SFX Practical: Textures & Scarification

In the studio, we were encouraged to play around with different textures and shapes on the skin inspired by tribal body modification.

The materials available for us to work with consisted of latex, tuplast, gelatine and fullers earth. We also brought in various textures to work with such as rice, pasta, lace, beads and string.

In the first practical I tried creating a symbol on the wrist in the form of scarification.

Materials used: Latex, string, blue hair colour spray.

To create this, I first layered the skin with latex (after testing the model for latex allergy). I then soaked a length of string in liquid latex and applied it to the skin and moved it around with a thin spatula stick until I created a shape I was happy with. I then dried the latex with a hairdryer in cool setting until the latex was clear and no longer milky coloured. I then continued to add layers of latex until I was certain the string was adhered onto the skin, once again I used the hairdryer to speed up the drying process. Once everything was dry I took some blue hair colour spray and sprayed over the area.

I was not happy with the outcome, instead of looking like the pattern was under the skin (which I intended) it looks very much like a alien object laying on the exterior of the skin - the colour I chose did not help either. To improve, I should've made the shape lie flatter on the skin, using a skin colour to merge the shape into the skin and adding a layer of gelatine to add shine and dimension.

I then moved to experiment with tuplast.

Tuplast can be used directly out of the tube and is very fast drying, depending on the thickness you apply it. From the photos above you can see that I have created a pattern on the arm with this and this has a much better effect for scarification. On the left, is a photo of purely tuplast, and on the right shows it after being coloured and powdered to match the models skin tone. Without colour, the tuplast gives a  lot of shine and dimension to the skin, almost a wet look, when powdered and coloured, it becomes matt, but looks more realistic as an aged scar. However, I feel that it would look great with a dab of vaseline over the top to give it a glisten as most scars have.

I decided then that I wanted to create tribal scares on the face inspired by the sepik river tribe.

This is the outcome. For this I used rice, liquid latex, concealer and powder.

First of all, I stuck the rice onto the face using latex, and using tweezers for a precise application as I had a thought out pattern. I let the latex dry and preceded to coat each rice with another layer of latex with a small art brush to make sure the edges of the rice are filled and tightly attached to the skin. I let the latex dry again, once dry I used another small art brush to coat the rice with a concealer matching the model's skin. I then dusted loose translucent powder over to give a matt finish and to set the colour. I am very happy with the outcome, I found that this method allowed the rice to look like part of the texture of the skin. I also like the symmetrical pattern I had created.