Supplies for Scary Halloween Makeup

Series Summary

Cosmetic makeup has been used for years to enhance the natural beauty of women around the world. When used on stage or in a movie, makeup takes on a role of its own. Special effects makeup can be as simple as a cut or a scar on the face or as complicated as full-body character makeup. Do-it-yourself special effects makeup is easier than you might think and can be done using things you have around the home.

In this series of videos, our expert instructs viewers how to use makeup and household objects to create a character or costume appearance. Watch as our expert transforms his assistant from an attractive, healthy young woman to a disgusting zombie in a matter of minutes. Learn how to apply makeup using an airbrush or how to apply adhesive safely to the face. Get insider tips on using gelatin-based makeup or applying color and powder to change the tone of the skin. If you want to apply objects or appliances to your special effects makeup such as screws or nails, watch this video series. Using layering and blending, you can apply anything to the face or body and make it look natural, including toupees and wigs, as you will see in these videos.

Video Transcript

"My name is John Mays. Some people refer to me as “Evil” John Mays. I’m here today to demonstrate some makeup techniques for Expertvillage.com. We’re going to take a rather attractive young lady and subtract that from her - going from a girl to a ghoul. Hope you enjoy the process. So what we’ve got here is kind of the horror movie kit, or at least the makeup things. We’ve got your palette of colors (they’re alcohol based - they won’t sweat off the makeup), a little hair decoration, gel effects makeup for making appliances and nice little wound treatments. One of the things you’ll need to know about some of the makeup is that it has to be melted, so you’ll need a little heating pot to do it, so be sure you have an appliance set up where we can melt it. What I’ve got here is just a coffee pot that I’ve cobbled together. The melting temperature is between 140 and 120 degrees, you can see a thermostat here for that and it goes without saying that you need to wait a couple of seconds before you put it on the actor because they really don’t appreciate temperatures quite that high. Powders, adhesives for the appliances, we have the activator for the alcohol base makeup - these things are your friends. And gloves - because most of the stuff, since you’re working all day, is going to dye your skin. "