Hansel & Gretel's - Gretel

My next shoot was the character of Gretel in the story of Hansel & Gretel. The main make-up look for this story is going to be the Evil Witch as there is much more creative scope that can be built upon with her character, Gretel's look on the other hand is much more subdued. I found this make-up look the most difficult to create even more so than my more complex shoots that involved prothestics and special effects, the part that I found most difficult was trying to keep Gretel looking realistic as a child without letting her make-up and overall look bland and uninteresting. I feel however that this is my least successful look and one that upon reflection I would change the most. I had a new photographer working with me for this shoot, as I was trying to shoot two characters in my four hour time slot I left the photographer to shoot part of this shoot on her own. I directed to her what I wanted from the images and explained that the lighting should be quite dark as the book is dark themed however her lighting set up was much darker than I had anticipated and hoped for and after looking at the photos I've had to edit them quite heavily on Photoshop to completely lighten the images so that the make-up, hair and styling can actually be seen. This has taught me that with future shoots, even with a photographer its best for me to be in the room from begin to end so that I get my exact desired photographs. 

Although there are some elements of this look that upon reflection I would have changed if I had more time here are some of my more successful images from the shoot - 

 Make-Up 

I found the make-up for this character quite challenging as creating a natural make-up look can sometimes be more difficult than creating a more complex make-up design. Gretel is in fact a child and in reality wouldn't actually wear make-up so I have had to keep the make-up minimal and simple with just a cover up make-up of a base, concealer and light blush. However I am worried that the simplicity of the make-up could make a quite bland image, in contrast to my other images here I have relied heavily on the styling and composition to portray Gretel as a innocent child figure as apposed to using a strong and dramatic make-up look. A problem that I occurred shooting this look was that the model showed up wearing blue nail varnish, usually I carry nail varnish remover in my kit but today I had forgotten it and only packed what I thought I needed. The nail varnish is completely irrelevant to the shoot as it doesn't symbolise her age or status so I've tried to edit out her nails using Photoshop, although it does look slightly over edited I feel it looks much better than having the nail varnish so obviously showing.

Styling

I am really happy with my styling choice here, originally I felt that the dress could look a bit too over the top however as the make-up is simple and quite plain I feel that it makes the look of the character and is obvious in depicting her as a child. I also feel that the blue colour works well with the lighting and black colorama, its bright and playful but not too over powering to the overall look. On the other hand I am less pleased with my styling choice of the blue ribbon in the hair, all though it matches well with the outfit and adds to the innocent, child-like look, I feel that the size and positioning of the bow along with the positioning of the lighting almost makes the bow the main focus of the image and detracts away from the make-up and actions of the model. If I had time in my schedule to shoot again I would remove the ribbon completely and use a different brighter light set up. 

Hair 

This is the part of the shoot that I struggled with the most, as this was the look I was most worried about looking too plain. Due to this I felt that I couldn't leave the hair natural but I also couldn't have the hair too stylised as in the narrative Gretel is living in poverty with her father and step mother and a overly stylised hair wouldn't be realistic to the plot. To depict her character as I child I choose to lightly curl the hair with straighteners as I felt this was quite a childlike style; other than the option of plaiting the hair or putting it up in high bunches, both looks that I felt were over done and inappropriate to the narrative. Thankfully due to the lighting the hair blends into the black backdrop and doesn't become the main focus of the look, I like how the curls have created a short shoulder length to the hair and doesn't detract at all from the strong styling of the image.