A third try…

For this week's Moulage Monday knee look I went into it with far more confidence. I noticed this as soon as I started mixing up my sculpt gel as I mixed up far more than I had the previous weeks.

I knew what I wanted to achieve right off the bat and with my reference images and knowledge of where I wanted to improve from previous weeks, I got going. Like last week I started off by building up the inside of the wound first. I created the basic shapes, not worrying too much about perfection at this stage, but rather just getting the basic shapes and thickness of product that I needed so that I could build off of it. Next time I do this look, I am planning to colour this initial layer of sculpt gel a fleshy pink colour as I ran into some small issues with the colours I applied later beading on the surface. I think that this is due to the fact that I used far more product than previous weeks so I think that the best way to combat this is going to be by pre-colouring the gel.

Once this layer had started to set I went in with some more sculpt gel to build up the broken skin layer around the edge. I probably will not bother colouring this layer next time as I think I can get a better blend into my natural skin with the clear sculpt gel and colouring on top. I do feel that I made the wound a little too wide this week in comparison to my reference image, however I don’t think that it is too much of an issue, just something to be aware of next time.

As always I added in skin texture once the sculpt gel had begun to cure. I opted to try out some different tools this week, so I used a very small metal ball tool (the sort you get for nail art) and a silicone sculpting tool as well as my usual coarse sponge. I enjoyed the way that these tools added texture into the sculpt gel, however I don’t think this is by any means an essential step and it is something that I am only likely to do again if I am creating a look that requires a lot of fine detail within the skin texture such as a scar or perhaps a burn.

Once this was fully cured I went in with my colour. I again opted for my Skin Illustrator palette and my favourite drying blood from Fleet Street bloodworks in the shade ‘dark’ as well as another one of my favourite bloods from Kryolan. I am still not 100% happy with the colouring as I feel I lost a lot of the nuances that I had attempted to build when applying. I do not feel that the yellow iodine colour was used as successfully as in previous weeks and I feel it got a little lost by the end. I also think that the colouring inside of the wound could have popped more, perhaps with some lighter tones of pink showing through, although as stated earlier I feel that this could be more easily achieved by pre-colouring the sculpt gel.

Overall I think I am definitely making progress each time I do this look, there are always going to be things I want to change and new techniques I want to explore, and giving myself the freedom to stick to one look has allowed me to analyse my own work more than I have done in a long time. It is a really challenging and equally exciting experience and it is definitely something I am looking to do more of, not just in my special effects makeup but also in other aspects of my creativity.

I am planning to do maybe one more look in this series and hopefully conclude next week so if you’re interested then keep an eye on my social media for updates when I post.

Thankyou for reading and I hope that you have been enjoying this mini series 😊