A woman lies dead outside the shed where Larry Van Duynhoven works. A trickle of blood underlines the gruesome spectacle, leaking from the empty socket once home to her left eye. Her neck is twisted to an awkward angle.

Inside, a pig-skin mask with ragged stitching sits near mutilated faces, containers of blood, and a power drill. Charred corpses line the walls.

Van Duynhoven says what he does is art — a dying craft steeped in blood, guts, and bad taste.

He's working at Bywong Town, an abandoned gold mining village just outside of Canberra, where another one of his gory creations hunts a group of young women in the upcoming slasher film The Furies.

Upcoming horror movie The Furies aims to push the boundaries of good taste. ( ABC News: Jordan Hayne )

The creature, called Skincrow, wears an entire husk of a human for clothes: Skin, hair and blood.

Macabre details saturate the full-sized skin suit, right down to its hollowed-out feet, which dangle limp behind its wearer's own.

But its inspiration comes from a more family-friendly affair.

"The idea was taking the innocent thoughts … for us it was a character like the Wizard of Oz's Scarecrow, so let's take that and make it a bit scarecrow-y," Van Duynhoven said.

"That's why we call it Skincrow, and that's why I put the noose around his neck, a bit of rope around his wrists.

'When you see a head explode, you feel good about it'

Larry's stash of equipment includes a power drill, disembodied faces, and buckets of blood. ( ABC News: Jordan Hayne )

The Furies relies on practical effects for its scenes, but Van Duynhoven says computer-generated imagery (CGI) has become the norm for most films.

"The art is slowly dissolving," he said.

The Skincrow, one of the villains in The Furies. ( ABC News: Jordan Hayne )

"We used to go out and put rigs on for bullet hits, on the face and stuff … rigs you have to set up with air pressure and stuff like that.

"They look really great — they used to do it in the Godfather films and back in the 70s. And it was an art, it was a skill.

"Now what we do is normally we put a bullet wound on someone, and they go out and film the scene as if it's not there, and basically the CGI guy takes it away leading up to the point, and then puts it back on in one of those frames, and it looks like he's been shot."

Van Duynhoven says films like The Furies, which only use computers for minor details, are the most effective.

"The other day we were blowing a pig's head up — tomorrow we're chopping hands off, fingers off," he said.

"When you see a head practically explode, you feel good about it.

"When you're watching all those superhero films, it's just subliminal editing, special effects, CGI … but you're left feeling not that fulfilled."

The Furies sees its characters stalked through the bush by a group of sadistic killers. ( ABC News: Jordan Hayne )

The Furies' blood-soaked approach and extreme on-screen violence were something Van Duynhoven developed with director Tony D'Aquino.

"This film doesn't just go and get put on the shelf at JB [Hi Fi] … let's go a little bit further with it, try and go for the R rating," Van Duynhoven says of the film's planning.

"It'll get noticed more, it can shock people."

Practical effects harder but 'more real'

The Furies, due to be released in February 2019, takes inspiration from old-school slasher movies, and D'Aquino said practical effects were essential to emulating the style.

"The horror fan in me wants those extreme gore moments," he said.

"It's a bit of a throwback to those films."

Director Tony D'Aquino made the deliberate choice to use practical effects. ( ABC News: Jordan Hayne )

The film might draw on the damsels in distress of classic horror, but D'Aquino tries to take the theme in a decidedly feminist direction.

That won't dull the brutality though — more than 100 litres of fake blood has been used in the production.



"I was very specific right from the start to be practical, not CGI, because the films I'm referencing from the 70s and 80s, they were all practical, and those sort of effects have a different feel to CGI effects," D'Aquino said.

"They've just got a bit more weight and a bit more realism to me.

"Today most of them will do those effects CGI because practical takes longer, takes more patience and can be harder to achieve.

"[Practical effects] can be less than perfect, but I like that; it just seems more real."

Pulled over with a body in the back

Prosthetics are used extensively in The Furies. ( ABC News: Jordan Hayne )

Van Duynhoven has worked on prosthetics and makeup for acclaimed films like Hacksaw Ridge, Lion, and Netflix zombie movie Cargo, starring Martin Freeman. But a life in practical effects is not without its drawbacks.

"I've been pulled over a few times for speeding with bodies in the car," he said.

In most instances, police are understanding about him driving around with bloody corpses — but he has been the subject of at least one semi-serious investigation.

"I worked all day, went home, I was just having a beer and the doorbell went, so I answered it and there was four police officers and two plainclothes detectives," Van Duynhoven recounted.

The Skincrow wears the husk of a human for clothes. ( ABC News: Jordan Hayne )

"They were asking who I was … they had a folder.

"They opened it up and there was a big printout of the back of my ute with these legs!"

"They said 'do you work in films?' and I said 'yeah', so they had all big smiles — they knew.

"So I think they were just bored … but they had to do the paperwork.

"I did end up saying to them 'I get to do this for a living, it's kind of like the perfect crime — I could actually go out at night and do this and get away with it'."

Van Duynhoven says the officers gave a half genuine laugh at the suggestion, with just a hint of concern.

A taste for gore

Van Duynhoven says one of the most effective horror movies — in terms of scares and budget returns — is the Blair Witch Project, which has next-to-no on-screen violence.

Simplicity, he says, is key.

Not so scary: Van Duynhoven's prosthetics are featured heavily in the film. ( ABC News: Jordan Hayne )

But a growing international appetite for the gruesome and grisly has left a market of horror fans baying for fake blood.

"There's no point making a horror film with no blood," he said.

"These days you need to have something. You can't make a film without any blood and gore.