Evaluation as designer

My design:

My design has changed a lot since pitching my ideas to the group.  I went away and tweaked in, keeping in mind the advice I had been given and also that my partner only had a certain amount of time to complete it. In one of my original designs, I blocked out the eyebrow and then drew on a thin black line to create a frowning brow. I eventually decided to remove it from the design as it was too time consuming and I didn’t want to put my partner under too much pressure. When Marianne tried my design for the first time, she took quite a lot of time on in so I was certain I had made the right decision with removing the eyebrow detail. But as time went on and Marianne became more confident, she was completing my design with time to spare. By this point it was only a week before the assessment and I felt it would have been cruel to add in the eyebrow detail. Next time I will hand over my ‘ideal’ final design, and then I could always make adjustments after my partner has had a go at it and given me feedback.

Looking back, I am not entirely happy with my final images. In hindsight, I wold have gone for a thinner layer of skin base. I did want a dramatic look to suit my lady in waiting (Elizabeth Brydges), but I feel that I could have toned down the base to accommodate for the rest of the detail. I really loved the gold lips with the red and black eyes, im so pleased that I stuck with my original colour scheme. I was originally inspired by the colours in Elizabeth’s famous coronation portrait and wanted to incorporate this into my design. I am also really happy with the detail on the neck, I wanted to create something that represented the deterioration of Elizabeth Brydges’ wealth, social status and mental state. I chose to do white streaks on the neck as pale skin was essential for the noblewomen, so by doing this it shows that her status and wealth is fading. 

For the hair, I wanted half of it loosely off my face and then the rest of it to be heavily backcombed for a really messy look.This is because I felt it was fitting for my character- however looking back at the pictures, i have realised i should have tied it all up so that the detail on the neck was visible from every angle.  There are some things that I would change about my design, but I am pleased with my ideology behind it and how every feature was linked back to my lady in waiting.

The assessment-

Me and Marianne had really good communication throughout this unit. We were constantly in contact via facebook and we did a lot of practice in our own time. However, when it was my turn to be the make up artist, I was so desperate to get as many practises in as possible before my assessment. I wanted to make sure that I was confident with every aspect of marianne’s design. I felt a lot of pressure doing someone elses design and I wanted to make sure that my application was perfect as she had obviously put a lot of effort into creating it. I was quite disappointed that Marianne only wanted to do a couple of practises prior to the assessment. I understand that people work differently, and perhaps I just worry more than others! She obviously was very confident with my design which was good, but I would have liked it if she had wanted to practice a bit more to perfect certain areas. When she did practice, she struggled with the evenness and blending around the eyes and down the face. I would have liked  the red eyeshadow to have been blended better, so that it faded into the white nicely.  The only other area I wasn’t 100% happy with, was the lines going down the nose, I would have liked them to have been a bit harsher and defined. I was really happy with her lip, eyelash and eyebrow application. I know that she initially struggled with coating the eyebrow without touching the skin, but I was really happy with how they looked in the assessment.  I know that she would have been able to perfect all areas if she had practiced more, but other than that I was happy with the overall application. Based on this, if I was to give her a grade, I would give her a C1.

This unit has definitely been a challenge but I have really enjoyed adding to my skill set and broadening my creativity. I loved combining new techniques with contemporary and historical influences.