Canadian Makeup Show Demo's: Part One - Sculpts.

So for the Canadian Makeup Show (held April 4th and 5th '09), friend, coworker and makeup artist Stan Edmonds ask me if I would be interested in doing a makeup demo at the VFS booth. I of course am always up for another make up project and also supporting the school.

I decided that doing a different one each day would be cool, and also give me a great side project for the evenings and weekend after the 9-5 shop work. I did a face cast of Jon and Katie both from MKD08 (newest VFS makeup class). I right away new I wanted to do a burn scar on Jon, and then decided to do a subtle aging makeup on Katie. I first sculpted and completed the scar make up molds. It was a single sculpt floated off and broken down into 4 appliances. The over all piece was an awkward shape, and breaking it down not only aided in application but also in molding as there was now no undercut worries. It turned out great!

I then started Katie's makeup. I got the 3 piece sculpt based out and was gonna float off and finish on the separate molds. I then decided I didn't want to do gelatin both days, and thought it would be better to do something different for the second day. Just making a run of bondo transfers last week for friend and mentor Charles Porlier, I decided it would be cool to do a full bondo transfer makeup.

I removed the original age sculpt (I really like the forms a lot too, oh well ) and quickly drew on a cut/scratch pattern, I then quickly roughed in the cut edges and then refine them all. It actually went quite quickly pre drawing them, as I knew exactly what to do and didn't need to come up with it off the top of my head. Once the were 95% done I floated them off, flattened them all and finished the sculpts. The flattening is required in the making of bondo transfers. I then poured up a silicone mold.

Here are the gelatin burn and bondo transfer cut sculpts. Makeup's to come soon!

Burn Sculpt.

Floated off and remounted and refined.

(chin picture won't show up right side up!!?)

Bondo sculpt.

Floated off, flattened, and finished.

ALIEN TRESPASS!!!!!!!!!!! OOOOOOO, SCARY!! Well really it's not...

So a while ago (late Sept 'o7) I worked on the film 'Alien Trespass'. You can check it out here: http://www.alientrespass.com/

It was a lower budget film based on the idea of 50's sci-fi flicks. So the film was sent in the 50's era and they even went so far as to have the creature and creature design after the 50's monster movies. In fact the movie was suppose to be a lost film from the 50's, or so goes the marketing for it.

There was 5 of us working on this project creating the suit. I helped as a sculptor, mold maker, foam runner, foam seamer, painter(bottom tentacles only), and also did the finishing vein and silicone work on the suit. I was also involved heavily with the design and creation of the under structure of the suit.

The suit had an animatronic eye, which I was only involved in the installation, not fabrication. It also had rod controlled tentacles on the top of the head.



There was some issues with the foam run sticking to the core, but eventually it all came together, and I really liked the out come! It really does give you that 50's feeling, and the production really liked the end result as well!



Here are some pics of the finished suit, enjoy!

Lastly here is the tip (sculpoted by me) of extending tentacle that came out of the back of the alien. I didn't get a shot of where it sat/came out of due to the fact the back side was unavailable when I took my pics sorry!

Who wants to rock out!? This kid does...

So just recently I got an offer to do a makeup turning a 13 year old boy into a 35 plus year old man. It was for an unusual circumstance but in the end I had to say yes!

Once it was agreed I'd do it, I quickly got the face cast done, and sculpted 2 cheek/nasal labial pieces, plus a forehead piece. I didn't want to have a huge pieces to glue down as the boy would be removing the make up him self with the help of his dad. SO I covered what I felt I need to, to get the proper end result.

The sculpts were done on a the face cast then floated off, and remounted on individual molds. I was happy with sculpts and the resulting appliances.

Since there was no chance for me to up keep the makeup once he left my place, I made sure to really seal and secure the make up applied. I used a barrier foam on the skin first then Top Guard from PPI. This gave me a nice surface for gluing too. I used pros aid for the glue down. Once it was blended off, I sealed it all again with pros aid, then 2 passes for Green Marble Selr, drying in between each pass. Then lightly powdered it after.

After this I did a quick couple passes of of Green Marble concentrate as a wrinkle stipple on the eyes. It was the first time I had used it for this purpose and was happy with the results. Definitely want to use this again in the near future to see what I can come up with.

I went onto doing a base of Illustrator with a sponge then used my air brush to do a serious of spatters in different red and brown shades. I also did some finer work with a regular brush. I did a vein tone pass in the deep eye sockets, plus some red finer veins on the upper lids. I did a heavier paint job than normal since the make up would be viewed in a darker setting. I was over all happy with it, but found it too yellow (yellow lights in the area I applied in), though everyone who has critiqued it says they don't feel it is...I still do!

I then laid a full beard and mustache. I gave the beard a quick cut, not too much time spent on styling it. I set it in place with a couple passes of hair spray, then finished it off with some hair whitener in his real hair and eye brows. Next time I will set the facial hair after I do the whitener, as it was hard to brush and blend it into the stiffer hand laid hair. The hair looked fine to the eye, but shows up much whiter in the pic due to the flash reflecting off of it.

In the end the father and son were very pleased, and the make up did what it was suppose to do!

Sculpt up date.

Here's some close ups of my silicone aging sculpt that I'm nearly finished.

I have another day or so on it, then I need to finish the hand sculpts and ear lobes. Then it's time to start breaking the sculpt down.

Some HD trauma!!!

A few months ago make up artist/mentor/friend/co worker Stand Edmonds asked me if I would be interested in creating a make up for an HD lighting seminar he was co hosting. The make up would be lit on stage and shot and projected live with some of the latest HD cameras out there. I always enjoy doing new make ups and this was just the chance to do that once again!

He set me up with a model Caryl -Ann (VFS graduate) and I was able to get her face cast as well. I went to work sculpting what would be an assault victim make up. It consisted of 4 pieces. A right puffy split cheek, a puffy left eye/puffy cheek/split brow, a split nose and a split lip.

All the pieces (run in gelatin) had real thread stitches pre sewn in and secured with super glue (a method I highly recommend!)

I applied the make in around 2 hours or so, glued down with pros aid, colored with Illustrators and Stacolors and then sealed with Green Marble. I finished the make up with some 3 Kings My Blood (a nice aged brown shade).

All in all I liked this make up, the bruising got a bit washed out in the photos but to the eye it was much more intense, you can see this in the application pic below. The only thing I really regret is not having fake lashes in the puffy eye appliance! Oh well next time!!

Here is the finished make up with some mold and application pics as well!

Some bonus trivia: I also did a subtle silicone aging make up for the HD seminar as well, but at this time I have no pics of the finished make up. Also the reaction to the assault make up from the seminar crowd was just awesome, they gasped and awed, have to say it put a smile on my face. Finally I actually did this assault make up one more time for a demo shot at VFS for a TV spot on the school. To watch that spot follow this link!: http://www.vfs.com/blog/2008/10/17/makeup-design-program-stars-on-tv/

Some silicone work, from a bit ago.

So last spring while on a break from WCT Productions I did a quick job at SFX Studio Inc. I came in and first had to finish off a sculpt originally started by one of the most amazing sculptors in Vancouver and the world, Jamie Salmon. The first sculpt was about 85% done, I really just completed the sole of the foot.

Then I had the task of sculpting the entire other foot, which had an even further lizard mutations than the first. It's hard tyring to match the sculpting style of another artist, not to mention one with such incredible talent, I feel I did an OK job.

In the end we ran both feet in foam latex, which I painted with pax and Illustrator inks and acrylics. Then we ran a single silicone copy of Jamie's foot, which I seamed and painted with thinned down caulking and oil paints. These are some shots of that finished silicone foot.

Year old make up!!

Yes this is a year old, it was just a quick make up done as a favour to my friend and mentor Charles Porlier.

Last Halloween, Charles asked me if I could do a pirate make up on the director of marketing at VFS, Stephen Webster. I said sure of course! He mentioned maybe I could use some generic pieces from 'Making It Big' I made a while back.

To be honest though, I am not a fan of generic appliances, especially nose pieces, as they NEVER fit right. So I said, you know what? Just tell him to come down to the class and I'll do a quick fast casting. So that's what I did. Even though it was just the front of his face, not even half his head, Stephen totally got the fear! Little too encased for his liking. The cast turned out great though!

Anyways that night I sculpted, molded and ran the make up pieces.

The molds weren't the prettiest, but it was all done for free, of course it was my choice!!

For me the best part of doing this was the reaction I got from Stephen. He thought he was gonna come down and get a scar "painted" on his face. But when I was finished he was truly blown away. I don't think until that very moment, he realized what the students at the school and make up artists in general do and can do.

I sent him home with a clean up kit since he would wear it home form work and for the evening while he took his kids trick or treating. I asked and the removal went just fine.

The make up consisted of 2 pieces. One huge nose/nasal labial/eye bag piece, and one little piece to continue the scar below his eye to above his brow(note the scar should have gone through his eyebrow, I skipped this to make the removal easier). Glued down with pros aid and colored with Illustrator colors. I laid hair with pros aid as well. There was a shine from the glue in the hair, I should have matted it down, but I didn't, next time!

PS: I had help from Elissa and Laura at VFS putting on Stephen's wig!!

Holy jeeeeezzzzzzzzz!!!!!!!!!!

So yeah, it's been way tooooo long since my last post. My last post talked about a current personal project, it is still under way!!! I was working this past few weeks here and there on the sculpt. Once that is completed I will post pics, or maybe ever before then!!

For now here is the bust of the guy (Jamie) I will be doing the make up on.

The casting came out of a Body Double mold, so the casting was really high in detail and came out almost perfect. Very lovely indeed!! I put on a few coats of alcote (or similar) and have put several hours into the sculpt. I am also work on hand sculpts as well.

So hopefully in the next day or two pics will be up! Keep checking for more updates!!

As of late....

I have been super busy working at WCT Productions here in Vancouver. I haven't had time to work on any personal projects, thus haven't posted in some time!!

Anyways I have a bit of down time recently and decided to buy a crap load of new materials I don't have much experience with. This includes platsil gel 10 (yes the infamous) for making GFA's using bald cap plastic. I'm also gonna experiment making molds out of TC-1630 for both silicone and gelatin.

I also bought a crap load of pros aide, with wet slide paper and acetate to get even more comfy with the amazing bondo transfer appliances. I have made quite a few of these now, from sculpting them, to molding them and running the molds. I just want to find out the little things I was always curious about ie: how much shrinkage is there, how much should you over sculpt to compensate and to see if using a food dehydrator works as I've heard for speeding the drying process with good results. Also achieving the correct bondo color mix, as it's super tricky since the end color is way different then the wet bondo mix.

So yeah, I'm planing on doing an aging make up with the silicone work, and some cool crazy things with the bondo appliances (not exactly sure yet). The aging make up will even have a tricky mold too! Planning on doing a 2 piece core full neck appliance mold, where the negative is one piece. The make up will include hand appliances as well.

Anyways I hope to have some sculpts up when ever I get crackin and other cool stuff to post soon!

There is some WCT work that I'm pretty proud of, and will be released in theaters soon! Just have to wait and see what it is!! ;)

New scar!! (well sort of)

So while working at VFS as a TA I let a student use the scar mold I had to run some foam pieces for herself. In doing so she also ran a copy for me as well!

So one day (back in Aug '07) I decided to apply the piece and color it. Now before the foam appliance was glued down I used a piece of nylon, glued and anchored to the upper cheek and side neck, to give the face some tautness, resembling tightened scar tissue. It's not super obvious, but you can see some droop on the outside of the left eye. Next time I use this technique, I know I'll go for a little more pull. Also this foam piece was not made for Natalie, but due to the nature of the piece, it would fit just about anyone quite easily!

The piece was glued down with Beta Bond, and colored with a base Pax wash and then Illustrator colors. I wanted this scar to look more raw and new, compared to the gelatin scar which looked much more healed. There is quite of bit of pinks, reds and purples used. Enjoy!!

Quick post, older material though!

This is was a dislocated compound wrist fracture. It was made for a BC Hydro first aid relay competition at their company event. I sculpted it on a plate mold and ran with gelatin. I first stippled in some latex in the bone section then backed it with pros aide, once the gelatin was poured and cooled, the latex suck nicely to that area, giving the bone a different shade and texture. The finished effect (colored with skin illustrator), I felt turned out excellent for what it was! The guys who saw it were totally in shock, you'd swear it was real!

It's been way too long!

Well I haven't posted on here for over 10 months now!!!! Yes it has been a while, but trust me I have actually been working, no lie!

These latest pics are from work done in a shop here in Vancouver. Both sculpts shown are for the TV series 'Flash Gordon'. The first is deformed leg for the character Renkel. It was seen in a quick shot, and not from the best angle, could barely even tell it was deformed(oh well!). The sculpt had to be done in 2 days, from armature construction to finished sculpt. The over all lay out is pretty cool I think, how ever the sculpt in general could have used at least a good 3 more passes of texture. All in all I like the piece! It was run in gelatin backed with foam. I ended up painting it but have no pics of the paint job.

The second sculpt was done for the same character as well. The sculpt is of a scull plate the guy has on his head. The final plate used in the show ended up being an altered version. The original had a large hole in the plate with a veiny fluid sack bulging out. It also originally covered the left eye brow, but it was felt it may restrict facial expressions so it was cut back. The brain hole was made smaller, and wasn't bulging anymore. It was changed to a see through window with brain matter visible. I used a fast cast resin copy of the original that was cut back and then re sculpted in clay. The piece was colored and finished by Andre Gaul (an amazing artist if I do say so myself!) The sculpt was suppose to look like it was made of metal and have "electronic" designs and engravings. The "3 circle" pattern is also a part of the plot line, though I do not know exactly what it represents. Enjoy!

Aging...The latest and most advanced!!(Well for me) UPDATE!!!! SCULPT PICS ADDED!!!!

It has been a while since my last post but I'm still trying to keep busy with my make up. This latest make up creation was brought upon by a request. A fellow by the name of Colin Steele contacted me and asked if I would be able to make him look 80 years old. My response..."I'll do my best" So from the first face cast to the final application was a mere 13 days. For this make up I decided I need to go as far as possible with the prosthetics. That said, I figured it was about time I stepped foot into the realm of wrap appliances. Now in order to get a wrap appliance you first need a flared positive. So what you do is, you take your life cast of the face/neck/collar, AKA a 3/4 cast, and you build taper all around it, then basically do another face cast of the corrected(flared) positive. With this corrected face cast you are able to sculpt an appliance that will wrap around the neck and have the blending edges out of view, but because of the flare on the positive you don't need to worry about any undercuts when sculpting.

Now this was my first attempt, and all I can say is it was a complete success, especially in that the flared positive, mold and appliance came out great. In all I created 5 different prosthetics. A forehead piece that covers the brows, a nose/upper lip piece(first), ear lobe extensions(first as well) and the grand daddy cheeks/chin/neck appliance. Basically everything I had to create for this make up was new, not in technique for all but just the type and size of the piece. I had done noses and upper lips before, but not together as a single piece. Ear lobes I had never done before either.

When it came time to pouring the pieces, I soaked the molds in water so that any air bubbles in he molds would be full of water and would release less or no air, and I wouldn't end up with bubbles in the prosthetics. This worked out pretty good though the nose mold was giving me a few problems. I also didn't soak the wrap mold because of its size, its was big, I think I used about 50 lbs of ultra cal 30, in the making of the flared positive and negative. I had to fill a few bubbles in the end, but the pieces were all really workable and with great blending edges.

When I applied the make up I did the nose/lip piece first, then the wrap, then forehead and the ear lobes last. During the wrap application Colin was actually laying down, cause I had no assistant to help me that day. I honestly really liked this technique, he was relaxed and the piece went on with no trouble what so ever. After this he sat back up for the forehead and ear lobes. The worst part of the application was my color job. It wasn't that great, and honestly could have been a lot better. It was ok in the end though due to the fact it was shot in black and white. Actually in person it looked pretty good, but the pics I took(with flash) didn't turn out very well, all the sculpted fine line detail is not visible, and the color job comes off to pink. I think I really need to be less afraid of browns and really incorporate them more. The hair was colored with spray in and some white skin illustrator. The brows were hand laid(not my best), next time I think I might try punching the brows. The brow color was a little off too, could have been more grey.

Anyways the following pics are what I ended up with, I had a great time applying the make up and was really pleased with how all the pieces came together, enjoy!! In the first 2 pics the eyes are photo shopped a bit to look older, and the first is set in a black and white which the film was shot in.

These last 4 are stills from the footage shot. As you can see it turned out quite nicely, the one thing I didn't do was make up on the hands (I know I know, I should have!!) I didn't because you don't see them much or close up, but I wish I had, oh well, next time!

I thought I'd add these just cause!
They are the sculpt for the wrap appliance.

Personal Project

So as the days go on I hadn't done anything prosthetic wise lately, so I decided I wanted to create a new make up. I had the face cast of a guy named Gabriel Koenig. He played the zombie(make up done by me, pics below) in my friends film 'A Night of Removal'. So I emailed him up and said "Hey I want to create an aging make up for you, is that ok!?", he was fine with it so I got to'er!

I sculpted all the pieces(3) and created a single negative that would produce all of them at once. I made a forehead piece, that covers the eye brows(new brows were hand laid), then an upper lip piece. This piece was so thin, less than a millimeter I believe, I wasn't even sure it would work, but it ended up working beautifully. The last Piece was the cheeks/chin, it blended off just over the edge of the bottom lip and just under the jaw line. They were all made out of PGG and colored with Illustrator pallete. I think this has been my best sculpt and make up to date, the fore head wrinkles looked awesome and creased very realistically when the fore head moved. The nasal labial folds worked nicely too! There was also a bit of latex stipple around the eyes to add wrinkles and blend the pieces in.

Here you see the finished sculpt before I poured the negative.

Gabriel is actually 20, here you see him looking around 55-60 years old. The make up application took just over 4 hours to complete.

These last 3 pics are of the same make up done the next day believe it or not. I did it for a demo at the FTX representing VFS. I did the make up with the help of a couple VFS make up alumni, Courtney Frey(left) and Amy St. Jean(right, though you can't see her face).
NOTE: This time the make up was completed in just over the 2 hour limit we were given!! I precolored the pieces to save time.

Scaring Results

So for the film 'Are you Sleeping' I ended up applying the scar prosthetic for three days of shooting. They shot over 4 days but the character "Simon" wasn't needed for the first day of filming. It was a one piece prosthetic you saw from the sculpt. It was attached with pros aid and sealed with pros aid as well. I colored the scar using my Illustrator palettes(Skin, FX). Beside the scar I was constantly touching up the sweat effects on Jono(Simon). I had a few problems with the make up over the 3 days, nothing major but things you will constantly run into being a make up artist. The first and most serious one was the sweat. Not the fake sweat I applied, but the real sweat that was slowly ruining the edges of the applied piece. I fixed it up as best I could, not messing with it too much, as I didn't want to further the lifting edges. The second thing that happened was that the coloring was not exactly the same through out the 3 days, though this was minor, cause you don't see the scar close up enough in the 10 minute short to even notice it. The third and final thing was, on the second day the placement of the piece was a little to low, though only noticeable on the ear lobe, and most likely only noticeable if you are looking for such mistakes!!! But all in all it was a great experience, and the most times I have applied the same make up to date!! Oh also on the second day of shooting I ended with me doing some quick gashes(5) across Simons face. This will ended up being the final scene in the film. I really disliked th gashes I was extremely rushed, so I used thick blood to make the cuts, with normal blood running down. I wish I would have taken a bit more time to make the cuts a bit thinner. Less is more!! The one cool thing that worked out was I was able to cut right into the gelatin scar prosthetic to create one of the cuts, though I think in the end it will be so quick it wil be unoticeable.

This was from day one, I liked the color job the most on this day, out of three. Namely the light tones and pinks tones that resemble the loss of skin pigment.

This was day two, like I said the placement was a little low, though hopefuly no one will notice!! Also it didn't have the same levels of pink and lighter color that I liked from the day before.

For the final day seen here, the piece was actually precolored before I even applied it. I actually precolored this piece as a color guide for the make up itself, then I ended up running one short(used for the practice application) so I used the precolored for the final days shoot. I don't recommend having just enough pieces, you should always have a back up just incase!! Once it was glued down I did a bit or color blending on the edges.

So even though this was from the second day of shooting, I put these up after the normal looks as it does happen last in the film. You can see the thick blood doesn't look so great but it did the trick, and the director was happy with it.

I added these last 2 pictures just for a different view. The first is an angle from behind the ear so you can see what it looks like back there. The second picture was from the make up from day 3 after I had sealed it with pros aid but not powdered it yet. The result was a very shiny look, I really liked it, and in the future might try to get a shinier look like this, some scaring does look like that.

UPDATE!!!: I attended the MAMM this past Sat the 9th of Sept, sadly our movie didn't place in the competition(we got greats reviews from viewers though!!), though we did lose to some great movies. Ours was much darker, the rest had a happy/comedy feel to it. It was a great experience none the less and I hope to collaborate again with the same guys. I for sure want to be apart of the competition again!

Networking

So while working on a VFS student film called 'Per-specs' I met a local actor named Jono Lee. He was a really great guy, super nice and funny as well. While on the shoot I showed him my portfolio, and as a result he asked if I could maybe help out with something he had coming up. He wanted me to do a scar(we later made it a burn scar) of some sort on the side of his face. So I said sure I'd love to and we exchanged cards. I must say you're never really sure if things will progress or just stand still at the first initial talk. But sure enough they did, it ended up that project he wanted me to work on was going to be an entry for a competition held by the Vancouver Asian Film festival. We had a meeting and set a date to do Jono's face cast. Once that was done I went on my way sculpting the piece I would use on him. I ended up sculpting 2 different scars. I did the first and showed Charles Porlier and asked for tips as I always do!! He gave me some great advice, which involved me thinning out the piece/sculpt. In doing so I basicaly removed all the detail I had sculpted. The resculpt was even better and I was extremely please with the outcome. It had a much more realistic look and feel. So for some of you who aren't exactly sure how prosthetics are made. I have posted some the rough stages of creating the piece.

Here you see Jono first with the alginate setting up with some cheese clothe lightly pressed into it. This enables the plaster bandages, which you see in the second picture, that go over top(which give the cast a ridged support) something to grab onto. After the alginate piece is removed a positive is made by pouring Ultracal 30 into the face cast. Once hardened, the alginate and bandages are removed and the positive was put in a Ultracal 30 base. Once this set up I cleaned up the edges a bit and it was ready to sculpt on.

You can see in the pictures here how the ear was completely filled in(with Ultracal 30) and only the ear lobe was exposed(now covered with clay though) with a bit of the outer rim. The one on the left was my first sculpt, as you can see it is quite thick and almost Freddy Kruger like. I wanted it to be more real, and although I did see actual pictures of real scars that were this thick and obvious, the less is more idea seems to always work. So once I removed a lot of the mass I extended the scar even further, though it was much thinner, this gave me a better blending edge, and the scar didn't look like a thick prosthetic just slapped on the face. The piece came out amazingly well, and had great edges for blending! The final result soon to come...

1 Day job!!

Quickly following the zombie film, a guy named Doug from the same class as Jonny(Director of zombie film) asked me to create a prosthetic that would make it look like this clock was embedded in to the main characters arm. The thing was he brought be the clock the day before he wanted to shoot!! So I had to quickly sculpt a piece that would hold the clock and create the negative mold that same day. The result I actually didn't mind! It was a quick job, but really interesting and a good experience to do. I ended up applying the clock for 2 days in a row, this was the first time I have ever applied the same effect twice. Not to shabby, there was also a bit of hair laying involved, just to replace the hair that was shaved away so the prosthetic would stick with out problems. Try to tell where the fake hair is!?

Just a final note, I hate how thick the clock actually was and how much of a slope I had to build to make it look like it was embedded. When he first told me I totally imagined your typical wrist watch with out the straps. Just goes to show how you can envision something completely different than some one else!!!

A night of removal...Pt. 2

Like I stated earlier this has been my most favorite make up I have done so far. This was done for the same film "A Night of Removal". What I ended up doing was creating the neck bite on a plate mold, and even sculpted in some muscle detail in the hole. Then when I applied it I removed the muscle to create an actual hole/bite in the piece. Never doing this before, I wasn't sure how thick to make the prosthetic itself, not wanting it to bulge out in an unnatural way I made it a bit too thin. Though this later came in handy, as I wasn't sure how I was going to glue in the stringy latex bits that would be tearing and look like tissue and flesh. I ended up sandwiching the latex bits in between 2 neck bits pieces, there for getting a prosthetic that wasn't too thick but was still able to conceal the blood tubing under neath.

I ended up having 3 blood lines. 2 carried blood to the hole to pour out of it, while the 3rd line was connected to a vein I crafted out of latex(built up layers on a skinny round chop stick, then powdered and removed and then colored with the proper shade of pax paint), which had a hole in it, that would squirt an actual stream of pumping blood. So below you'll see several pictures going through the stages of applying this effect.

I glued down with pros aid the removed muscle textured pieces that were originally in the hole on the neck bite piece its self. Then put the vein I created over top, this was glued to the piece as well as the actors skin with Telesis 5. Then lastly I put a nice little piece of webed latex for another layer of texture. When I was placing the vein I would put the prosthetic over top to position the hole and make sure it was not covered.

Next I glued the other 2 blood lines(connected to a 30cc and 60cc syringe) in place with Telesis 5 as well. After that I glued the neck bite piece in place with pros aid. I had sandwiched the latex in between the the 2 pieces earlier to create the final single piece to apply. I colored it with Illustraor colors to match his skin tone. Then even added some stubble effect with a dark brown and black so it would blend more on the neck. You can see all 3 blood lines coming out of the bottom of the effect.

After the coloring was done we got him in to wardrobe and to the set. As you can see it blended nicely and everything that makes it work was perfectly hidden. What was to come was so thrilling, after the take, people literally stood there swearing and in awe of what just took place.

This is the aftermath. The large area of blood was the from the vein and it looked awesome as it squirted(pumped with 60cc syringe) out of the jugular. The latex strands were bit and torn off by the zombie. I was extremely pleased with how it tured out, and so was the director, so it was just the best feeling.

A night of removal..Pt.1

So my friend asked me to create a zombie make up for his student film project. I hadn't done anything for a while in the creating end of prosthetics. I had applied recently but not sculpted or made my own. The end result was awesome. It felt good to get back into sculpting and creating a make up from scratch. The actor, who does acting for fun in his spare time had never had his face cast or had prosthetics on before. So it was a great experience to go through all the steps with someone who's new to it all. I applied the make up with a lot of time available to me..which probably wasn't the best thing, cause I really want to get better at the speed of my application. In the end I applied a forehead piece(covers brows) as well as a cheeks/chin/frontal neck piece . There was also a small cut piece applied to his nose. These were all. I used a duplicate of the nose piece on the upper lip cause it seemed bare. I then applied some hangy bits of latex from the open wounds. I think next time I do something like this I may not do that or do it in a softer way. I spent a lot of time sculpting and then covered it up with blood and latex bits...lesson learned. I still really liked it though..but the best and most favorite make up(effect) to date was still to come...

I added these last pics just cause I liked they way they look..I took them in a very dark room with no flash then did a quick fix on photoshop..you couldnt even see what he looked like until the fix!

IMATS....June 24-25, 2006

What Can I say..it was an amazing experience! I was accepted into the character/prosthetics competition. Only me and 8 others were selected from entries all over the world. So just being there was a great honour. I didn't place in the competition, sad but true, but I learnt a lot of things from it...like practicing...so important!

It was also the first time I ever applied foam latex, so I did my best. What happens is they give you random foam pieces and you have to make them work! They might have bad edges..or might not, they might fit..might not..I had a case of bad edges..but you just have to go with it. I got 3 pieces; a nose, a chin piece that also covered the bottom lip, and a piece that was like a zorro mask, it went around the eyes and had a huge brow, then went up onto the forehead a bit and down onto the cheeks.

My favorite part was Brent's (my model and friend) character presence he gave on stage(the anouncment of winners). It made me laugh so hard during rehearsal they told me to be quiet. Then the actual crowd really liked it as well.

Anyways besides the competition...my mentor Charles Porlier (Head of Make Up at VFS) is extremely good friends with Howard Berger(Academy Award winner, best make up effects, Narnia) and he invited me and Brent out to dinner with the two of them and a friend of Howard's. Holy crap...I wanted to ask Howard so many things...he even asked if I had questions, but I could barely think of anything...I'm sure he understood..and maybe even felt good because he saw how awe struck I was to be sitting there with him. He, like Charles, is an incredible make up artist and a huge role model of mine, they are both extremely funny and down to earth, but 150% serious about their work. He had some great advice, and I truly wish to meet him again..maybe even work with/under him one day...who knows!!!

For those who don't know, thats Howard Berger on my right(in pic) and Charles Porlier on my left!

Oh I Forgot!!

I worked on this short film back in March for a SFU student. They wanted me to do this leper arm, or something gross. So this is what I came up with. It was done with out of kit effects gelatin then colored with Illustrator palette. I think It turned out great for doing it with no direction! Very gross looking!

In the right picture you'll notice it has a shine to it or a sheen effect. This was done by adding some glycerin over the colored gelatin. Note, you will not want to do this yourself, the glycerin will start to break down the gelatin. I did it cause I had some to use up and also cause I knew this effect wasn't going to be on the girls arm for long. You can get the same effect with Vaseline, and it will not effect the gelatin!

You guessed it!!!!!!

Yes my make up of choice is prosthetics! I truly do love it. I enjoy all make up really, but creating and applying prosthetics is where I'd really love to make my mark! From body casting to sculpting to applying the final created piece, it's all for me. Back to school though and where it all started, everyone seems to get in there wanting to make monsters and all the extreme make up creations, but when you start its from ground zero. In doing so I found something else I really enjoyed, it's simple, quick, but still challenging sometimes. Your basic corrective make up. Taking a face with all its blemishes, dark circles and anything unappealing to the eye and making it disappear! The result is a nice clean natural looking skin tone and complexion. I also found out that I enjoyed beauty a lot more then expected! So keeping with this whole corrective tone, these pictures are from my first VFS student film I worked on, which was a month or 2 out of school. It was shot in black and white, and stared only 3 men so the make up was pretty basic. Still from the before till after you'll see the work that was done. A plus was some nice sweat effects, so enjoy.

If you would like you can view the film short here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3DltHY8lTnI

Just out of school...

So once being done school, I had the chance to do another aging make up almost instantly. It was great, though my only complaint was my model, she was constantly checking her self every 2 min in her pocket mirror, it started to make me fall behind. Oh well though, she ws nice enough to model for her friend(it was her project, I was just doing the make up), and the piece turned out well. I am still getting my sculpting skills down, I don't mind these pieces(gelatin forehead and a cheeks/chin) though would make the under eye wrinkles much differetly now. As well and the forehead wrinkles. Guess it goes with the territory of learning. I think my biggest thing I need to work on though is coloring. Sometimes it just comes to me, and others I just struggle so much trying to match or find the color I need. I am just getting to know foam latex, and the way you color those pieces and it is quite different! I hope to master it all someday muahahahahahaaaaaaaaaa...hack, cough, weeze!! I'll once again try to update asap this was done back in March, seems so late to show it now. But I just felt I should start from the beginning. So once again please enjoy, and comments are always welcome..even if you think I completely suck at this..at least I won't go on thinking I'm good or something..:(

pffffft!! Yeah right I rock!!!! Kidding..enjoy

First blog, first prosthetic...

Well this is it, my first blog. Seems to be ok except the page refreshed out of no where and deleted everything I had wrote in my original "first blog". So now I'm going with something a little shorter! These first pictures are from my final exam(Feb 2006) while attending the Make Up design course at VFS, which is an incredible school by the way and the course was amazing! Just a side note they now offer an even more intensive course involving even more prosthetics!! I myself am little upset I never got the chance to take this version of the course , but in all, am glad I chose this school. Back to the final I decided to go with an aging prosthetic. The first done at VFS for a final, though a girl in my class also chose it as well. We were the first class to do it!! So I ended up creating 3 pieces; one that cover the forehead and brows(new brows were hand laid), a nose extension and the mother piece being a one piece cheeks/chin/partial neck prosthetic. These were made out of prosthetic grade gelatin, and colored with Illustrator Paletts. The final result was well awesome, I felt for a first timer I had done well. So please enjoy and tell me what you think!!

Just as a final note, this first work I did is also on the VFS website now as an example of aging prosthetics, for their new one year course!