Special Effects - Burns Assessment!

This week I did my assessment, and again did a hand burn, but on the opposite side because I felt that the oils in the palm of the hand (that I did on Debbie - see previous post!) made it difficult to blend the colours. My scenario for this was a bit more simple - Holly's house was on fire and she got burned while trying to escape. I wanted it to look really charred and burned, and Mo said the end result was very realistic! Take a look:

This was, by far, my favourite burn - I'm glad my assessment went so well! I have another picture where I wrapped a bandage around her hand but the one above is better quality. As before, it is a mixture of greasepaints, latex, collodium and gelatin. I felt like I really got the hang of tearing and peeling the latex - it turned out exactly the way I wanted, and I really loved using black greasepaint on the peeled areas to make it look really gory. Although at one point, I almost cut Holly's real skin with the scissors - that latex sure is realistic!

I'm really pleased about passing my burns assessment. Next we're moving on to cuts and bruises, so look out for that!

Gill :)

Special Effects - Burns 3

Yesterday I did my burns pre-assessment, and - good news! - Mo told me I'm ready to be assessed :) She was judging us on our product knowledge, time management, understanding of colour and overall result, so I'm really happy that she said I'm doing well on all those things. The scenario for our assessments is a house fire, so again I decided to do a fire burn. It went really well, I even managed to finish before the allocated time was up!

Mo recommended we have a back story to our burns so we can fully understand the kind of effect we want to end up with. So, I decided that Debbie was straightening her hair and dropped the straighteners - but instead of letting them fall she caught them by the blades and one of them burned her hand.

Take a look!

In my camera's light it looks quite brown, but I really layered on the black to emphasise how badly burned the skin is. I used a mixture of greasepaints, latex, tuplast, collodium and vaseline to create the overall look.

I'm really happy with the way it turned out, especially the way the skin is peeling around the wound! Can't wait to do my assessment now, I'm feeling quite confident about it :)

Hope you like it!

Gill :)

Special Effects - Burns 2

Last Wednesday I did my second attempt at a skin burn. It turned out really good in the end, but getting there was difficult as I had a bit of a Gelatin disaster halfway through! I was trying to create burnt scabs but they stuck out too much so they looked really fake. I managed to remove them and redo the area but I was worried because it took more time than would be allocated for assessments. Here's the picture and I'll explain the effect I was going for!

So this was another fire burn, and this time I wanted the first few layers of skin to look like they had peeled back to reveal the flesh underneath. I used plenty of latex and folded it back, then sealed it with collodium - this also made the skin around the wound look crinkly, and some parts even started hanging off and flaking which added to the effect! I applied plenty of black colour on the skin to make it look really charred and dead.

For the wound inside, I was trying to create scabbing but it didn't work - when I took the Gelatin off I redid the area with bright reds and applied a layer of vaseline to make it look shiny and sore, and again applied some collodium which was painted black to add more texture.

Hope you like!

Gill :)

Special Effects - Burns 1

Special Effects is a great class to be involved in - I love getting as messy as possible and being left to work on really creative projects, so it's definitely my favourite class so far!
For the past few weeks we've been practising skin burns, to a variety of degrees. Our research had to involve burns of different types, such as chemical, thermal, fire, radiation and electric, and we had to make ourselves aware of how the skin is affected by these.

The following is my research, these are all either 2nd or 3rd degree burns, and range from moderate sunburns to serious radiation and fire burns which could potentially disfigure the victim:

Researching burns is sometimes distressing, especially when the burns are particularly severe, but I have a pretty strong stomach and I find it interesting to look at how the skin is affected by different types of burns. Also, I'm looking at them through the eyes of a makeup artist, so I like to observe the different colours and textures.

I decided to try a fire burn on Stephanie's wrist, as I like the way fire affects the skin - in many cases the skin is left hanging off and the different epidermal layers are visible. Also, the skin is usually very charred and vivid colours are revealed.
I used greasepaints, latex and collodion to achieve the effect - take a look at the picture and I'll explain how I did it!

First, using my hand as a palette, I mixed the right base colour. I wanted it to look as fresh and sore as possible so I used a lot of reds, pinks and a little brown. I applied with a sponge and blended on the outside to create a soft edge, therefore making it look more real. Sometimes with burns it's ok to be a bit sloppy or clumsy because a very even shape or pattern could make it look fake - realism is key!

I then applied a couple of layers of latex and let it dry, then added collodion on top. The latex provides an invisible 'skin' which can be peeled, cut, cracked or rolled back to make it look like the person's skin is hanging off, or it can be piled on top of itself to create a thicker layer which can then be manipulated as needed.

The collodion is probably my favourite product to use in Special Effects - it is applied wet, and as it dries it wrinkles and tightens the skin. It can then be manipulated like latex, however it is thinner and not as flexible. I let the collodion get to the tacky stage, then used cotton buds to 'rip' the layers I had added - these then became the charred, wrinkled bits of skin that you can see in the picture.

To finish the look, I added more colour using cotton buds, a soft sponge and a stipple sponge (a textured sponge that applies colour less uniformly), using black to bring out the burnt skin, red to make it look fresh and painful where the skin has peeled back, and a mixture of reds and browns in between to add depth and texture. Finally, to add to the freshness, I layered Vaseline around the fresh-looking areas. I felt this really brought an extra dimension to the burn! 

(excuse the not-great quality of this picture - Santa is bringing me a new camera!)

I was delighted with the final result! I managed to create the effect very quickly - I managed to get my base colour and latex/collodion application correct first time, and it applied the way I wanted, so I feel like this gave me confidence and focus to get the look I wanted.

Keep checking my blog for more fun with gore :)

Gill