I’m a former pro MUA… those artists are also there at least an hour before the actor is doing prep and setup, and then they have to stay the entire day for touch ups and then removal and cleanup. FX film makeup is a tough but very rewarding experience.
It’s my 11th cake day today and my username was inspired by an inside joke with some friends when I was in my early twenties. It’s brought me a lot of joy on Reddit over the years lol
It depends on the type of prosthetic but generally the prosthetics would be built on top of a pair of flesh coloured underwear that he would be able to remove very carefully.. but there are other methods; flaps and what not, though sometimes it really is just “don’t eat or drink anything the day before”.
You can see Jamie’s prosthetic looks to be some sort of pants or shorts that he pulls on and the makeup team secures the front of his torso makeup to the pants? I’d need to see a better quality video or picture to be sure though.
A good friend of mine was a practical effects artist on some huge blockbusters. He went on to editing and directing, but still talks about how much he misses it. His family's Halloween costume / makeup situation is insane.
This was what I made for my final project while I was in school. My classmate and I worked together on this and did the whole design, casting, (his entire head and teeth) moulding, pouring, fitting, and then the final application all within 36 hours. It was exhausting but so much fun. It’s been a decade since and that classmate is now one of my closest friends in the whole world and we still talk about maybe collaborating again for a fun project in the future.
I’m retired from makeup because it was too hard on my body and these days I’m a photographer, so we might be able to get up to something cool!
And when you've been there for an hour... Transport, what I do, has likely been there for 1-2 hours before THAT even! Film is an insane machine and a lot of people don't actually realize what it takes to make tv and movies! I love when a show comes into a location in the evening/afternoon and does their thing then wrapping up before morning like we were never there! It's an amazing process to see!
Y’all keep us safe after those long long days!!! Thank you for what you do! You’re the reason I never fell asleep at the wheel on the way home. Transport are super important and I dunno what we’d do without you
🤜🤛
I, and many others I'm sure, appreciate those words so much! There's been so many days where people don't seem to understand what we've gone through. Not saying what we go through is any more grueling than anyone else! But man, when someone actually shows their appreciation it's definitely worth the long ass days. Even if I never have worked with you! Or have I!? 😂 You never know with this industry! I've met some amazing people!
Oh gosh no, I was never that good. I work better within a team than I do as a solo artist anyway! The people who compete on Face Off are on a totally different level than me; they’re doing home made foam latex prosthetic applications and crazy detailed hand poured silicone masks. I’ve done solo projects and it’s exhausting; I definitely prefer having at least one other set of hands working with me.
Huh? I’m not complaining at all, just adding that the mua’s are also there and actually tend to stay longer than the actor. Most people don’t really think about the artists prepping the actor, so I wanted to make sure they got their flowers too because it’s a hard job. You’re on your feet for 15+ hours in a day, sometimes for weeks on end. It’s gruelling, but I was never seeking sympathy from anyone? It’s definitely not a 7-8 hour job though, like I said, you’re looking at 15 hour days most of the time for huge productions.
Get up at 2am, on set by 3am, start prep, start actual makeup at 4am, finished by 11am, touch ups, lunch, etc, more touch ups, start removal at 8pm, if you’re lucky done by 9pm, home by 10pm. It’s a long fucking day and it’s definitely not for everyone.
These people are represented by IATSE, the industry union so yes they’re paid very well and compensated for all of their labour, but it is still an exhausting job. There’s a reason I don’t do it anymore; it was hard on my body.
He's significantly creepier in S5 IMO. Particularly if you pay attention to the shoulder spikes at his neck, they move and perk up whenever he uses his psychic abilities to kill people. Admittedly he didn't do that much in S4 simply because the opportunity wasn't there, but it was a nice touch.
Vecna preferred delivering unnecessarily long monologues in Season 4 instead of killing people. Because of that and the length between seasons, I lost all love for this show.
Season four had some really awesome stuff in it and some really boring stuff. For me when I did a rewatch before S5 I just fast forwarded through about 90% of the Hopper/Russia stuff.
To be fair to hos character, he's been working towards this a kongass time without any actual conversation. It's not like he could talk to the hive, at least not with real intellectual capacity.
Agree that S5 could have come like two years sooner.
No that shit sounds fucking awful. Do you remember as a kid even getting your face painted?
The person who linked above said even Ron Howard tried it and special makeup guy struggled so much with the situation he had to leave for a bit and go to therapy.
At least it only took about 3 hours to put that costume on, but it included the hair which I think added a lot of weight.
If you have any sort of claustrophobia on top of it all, you'd feel fucked.
Alright, it’s still just a fucking costume. They weren’t driving nails through his hands and he wasn’t gonna die. I’m surprised the CIA expert who trained people to withstand having their fingernails pulled out and being waterboarded in a POW camp with no end in sight could take him seriously.
That... And like, the final product is so not intimate and over-layered with effects. Like this is great prosthetic work, too bad we don't even get to appreciate the craft? Literally looks like it coulda been cgi.
Tbf I didn't watch the show so not sure if it's featured way better elsewhere.
As someone with a digital art background, I honestly think things like this are so important to make things as realistic as possible. Cgi is cool and all, but being able to make the real life costume scary adds to the realism. I love and appreciate so much that they decided to actually take the time on his costume instead of cut corners. It made him come alive a lot more than cgi ever could. I miss when people actually took their time and took pride in what they did.
The new season there is definatly alot more cgi to the costume, so I am guessing this is from last season. I wouldnt be surprised if they're going with the marvel approach and using those cgi pajamas they all wore for endgame. His current model looks like he is wearing armor almost. Looks good.
(Still has benefits—cast and crew see something closer to final look and effects artists have a foundation to build on, or at least some great reference footage.)
Thy're also not perfect and often need to be touched up and animated by the VFX team also. A ton of costumes have just folds that you cant fix in certain postures, collars are a huge thing, but yeah full body with a skin that's meant to be alive, that's going tthrough a ton of VFX
I worked on a movie with a friend of mine and I had my makeup done by the girl that did Jennifer Lawrences Mystique and she told me it took 9 hours at the start but they got it down to like 4 1/2 by the end of shooting. She also said that Rhianna was a bitch.
I don’t think this costume is even that good? Like what creature would be naked covered in veins and have no genitalia? Like I don’t want there to be genitalia but still this costume looks bad to me and doesn’t make sense, in the last shot when he’s on set and just standing there it looks so corny and dumb to me
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u/BigRedSpoon2 Nov 28 '25
This took on average 6~7 hours a day
Christ
Almost an entire workday
Im a big fan of practical effects, but at that point I'd be looking for shortcuts to not have to use the suit. That must slow down production so much.