****For those of you that prefer shorter explanations and cliff notes I have a page where I have all my presentations that cover the same stuff with less wordage and focus on the base principles that I go over!****
As any type of artist, you need a basic kit of supplies to get started. A painter needs paint and brushes, a sculptor needs clay, and a makeup artist needs their makeup and tools. An FX artist needs a fair few more things than just lipstick and mascara so I think I’ll cut the introduction short and jump right in.
Before I start just listing stuff off, I offer a disclaimer: You don’t have to buy EVERYTHING I have or what you can make yourself at home. My kit cost me about $700 bucks because I decided to jump in head first and buy every FX related thing I could with my student loans. I’ll be posting more within the FX realm and Beauty realm as time goes on but today we are talking kits.
Here is a quick photo of some of the stuff in my kit that I used for a piece not that long ago. It has a little bit of everything that I am going to be talking about in this post so take a look and see what you can find around your house!
The first thing I have in my kit is cotton balls. It seems like a very odd thing to have but trust me, you need to hoard these like gold. They are used on anything from small cuts to large prosthetics. I bought roughly 2,000 of them for less than ten dollars on a website called Qosmedix.com. They sell all kinds of beauty, organization, and a whole helluva lot of super handy FX stuff. Now the FX stuff isn’t labeled as such but they have stuff like cotton balls, gauze wrapping, short and long Q-tips, disposable brushes, and even makeup wedges for latex and stippling!
I love their store and will order anything and everything I can from them because by and large it’s cheaper than going to seven hundred (seven) different stores to try and find this stuff. They have more than I’ll ever realistically need so It’s an invaluable resource for any makeup artist, of any level.
Fake blood is essential for those super gory and gross Halloween looks you’ll find yourself doing. I recommend buying corn syrup and red food dye and making your own blood. Most, if not all, big FX retailers will sell this simple product for upwards of $20 and you can easily make it at home for under $8. It may be a sticky mess, but it cleans up easy and doesn’t stain you. Upholstery and clothes are a whole other sport compared to you, so be careful of that. I know this one from experience so trust me. There’s a chair at my high school that is stained permanently because someone who has used my blood in a video project sat back on the chair and quite literally jammed it up with the syrup and dye. Sorry Mr. Gibson!
On the same track of making everything that you can at home, Glycerin is a pretty hot commodity in a kit because it is used in a gelatin recipe that I will explain later in the post. It is primarily use for mimicking sweat because when mixed with water, it will bead on the skin as you spray it because the water will absorb fairly quickly into the skin. It’s more slippery than sticky so just wipe it off with a wet wipe and you’ll be perfectly fine. you can also use it to make different types of wounds shiny. These wounds include, burns infected wounds and other like injuries.
I try and make everything that I can because FX makeup is an expensive endeavor as I’ve already explained. Next up on the list is Liquid Latex. I love the Slip Latex from Nigel Beauty Emporium and it’s only $14.95 for a 32oz bottle so there’s a bargain right there. It’s also really good because it holds up well for larger pieces and lasts a really long time. From what I’ve done, it’s very resistant to tearing and very flexible. You can’t pull on it like you’re the hulk, but it holds up under pressure (walking down the street…I love Queen okay…). It peels off skin and molds really easily so that’s not an issue!
Fun fact, I made a pair of horns for my haunt and they have lasted a whole season and hopefully a few more. I just did a quick sculpt with some clay I had laying around (I’m also a ceramics artist so i actually have stuff like this laying around) and let it dry out and layered the latex until I couldn’t see the clay through the latex. I even had one of my coworkers tell me that their friend saw them and made their own pair just like mine! Major self-esteem boost right there. On to the next item on the list!
Gelatin is another staple, especially if you have a latex allergy! This is great alternative for that reason. I will warn you though, it smells like a dirty diaper when you melt it because of the unflavored gelatin you need to make it set up properly. That stuff melts down and smells terrible. It’s really cool to use because you can make individual pieces like Glam&Gore did with her Toxic Mermaid Nyx Face Awards Entry, or straight onto your face applications like burns or like a melted face I guess? I can’t think of any other things at the moment. A quick tip, to preserve it, keep it fresh longer, add a tablespoon of any type of alcohol to the melted mix and stir it in. It can be any type, even drinkable liquor like vodka or rum. it prevents bacteria from growing for longer than without it. This is a very helpful thing to know, especially as a beginner.
Speaking of bacteria, something else you need to have is a spray bottle with 70%-99% Isopropyl Alcohol to disinfect your stuff after using it. If you don’t actively do this, you are at risk of causing someone to develop an infection from the non-clean items. This seems like an asshole thing to say in order to scare you, but it’s really not. This stuff happens and it sucks. It also ruins your reputation and you will end up losing business from mistakes like this. Wowzers, that got serious really fast. Anyway, a quick spray between people will go a long way.
Moving on from that, the next thing that you need is a set of water activated paints for covering large areas of skin. The colors I recommend for beginners are the primary colors + black and white because these are colors you can mix easily for hundreds of blends. Makeup doesn’t have to be expensive, (Loosely used bc this shit is not cheap), but it does have to look good. It may not look great in the beginning, but you will always grow and improve.
On the topic of paints, you’ll need cream paints as well. This is more for small detail and for around the eyes and mouth since those areas will wear off the fastest out of everywhere. Set the stuff with eyeshadow so that it doesn’t move for even longer! You’ll need pretty much the same colors as the water colors because they mix much the same way. Few colors, many possibilities my friends.
You also need to have something to stick things on with! You have two options but one of them is less fun to work with. Pros-Aide and Spirit Gum are the two most common adhesives you have. I’m actually not sure if there are anymore than these two to be honest. Either way, Spirit Gum is sticky as hell, which is a good thing, but it’s really hard to get off and requires an oil based remover to really get it off. Pros-Aide washes off with soap and water so i would go with that one for that reason. With both, you have apply it to both your body and the prosthetic, and wait for it to get tacky before pressing it on. This allows them to adhere better and stay in place for a longer amount of time.
Pros-Aide also has a cream version which is really handy for blending in edges so I’d go ahead and pick that up if you can. I definitely need it honestly. Spirit gum doesn’t which is another reason to go with Pros-Aide. What I’m saying is that I really hate Spirit Gum with a passion. Period. \(-_-)/.
Makeup remover is very very important for anyone with any level of involvement with SFX or beauty makeup. This shit is hard to clean up from. I make my remover from scratch with three ingredients and it works wonderfully. It’s water, coconut oil, and baby shampoo so that it can be used anywhere on your person. It really helps with stubborn stuff around the eyes and nose. It works with spirit gum pretty well but it does require a bit of scrubbing regardless because it’s spirit gum. \(-_-)/.
Now that we have all the big stuff out of the way, we can move on to the tools you’ll need. I’ll try and keep this part shorter than the other half because that got really long really fast. You’ll need stuff like copious amounts of makeup brushes and sponges because if you work at a haunted house where you’ll be doing makeup on up to 20 different people, you can’t use the same sponges on multiple people for hygiene reasons. Disposable stuff is always useful for the aforementioned reason. Keeps bad things from happening.
You’ll also need baby powder/setting powder to keep things in place and avoid smudging with the multiple layers that will be happening. I use baby powder because it’s cheap as hell and you get more bang for your buck. Literally. You can get it for a dollar at the dollar store. Super nice. Same with cotton balls for latex builds. The dollar store is great for a lot of things man. Highly recommend it.
Brush cleaner is also very helpful because you’ll need to keep them clean and stuff between uses. This applies to personal use as well because you can give yourself a nasty infection with your own grossness. This is something I need to get better at doing because I hardly ever do it. Oops. Do as I say, not as I do. I also need to get more brushes because I have like five. Not kidding, I have a personal set and a work set. That’s it. Again, Do as I say, not as I do.
Disposable everything is a must with any form of makeup. I again recommend Qosmedix.com because they have a whole kit of disposable stuff plus the stuff to refill it with for a super low price! The kit is $16 and you have to make it to $25 but that is far from difficult. The amount of things that you can get from their site will astound you. I have most of my disposable kit stocked from them and I couldn’t recommend them enough.
There are a few beauty related items that you need for a fully functional kit. Palettes that have a lot of red, orange, and brown shades are a must because those are what create depth and dimension in wounds. Lip liners are a sister piece to the palettes because they are/can be used to draw out guidelines and exact pieces of wounds and placements of prosthetics. I really dragged on with this one and for that I am super sorry. Can’t promise that it won’t happen again because I write as though I’m talking/stream of thought.
The beauty stuff is pretty much for shading and placement because the FX stuff does all the heavy lifting. Go for the FX stuff first because you’ll be able to do more with that to start out. Shading is something that you don’t need to do right away so just keep that in mind when scraping this stuff together.
Whew! That was a long one holy crap. I hope you learned a lot about the stuff you’ll need to make great things happen!
Kit By Design Signing Out!
Remember I love all of you no matter what and I’ll see you in the next one!
Kit By Design 