Editing the video/film

The video that I made using Final Cut Pro consists of my two final characters that were chosen presented in a conventional, stereotypical way which then is rubbed away showing my interpretation. I came up with the idea of having the model run away the makeup of the first piece then the second piece would be put in reverse to seem as though they are rubbing off the first and forming the second with their hands.

When editing the video together I knew that I wanted it to be more of a fine art piece than a simple range of images. I also knew that I wanted it to be purely visual with no sound, this would mean that people who are viewing it are free to come up with their own views and perceptions of what they are seeing. This was an alternation of what I had previously planned which was to have a recording of someone reading out the characteristics of the character on the screen, explaining what you are seeing. The reason why I chose to change this was partially because I thought it was too obvious and on the nose. Another was that I thought that although the audio would be linked to the images, it would deter from what the viewer was seeing and them coming up with their own interpretation.

as the part of the video where the makeup was rubbed off was so long and time consuming, I decided to cut up this segment so that when you are watching it, the clip cuts to small parts of the model removing the makeup. I did this by using the blade tool and cutting the clip into small parts then deleting every other small clip.

Second Character: Two Face

Prior to doing a survey of who people thought I should do, Two Face was one of the characters that first came to mind when thinking of who to do. This is due to the fact that his appearance is not only very iconic but has a lot of things that I would be able to work with when recreating the look in the second part of the video. There are many different portrayals of this character, one being in one of the most recent Batman films 'The Dark Knight' played by Aaron Eckhart. In this film, two face is presented in a very realistic, gruesome way. (Picture below)

Although I wanted to look into many different representations of Harvey Dent\Two Face, this particular one wasn't something that I wanted to achieve as my project does not involve prosthetics and focuses more on body paint. Even though I did not want the piece to appear realistic, I did want it to have a very harsh, clear line down the middle, making the two halves completely separate from each other.

I then discovered the comic 'Dark Victory' which showed Two face in the exact way I wanted my makeup to appear. (pictures below)

Conventional comic makeup:

My Interpretation:

 When designing what my own interpretation would be, I thought about creating the feeling of something that had been split or broken without presenting this in an obvious way much like the conventional version. I thought that it would be quite effective to incorporate a broken/cracked aspect that would create the illusion that there was some kind of face or different level beneath the cracked surface.

Outcome:

Working to my Final Piece

For my final piece I knew that I wanted to include a comic/cartoon like well known version of the people I would be creating contrasted with a different interpretation. To start this I had to have a good idea of what characters to include in this. I decided to do an additionally small survey to decided on what characters are the most visually striking and iconic to people to the people I asked. As there was a large possibility that due to their being so many iconic characters in history it would be unlikely people would choose similar people, I researched into famous film and book characters in history and made a list of people who I discovered. From this list, people I surveyed were able to choose one person as their choice and I would then see who was the most popular out of the collection. Each person had two votes as I would be doing two characters.

Survey with characters people can choose from:   total number of people who answered - 26

Batman - 9
The Joker - 14
Catwoman - 2
Poison Ivy - 1
Wolverine - 4
Two Face - 10
Captain America  - 2
Spiderman - 2
Superman - 3
Green Lantern -
Wonder Woman - 0
The Hulk - 2
The Wicked Queen - 1
Ursula - 0


First character: The Joker

from my previous research, The Joker was very well received by outsiders and came up as the most popular in my second survey in which people could pick who i included in my final outcome. As the character does have such a range of iconic looks, I wanted the first bit of makeup I did of him to be instantly recognisable and very conventional. I looked into old comics in which The Joker obtained his most well known look. One comic in particular that I looked into had the best representation of him in my opinion which was 'Batman: The killing joke'. (pictures below)

I thought that this representation was the closest to what I wanted to capture, so i used this as my primary reference when doing the first piece of makeup that would be rubbed off to reveal the alternative Joker underneath. I looked into people that had previously already done makeup in a comic style which appeared very 2D, with little to no shadows etc. I found a number of people who had done this in articles and on Youtube including a woman, who's channel is called 'Madeyewlook'. On this channel she does multiple different comic and cartoon like body art pieces, and when looking  into these I was able to get a good idea of how to begin my own work.

Links to her Youtube videos that I found useful:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4kVl5VPBMkc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=izpI8heNfhA&t=321s
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pq3JRFjPUTk

I also discovered an article about an artist called Kay Pike who is a body paint artist who recreates whole body designs of comic book characters Article: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pq3JRFjPUTk
Although she does very extreme body art which covers almost the entire body, I found her work to be most helpful and inspiring in terms of what I am trying to achieve in my final piece.

Videos i studied of hers for techniques when doing my makeup:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GaJUCq4uc7M
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EsFyw76U7Js
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pu5Mp2HxAcY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xZ8IwgNfpfM

After looking into all these aspects I chose a feminine male model as a number of people said to me that they saw The Joker to have a feminine, slender quality so I thought that the person I chose would be perfect for that. I then did a small sketch of where I was going to position facial features, clothing etc on the model before I actually did it. This helped me to be more precise and not loose certain details that I wanted to include. It also allowed me to practice The Jokers face on a body shape that would obviously differ from a humans.

Conventional comic makeup:

My interpretation:

When i looked at how I personally perceived The Joker, I saw him as a mainly a character who hides their identity behind a scary, alternative exterior and this was my starting point. I researched into covering identities and faces and gathered images that I found inspiring.

Some pieces of art which inspired me:

Hidden identity by Perry Rowe

I was drawn to this piece as it has the subtlety that I think is important in my piece, yet still gets across the message of something darker that is hidden behind.

                                                          Painting by Jeremy Olson

I love the abstract and obscure nature of this painting, and like the other one, I am drawn to the choppy, layered aspect

Outcome

I believe that my final outcome of my interpretation of The joker was successful in terms of the research I did on other themes involving disguising your identity and fragmented personalities. I knew that whatever the final piece was I wanted it to include the long split mouth element, which is classic of The Jokers character. I also wanted to keep the dark around the eyes so that this, with the mouth element would still hold connotations of a clown like character. The fragmented facial features was something that I came up with when designing what I would be doing with the makeup. This was based on my research but also came from what people told me about how they perceived the character as being broken, hidden and also most importantly frightening and I think that the makeup definitely holds an element of fear.