do for my costume this year? Like, I know the toilet paper you can kind of use with latex and kind of.
make zombie kind of peeling skin. What else can I use that would be in my house? Also cotton batting, know, like cotton batting that they use in like quilts and stuff. I built, I made whole masks out of just cotton batting and latex. You put a little cotton, you paint some latex, that. You can build up. I made a, somewhere my first Corella masks were all built up out of that cotton latex. And you can also use just cotton and Karo syrup. I did some really grotesque makeups.
which is Kero syrup, you know, with food color and cotton batting stuck in your face. So it's a real cheap and easy way to do it. And also, also something that's really fun is a duo eyelash adhesive, which is basically a latex. You can stipple it on your skin and it dries clear. And then you can like pinch your skin together and you makes a really cool scar. Or what I used to do, I used to, I liked getting a response from people and
Jonathan Moffett (21:37.582)
I mean, I've told the story so many times, but a little kid, Frankenstein, didn't get the response I wanted. He was supposed to be afraid of it. And I was like, isn't that cute, Ricky? He looks like Frankenstein. And I was like, yeah, that was a disappointment. So the first time he did a bloody thing, I got a real visceral response. So I went through a blood and guts phase as a kid doing stuff on myself. I was like a latchkey kid. I'm an only child and my parents both worked. So I would come home from school and get into trouble.
make myself up with bullet holes and go lay in the street and somebody saw me like and then I run and hide. It's so cool that you're not only somebody who does the makeup but you're somebody who is in the makeup and I mean Tori and I have both been in heavy makeup and zombie makeup. Do you have how do you not sweat your makeup off? Like what are what are some of the tricks for being someone who's underneath the makeup? Well first of all I think every makeup artist who does something like this should have it.
done to themselves so you know what it's like on the other side. mean, I learned makeup on my own face. I used to do all kinds of crazy shit, wear all day long. And I think it's very important. Same with taking a life mask. If you never had a life mask taken of you, you shouldn't be taking a life mask with somebody else. But back in the day, we only had spirit gummes and adhesive. Like when I did the autobiography with Jane Pittman, I think it was a TV movie in the 70s.
about an old slave, 102 year old slave who, during the civil rights movement, goes to the white only drinking fountain. Stan Winston and I worked on this together. And it was in Louisiana. And at the end of the day, Cicely's makeup was falling off her face. mean, so hot, so humid, and a point where you just can't fix it. So sweaty, gluing a wet sponge on somebody.
The only thing it was holding on we in those days we would use spirit gum and we'd use duo I actually he's of around the edges and the duo would kind of hold it hold it up some so that was like But the only thing and usually they would do the close-ups the last date last shot of the day Which they do it little close-up first, please Right. was a medical he's called 355 which was made Specifically, I think originally for a colostomy colostomy bags, but it was again
Jonathan Moffett (24:01.998)
It was a silicone and it was really strong. So that really changed stuff. would stay on. You could do a makeup with 355. It would stay on all day, no problem. It used to be, you know, like when I did schlock at the end of the day, the thing was barely hanging on. You could just pull the appliance off and just remove it and it. The 355 days, if you pull the appliance off, you pull skin off with it. So you would have to use solvents to remove it, which took an hour usually, you know.
When you're looking at internet, YouTube, what are the top mistakes that these YouTubers are giving misinformation about that we should avoid? Yeah, I don't know. mean, there's so many. First of all, I wouldn't use plaster on your face. Maybe plaster bandage if you do it. You have to put a lot of Vaseline or some kind of release on your face. You kind of don't want to do it to yourself because at some point I know some people I've tried it too.
cast my own face but you once you cover your eyes you kind of can't see what you're doing and it's a little bit tricky. You have to understand what an undercut is. know, an undercut I found out the hard way. The very first masks I made were I made on that there was it used to be a model kit called the visible head. It was like a clear plastic head that inside was a skull and inside the skull was a plastic brain and they had plastic eyes and you know plastic esophagus and all that stuff and that was
a face with no undercuts because it's a mass-produced toy. So when I'd made a mold, the mold would come up and I could pull it off fine. When I was in seventh grade, I did a science fair project on how to make a mask. said, I should have got to do a science fair project. And I went, I'll do one how to make a mask. Then can do what I want to do for fun and make my science fair project. And that's when I decided I was going to do a life mask. that's when I had my dad make that plaster life mask in my face.
We only went to here, but a nose has undercuts here. Yeah. And undercut is, know, if you have something that's round, I at the top part of the mold would come off this way, but if it was down here, it would stick. You couldn't remove it. Right, it would lock it in. So again, I had scheduled out because it's something I had to have done by a certain time. I figured out when I had to make the mold, I made the plaster mold, could not get this thing off. I couldn't get it off at all because it was undercut here.
Jonathan Moffett (26:23.534)
So I found out what undercut was the hard way. And so I never made that mistake again. But I mean, if you do a plaster life mask of yourself, if you get that plaster back behind your jaw, it goes around, this is an undercut. It's really hard to get it off. You might be able to tilt it down and get it off. Before you do anything like that, I would watch more than one YouTube video. Maybe try to find a makeup book that tells you how to do it right, because you don't want to do some of that stuff.
I mean, I've seen a lot of tricks that I really like, like when people lay lace and use that to kind of create a texture with makeup and like put lace over their eyes and kind of, you know, blend it on in. Are there any favorite, like, do-it-yourself tricks that people are using now for just like quick Halloween costumes? Well, again, I mean, I really done some cool makeups just with caro syrup and cotton, cotton batting and food color and
It's not something I would do for a film unless it was a quick shot of somebody just laying there. It may not last all night if you're trick or treating and being very active, but you can do some really cool stuff. I mean, the blood stuff is the easiest stuff to do. I mean, I found that out when I was a kid and you just put blood on something and people respond. But yeah, if you don't know what you're doing, you should find out what you're doing first before you do it. That's what I would say.
Well, Halloween is right around the corner. Can you give us any clues as as to what you're going to be this year for Halloween? How can you ask me that? I have to. You are. Everybody. Everybody's going to watch this and go, why didn't you ask? You have to ask. I have to ask. Yeah, you can ask. I'm not going to tell. All right, my legend, Rick Baker, how how can people follow you so they can see your reveal of your Halloween costume? Like, where can they get more information?
I mean, on Instagram, at The Rick Baker. I'm gonna put The Rick Baker, because somebody else had Rick Baker. Though I actually haven't posted, I usually don't post much when I'm making stuff. Yeah, I mean, I definitely will post the Halloween stuff. I'm trying to look in your background to see if there's any reflections, anything that'll give it away. You'd have to look that way and you can't see it. But also, if you want to learn some stuff, again, my book. Plug it. Yes.
Jonathan Moffett (28:49.076)
one of the two volumes, it's 17 pounds a book. It's full of cool pictures and stories and stuff. It's too hard to do. I have that book. Can you see it in the background? yeah, there you are. Yeah, there's some fun stories and a lot of cool pictures and some cool makeups. Well, I think that I'm going to put together a list of all the movies that you recommended.
And it'll be right next to all the movies that you've done that we'll probably post so that people can find them because you definitely are a wealth of knowledge when it comes to both makeup, movie history. You've just known so many cool people and worked on so many cool jobs. Yeah. And I feel like we're going to have to get you back on because there's like, we didn't even touch half of the things I wanted to talk to you about. But thank you so much for taking time to come on our podcast. I know how busy you are and it's just so great to see you and catch up and
Yeah, we appreciate you. And I'll be following the Rick Baker on Instagram so I can see your review. Yeah, for sure. OK, it won't be till Halloween. Thank you. Awesome. I love it.
Jonathan Moffett (30:04.312)
Welcome back guys. Tori, are you? my God. Are you just having a moment? I literally could talk to him all day. Like there were so many questions that I didn't ask. It's just like, I don't know. I'm such a nerd and I try not to fan out. Before he retired, he used to have these Halloween parties. He had this big studio in Burbank.
And it was like the last time he was going to have one of these big parties. And so we went and he came out, he had two costume changes. I mean, it just like, there was tons of people there in costumes. It was like a dream come true. And it's just, it's like all his props were all over the shop. It was just, it was like pinching yourself. Cause you're like, I can't believe that this is actually happening. I can't believe I'm here. I can't believe I know Rick Baker.
I'm such a dork, This is one of the reasons that we decided to do this podcast. It was just so that we could be very selfish and talk to the people that we find interesting. And to get somebody on who has been that influential on ours and so many lives and the entire industry is just so cool for us. I remember one time I was at lunch with them and I was like, do people ever just fan out on you? And he's like, like you? Yeah.
I was like, damn, Rick, that's cold. Yeah, meet your heroes. All right. OK, it's that time of the show now where it's your turn to ask a question. So we have our first video question that's come out. is exciting. It comes from James Morehead. So roll the video. Hello, Tori and Jerry from the heart of Silicon Valley. I love this. That's a curious question.
What myths have you busted that you think has had the most significant real world impact? I can think of a couple, but curious to what you have to say. Thanks, James. There's a lot. We've had a couple episodes that have had some serious real world impact. For one, when Jamie and Adam tested a car that goes off the road and starts sinking into a lake, that, you know, like, what do you do? How do you escape that car?
Jonathan Moffett (32:23.282)
you can roll the windows down before it completely sinks because the pressure of the water, if the car sinks, will make it so you can't roll the windows down and you can't get out. So this way it'll sink faster, you hold your breath, but you can swim out of the window. Like there's, you know, all these different kinds of tips. And from that episode, I started carrying this little hammer in my car. if I had to break a window, but there was a news clip we saw of someone in real life used their Mythbusters tip.
and got out of their car and when they were talking to the news, they're like, no, I saw this on MythBusters and this is what saved my life. It actually happened. A woman drove off a bridge into like a ravine, right? Yeah. And she, because of the show, she knew what to do to get out of the sinking car. That's so crazy because the pressure, I remember Jamie and Adam were testing this one and the pressure of the water was so great that you really couldn't open the door.
But yeah, breaking the window or rolling the window down, brought water in and then relieved that pressure and then you could get out the door. We're saving lives. We saved lives on that show, There so many different episodes that had that sort of effect. mean, the reasons that air marshals can carry guns on airplanes now is because we did the explosive decompression myth where you shot a bullet and it didn't suck everybody out of the plane. And then I got this one,
this one comment on Instagram, said, I'm retired, so don't come after me, but I was an environmental health and safety specialist. One of my many duties was EHS training. I was the subject matter expert in combustible dust. So I would go to the at-risk sites and do training on dangers and remediation of combustible dust. I always played the creamer cannon episode for those facilities. The wow factor from the audience was astounding.
This was a time when the nation seemed to be going through a series of combustible dust explosions. Remember the dust does not have to come from something explosive or even flammable. It's all about the finest size of particulates. Even metal dust can ignite. I mean, that was definitely something that we learned on the show when we took creamer and threw it into the air. It was like 500 pounds of it. And then we had a flare inside of it and a giant air cannon.
Jonathan Moffett (34:44.93)
the dust into the air and created a giant explosive ignition. And it was the same sort of thing that would happen, you know, in in flour mills. Well, that's that we got the idea. This guy was making low budget special effects. And so he was doing this kind of explosion effect where he took sawdust and put it in the air cannon and put a flare and launched it into the air. And once it aerated, the particles caught on fire. And this was a big problem in
saw mills and in factories where there was a lot of dust and some spark from the machinery would catch fire, it would ignite all the particles and create basically like an explosion. I feel like MythBusters had a long legacy of being a cautionary tale, both for what we think that we busted and for things that we did. The dumb stuff we did on the show, I think we proved you should not try this at home a lot. Definitely.
Definitely don't try this at home. Let idiots like us. Thank you guys for your questions. Please. I love seeing a video question. It's so cool to see your guys' faces. Yeah. And then we get to bring you guys onto the podcast. So keep those videos coming. Like, that was awesome. Great question, by the way. I guess that's it for us today. We had the most fun with our guest, Rick Baker. Everybody, stay weird, MythBits. Stay weird.
Jonathan Moffett (36:17.134)
pioneer.
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