Who Is That Masked Man?

When Ed Edmunds was in college in Greeley in 1978, he went to a costume contest and lost to a guy wearing a mask that he had painted himself. “So I thought, well, I’ll just make a mask or a whole costume that’ll win these costume contests,” says Edmunds with...

By Robin Edwards

October 27, 2011

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When Ed Edmunds was in college in Greeley in 1978, he went to a costume contest and lost to a guy wearing a mask that he had painted himself. “So I thought, well, I’ll just make a mask or a whole costume that’ll win these costume contests,” says Edmunds with a laugh. He did, and soon his penchant for creating macabre masks and, eventually, animatronics turned into Distortions Unlimited, the Greeley creepy-creature-making studio that’s the subject of the Travel Channel’s four-episode series,“Making Monsters,” which finished airing last Sunday.

Put together by Missoula’s Warm Springs Productions, the show takes audiences behind the scenes of the projects Distortions undertakes, from creating creepy set pieces for musician Alice Cooper to engineering aliens for the UFO Museum in Roswell. “People just don’t know how these things are done, and they get to see what we do and how we pull that stuff off,” says Edmunds. Denver artist Daniel Crosier, who draws the Distortions Unlimited comic and is featured in one of the episodes, adds, “It’s a great love note to that area and the whole unique industry.”

For those who missed the series when it aired, the Denver FilmCenter, 2510 East Colfax Avenue, is screening two episodes of the show free tonight at 7 p.m., hosted by Andrew Novick and featuring a Q&A with the team from Distortions. Come dressed as your favorite monster for chances to win custom wood-burning art from Crosier, a $100 Denver Pavilions gift card, and various prizes from the I Heart Denver store. For more information, visit www.denverfilm.org or www.distortionsunlimited.com.
Thu., Oct. 27, 7-10 p.m., 2011

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