jon math
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Registered: 11-2005
Location: New England, USA
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Multiple Masks
I recently Googled two of my favorite keepers, Beezer and Kirk McClain and when looking at the image section was amazed to see how many masks these two used. I knew Beeser had had the red striped one and the blue cityscape ones in New York, but never knew he had a third with a red white and blue flag motif on it. I also knew he had a more natural cat face in Florida, but did not realize he ever used it. He had a few of the gold cartoon like cat masks too.
Same with Kirk. He had more than a few in Vancouver, including one with a Scottish Tartan pattern across the chin area that I had never seen before.
Quite a contrast from the days when a goalie would wear the same mask season after season; even repainting the same one when they were traded.
--- "I'll be a story in your head, but that's OK. We're all stories in the end. Just make it a good one, eh?
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5/8/2013, 10:53 am
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Maskguy5
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Registered: 05-2009
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Re: Multiple Masks
This is very true!
That is because today most of the goalies use what I like to refer to as cookie cutter goalie masks. These masks are not the true custom made goalie mask that Greg Harrison, Ed Cubberly, Micheal Lefebvre, Dom Malerba, Bob Dillon, Dave Neuman and some others use to make. This process begins with a plaster mold of a goalies face and then having the mask completed sculpted by hand and then laminated. The entire process could take up to 40 to 60 hrs to produce. But the results spoke for them selves. Each mask besides being totally custom was also a work of art.
Today most NHLer's masks are semi custom where a shell may be chosen that closely matches up to a goalies face. It is then padded according to a goalies facial specification. Working off a 2 or 3 shell sizes, a maufactuer can automate the process and produce several shells. That is why you see several goalies using 2 to 5 or 6 different masks in a season. Hell the longest part of a mask delivery today is probably due to the painting process. But if you look at some of the masks that are out there today. I'd rather have a quality custom molded hand made mask from one of the above gentlemen rather than go through 2 to 6 masks a year like some of these goalies do today.
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5/8/2013, 4:26 pm
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uflbarry
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Re: Multiple Masks
Vanbiesbrouck did go through a ton of masks. That 3rd Rangers mask with the red, white, and blue design is my favorite combo mask paint job of all time. It is not a very well known mask ... he wore it just for the 1998 Olympics and during the 2012 Winter Classic Alumni Game.
I never realized he wore the natural cat face mask in Florida. I've seen it pictured on a couple cards from 1993, but it was just him holding the mask. Did you happen to save any pictures of him wearing that one ?
With the Flyers, Beezer had 3 different style paint jobs. He had one without glitter. One with glitter and black effects. One with glitter and chrome effects.
With the Devils, he wore 3 separate designs even though he was there just a season and a half.
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5/8/2013, 4:47 pm
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jon math
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Location: New England, USA
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Re: Multiple Masks
I did not save the photos but I found them on Google images. The natural cat mask was in a game shot so it saw at least one game of action.
I knew the modern masks are production; I was surprised to see two guys having so many customs in different paint. Kirk was a Harrison user. Beezer's masks were similar to modern ones in that Don used a hand full of stock sized shells with custom padding.
--- "I'll be a story in your head, but that's OK. We're all stories in the end. Just make it a good one, eh?
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5/9/2013, 4:24 am
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