The Makeup Artist Handbook

by Gretchen Davis

  Mixing Pigment for Flesh Tones

  by Don Jusko

  Every skin tone is unique. All the colors and ranges of colors from #1 yellow to #7 red are colors used to get skin tones. Colors from yellow to red all darken to brown, either by adding brown or by mixing brown. All skin colors have a range of 10 tints and 10 darks for each of the seven colors. To make a skin tone lighter, you will take the color already plotted and lighten it with white or yellow. To make a skin tone darker, you will take the color already plotted and darken with browns and the complement color. You can also change existing foundations or mix your own by using the color wheel.

  Color Function

  Usages and combinations of color greatly affect your final makeup application (Figure 3.17). You will also need to address the undertones in the skin, eyes, and lips. Color can balance, conceal, correct, or show emotion. Example: If there is too much red in the face, you can apply a green or yellow under or over the foundation to neutralize the red. You need to understand how colors function in relation to makeup artistry.

  Figure 3.17 Tube Pigments for Color

  Red is one of the secondary colors. Magenta is a primary color. The complementary color to red is cyan. Red is made by mixing yellow and magenta. A cool cherry red (RCW #12.6.5) will bring life into a darker skin tone, but only if the skin tone is cool as well. Orange red will give a healthy glow to golden skin. Red is also used in makeup effects to show sun damage, alcohol abuse, windburn, crying, skin lesions and rashes, bruising and trauma to the skin, and to neutralize any gray undertones in appliances and tattoo cover-up.

  Blue is a secondary color. The complement to blue is yellow. Cyan is a primary color. Blue is a combination of magenta and cyan. Blue will work with most skin tones. Blue and shades of blue should not be used for bluescreen work—it will disappear. Blue can be used in makeup to portray illness, death, cold, and freezing, as well as bruising of the skin.

  Yellow is a primary color. The complementary color to yellow is blue. Yellow is used to add warmth to other colors. Yellow browns (gold) in eye shadows, blushers, and lipsticks flatter golden skin tones. In makeup, yellow can be use to portray illness, weakness, rotting, and bruising.

  Green is a secondary color. Green is a combination of cyan and yellow. The complement color to green is magenta. Green can be cool (blue green) or warm (yellow green). In makeup, green is used to neutralize reds (for example, to tone down ruddy skin tone or broken capillaries in the face). Warm greens (with yellow added) look good on golden tones, or golden skin tones. Cool greens (with cyan or blue added) look good on cool tones, or skin with cool undertones. Green is also used in bruising and to portray illness, cold, or rotting. Green is also used to cover tattoos. Green or shades of green should not be used in greenscreen work—anything green becomes invisible.

  Orange is a warm color that is between yellow and red on the RCW. The complementary color to orange is halfway between cyan and blue, called cobalt blue (RCW #22). Orange is a vibrant color that can be used as a highlighter on warm and dark skin tones. Orange is a good color to use for masking out blue, as in beard stubble and covering tattoos. Orange also will neutralize blue undertones (or blue lighting) in dark skin tones.

  Violet (RCW #14) is the color between purple and magenta. Violet is a cool color. The complementary color to violet is chartreuse. Violet is used to correct too much yellow or sallowness in skin tone. Most cool skin tones look good in the color violet. In makeup, violet and combinations of violet are used for bruising, wounds, freezing, and death.

  Pink is red with tint (white) added. There is a warm pink, which is a light red, and a cool pink, which is magenta. Pink is flattering to most skin tones. Magenta pink is good on cool skin tones. Warm pink (with golden tones added) looks good on warm skin tones. In makeup, pink is used in eye shadows, lipsticks, and blushers to show good health.

  Black is often used to darken another color and make a shade of that color. Shading colors can also be made by mixing opposite colors together. Black mixed with white makes a neutral gray. Cool, darker skin tones tend to look good in black. In makeup, black is used in eye shadows, eyeliners, brow color, and mascara. Black can be used to add drama or depth to existing colors.

  White is added to other colors to make tints. In makeup, white or off-white can be used as highlighters, or to make darker colors stand out. Cool, darker skin tones tend to look good in white.

  Color Lessons

  Color is one of the most important things to have a good understanding about. The more you use what you read, the easier using color becomes. Whether you use a traditional color wheel or the RCW is up to you. The lessons address using the different primary colors, but the knowledge can also be used for more traditional ways of color mixing. Just think of these color lessons as a way to mix to get even more color choices.

  Lesson One: The Color Wheel

  1. Using artist paper and a pencil, draw a RCW. Be sure to use the correct dimensions and straight edges. Use the RCW in Figure 3.3 for reference.

  2. Paint in the correct colors on your wheel.

  3. After you are done painting, number and name the wheel.

  Lesson Two: Complementary Pigments Make Neutral Darks

  1. Draw three simple contour drawings of an object or face.

  2. Pick three of the opposition colors in Figure 3.11 to use as details, shadows, or highlights (for example, cadmium orange and cobalt blue are opposition colors).

  3. Use the colors separately and mixed together to create neutral darks.

  Lesson Three: Complementary Pigments Make Neutral Darks

  1. Use the example from Lesson Two, but instead follow the brown pigment chart (Figure 3.16) for reference.

  Lesson Four: Creating Several Skin Tones

  1. On artist paper, create several skin tones by using pigments that have been tinted or darkened accordingly. Remember to use all the ranges of color from #1 yellow to #7 red.

  2. Darken these colors to brown by mixing your browns.

  3. When you come up with skin tones you like, write down, next to the color, the exact combination you used. This is a way to keep records for future use.

  References

  Jusko, D., www.realcolorwheel.com.

  Jusko, D., www.realcolorwheel.com/complementsneutral.htm.

  Jusko, D., www.realcolorwheel/pigmentrcwmap.htm.

  Jusko, D., www.realcolorwheel/tubecolors.htm.

  4. Lighting

  Lighting can be one of the most important tools for a Makeup Artist. It is always a good idea to know what type of lights are being applied as well as the kind of gels or filters that will be used in front of the lights or the camera lens. Makeup is often adjusted to meet those demands. Most often, if you have designed your makeup with the lighting in mind, your artistry will be enhanced by it. If you ignore the effects that lighting and color have on your makeup application, the mistakes will be obvious for all to see. It all works together and takes years to really learn, but you will get invaluable practical experience with each job. Eventually, you will recognize what colors work with the lighting situations you are in, and the more you know about lighting, filters, and gels, the better the outcome.

  Before a shoot starts, ask questions of the director, the cinematographer (also known as the DP, director of photography), or the gaffer (lighting designer). If they are not available, sometimes the first AD (assistant director) can help. Of course in some jobs, you will not get the chance to ask any questions. Be observant, watch the lighting crew and camera, and ask questions when they are not busy. Most people are very happy to explain their job or situation to you. Is it a film, video, HDTV, or stage production? You should know whether you are filming indoors or outside, day or night, and what lights, filters, and gels are planned. There are so many factors, and the more you know, the better off you are. Remember, this is not a perfect world—there will be many, many times that information is not available. So know your stuff, and be ready to work out of your kit and think on
your feet.

  Joseph N. Tawil, president of GAMPRODUCTS, Inc., is an expert in light and color mixing. He suggests: “Often I recommend that lights be set up in the makeup room in which you can put colored gels to simulate the lighting on stage or for camera.”

  This is a perfect working condition, but you cannot count on it. In some productions, this will be accommodated, but it depends on the project, prep time, and—very important—the money. Lighting packages can be expensive, and so are those light bulbs.

  Color Description Terms for Light

  By Joseph N. Tawil, President, GAMPRODUCTS, Inc.

  Hue, value, and chroma are terms from the Munsell system of color notation (published in 1905). It is a system designed for explaining color in ink and paint rather than color in light. However, the three descriptive terms are used to define the color of light, contributing more to the confusion than to the clarity of the subject. The vocabulary of color is a minefield of contradictions and confused meanings. Colorimetry is another system for describing color, and is of particular interest because it relates well to colored light. In colorimetry, the following terms are used to describe the color of light:

  Dominant Wavelength (DWL): The apparent color of the light. Similar to the term “hue,” meaning the apparent color (e.g., red).

  Brightness: The percentage of transmission of the full spectrum of energy (similar to value). Often described as intensity.

  Purity: The purity of color is similar to chroma. It describes the mixture of color of the DWL with white or the color of the source. If there is only color of the DWL, it is 100-percent pure; but if there is very little DWL in the mixture, as in a tint, the color could be as low as, say, 5-percent pure.

  White: The presence of all colors in the light.

  Black: Absence of all colors.

  Texture: The surface properties of a color, as in shiny or matte, reflective or diffusing.

  The Language of Additive and Subtractive Color Mixing

  By Joseph N. Tawil, President, GAMPRODUCTS, Inc.

  Color mixing with lights is called additive color mixing (Figure 4.1). This tricolor mixing theory was proposed by Sir Thomas Young in the early 1800s, and it is the basis for all film and video color systems today. Young discovered that by mixing red, blue, and green light, he could make most of the colors in the visible spectrum. Young determined that red, green, and blue were the ideal primary colors of light because they allow for the widest variety and create a reasonable white. Red, green, and blue are three colors that are widely separated from each other. Because of this, they will combine to make many other colors, including, in the right circumstances, white.

  Figure 4.1 Additive Colors

  Combining two primary colors creates a secondary color that is a complement of the third primary (“complement,” as in completes). For example, by combining red and blue, you get magenta and other colors in the violet and pink range. Combining blue and green generates cyan (blue green) colors. Combing red and green creates yellow and other colors in the orange range.

  Complementary colors are also called secondary colors. Violets and pinks are complementary to the primary color green because they contain red and blue. Oranges and yellows are complementary to the primary color blue because they contain red and green.

  Tricolor mixing is illustrated in Figure 4.1. It is interesting to note that the complementary colors (or secondary colors) created in the additive color-mixing process—cyan, yellow, and magenta—are the primary colors of the subtractive color-mixing system. Obviously, this is not an accident, and the two theories do tie together.

  Subtractive Color: Subtractive color filtering (Figure 4.2) is something all of us have experienced in elementary school, where we have mixed paints to make a variety of colors. It's possible to read art books where painters talked about mixing primaries to make different colors. The primaries are often described in these art books as red, yellow, and blue. Filmmakers, however, see the subtractive colormixing primaries described as yellow, cyan, and magenta. Using the same language to describe primary colors in both the subtractive and additive color-mixing processes causes a great deal of confusion. Printers and filmmakers define the subtractive primary colors more accurately as cyan, yellow, and magenta (CYM), separating them from the additive color process. In subtractive color mixing, as we mix the primary colors of paints, inks, or filter emulsion layers, the resulting color gets darker and darker, and eventually black.

  Figure 4.2 Subtractive Color Chart

  Subtractive color mixing is what we do when mixing makeup pigments, as opposed to the lighting department, which will use the additive process for color mixing.

  Additive Color: In the additive color-mixing process, we are adding primary colors to come to white light. In the subtractive color-mixing process, we are mixing the primary colors to come to black.

  When the artist knows that the word “additive” means mixing light to get a color, and the word “subtractive” is mixing pigments (makeup), all the mystery about a light source is better understood.

  Correction Filters: The primary function for correction filters is to balance to a given light source. The two points of balance most often used are 3200K (or tungsten), and daylight (usually 5600K). Most film and television is divided between the two. For example, if you are shooting in an office with sunlight coming through the window, you will want to correct for one or the other. You either warm the sunlight toward tungsten, or you raise the apparent color temperature of the incandescent to daylight. The Makeup Artist needs to understand that the light itself does not affect the makeup, but how the lights are manipulated by additive color mixing with the use of gels and filters in front of the light source does.

  Fluorescent Light: This type of light is problematic because of the green spikes attributed to it. Manufacturers make two kinds of fluorescents: warm and cool. The warm leans toward tungsten, and the cool leans toward daylight. Other problems with fluorescents are inconsistent lamp manufacturing, aging lamps that are still being used, and the fact that certain colors are always missing from the spectrum. If you find yourself on a shoot with fluorescents as a light source, and you need to match or create a specific color (let's say lipstick), take a test photo before the shoot begins.

  Video Lights: Video often uses softer lights (soft boxes) for indoor interviews. Film and video usually work with HMI (hydrargyrum medium-arc iodide) if shooting outside in the daylight or with incandescent in the studio. Be prepared to make adjustments to the makeup if the actor is being moved from an interior shot to an exterior shot. There is a big difference in the visual perception of colors when incandescent lights are used inside to do your makeup, and then you go outside and shoot in daylight or with HMI lights.

  If the actor is going back and forth between interior and exterior shots, and there is no time for adjustments, choose the situation that is the longest on screen, or the most important for dramatic content, for your makeup to be the best. This works for film, television, and stage.

  —Gerd Mairandres, Wigmaster, San Francisco Opera

  Stage Lighting: Stage lighting uses light for different reasons. There are a wide range of colors used theatrically. When you're working in the theatre, the lighting designer is there during the technical/rehearsal period, and the color design can be discussed then.

  The theatre typically uses an incandescent source unless you're looking at a xenon follow spot or HMI follow spot, which is very close to daylight, and much bluer in its energy. The makeup is decided by how bright the light will be, how large is the stage being lit, what color gels or filters are being used to light the actors or objects onstage, and how the light is used around the stage.

  Photography

  Still photography uses light to create greater dimension, to highlight different areas, and to reduce or magnify details. Natural light or ambient light is often used to create moods. Artificial light is used to control different shoot locations and situations. Tungsten or incandescent lig
hting is most common.

  Whether you are shooting photographs for fashion, beauty, or editorial, the lighting, attention to detail, and understanding concepts will be very important to the final print.

  Still Photography Lighting

  By J.C. Cerilla

  In creating an impressive photograph it is necessary that you collaborate with a great team. Photographers have a keen eye for details and an amazing photo is not created by the photographer alone. It is a group effort among different artists excelling in their own fields. I believe you are only as good as the team you work with, so I look for a makeup artist who has a keen eye for detail, is consistently conscious of the model's makeup, and always sees to it that the desired look is achieved for the photograph. Lights have different effects on makeup, so a makeup artist should always ask for and see a test photo or Polaroid. This lets you see the effect the lighting will have on your makeup and allows for any needed adjustments.

  Since a key element in photography is lighting, the proper lighting is essential in achieving a great photograph and images that sell. The lighting should have a sense of balance with shadows and highlights. Facial features or objects might be highlighted to enhance the beauty of the subject or create a mood. Some photographers choose to work with a perfectly exposed image. Another lighting trick is adding reflectors or white boards on the dark side of the subject to add back some details to the shadow. Photographers also work with different types of light modifiers, like a soft box, to change the look and feel of an image (Figures 4.3 and 4.4). The number of light strobes you use does not matter if you know how to do proper lighting. You could use all the lights that you have, but if you do not know how to properly incorporate them in your shots, they are useless.