Directions: Drama: SFX make up

For my production I wanted to create prosthetics to heighten the believability and the quality of my zombies. I watched a lot of youtube tutorials and I realised that there is a technique to creating such pieces but I was really willing to try it out. Usually you would need to make a a cast for the persons face but I decided to simplify it for myself and just use  plate. I learnt that this could be just as good after watching someone create a brilliant prosthetic that way. 

In the video here you can see that she has moulded the clay in to the desired shape and preps it for the covering of the liquid latex. I then proceeded to doing the same. 

I was using coloured, oil based clay for mine. I was then required to sprinkle flour over mine to thicken the layer of the latex. I would repeat that until I was happy with the thickness.

In the same tutorial, she moulded teeth for her zombie and I thought it would've been cool to do the same. For this, I had to bite down on some clay and pour liquid latex in it and wait for it to dry. Here is an image of hers and mine. 

After it dried, it came out like this; 

I was really happy with the results. I would need these in order to excentuate the jaw and create a protruding effect.

One of my biggest challenges was learning what you could use to stick the prosthetics onto the skin. There are so many things out there you could use and each of them have different effects. There is a chemical called "spirit gum" and that is used to smoothen out the edges and help it blend with the skin but it was slightly expensive. I wanted to find a way of cutting costs and have the latex blend with the skin and also have the ability to be covered up with make up. In a different tutorial but by the same person, she uses the prosthetics she made and creates a "no skin" zombie. The prosthetics she made worked really well with what she wanted to create because there was room to be untidy as she used liquid latex to stick the prosthetics on and cotton wool to blend the edges and create rough skin. image of this is below; 

I wanted to test it out and see if I could get a similar effect or if I would need to by prosthetic glue and spirit gum. I also wanted to test out the new paints I bought to see if I could get the look of mottled flesh. So I created a strip of latex and played around with the liquid latex and cotton wool. I was pleased with the result.

before buying my face paints I wanted to know what colours I should buy because full zombie make up kits from professional sites were costing £30+ and I knew there had to be another way. Thats when I found a blog where someone used white, brown and purple. There was a technique of layering that I would need to follow, by wetting the brush and flicking it onto the skin instead of using the brush to paste it on, it gives a better effect and thats what I did. 

On shooting day, I had Lisa arrive an hour before the call time for the rest of the actors so I could apply the prosthetics. I didn't realise how long it would take and I ended up taking longer than I intended because it just wasn't working for me. I used the latex and cotton wool method but I didn't like the effect it had. Thats when I realised that that only worked for that tutorial because of what she was making. What I wanted to make was a lot different. Below is what the prosthetics first looked like on Lisa.

I spent so long cutting out the prosthetics and arranging them on her face but I did not like the effect and ended up taking them off. Now I was behind schedule and begun to panic because the actor had arrived and was waiting. Josh then made a point that the first season zombies were not that much decayed as they were in the 6th series and so I didn't need to do too much. I then took the prosthetics off and improvised with the liquid latex. I knew that when latex dries you can pick it off and it looks like flesh so I decided to do that instead. I got Lisa to put in the contacts that I bought and the look was then completed after all the make up. 

I was really pleased with this final outcome. I still think there are elements that I could've improved on to make her more scary but I was really pushed for time. In the end I was happy with the result. I repeated this step with my second zombie.