Face Off Series 4, Episode 1

Last night marked the premier of Face Off Series 4. If you're not familiar with Face Off, it's basically like X Factor but for Make-Up Artists.

Each week begins with a Foundation Challenge, in which the contestants are usually given around 2 hours to complete a make-up based around a brief. This is then judged by a guest judge and the winner is given immunity from elimination that week.

The second challenge is the Spotlight Challenge. For this the contestants are usually paired up or work in teams of 3, they are then given 3 days to complete a full body make-up including costume, props and hair set around a given brief.

The Foundation Challenge

Here's 3 of my favourite looks from the Foundation Challenge; to create a make-up based around a chosen crown...

Eric F.'s the Queen of lost Souls - great thought process, so unlike any of the other contestants with great colouring and overall appearance. My personal favourite.

 



Jenna's Warrior Queen - love the added prosthetics, really believable piece.

 

Anthony's Queen - as a painter, Anthony's colouring is perfect!

Guest judge and mentor Michael Westmore crowned Anthony as the winner of the Foundation Challenge, saying his make-up "could shoot on film".

 

The Spotlight Challenge

 

Autumn and Eric Z: Jungle Goblin King

 

Eric F and Jenna: Desert Goblin King - My favourite!

 

Alex and Wayne: Swamp Goblin King

 

Michael and Troy: Volcano Goblin King

 

House and Katie: Arctic Goblin King

 

Anthony and Meagan: Mountain Goblin King

 

Kris and Alam: Forest Goblin King

 

Anthony and Meagan were crowned winners of the Spotlight Challenge even though they came across some of their own challenges during the 3 days, with Anthony being chosen by the judges as overall winner. Troy was the first contestant to leave the competition and it's always sad to see the contestants pack up their cases and turn out their mirror lights.

 

Some extraordinary talent within this group of contestants proves that series 4 may be the best yet. Rumour has it, next week's challenge is based around superheros, no doubt we'll see some more incredible designs and make-ups.

 

Which was your favourite creation?

 

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Oscar Nominations 2013

The 7 shortlisted films have now been whittled down to a final 3. Which consist of:

Hitchcock - Howard Berger, Peter Montagna and Martin Samuel
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey - Peter Swords King, Rick Findlater and Tami Lane
Les Misérables - Lisa Westcott and Julie Dartnell

As I have already blogged about Hitchcock, I'll concentrate on The Hobbit and Les Misérables here.

The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey

With 4 tonnes of silicone to just cast the faces of 13 dwarves, Richars Taylor head of special effects house WETA Workshop had a lot of work to do.

“We had to give them prosthetic hands to wear, we had to give them much bigger feet, and we had to give them much wider heads. That’s why we had to create these ears that stuck out, and the wigs created the illusion that their heads were bigger than they were,” explained director Peter Jackson.

"Because of the higher resolution from Jackson’s 48 frames per second (twice the visual information of the industry’s standard 24 frames per second) and the 3-D, prosthetics supervisor Tami Lane’s team used the same compressable material used on the underside of the space shuttle to smash the edge of the prosthetics down to a hundredth of a micron to blend it with the skin. Anything thicker and the audience might notice." Taken from NY Daily News.

The standard of prosthetics, make-up and hair has dramatically changed this year. From using yak hair for wigs and beards to smashing prosthetics with something only NASA should use, the new technological developments begs the question "What will be next?"


Les Misérables

This video pretty much says it all about Les Misérables. Amazing tallent and dedication from all the cast and make-up team! I cannot wait to see this and probably cry my heart out.

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BAFTA Nominations 2013

It's that time of year again; award season. The BAFTA nominations have now been released and tomorrow will see the Oscar nominations.

BAFTA Nominations for Make-Up & Hair are:

    Anna Karenina - Ivana Primorac


    Hitchcock - Julie Hewett, Martin Samuel, Howard Berger


    The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey - Peter Swords King, Richard Taylor, Rick Findlater


    Les Misérables - Lisa Westcott


    Lincoln - Lois Burwell, Kay Georgiou


Personally, Les Misérables does it for me. The high variety of characters from slaves and beggars to royalty and aristocrats, Lisa Westcott nailed them all. Not to mention the scene in which Anne Hathaway's hair is cut off was actually her real hair and not a wig.

The BAFTA's take place on 10th February and I'll definitely be tuning in. What are your predictions? Who scoops it for you?

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Lush 'Dreamtime' Bath Melt

I've been struggling to sleep recently with being stressed to high heaven so decided to treat myself to my favourite Lush product, 'Dreamtime'.

'Dreamtime' is an amazing bath melt from Lush, made primarily from cocoa butter. Mixed with a variety of essential oils including lavender, camomile and jasmine, this melt is pretty much guaranteed to relax you.

Just drop it into your ready run bath and lie back.

This is my number one Lush product: it's soothing, helps me sleep and relax, smells to die for and is so moisturising you feel like Cleopatra in a bath of milk. Every time I go into Leeds I make sure I pop in and pick one up, along with about another 5 things!

For a mere £3.15 this is definitely my must have bathroom essential. It also smells delicious just in the wrapper so makes a lovely bathroom fragrance.

Go on, treat yourself.

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A little slice of 'Utopia'

For one of our recent uni assesments, we had to design a makeup based upon the song either 'Utopia' or 'Strict Machine' by Goldfrapp. I chose 'Utopia' due to the links with Mother Earth, nature and paradise. And the fact that a lot of my peers chose 'Strict Machine' made me want to do 'Utopia' to ensure I didn't have similar ideas to anyone.

I decided to go down the research route of Thomas More's Utopia, Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, The Green Man and Mother Earth.

After countless hours of research, planning and practicing, these are my final photographs. I'm just getting used to using my camera (Canon 550D) so they're not as crisp as I would of liked. Any advice would be lovely! What do you think?

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Sir Anthony Hopkins as Alfred Hitchcock

One of the many films I'm dying to see this year as a makeup artist is 'Hitchcock'. Sir Anthony Hopkins alone makes this a must-see for me, you don't get to be a 'Sir' for making rubbish films. But the part that really grabs my attention is the fact Howard Berger is crating the prosthetic makeup.

For years now, I have admired Berger's work, so much so I wrote a uni essay about his career. He's transformed people into a variety of creatures from the horrors of "The Hills Have Eyes" to the fantasies of "The Chronicles of Narina: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe".

This article from Co.Create gives a really good insight into the challenges a makeup artist can come across whilst working on a film. The video at the end is definitely worth a watch if you're interested in seeing the application process of the makeup.

http://www.fastcocreate.com/1682054/see-how-anthony-hopkins-was-transformed-into-alfred-hitchcock#6

It's an obvious watch for me this year, hope you all enjoy it, let me know what you think if you get a chance to see it!

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My Cookery Journey 1

Hello!

With it being Thursday, today was my designated evening to cook for myself and my parents. This week I chose a Steak Pie from "Maw Broon's But an' Ben Cookbook". Now this is quite an adventurous thing for me as I've not tried to cook anything other than pasta and rice before, but think a steak pie is a great receptive to be familiar with especially if you're cooking for a lot of people.

This is a great cookbook and makes me think of the home cooked delights I used to get at my Grandma's in Sunderland when I was a kid. The recipes are really easy to follow and it had a load of great conversion tables and charts in the front few pages. I'd definitely consider giving this book as a gift as the illustrations throughout add to the delight.

For my pie, I used Sainsburys Pre Rolled Puff Pastry and in all honestly it's probably the nicest I've had. I'm not usually a big pastry fan but I actually went back for seconds.

A simple, relatively cheap dish to make for a lovely winter warmer for the whole family. I absolutely adore this recipe and will definitely make it again.

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Hello!

Hello!

And more importantly Happy New Year! I'm Jessica/Jess/Jessie/Babs (depending on who you are) and this blog is one of my New Years Resolutions. Personally I'd take Christmas over New Year any day and never do resolutions but thought this year would be a good time to start. I'm currently in my first year of university studying Special Effects Makeup Design for Film, TV and Theatre in Grimsby, Lincolnshire but live in Leeds, Yorkshire.

Here I will tell you about what I'm up to makeup wise, university wise and just generally ramble and show you my baking and cooking attempts.

Hope to talk to you all very soon! Please feel free to leave your blog names/url's and twitters if you'd like, I'd love to have a nosey!

That's all for now! x