Quentin

Quentin is my second character. I've decided to make Quentin a new Police Officer in town, fresh out of high school and Claudia's only real friend/ ally. I thought that Quentin and Claudia could be a pair of monster hunters trying to get rid of the bad guys. However Quentin doesn't know Claudia is a monster herself. Quentin likes to stick to the rules unlike Claudia who is a bit of a wild child and is a bit of a bad influence on Quentin. I would like Quentin to be the opposite of Claudia so tanned, dark hair and eyes. I would either have Quentin with a scar or cut on his face from a fight with a mystical being. Claudia maybe? I haven't fully decided yet.

The word that I have chosen for quentin is The Woods. I chose this word as part of the series is set within some woods. A lot of the murders that go on occur within the woods so I felt that it would be fitting with my character as he is part of the police and trying to find the killer. I would probably add a few cuts and scrapes and possibly some mud stains as if he had a fight with some creature in the woods. I think my word fits Quentin quite well as I want him to be mysterious and slightly scary. 

Claudia

So my first character that I chose was Claudia. I am thinking of making Claudia, Roman Godfrey's long lost cousin on his mother's side as Roman hasn't met any of her side of the family. Roman's mother originates from Russia, however left and moved to England where the rest of her family are. Claudia comes from a wealthy family and I want her to be a little rebellious and to be completely different to the rest of her family. I want her to be a little edgy as she hasn't grown up with her parents affection and want to try and gain some sort of attention from them, even if it means getting trouble. Roman is a Vampire and has an ability to make people so whatever he wants them to do. I want Claudia to share that power however the consequence is that it can cause bleeding from the eyes and nose. I would like Claudia to be blonde with pale skin and big eyes. I want her to look 'doe' like. Cute but with a firey personality. 

The word that I have picked for Claudia is Fork. I chose fork because it is seen in the series that Olivia Godfrey uses a knife and fork to cut up the flesh of her victims to eat. I thought that I could link in Claudia with this way of eating.The thought using a knife and fork on a person is quite disturbing which is where I am hoping to portray Claudia as. 

Character Overviews

We were given the task to fit in two characters into the series of our choice. We were given 3 character overviews and we have to choose 2 of them to include in our series.

The first character that we we given was Claudia. The brief that we were given on her is:

Claudia is a girl in her twenties. As a child she was left alone to develop with very little parental guidance and through her relationship with T.V and movies developed an unhealthy relationship with Horror Films, believing this to be the way life really is. 
All the scenes take place in various parts of Claudia's apartment, which is European in style with a great deal of Kitsch decor. She is Agoraphobic and is kept in touch with the outside world through her neighbours who provide her with every day requirements. She models herself on a variety of girls often twisting her look to suit whichever film she is watching at the time and there is often a nod to the main character in the current film in her appearance.
The script portrays her as psychotic and there is always a feeling that her character is scripted/ can be seen as humorous, danger is just round the corner. However all this is normal to Claudia and she is of cheerful disposition in this mad world of hers.

The second character that we got was Quentin and the brief that we were given is:

Claudia has an imaginary boyfriend, Quentin who is long suffering and a constant disappointment to her. They don't listen to her but he visits regularly and they talk on the telephone if he can't get in to see her. As he is part of her imagination his appearance changes to suit her mood. Sometimes he will be a David Beckham look guy, while in another scene he will appear as a Pete Docherty, Daniel Craig or a Hollyoaks babe. If she is having a bad day he will morph into an uncouth couch potato cha with all that brings with it.
He is as into horror film genre as she is  and into role-playing to suit her whims and moods.
Claudia has a paranoid suspicion that he is constantly having an affair behind her back and keeps her firmly under her thumb, sometimes restraining him or keeping him locked up in one of the rooms. 

The last character that we were given was Mrs. Laderman and her brief was:

Claudia's neighbour in her 40's. She alternatively changes into a variety alter egos and is Claudia's friend and confidant. Living in the appartment opposite, she was Claudia's only link to the outside world. Although the are friends there is suspicion Mrs. Laderman has designs on Quentin. In fact she has designs on Claudia. 

Along with choosing two characters we have to pick a word that fits with our character. We were given a list of words from which we had to pick one:

Special Delivery, Blue Coat, Hydro Bath, White Rose, Ascend, Glass Prison, Red Rave, White Rave, Taste, Bandages, Fork, Stitches, Save us, Hellevator, Slipping, Veiled, Spinning, Exam, The Woods, Spiral, Awakening, Face, Door.

Hemlock Grove

Like the first half of the assessment we were given a list of tv shows and we had to choose one to create characters that fit in with it. The list that we were given was:

The walking Dead, American Horror Story, Dexter, True Blood, Bates Motel, The Strain, Supernatural, Penney Dreadful, In the Flesh, Being Human, Hemlock Grove, Hannibal and Grimm.

The two that I was deciding between was Hemlock Grove and Supernatural which is one of my favourite tv series.
I chose to do Hemlock grove because I wanted to do a series that I had never seen before. From the list that we were given I had heard of most of the series and none of them really appealed to me. So when I did a little digging into the others I found that Hemlock Grove intrigued me which has led me to watching the first season to get a better idea. This series is set in a fictional town called Hemlock Grove in Pennsylvania. It’s got werewolves, Vargolves, gypsies and things I can’t even pronounce!!

Hemlock Grove has an audience demographic of 16-30 year olds, mainly the male population due to the fact that there is a lot of gore and can be linked to types of video games. I think what might draw in the female population is the fact that there are a lot of young fit males in the cast which may catch the female eye!! I would say it mainly target the younger population due to the fact of the young cast and also because the amount of mythical creatures and gore that is included. It is also a Netflix Original series which may help with the younger audience. Hemlock Grove is rated an 18 however I am sure there are those younger than that watching this series.

What I like so much about this series is the fact that there are so many twists and turns and there are so many different story lines to follow that you can never get bored! What I will say is that towards the end of the first series things start to get a little weird in the way that the storyline is all over the place and I don't think it was that well done. I did enjoy the first series however I don't think that I will be watching the rest.

Cut Throat

I decided to practise doing a cut throat so that if I chose that to be my final design I would have an understanding of what to do and how best to do it.

The first thing that I did was to add a very thin layer of barrier foam just in case my model had any reaction to the products. I decided to use Sculpting wax as I thought it would be easier to use than Gelatine. I placed a large amount of wax into the back of my hand and using a pallet knife, warmed up the wax slightly so that it was more pliable and easy to work with. Trying to then place it on the neck was incredibly difficult. There were quite a few times that I got incredibly frustrated with it as it either kept sticking to the pallet knife or my fingers. After a while of trying to get the wax on I finally succeeded. I originally placed a long line along the neck and then used the pallet knife and dragged it along the middle to create the cut effect. More frustration occurred when doing this. The next step was to add a thin layer of latex over the wax so that when it came to adding colour it wouldn't ruin the shape of the wax. I then finally started to add colour. I started off using a light shade of red around the outside and started to build up the colour the more towards the middle of the cut. I found that I struggled to blend the colour without ruining the latex. I then added a small amount of wound filler and some blood to help make it look a little more realistic. 

In photos it doesn't look as bad but you are still able to where the edges of the latex are. On the first image you are able to see a slightly darker patch, which is where I accidentally placed a small black patch and wasn't able to completely get rid of it! However due to the amount of time that it took to do I don't think that I will be using this as my final design!!

Hair Chart 2

My second hair is also very similar to the first one. The only thing that I changed was the fact that the top half of the hair is in a plait wrapped around to form a bun. I would then curl the bottom half and pin it so that it frames the bun. I changed the idea slightly because it may be slightly difficult to keep up with continuity and also because time might be an issue. I am not as big of a fan of this design as I am of the first one but I think it still fits in with the character and the era that it was set in. (Again you'll have to excuse my drawing skills!)

Face Chart 2

For my second face chart I decided to try and keep it as similar to the first one as possible. I liked the idea of having the gaunt look to my character but due to timings I'm not too sure how quick the cut throat will take so I made a slightly easier version. Rather than having my designed my character after death, I decided to do it right before. So the gauntness is still there but rather than having a cut throat there are a set of Vampire bites. I think this look works just as well because it fits in slightly more with image of Vampirism. I don't think I explained it on my last face chart post but I decided to have blood dripping down the lip as I feel that it makes it a little more obvious as to the mythical being that I am trying to portray.

Hair Chart 1

When it came to designing my hair chart I had to make sure that it fit in with the era that the book was set in. Dracula was written so that it was set in late Victorian times meaning that the hair was a lot looser around the face and that more of it was up rather than down. I decided to take inspiration from the film rather than the book as I was able to get a better representation of what Lucy should look like. 

Now you are going to have to excuse the horrific drawings, unfortunately I'm not the best artist! The look that I was trying to convey was to have the back of the hair up and completely curled. I would then pin certain curls in a few places near the top of the head. I would use rollers to create the front parts of the fringe and also pin those back. In the film Dracula, Lucy often had her hair down and in both the book and the film she was seen to have had curls so I thought it would be good to include this in my design. 

Face Chart 1

So I started to think about ideas for what I could do for my character. Lucy Westenra was a high class female in society, however in unfortunate events Lucy was turned into a vampire!! I wanted to try and keep to the idealisations thought about vampires, so things like pale skin, smooth skin, pointy teeth and just overall looking flawless. However I also wanted to try and keep to close to the book, so Lucy unfortunately had her head cut off to make sure that she was officially dead in the vampire terms. So I tried to base my character around the dead version of Lucy. 

This is the basis of my first look. I wanted to include the slit throat as it links to Lucy's character but I also want to try at having a go at something slightly different. I think I am either going to use Gelatine or Sculpting Wax to create the cut and then add on the colour. I wanted to create slightly sunken in cheeks and eyes to create an effect that made her look as though she was dead. After bravely scouring through images of dead people and make up styles I came up with an in between version so that it wasn't over the top but it still had an effect. Apart from the throat, I wanted to keep my design simple so as I only have a short amount of time to get both the hair and the make up done and I don't want to be rushing.

Hat, Broom and a Back Cat

In broad terms Witchcraft is thought to be the practice of magical skills and abilities which can be practised by either an individual or group. Witchcraft has three main roles which is religious, divinatory and medicinal, however there are other smaller subjects that link with witchcraft such as sorcery, magic, nercromancy and healing.

Witchcraft originated from The Old Testament Laws which said that Witchcraft was seen as evil and was a form of devil worship. This soon led to the famous Witch trials, which was mainly done in protestant Europe. The witch trials caused people to be tortured, killed and scapegoated. Witches that were thought to have had melavolent causes were the first to be sent to trial where as those that were thought to benevolent thought were accepted into the community, however trying to tell the difference between the two types was incredibly difficult.

Witchcraft is mainly based on spell casting, so the ability to cast a magical action. A spell can be done in a few different ways, some of which are: Chants, runes or a ritual action. Spells can be done for all sorts of magic.

Necromancy: Necromancy is the conjuring of spirits and the dead. This would be classed as the devil worship magic and would cause the witch to go straight to the trials.

White Witch: White witches were thought to be the kinder witches, however in reality they were more like herb healers. This did end up killing a good few women as it was still seen as witchcraft.

In the 20th century people started looking more into the practice of witchcraft and eventually books were published stating that wtitchcraft wasn't acually bad. This then led to the Wiccan religion, which is still practised today.

A Full Moon...

So we have already gone over what a monster is and we looked into the vampire legend. Today I thought we could look into another well known create known as Lycanthrope or more commonly thought of as a Werewolf!! These particular beings are thought to be able to change in to a wolf or a wolf like creature either purposefully or by accident such as a bite or scratch from another werewolf. The folklore behind the werewolf came about around the same time as the witch trials were happening. It started off in what is now known as Switzerland and eventually spread across Europe. Soon the persecution of Werewolves was an incredibly common thing just like the witch hunts.

In the old European folklore there were many different characteristics that were thought to be able to distinguish a werewolf to normal human being. These included both eyebrows meeting in the middle, curved nails, low set ears and a swinging stride. However in wolf form there were very few differences from a normal wolf. One main one though is the fact that a werewolf will have no tail. This is thought to link to witches for when they are in their own animal form.

There are thought to be a few different ways on how a werewolf turns. The most common is one is on a full moon. This came about from French and German folklore, it was thought that if a man or woman was to sleep outside on certain Wednesdays and Fridays on a summer night with the full moon shining on their face that they would be able to turn. One of the more simpler way was to strip of clothing and wear a wolfskin belt. Another was to drink rain water from the footprint of that animal was said work. Remedies to help get rid of a werewolf include the medicinal use of wolfsbane, exorcisim or some slightly more painful methods. 

Since the 1900's Werewolves have become more popular in modern fiction writing. It was actually in 1935 that it was thought that silver would be able to harm a werewolf. It is also said in Bram Stoker's 'Dracula' that a werewolf can only be harmed a 'sacred bullet' and they can only change forms during the night and not day. Also thanks to modern fiction it is thought that werewolves have heightened senses such as speed and strength. Each film or book depicts werewolves to look slightly different. For instance in 'Werewolf in London' the main character is said to keep most of his main features, while in Stephanie Myers 'Twilight' Jacob Black turns into a slightly larger version of a normal wolf. Another version is in J.K.Rowling's 'Harry Potter' series, Professor Lupin turns into a wolf form but walks on his two hind legs but has none of his normal features.

There is a medical condition called Clinical Lycanthropy. This is a rare psychiatric condition where the person thinks they can transform/ have transformed into an animal. 

Continuity?

When it comes to things like creating characters, you need to think about the characters background, status, characteristics, personality, state of mind, apparition and attributes. All of this is what makes a character who they are as a person. You have to treat them like real people because if not it's harder for the audience to get as involved and interested in the movie as they can't really relate to them.

The responsibility of continuity on set is down to the script supervisor however it is up to the make up, hair and props people to actually keep the continuity going. The character must have the same clothes, jewellery, hair style, make up and props at the start of every new scene as they did in the previous one. Without continuity it makes the film look a little stupid as it ruins the illusion that the film is meant to be real life. Careful notes and lots of photos have to be taken before and after the shot so that you can keep up with continuity.

We were given a task to show us how difficult continuity can be. We were to create a black eye on our partner, take photos, get them to remove it and do it again the exact same! Now it may sound easy but trying to do things like keeping the colouring and placement of the bruise was a lot harder than I thought it would be!! 

The one on the left was my first attempt and the one on the right was my second. As you can see they are slightly different colours as the left one has a slightly bluer tint while the right one looks slightly redder. However I think I did an okay job as the differences aren't really that noticeable. At least I don't think they are!

There's no such thing as monsters!

There are a few different definitions for monster:

• A large, ugly and frightening imaginary creature. 
• An inhumanly cruel or wicked person
• A thing of extraordinary or daunting size
• A congenitally malformed mutant animal or plant. 

The word monster originated from the Latin word monere meaning warn. It then slightly changed to monstrum meaning portent or monster. The last change was it becoming the word we know today. 

The monster that I am looking at today is the Vampire!! A Vampire is a mythical being that is said to live of the life of human beings. There have been many adaptations of what a vampire might look like from Stephanie Myers sparkly Edward to Bram Stoker's scary Dracula. Vampires were originally thought to have been bloated and dark skinned however in the 19th century that image was changed rather drastically to the pale and gaunt looking vampires we think of today. Vampires are a widely known legend and in the 18th century many stories including these foul creatures led to actual human corpses to be staked. 

The start of the vampire phase is all down to one man. John Polidori wrote a book called 'The Vampyre' which was one of the best selling books of the 18th century. However it is Bram Stoker's Dracula that people automatically think of when the word vampire is said and it is probably the basis of the modern vampire style and legend.

There are many myths around that surround the Vampire such as that they have no reflection and don't cast a shadow (this could be because they lack a soul). Another thing is that garlic is said to harm vampires along with things like a rosary, holy water or a crucifix. It is also said that a vampire can't walk on consecrated ground such as a church or temple. They also can't cross running water. It is also thought that they sleep in a coffin and come alive at night. Lastly they can't enter a home without permission, but after the first invitation they can come and go as they please. Legend says if you're trying to kill a vampire you gotta have quite a bit of strength in you as a stake to the heart or decapitation are the more popular ways, and they don't sound easy

Now how did the vampire legend come about? Back in medieval times many people were buried alive due to the lack of medical knowledge. This caused people to scratch at the coffin causing fingernail marks making people believe the person had come alive. In the worst case the person may bang their head and face against the coffin door causing blood to come the face making it look as though they had been 'feeding'.  And an easy explanation for the noise coming from the coffins is the natural gas being released from a decomposing body. Sounds lovely eh......

Dracula part II

So I have finally finished Dracula meaning I've got a slightly better understanding to my character. So after writing my last post, Lucy had been killed with the next few pages of the book. Unfortunately Lucy had her head chopped off and a stake through her heart. Little gory but hey ho. This has given me a few ideas as to what I could do for my character design.

To help give a few more ideas, I decided to watch Bram Stoker's Dracula made in 1992. Now at first I was really enjoying the film however mid way through it started to go in the complete opposite direction from the book. I felt that this didn't portray the greatness of the book and it ended up just being a little too strange. However I was able to get a version of what Lucy Westenra was portrayed as. Instead of having blonde hair, this version had a slight ginger tone to it. The curls were there and the angelic look could be seen. During Lucy's time alive the film portrayed her as quite the seductress, with daring dresses and a confident attitude. Lucy had naturally pale skin accentuated by the pale pink cheeks and the slightly framed eyes. There is one scene where her lips were painted to match her cheeks. As her 'illness' goes on her skin becomes a slight grey/ blue colour and her cheeks and eyes become hollow. The small puncture wounds on her neck are barely visible as they blend in with the skin but there was a small amount of blood to help them stand out a little bit. Once poor Lucy had fully transformed her skin had gone completely white, meaning the paleness of her cheeks stood out. She had a small bit of blood on her lips and running down her chin. Let me say, she was a sight to behold.

Due to her head being but off I was thinking about maybe trying to do some sort of cut along my models neck. I definitely want to have some sort of blood around the lips as I think that it really makes a statement. Pale skin and rosy cheeks are an obvious but I need to do it in a way so that it fits in with the time period. When it comes to the hair I'm not so sure as to what I am going to do. I want there to be curls but I can't figure out whether the hair should be up or down or both!!

Dracula

Dracula

So along with reading Dorian Gray, I decided to try and read Dracula as well. Just like Dorian Gray, I have never seen or read anything to do with Dracula so it is completely new to me. Dracula was written by Bram Stoker in 1897. So like Dorian Gray, the wording isn't that modern making it incredibly hard to read. Also the book is done in diary entries, telegrams and newspaper clippings meaning I can get very confused as to who is talking as there are many characters.

At the time of writing this I am only half way through the book and I am really enjoying the book, and I have decided to base my character around Lucy Westenra. From the description that Stoker has given of Miss. Westenra is that she has an angelic look, with pale skin, and long blonde curls. Admired by many men but held down by a Lord Arthur Holmwood. I chose to pick Lucy as she starts of as human but eventually turns into something from the supernatural. Lucy starts to sleepwalk which at the moment I believe to be the work of Count Dracula and eventually she is able to get out of the house and is 'bitten' by the count but she is unaware of it. over the course of the next few weeks, she becomes incredibly ill and with the attempted help of John Seward and Van Helsing tries to get better. She becomes gaunt and incredibly pale and the only thing that seems to be able to help her is blood transfusions and strategically placed garlic..... Eventually she 'passes' and when the time comes for her to be buried she has disappeared. Coincidently a series of disappearances occur due to a 'woman in black'. 

What I like about Lucy is that fact that she is seen to be a gentle being and very serene and she has suddenly changed into something that is on the other end of the spectrum.

That is as far as I have read so unfortunately I have only got a brief idea as to what I would like to do for my character. Hopefully once I have finished the book and see the fate of Lucy I will be able to get a better idea as to what designs I can do.

The Picture of Dorian Gray

The Picture of Dorian Gray

Over the Christmas holidays we were give the task to read a book. Not any book though. We were given a list that we could choose and there were a few that stood out. One which was 'Dorian Gray'. Now I know that there have been a few films made about it, but I had never seen one and I wasn't really sure what it was actually about. 

Dorian Gray was written by Oscar Wilde in 1891 and the little section on the back of the book that explains briefly what it's about reads:

'Upon seeing his own striking portrait, Dorian Gray is bewitched and offers his soul if only the painting will age while he remains eternally youthful. Believing himself incorruptible, Dorian indulges in a life of pleasure and excess. But what has become of his portrait?'

Now after reading this, I was quite intrigued and I felt quite pumped to start reading. I normally enjoy reading anyway as it is a bit of a hobby, so I felt that when it came to this book it would just be a walk in a park. What I didn't think about was that the language would be so different. However seeing as it was written over a century ago it is very different. I found this book incredibly difficult to read and it took me a long time as I didn't want to pick up the book because I knew I wouldn't always understand what was going on. I had to re-read paragraphs so that I could get a better understanding as to what was being said, and even then I still struggled. I also found that it took a while for the the book to really 'get going'. I found that I didn't really enjoy the beginning as at first I felt that it didn't really have much to do with what I originally thought the book was about. However towards the end I really started to enjoy the book (well the parts that I understood) and I started to realise how everything fit together.

So Dorian Gray is meant to be a young, naive teen with an ethereal look that appealed to both men and women. This is what originally caught the eye of notorious painter Basil Hallward and made him question what beauty really is. This then lead to the meeting of Dorian Gray and Lord Henry Wotton, who would soon become a philosophical yet dangerous and influential person in Dorian's life. Wotton is the character that manages to convince Gray that Beauty only matters when one is young, and that when you get old beauty leaves you along with other signs of happiness. After seeing a portrait of himself done by Hallward, Gray realises the extent of his beauty and in an impulsive moment sells his soul so that he could stay young at that the painting would age. At the time Gray though nothing of the comment, it is only later on in the book that he realises what he has done. 

Pretty early on in the book, Gray announces that he is in love with a small time actress called Sibyl Vane. However Gray was in love with the thought of being in love and the idea of the art that Vane creates through her acting. However after finally introducing himself, Vane feels as though her love for acting is nothing compared to her love for Dorian and so when he next goes to see her with Wotton and Hallward she acts horrendously causing major embarrassment for Gray. After being told that Sibyl had  acted badly on purpose due to the fact that Dorian was more important to her, Gray reacted with saying the she had 'Killed his love' for her. Immediately he got rid of her and went back to his town house in a state of fury. After calming down, he realised his mistake and wrote a letter to Sibyl apologising for the way he acted and asked for her forgiveness however it was too late. Vane had committed suicide by taking a large amount of pills due to the heartbreak that Gray had caused. This was what started the change in the portrait. After noticing a slight in expression on the painting, an almost cruel undertone, Gray realised the severity of the problem and had the painting removed from the sitting room to his old school room at the top of the house.

What Dorian wasn't planning on was letting the painting take up a huge part of his life. Gray started collecting objects and learning new things as well as throwing the most extravagant parties throughout his years, however he became so paranoid that someone would find the painting that he couldn't bear to be away from it for too long. He would sit up in the old school room day after day watching the painting change as he learns new things. Throughout his life, Wotton is by him every step of the way, placing new thoughts and ideas into Gray's head, however one day Basil Hallward shows up and tells Gray that he is far from the boy that he originally met and that he hasn't changed for the good. This leads to the first viewing of the portrait from an 'outsider' as Dorian shows Basil the monstrosity that has become of the painting. After realising how bad Dorian has got, Basil exclaimed that Gray could get help however due to the fact that Dorian is so engrossed in the fact that he will forever stay young he refuses and in a fit of rage kills Hallward. This is what starts a downward spiral for Gray. Another thing that doesn't help Gray's state of mind is bumping into Sibyl Vane's brother and having him try to kill Gray for 'killing' Sibyl. The guilt from Sibyl and killing Hallward presses down on Gray and eventually he realises the extent of how he has been acting and goes up to destroy the painting and in turn killing himself along with it.

Now I got very confused reading this and I felt the need to watch a film to see if I could get a better understanding. I first watched the 2009 remake. Point blank I didn't like the film. I found that at first yes it related to the book and it helped me figure out the personalities of the characters better but towards the end it just went off and did not relate to the book at all. I also found that the characters didn't really fit the descriptions that the book described them. I tried to see if I could find another version to see if I preferred that one. I found one made in 1973 which I actually really enjoyed. It had all the original wording so I was able to get an even better understanding as I was able to understand what was meant to be said. I found that this film also really related to the book and it followed the storyline really well.