Battles With Bits of Rubber

This episode is a catch up on some emails and questions we had over the last couple of weeks. We have some great questions this time around, so many thanks for getting in touch!

We talk about epoxy surfaced moulds, crinkly edges, and dodgy makeup course practices.

Books mentioned in this episode:

Silicone Art - Silicone As An Art Material By Tom McLaughlin V1.3

Fundamentals of Facial Prosthetics By Robert E McKinstry

Products mentioned:

MAC Matte Cream or 'Crème Matifiante' A quick shout out to Thomas Tuohey for making this awesome mixer head available on Thingiverse: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:4648372

This fantastic materials calculator: https://www.fxcalc.monster/

Many thanks as always for your time checking the stuff out. You can email us direct at [email protected] or leave us a voice message directly on our site.

If you enjoy this podcast and got something out of it, would you do us a solid and tell just one more person about us? Send them a link and help us grow!

-Stuart & Todd

Brian Kinney is a primetime Emmy-nominated makeup artist and a Journeyman in IATSE Hollywood Local 706 Make-up Artists and Hairstylists Guild, where he serves as Makeup Craft President and Executive Board Member.

His work can be seen in feature films and television shows, such as Fear The Walking Dead, Game of Thrones, Westworld, Purge: Anarchy and CSI. Check out his extensive IMDb page to see the hefty list of credits.

Brian came to my workshop just after Christmas 2019 and we had a great afternoon catching up and recording a chat. It seems funny to remember when you could just be in a room with other people normally and not wear masks...

Anyhoo, we started our chat with the time Brian visited the workshops of Stuart Freeborn (original Star Wars trilogy, 2001, The Bridge Over The River Kwai) which is eye-watering nostalgic.

Brian has a fantastic manner, combining the makeup artists skills with exquisite etiquette (plus a great voice for radio as you'll hear!).

We chat about being responsible for things on set, how bosses may allocate tasks to their freelancers, case-hardening skills learned in makeup school in the real world and being available to help others.

Check his website out here. He is on Instagram @bekinney.

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Many thanks as always for your time checking the stuff out. You can email us direct at [email protected] or leave us a voice message directly on our site.

If you enjoy this podcast and got something out of it, would you do us a solid and tell just one more person about us? Send them a link and help us grow!

-Stuart & Todd

Lars is a generous self-taught artist from Sweden. He works in film, TV and theatre productions often using new technology to scan and print items for practical effects.

We wanted to chat theatre stuff, as that is not something we have spoken much about on the podcast. It's an area which may well be more available for people starting out, as many sizes of theatre and regional playhouses have small scale productions offering great opportunities for creative people starting out.

In this episode, we talk scanning, printing and sculpting in virtual reality, trouble with new LED lighting in theatres, making mistakes and having the courage to say YES to things in order to figure out how to do them. We also chat about the famous airbrush splatter nozzles which Lars came up with and freely shares on his website.

Check out Lars' website, shop and in particular, the tutorials which cover so many important areas in makeup effects, from sculpting, moulding, painting and of course, hair punching. Of particular note is the excellent silicone calculator on there too! Lars is on Instagram @makeupfx.

We mention the Effects Lab, which was a big deal in the early days of the internet before everything became a massive echo chamber. It is currently being overhauled and upgraded, but much of it is accessible here. Well worth checking out if you haven't already.

Many thanks as always for your time checking the stuff out. You can email us direct at [email protected] or leave us a voice message directly on our site.

If you enjoy this podcast and got something out of it, would you do us a solid and tell just one more person about us? Send them a link and help us grow!

-Stuart & Todd

https://battleswithbitsofrubber.com/

It's Halloween. A Saturday! A full moon! Also not happening because of Covid. Boo.

It's a damn shame, but I imagine around the world, a lot more horror movies will be watched. I can only hope such mass consumption will drive production to make more stuff as we burn through the back catalogue of shows with a worldwide captive audience.

Cutting Edges

On appliances, a cutting edge is often employed to mark the boundary of where appliance stops and real skin should begin. With foam and gelatine, the end of the piece was the end of the piece. With silicone appliances, we usually have a cap plastic barrier which extends beyond the silicone edge to provide that nice, melt-to-nothing transition.

However, on a lot of flat moulds, we have seen varying takes on how far away a cutting edge should be from the sculpt. We chat about that!

Cap Plastic On The Back Of A Piece

We also chat about cap plastic on the back of pieces. Usually necessary when a mould and a core is involved, but there are some reasons why it is desirable to not have cap plastic on the back of a piece.

For one, often when removing the appliance, the cap plastic will stick better to the skin because of the glue than it does to the back of the appliance. This 'delamination' means it takes longer to clean up and can be a pain.

Why cap plastic the back at all? Usually two reasons.

One reason is deadened/softened silicone is very sticky, so the barrier makes it possible to handle the piece during demoulding. The other is to allow 'cheaper' water-based adhesives (as opposed to the more expensive silicone adhesives) to bond better to the piece.

Let's not forget that silicone is a material much used for moulds precisely because not much sticks to it. Including most glues and makeup.

By having a barrier on the surface which is not actually silicone at all, but cap plastic, suddenly a whole world of things can be used on the makeup and blendable edges are possible. The sheer joy!

So, when running flat pieces, now I don't bother with cap plastic on the back. I did it, like many do, out of habit and seeing it down without really asking myself why it was necessary. By spraying more cap plastic on the back, we essentially double the edge thickness and it's an extra step in the job.

We talk through some notions of why it can be a problem, and how one might get around it.

Podcast recommendation

Check out a great podcast I just discovered via Kiana 'Freakmo' Jones called Red Carpet Rookies. In particular, episode #5 with Bill Corso talking about digital makeup. It's a great show done by someone who cares about the subject, and I'd add it to your podcast subscriptions if you dig film chat.

So, getting the horror on with audio books to keep us spooked during the workshop hours…Salem's Lot and the The Exorcist was a double bill which put me in the right mood for some Halloween Horror Movies this weekend.

Sculpting a vampire face whilst listening to William Peter Blatty read Regan's tirades at Father Karras felt like a peak moment of Halloween fun. ---------------------------------------------------

Many thanks as always for your time checking the stuff out. You can email us direct at [email protected] or leave us a voice message directly on our site.

If you enjoy this podcast and got something out of it, would you do us a solid and tell just one more person about us? Send them a link and help us grow!

-Stuart & Todd

https://battleswithbitsofrubber.com/

Danny has done some interesting things with prosthetics, leading with fashion and high concept looks and bringing appliance work into the mix.

Most demonstrations at trade shows involving appliances are showing just the tail end of a much longer hidden process which perhaps isn't at all evident in the final piece. It's nice to hear about what happens in the lead up to such a thing.

As with many artists sealed tight with Non-Disclosure Agreements on professional projects, trade shows offer a real opportunity to try something new and experiment with ideas and processes without the risk of shooting days or high-stakes schedules.

We chat with Danny about her influences, approach and work ethic and get into some pretty useful stuff. For example, Danny keeps records of makeup applications and lists what was used, including techniques, materials and products as well as notes on what well and what didn't.

The result after a number of years is a great resource which will supply a record of a journey, as well as a very practical guide to your own best practice for similar jobs in the future.

It takes a deal of humility to acknowledge what didn't work and address those shortcomings. It is also good practice to acknowledge what did work and take note of what went well.

It is easy to become automatically self-critical as a default position, but the ability to have genuine regard for your own work, objectively seeing good and bad and using them both as a guide to improvement is a useful tool.

It was a great chat and we got fired up as you'll hear.

Links to things mentioned in this episode

The Dip by Seth Godin:

(summary: Every new project (or career or relationship) starts out exciting and fun. Then it gets harder and less fun until it hits a low point - really hard, really not fun. At this point, you might be in a Dip, which will get better if you keep pushing, or a Cul-de-Sac, which will never get better no matter how hard you try. The hard part is knowing the difference and acting on it.)

Science Kits for kids: https://www.robocube.co.uk/collections/stem-kits

We mention a popular chain of hardware stores in the UK called B&Q, the name is an acronym of the original owners' names, Block and Quayle.

In the US, Home Depot would be an equivalent. If you have been on the hunt for unusual uses for conventional materials, then you may be familiar with the odd looks when responding to enquiries.

Check out Dannys' work on her website and instagram.

Many thanks as always for your time checking the stuff out. You can email us direct at [email protected] or leave us a voice message directly on our site.

If you enjoy this podcast and got something out of it, would you do us a solid and tell just one more person about us? Send them a link and help us grow!

-Stuart & Todd

We have all spotted things in shows which were never meant to be there. Scars swapping sides, hair up one minute and then down the next, blood which moves shot to shot or an errant edge which can't be hidden.

Those are the things which you notice, and maybe take great pleasure in spotting and shaming those unfortunate artists who were 'responsible'.

However, there are many things which you didn't spot which could have been issues if they were not overcome before the cameras started rolling.

We go through some of these hidden problems which are not so rare, and which will tax the creative minds of those on whose shoulders these things fall.

We have had a long lay-off and been quiet coping with one thing and another, so apologies for the radio silence. We have a few new toys which will mean things are going to be more regular on the podcast front.

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Links to things we mention in this episode

Nomad sculpting app: https://nomadsculpt.com/ Procreate art app: https://procreate.art/ Infinite painter: https://www.infinitestudio.art/discover.php Forger sculpting app: https://forgerapp.com/ ZBrush (all bells and whistles): https://pixologic.com/ Zbrush Core (stripped down, lighter version): https://store.pixologic.com/zbrushcore-2020/ ZBrush Core Mini (even more stripped down and free): https://zbrushcore.com/mini/# Sculptris (free sculpting app): https://pixologic.com/sculptris/

What we do in the shadows (excellent TV show): https://www.imdb.com/title/tt7908628/

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Many thanks as always for your time checking the stuff out. You can email us direct at [email protected] or leave us a voice message directly on our site.

If you enjoy this podcast and got something out of it, would you do us a solid and tell just one more person about us? Send them a link and help us grow!

-Stuart & Todd

Closing moulds correctly is vital to get good casts out of them. There seems little point in making a good mould and then getting bad casts out of it.

In this episode we chat about things to consider when looking at 'mould closure'. Essentially, a mould other than a flat or open mould will usually need to be attached or fitted to another component to produce a cast.

This could be another part of the mould if a 'multi-piece' mould is made and/or a core which will be placed into the mould to create the interior.

These pieces need to remain securely in position, and may be required to exert a lot of force if the cast piece needs to have thin seams which are more easily repaired.

That has cost implications - think about having to repair bad seams of fifty casts out of a mould which wasn't closed correctly!

Small block moulds are often clamped together for speed and convenience, but what happens if the mould is huge, such as a full body or a dinosaur?

This episode has another hefty set of notes to help make sense of it all. It is picture heavy and goes deeper into what to look out for. Get them here or the blog post for this episode.

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Many thanks as always for your time checking the stuff out. You can email us direct at [email protected] or leave us a voice message directly on our site.

If you enjoy this podcast and got something out of it, would you do us a solid and tell just one more person about us? Send them a link and help us grow!

-Stuart & Todd

Cutting edges are the point at which a core meets the mould, and is crucial in creating a fine edge for many appliances.

In flat moulds, there can be something similar even though a core isn't involved, as it establishes where the appliance actually stops and the skin begins.

A cutting edge and overflow are critical in foam appliances, especially where a mould has foam latex added and a core is pushed into it. A gap between the core and the mould face would ensure the excess foam could escape, and the contact point where the mould meets the core would be decided carefully and precisely.

Go to our website to get the free booklet supporting this episode, or go here.

This principle has carried on with silicone, although usually excess waste is minimised owing to the fact silicone isn't mostly made of air, as is the case with foam latex.

Wherever the core meets or touches the mould - be it keys, the cutting edge or an unintentional, is known as a touchdown. Getting great edges is important in making pieces which will blend into the skin and appear as part of it, rather than exhibiting a clear boundary where the fake stops and the real begins.

Many thanks as always for your time checking the stuff out. You can email us direct at [email protected] or leave us a voice message directly on our site.

If you enjoy this podcast and got something out of it, would you do us a solid and tell just one more person about us?

Send them a link and help us grow!

-Stuart & Todd

Blog Post for this episode here.

Tim Baggaley played the one-armed zombie in Shaun of the Dead. He's a damn nice fella, an actor, talented graphic designer and a fabulous dancer.

In this episode, we chat about his experience on set and his recollections of being among the undead.

As we chatted, he reminded me of a few other things we had worked on together and we get into the nitty-gritty of whether or not we should see the genitals of monsters. Sounds like a fun tangent, but it is a serious consideration when making creature suits.

After all, their absence may be as strange as whatever freakishly upsetting creature-junk one may wish to design in their place. Who wants to write that back story?

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Many thanks as always for your time checking the stuff out. You can email us direct at [email protected] or leave us a voice message directly on our site.

If you enjoy this podcast and got something out of it, would you do us a solid and tell just one more person about us? Send them a link and help us grow to the right people!

–Stuart & Todd

Here is a little treat - an additional little episode that checks in with Mark Donovan who played The Hulking Zombie in Shaun Of The Dead.

We talked through the difficulties involved in getting ready to be attacked with records and cricket bats, shovels and the heat whilst caked in blood.

Also, as you'll hear, some very cool comic book related stuff which was an exciting discovery. You may recall in the bumper podcast episode #55 that Stuart Conran mentioned the back story to the Hulking Zombie, how he came to be a zombie and why he was there with Mary.

I mentioned this to Mark and not only was he aware of it but he has the actual original panels framed at his home!

Check pics in the accompanying blog post here.

Many thanks for listening.

-Stuart & Todd