RE4 Remake Dr. Salvador Costume

As tradition for most of my Halloweens in recent years, I wanted to dress up as something scary. As a Resident Evil fan, the recently released remake of Resident Evil 4 gave me a new costume idea: The Chainsaw Man, or Dr. Salvador.

I chose the design from the remake instead of the original due to the fact he looks much more terrifying. The design of Salvador is also very straightforward and simple, yet effective. Here's how I made the costume.

Nothing more classic on a horror villain than a burlap sack. Before making the mask, I looked at hundreds of photo references of Salvador's in-game model from the remake. I bought some burlap from Michaels and cut out two fairly-large square pieces with the corners rounded-off, making sure that is was larger than my head and went down to my neck. The remake Chainsaw Guy kinda has a big-head thing going on anyway, so I just went with that. I then hot-glued the top and side seams together, leaving the bottom un-glued so I can put the mask on. After that, I turned the mask inside out. So essentially, I just made a big burlap bag.

After a quick test fit with a rope tied on the neck to make it fit more, I began to weather it. Using my reference photos, I cut out the eyeholes (spacing them out a bit so that I can still see when I add the scary eyes) and added dirt, grime, and dried-up blood on the mask via by oil colors (mostly), acrylics and a few spritz of spray paint.

Since I can see through the burlap from the inside, I wanted to make those terrifying eyes that remake Salvador has. I took some craft foam and applied a paper-mache-like mixture of toilet paper and liquid latex for the "fleshy eye-bits." Painted it with some red automotive spray paint, which shocked me for how much it looked like actual blood. I also bought some awesome fake animal (owl) eyes from Amazon and just glued them onto the "flesh" parts, though I did experiment with some smaller eyes to see if it looked right (it didn't). After blending the animal eyes in with the same red automotive spray paint and darker red dry-brushing, I glued it to the inside of the cut eye-holes and the mask was finished.

I tried to be accurate to the in-game model as possible, but kind of just went my own way with it, so it's not 100% accurate. If you want, you can just buy a pre-made burlap sack that fits you.

The clothes were fairly easy. I had an old, white, buttoned, long-sleeve that I wasn't using anymore and just used that. I got the pants from Goodwill, which looked somewhat similar to the ones on the in-game model. I heavily weathered them with the same paints I weathered the mask with, and had tons of fun doing it (especially splattering the fake blood on it). I tried to add "dirt and grime" on parts where it could have collected, or stained on, such the armpit area.

I had some trouble on the suspenders. The ones that Salvador uses in both versions are a vintage type of suspenders called "Y-back" or "rabbit-eared" suspenders. I couldn't find those anywhere (including thrift stores) and the ones online are quite expensive and don't have the single stripe on them. So, I just opted to get some cheap ones at Spirit Halloween (specifically the 1920s Gangster suspenders due to it having a straight line design, albeit multiple lines instead of one). Since the line pattern was white, I painted them to be orange like the in-game version.

The shoes were just my shoes that I use at work.

What would be the Chainsaw Man be without his chainsaw? I was roaming around Spirit Halloween and found their animated chainsaw props in the weapons section and thought it would be perfect. Although it costed $50, it was a great model, had great sound effects, and was animated. It was worth it, if you ask me.

Since the default chainsaw prop was mostly a solid gray color with a terrible blood paintjob, I had to repaint it to match the one from the game. I taped off sections of the chainsaw that I didn't want paint on, and spray it with a yellow paint-primer. I then went to work on weathering it with oil colors and acrylics, making sure it looked old and worn. Since the blade was going to be covered in fake blood, I didn't bother covering up the terrible "orange blood spray" that the chainsaw originally came with.

You could make your own chainsaw by scratch, but I chose this way since the Spirit prop looked great already.

On Halloween Day, I put "makeup" (acrylic paint mixed with water) on my arms and hands for a more "undead/Plaga-infected" look. This is optional, of course.

I also wore a wig cap so that the burlap wouldn't fray into my hair.

After weeks of preparation and a few costume fit tests, I could finally put the whole thing on. I finished just in time for Halloween too, and it was really satisfying to see the whole costume come together.

Visibility out of the mask was fairly difficult, but not too bad. It was obviously easier to see during the daytime. Vision at night was a bit hard, but my house had light decorations, so that helped. I should've poked tiny holes in the mask so I could see better (might risk fraying the burlap).

It was also raining a little bit during the trick-or-treating hours, but to my surprise, none of the paints washed off (and I didn't add a clear coat)!

The reactions I got were fairly expected: almost everyone was terrified. Turns out that a guy with a chainsaw and a mask is a recipe for terror. And you bet I scared a lot of trick-or-treaters that night.

Overall, I'm extremely satisfied with the costume. It also didn't cost that much, since I already had most of the materials. Probably the most expensive thing for this costume was the $50 chainsaw prop, but this is optional since you can just make your own from scratch. Thank you for reading and I hope I inspired you to make your own!