Evaluation of the Project

   For the final major project unit I undertook two projects and produced from these two separate outcomes that both represent the concept of character transformation. The first outcome is a published book that focuses on the darker side of fairy tales and uses the original stories from the Grimm Brothers as a basis in creating their characters; the aim of this was to use my passion and interest in special effects make-up to show the darker, more violent side to fairy tales.  The second outcome that runs alongside the first is a portfolio of evidence that shows my work as a head make-up artist for a student zombie film called ‘Ruthless’ (2013), based and shot in London. The aim of this project through my outcomes was to show the transformation from a normal looking person into a character, whether it be the character of a zombie in ‘Ruthless’ (2013) or the character of the wolf in the story of Little Red Riding Hood. As I aspire to obtain a career in either television or film, I felt that my outcomes would be relevant to the industry and would benefit me with new and improved skills in preparation for future employment.

   By undertaking two separate projects and conjoining them as one, I have had to use a number of skills; mainly my time management, organisational and problem solving skills to ensure that the whole process ran smoothly and within a time frame. As well as building upon skills already gained, I’ve also learnt new skills throughout the process. Through my role as the head make-up artist for ‘Ruthless’ (2013), I’ve learnt new budgeting and accounting skills when sourcing and buying the make-up and hair products while also giving me an insight into a future career as a free-lance make-up artist. I've also learnt new management skills through organising and administrating a small team of three other make-up artists, including delegating job roles and overseeing the whole filming process. By creating new make-up looks and sourcing inspirational imagery I've built upon my creativity and research skills in order to create original make-up designs. Furthermore through actual experience in a chosen industry, I feel the skills that I’ve learnt can now be used appropriately for future reference and will assist me greatly when moving forward from education into the industry.

    Through the process of creating my book, I’ve learnt to be as organised and fully prepared for last minute changes as possible and in the case of these to think rationally about overcoming the problems instead of panicking. I’ve also learnt that researching deeply into both concepts and designs and using several image references is key to creating successful final images. Lastly I’ve learnt not to rely on other people so much as in the case of this project I have been let down several times by models and photographers alike.

    I have always thought of myself as being a much organised person and having good time management skills however with this project those skills have been put to the test. I have found it very difficult to arrange shooting dates within my time frame and through being unable to book studios at the university due to full bookings, I was forced to re work all of my planned shooting dates. This involved shooting nine of my ten looks in just three weeks, this for me wasn’t possible so I made the disappointing decision to remove one of my stories and therefore two of my characters from my book; I chose to remove the story that had the least relevance to my book’s concept. If I had stuck to my original time plan and made the most of studio time available then I would have been able to complete all of my ten characters in time.

With my original ten characters, one of the first difficulties that I faced was trying to come up with original and interesting designs for each character while still in keeping with the narrative. This became difficult as I struggled with how far to push my designs; did I want them fashion based or more theatrical, through research and my desired career I eventually choose to have the character designs in keeping with the TV, film and theatre industry.

   Having one to one time with tutors has also been vital to the success of my designs and the project as a whole. Receiving informative feedback from industry specialists has helped me to use my creative and visual abilities appropriately especially in deciding which elements of the characters need the most focus and how to layout my book so that it portrays the most important aspects of my characters.

     Although elements of this project have been both challenging and testing, I’ve had to use my initiative in order to resolve any major issues, I believe that it’s important to think rationally and find a solution to the problem without disrupting the project as a whole. For example in regards to ‘Ruthless’ (2013) I had an issue with one of my make-up artists so I spoke privately with the producer so that it could be resolved between him and her. Throughout the filming process I felt that my management skills lacked and that I didn’t have full control over my team, one girl in particular tended to do her own make-up without my guidance and as she wasn’t involved in the designing process I felt that her looks weren’t in keeping with the concept of the film. In regards to the book I was let down on three separate occasions by photographers and after seeking help from a technician, I took notes of his lighting set up and used this as a reference for shooting all of my future looks myself, this ended up working to my advantage as my lighting had the same reoccurring theme throughout. I also incurred problems with my book publisher; when I uploaded my book design, the background colour of black was appearing as grey; I sought advice from a local printing company that helped me resolve my issues ready for a successful print.

        My intended target audience for the film ‘Ruthless’ (2013) and also for the book was a younger generation particularly interested in the horror film genre, as they would be more likely to understand the reality of the genre and less likely to be effected by violence or gory images. The typical age bracket of ‘horror fans’ is between ‘15 - 24’ years old (UK Film Council), as the largest number of cinema goers also falls between this age bracket. The horror genre is generally aimed at men as they tend to be attracted to violence and action and usually seek thrill in films, however my outcomes were targeted at both sexes as 'the number of women attending cinema screenings of horror films now marginally exceeds male attendance figures’ (UK Film Council) and proves that the horror genre is now reaching out to a larger audience of both males and females. I feel that both of my outcomes and their concepts sit successfully in the horror genre and are therefore appealing to my intended target audience.

      I believe that the standard of my outcomes are appropriate to industry level and relevant to its competitors, however I do feel that I could have pushed some of my looks further particularly the zombies to show more of my design and make-up capabilities. I found it challenging at times to create innovative designs that would both sit comfortably within the genre and be relevant to the TV and Film industry.

    When creating my proposal for this project I originally had the main outcome as a portfolio of work for ‘Ruthless’ (2013) and then alongside this another portfolio of studio shot images that showed other types of character transformations. However once I approached my tutor with these ideas he suggested that I use a more professional approach when creating my outcomes, together we agreed on presenting my idea of character transformations through stories in a printed book to put my looks into context. He also suggested that my film portfolio should be professionally printed on photography paper while displaying a colour theme and labelled with my name to help brand myself and my work as an artist. Although the extra work load was challenging on my time frame and skills, upon reflection I am overjoyed with the decision to change my original ideas as I’ve now discovered how much more professional my work can look. I’ve substituted an original idea of a sketchbook in order to give myself more time to focus my full attention on the portfolio and the book.

   Overall I am very pleased and proud of both of my outcomes, although there are certain elements that I struggled with and problems that I had to overcome, I feel that my outcomes are both professional and appropriate to the industry and its standards. If I was to undertake the project again, in regards to the film I would have spent more time developing my zombie looks further to help make them completely original and different to its competing films. Also in regards to the book I would have given myself more time to design the layout of the book in InDesign so that I could have tested a more interesting and visually pleasing layout for my images and text. However on a more positive note, I happy with the project as a whole and what I have achieved in a short amount of time.  This unit has helped greatly in improving my confidence in make-up and hair application and producing several looks for both the film and the book within a short time constraint has prepared me for the reality of working life and given me a great insight into the film and TV industry.

The Book Has Arrived

After sending my InDesign template of my book design into Blurb, I received a fast and efficient delivery of the book back. I wasn't expecting such a quick delivery as the book was estimated to arrive on the 3rd May and actually arrived on the 1st May but thankfully I was here to answer the door. I felt both excitement and anticipation when I first held the package in my hands and I was unsure whether to open the parcel around my peers or on my own. I opted to take the first view on my own and proceeded to open the book, my first reaction was that it looked a lot more professional than I had envisaged, the black hard cover was a dark, deep black as apposed to look more grey and matte, I was extremely happy with how the book had been printed to such a high standard. 

I began to open the book and again I had the same reaction pleasure at how professional the colouring, paper type and texture looked in person. One of my biggest concerns was the colour of the black background of the book as I had previously had issues with Blurb and the colour of black appearing as grey on their PDFs I was thrilled to see that my pages were as dark black as I had hoped and that there hadn't been an issue with the colouring. The deep shade of black in the pages was paramount in creating and portraying to reader the dark theme and concept of the book. As blurb gives you a choice of which type of paper you want your book to be printed with, I was advised by my photography teacher to use the photo paper called Premium Lustre, as he said it will bring depth and tone to my darker images and their darker colours. He was correct, the paper type defiantly adds depth to the pages and has a subtle sheen to it creating a more luxurious, expensive looking print. 

Overall I am extremely happy with the quality of printing and how the book has transpired from a screen design into an actual book. I have studied the book several times and there are a couple of elements that I feel could be improved if I was given more time to re- design and re-print, however with my time frame before the physical hand- in this isn't possible. As in print you can see the images much more clearly than on a screen there are a few elements of the images that could do with further editing, for example in one image of Rapunzel part of the tuplast scar on the face is coming off, this could have been easily fixed in Photoshop with the clone tool and therefore would have been less noticeable in print. Also I feel that some of the images are too big for the page size and seem to get lost in the binding of the book; as the book is newly printed the binding is quite stiff and high arched in the middle of the book. I would try and press the binding down slightly however I don't want to handle my final copy at all as it is still in the cellophane packaging ready to be handed in for submission. 

Although I have mentioned certain elements of the book that could do with slight improvement, overall I am really happy and proud of my book as I feel it represents concept well and is printed and displayed to a professional industry standard. Through my own thoughts I was keen to hear other people's feed backs on the book, I showed my friends, family and university peers to see whether there reactions were positive or negative and whether I could receive any constructive criticism back from them. Most people were really impressed with my work and praised me on how professional the book looked and how it showed that a lot of time and effort had been put into it. A constructive criticism that I did receive was that the black of the images was a different shade of black to the background and that the pages might have looked better linked and more professional if the black edges of the images blended into the back background. During production I noticed this myself however as I had to change the images to CMYK colour for print it causes the images to lighten therefore making the black a lighter shade than if I was to keep the image in an RGB format.

As well has having the book ready for submission, I have also now completed my 'Ruthless' film portfolio. I printed all of my evidence work on professional looking printer paper with my name logo as a make-up artist on each corner of each page in the portfolio, I hoped that this would create a more professional finish. I am really pleased with the overall outcome of my portfolio as it shows a range of evidence of my time and work throughout the film process and clearly shows how much time, planning and skills went into my role as the head make-up artist. I choose a range of my most successful images and mood boards to add a visual element to the portfolio and to also show my design abilities and make-up skills. An element of the portfolio that I'm not so pleased with is the front cover of the portfolio, the logo was created by the marketing team and not by myself and in my opinion I feel that it looks slightly amateur and not particularly original, however as this logo is representative of the film and all of it's advertisements I had to use it as the front cover and title of my portfolio.   

Overcoming the Difficulties

Throughout this process of creating work for my Final Major Project I have had to overcome many difficulties from creating designs for each characters to finding models to finally sending off the book to be published. The best way for me to talk through the problems that I faced is to discuss each element individually. 

Although I already had an element of my final project secured - working as a head make-up artist for a student film, running alongside this I had also chosen to create a book based on the darker side of fairy tales as another element of my final major project hand in. One of the first difficulties that I faced was trying to come up with a new and interesting concept for my book while also choosing a theme that I have a passion for and that will aid me when looking for future employment. I was happy with my final choice of using the Brother's Grimm fairy tales to show the darker, more violent side to fairy tales and I felt that with this I would give me the opportunity to include my keen interest in prosthetics and special effects. 

After analysing each of my choosen fairy tales I then had to design and create a look for each based on what I had learned about their characters through the narrative of their stories. This for me was challenging as I didn't know har far to push my designs for each character and whether to make the looks more fashion based, or theatrical looking or something that you might find on a TV programme or film. As I have always wanted to work in either film, TV or theatre so I eventually choose this route and I have tried to keep my character designs more theatrical rather than fashion based. 

After designing each character and setting everything in place before shooting one of my main challenges was  finding and securing both models and photographers, the people I have collaborated with on this project have been either students or other young people all of which are very busy at this term time with hand in's themselves so trying to get both model and photographer available on the same days proved to be more difficult than I first anticipated. I found a photographer that agreed to work with my on all of my shoots but through illness and lesson clashes she ended up only doing one of my eight shoots. I was unable to find another photographer at such short notice so I was left to shoot alone. Although I have had photography lessons this was a challenging task for me as I had to set up my own lighting, as well as using a light meter to read the correct lighting, a lot of what I had been taught before came into play and with some help from one of the photography technicians I was able to shoot successfully. I was happy with how the shoot came out so I choose to do my photography for the remaining 6 shoots also.    

I have always thought of myself as being a very organised person and having good time management skills, however with this project these skills have been put to the test. I have found it very difficult to arrange shooting dates in a time frame that would work best for the deadline and as I had troubles booking studios at the university I have had to complete seven of my eight shoots in just three weeks. This isn't what I had planned in my original timeline and through this difficulty I had to make the decision to remove one of the stories from my book so instead of having five fairy tales, I now have just four, I choose to remove the story of Snow White & Rose Red as I felt this one went the least with my overall concept for the book.

The shooting of my eight looks was a stressful and hard process and I have found it difficult to maintain a high reoccurring standard through each. I decided to shoot most of my looks myself as I had now learnt how to create a correct lighting set up, however for two of my shoots I choose to use another photographer to give me more time to concentrate on creating the looks on the day. This however slightly backfired as the lighting set up created by this photographer came out differently on her nikon camera than previously on my canon camera. I felt that the images were quite dark and I became concerned about how dark they would be when printed in CMYK colour. I spoke to my photography teacher who suggested I lighten the exposure slightly brighter than normal on all of my images as when images are printed they automatically become darker anyway. This has taught me that it is best to use the same photographer or the exact same light set up for each shoot so that you have continuity through your images. 

After all of my shoots were complete and all the final images had been chosen and edited I now had to begin designing and laying out the template of my book. As my book includes four fairy tales, I wanted important quotes or sentences from the stories to run with the images as a way of telling the stories to a reader, however one of my first difficulties was choosing which quotes best suited which images and whether those images expressed what the story was saying. Although I am happy with all of my model choices, when shooting each it was hard to get them to express the emotions that they were meant to be expressing in the narrative so some of my chosen images don't quite read the same as the book, in future I feel that I need to go into a shoot more focused with what I actually want to achieve from the shoot and therefore I shouldn't leave until I'm happy with the outcome.

When creating the layout of my book another difficulty that I came across was choosing the positioning and placement of the images on the page and how I could use tools such as the crop tool to create more interest with my images and to help focus on the most important parts of an image, the parts that actually tell the story. Originally I wanted my text to run through the images, in a swirled or arched way however when it came to this stage in InDesign I felt that it didn't look as effective as I had hoped, I then choose to use straight lines of text as this to me looked more clean cut and less messy. I also spent a long period of time choosing a suitable font for the book as I felt the narrative and my concept needed a stronger text font, I was happy with my final choice of a swirled font but upon reflection it is slightly harder to read, I then had to use the spacing tool to create a more spaced and readable text. However with the amount of text in my introduction this wasn't possible so I choose to use a completely different, plainer font for this. 

Once I had fully completed my book design and gathered advice and feedback from two of my tutors, I thought that uploading it onto the book publishing website was going to be the easiest stage of the whole process. However once I had uploaded it and viewed it as a PDF document on their website I noticed that my page colours that were meant to be black were grey and this completely changed the whole mood and design of the book. I began to panic and went to visit a printing company as a second option for printing, I told the shop assistant of my complications and she advised me to change the colour of my blacks in InDesign to another shade of black that's called registered black as apparently this is a darker shade of black, her advice thankfully worked and I could then upload my book again with ease. 

Although I have faced many difficulties and had to overcome a lot of problems throughout this process, it has been a massive learning curve for me. At times it has been very stressful and wearing but I feel that the outcome of my book shows my hard work and dedication to the project. I now feel more confident in tackling future projects and overcoming any obstacles I might face through them. 

Little Red Riding Hood's - Little Red Riding Hood

My final shoot was the character of Little Red Riding Hood in the most well known fairy tale of the same name although originally called Little Red Cap by the Grimm Brothers. This was for me my least favourite character out of the 10 as I found it difficult to develop this look further from its stereotypical image. With all of my characters I have tried to push the boundaries of their stereotypes while also trying to keep symbolic elements of the characters that make them well known, in the case of Little Red Riding Hood, her famous red cape. 

Many theorists have labelled the original tale as holding sexual themes, with the concept of a young girl walking alone in the woods approached by a stranger. I however see this as showing the characters naivety as well as vulnerability as she opens up to the wolf, a stranger, about where her grandmother lives. I found these emotions challenging to show through make-up and hair alone, so I have relied on my model and composition to say a lot about her character. For the styling I've also used the red cape and a short skirt to reiterate the sexual voodoos surrounding this story. 

Before I talk separately and more in depth about the make-up here are some of the most successful images from the Little Red Riding Hood shoot - 

Make-up 

I found the make-up design for this character the most challenging of the ten as realistically Little Red Riding Hood is a child, however I felt this look would be too bland without a stronger make-up look so I've used darker and more sultry tones of red and black on the face to create some more interest, although I am still concerned about whether the image is to simple. 

 To steer away from the more plain make-up, I choose to add a diverse element to the look by adding severe looking claw marks along one side of her face, to show the more violent side to the story - whereby the wolf leaps out of bed and devours Little Red Cap alive. I initially choose to use tuplast to create these scars however on the day of shooting my tuplast had blocked itself and wasn't working as it should so I choose to use wax as a second option. Derma wax is known for being hard to apply to the skin and doesn't have longevity on the skin; this became a problem during shooting. Once molded the wax began to fall of the skin, so I had to get as many shots as possible while the make-up was still in tack, in future I will check the working condition of all of my make-up products before taking them to a shoot. Upon reflection I also feel that the bruising surrounding the cuts are quite dark and perhaps I should have used less dark purples and blacks and more redder tones as it is meant to be a fresh wound.

 I also think that I should have used a lighter fx blood coming from the wound as the image that sits next to this one in the book I have used a lighter shade and different brand of blood, this difference might become more apparent when the two images are sat next to one another. 

Although I have come across a few elements of this look that I would change, I feel the sharp, straight lines of the claw marks across her face contrasts well with her straight sleek hairstyle. Also the composition of her turned away head works well in conjuring up a feeling of sympathy towards her character and reiterates her naivety and vulnerability.

Styling

In order to make my characters easily recognisable to an audience and to use the advice given to me by a industry specialists I choose to keep the styling element of Little Red Riding Hood's symbolic red cloak. I hired this cloak from Hampshire Wardrobe as I felt it was the only suitable option to represent the description of the appearance of the character told in the narrative. To portray the underlying themes of sex in the story, I have teamed the cloak with a short, feminine cream skirt and a floral lace crop top that is purposely meant to show a small amount of the model's stomach. I wanted to portray the characters naivety in the fact that she hasn't purposely dressed in a slightly revealing way to attract attention from men as she is only child however her stopping and talking to the wolf, a stranger in a forest presents her as both naive, vulnerable and easy prey. The element of the styling that was least successful is the cream underlining of the cloak that can be seen in the images, throughout shooting I tried to push the lining into the hood so that it was less visible but the way in which it had been sewn wouldn't allow for much movement so I had to make do. If I was to shoot this look again, I would try and source a clock that had both red on the inside and outside of the hood.

Hansel & Gretel's - The Witch

My last but one shoot was that of the evil Witch in the story of Hansel & Gretel. When designing the make-up and overall look for this character I was in a predicament as to whether to go for the stereotypical witch look of wrinkled skin, a big, pointy nose and dark long hair or to steer away from that image and try to create something with more of a modern twist - taking inspiration from modern sources such as Hansel & Gretel the 2013 film remake of the fairy tale and Once Upon a Time, again a TV series based around the stories of well known fairy tales. I felt with this character that I had a lot of creative scope with both make-up and styling although I had to stick to some guidelines, these being her descriptions and characteristics in the narrative of the original tale. 

The Witch doesn't appear in the story until after Hansel & Gretel have been left deep in the wood by their parents, they begin to walk deeper into the forest until they come across a house that's made of cakes and sweets, they begin to eat away at it. However this house belongs to the witch that uses sweet treats to entice roaming children into her property, she then bribes these children with kind words and talks of luxuries until they are trapped in her house and power then she feeds them up with lots of food until they are fat enough for her to eat. Although we stereotypically think of a witch as evil and malicious, this witch first appears in the story as a kind and sweet old lady, it is only further into the story that we begin to see her more evil side witch eventually results in Gretel pushing her in to an open oven whereby she 'burns to death miserably.' This element of the story was always going to be my biggest challenge for a make-up change - I had a limited amount of time to create a half face of burns on the model - using both latex and cotton wool, upon reflection I would have really liked to have covered the whole face and neck to create a really extreme look, however I felt this would be too uncomfortable for my model as latex can be a painful product to remove. 

Overall I really enjoyed this shoot and I feel that the make-up and hair are successful and also what I had first envisaged for this character. A crucial part of this look was finding a model that would fit the characteristics of this particular character, although I found it difficult to find and secure a suitable model, I feel that Ami's facial structure and small frame really fits well into the look and her dyed white hair creates that old witch style that depicts the character quite clearly. 

However here are some of my favourite and most successful images from the witch photoshoot -

 Make-up

When designing this make-up look I wanted to keep in mind the elements of the story that depict the appearance of the witches character. In the original story she lives in a small house that is tucked away deep in the forest, I wanted to use elements of the forest such as leaves and twigs in her hair and branch strokes coming into her face to show the witch as almost part of the forest that surrounds her. I feel these elements work well and aren't too distracting from the overall look. She is described in the story as being as old as the hills so I originally wanted to use old age stipple to create wrinkles around the eyes and mouth, however once I had applied the product and dried it lightly with a hairdryer, there was no obvious difference and I decided there and then to remove this element completely. If I was to do this shoot again I would practice the technique not just on myself but also the skin of my model. However with the dark colour choices of black and dark green I feel it is successful in creating an evil looking character while also keeping elements of somebody initially approachable. I am also really happy with how the black long nails came out, as in shooting they were difficult to stick onto the model's nails as she had acrylic nails already on, it was then also hard to blend the black into her pink coated nails but after some editing and blending I feel they work successfully with the look. 

 Hair 

I purposefully choose this model for this character as she has white and blue dyed hair which I felt would be really apt for the hair of an old witch. I wanted to create quite a disheveled look with the hair, as she lives in a forest and is both an evil and crazy woman so I back combed the hair to create a messy, pushed back look and continued to back comb and hair spray the front hairs to accentuate the overall disheveled style. I then added fake leaves and branches, using these to weave in and out of the hair style, I did this so that they weren't obvious and overpowering to the hairstyle but visible if you look closely. Overall I am really happy with the hair styling and of course my choice of model. 

Styling

For the styling of the witch I hired a brown floor length dress from Hepwrights which had beautiful and intricate beading on both sleeves that to me immediately represented branches and my forest theme. I was unable on the day to secure a full length studio so unfortunately I was unable to get a full length image of her in costume. I did the best that I could with the set up given and I tried to include some of the detailing in the shots by having her hold her hand and nails up to her face, if I could have shot this look again I would of really liked to have had the chance to shoot full length. 

At the end of story the Witch is pushed into a burning open oven by Gretel, so I wanted to change the look half way through the shoot to match the narrative of the story. I used latex and cotton wool to build up layers on the model's skin, once dry I used both a bruise and cut wheel to create a burns effect, using both dark and light colours to create texture. I then added wound filler into random parts of the burn to give it a more gory effect! Burns can be difficult to create as there are different stages for example first degree, second degree. As the witch had been pushed into a burning oven I wanted the burns to look extreme - with this in mind I am happy with this look. However as I have said above I would have liked to have taken the burns further along the face to create more of a realistic effect. 

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.

Cinderella's - Cinderella

My shoot today was the character of Cinderella in the well know story of the same name. When people hear the name Cinderella, a lot will automatically conjure up a picture of a beautiful, young Princess however in reality when reading the original Grimm's tale Cinderella is through most of the story, a slave - dirty and unkempt. This is the image of Cinderella that I wanted to portray to eliminate people's initial Princess interpretation, Cinderella is in fact a house slave forced to work day and night, wearing the same ragged clothes and sleeping in a pile of ash at night - this ultimately doesn't conjure up an attractive appearance. 

Although I am very happy with the outcome of this shoot, throughout this whole final major project process I have faced many difficulties, one of the most difficult things for me has been finding suitable models for each character. I've used students from the performance course, model mayhem, mutual friends and university students, however as the shoots are long and obviously unpaid it has been hard to actually secure models for my booked shoots. Finding models has also been difficult because the people I find need to fit the character as apposed to being just photogenic, however with the models that were on offer to me I feel satisfied with the people I have chosen, particularly with this model Jessica as her child-like features and petite figure cause her to look quite timid and innocent (fitting with Cinderella's character). As my book includes violence and gore another problem I have faced has been getting the models to work with props such as contact lenses, uncomfortable and strong make-up products that are hard to remove, an animals heart and unusual styling elements - to overcome these difficulties I have to be very patient and understanding, skills I hope to carry with me into future employment.

Here are some of my favourite images from the Cinderella shoot - 

Make-up 

The purpose of this make-up look was to make the character resemble someone that looks worn, tired and unkempt. I wanted the model to look as hard done by as possible without making her look too ill or deathly, this became quite difficult as dark tones under and around the eyes automatically create that ill look. I used small amounts of brown and grey powder around the eyes, mouth, temples and cheeks and built up layers of this powder until I was happy with the complexion. As Cinderella is described as sleeping in a pile of ash I used fullers earth mixed with water to paint onto the forehead and roots of the hair, once dry this created a dry, grey, cracked look and could resemble ash. I am happy with the outcome of the make-up however I feel that the fullers earth technique looked better in real life as on the camera it became washed out and not as visible, if I had more shooting time I would have applied an extra layer of fullers earth.

Styling

The styling as this shoot is my favourite element, the ragged cut skirt and loose grey top instantly show to an audience a character that is dirty, poor and unkempt, this also creates a instant reaction of sympathy for her character. I hired this outfit from Hampshire Wardrobe where it had previously been used as a peasants outfit in the theatre, so it was instantly very fitting to my design. I also hand stained a piece of material to resemble a dirty cloth, to match her dirty outfit and to show her role as the house slave to her step mother and step sisters, I feel this works well in some of the shots however to create a range I have a variety some with and others without. 

Composition 

Within the book and this story one of my main images is going to be Cinderellas transformation from a ragged house slave into a beautiful lady fit for the ball. Originally when researching into design elements for Cinderellas character I came across this image, which I felt re interpreted would be a successful and very visual way to show her magical transformation. 

To create this I had to take several shots of the model in different positions, both moving and staying still, from here I can then crop elements of each together and layer them on photo shop to create the same flowing, movement effect as the image above, I felt by pushing myself to create something I had never tried before would show both my editing and Photoshop skills as well as just my make-up and styling. This however took me a whole day to complete as erasing elements of each layer becomes tricky and precise as you begin to add more layers, although I feel my hard work has payed off as I feel I have created a very successful and technical final image that will run across a double page spread.