Hi everyone, I’m working as Christine Blundell’s trainee on a film at the moment, and got the autorization to talk about what I’m doing on this blog. Regularly, I will go through an aspect of my work or a step of the filmmaking process.
Let’s start at the source : prep time.
The big problem filming a feature film is making sure you do the right make-up at the right time, so it’s all about continuity and and having the right wig/prosthetics/ make-up fine and ready when you need it. As a designer, It’s also holding everything within the budget you’ve been given.
Prep time is made for that. You need to go through your script and check out any scenes with crowds, any character make-up, any fight, any ageing… etc In a nutshell, translate the script into make-up and hair infos. Sometimes, an action may be discussed in the prep meeting to decide if it is better to get the effect on set, using makeup effects, or by CGI (visual effects).
After that, the designer will organize tests with the actors to decide about their look. Lots of talking with both the actors and the director are involved. Then, quite often quickly, the designer will order the things he wants to achieve that look like teeth, wigs, prosthetics. Once ready, there will be new tests done to be sure everyone’s happy with the result.
While all this was going on, as a trainee, I helped around with various tasks :
- checking kits,
- doing list of things to do,
- doing lists of things to buy, (or buying them directly)
- making boards with all the essentials informations to be seen at a glance
- running a few errands.
Everything is going fast once the film’s started, you can’t rely on your memory for everything.so you need quite a few documents to make your life easier.
A few documents I’ve been working on :
- lists of main actions,
- lists of specific scenes where loads of make-up is required with the dates of filming,
- week board with the scenes and their main infos
- crowd break down…
You can be filming the end of a scene before the beginning, and even weeks before. You really need a lot of clarity about what’s going on and when to prevent any mistake.
You also need to have everything nicely set-up in your bus, and that’s the next article
