It's that time of year!

I love black and white movies with the beautiful clothing and women with curves and eyelashes. What a dramatic pose with Cyd Charisse.Hats with little veils are very cool also, and also feathers. I like the almost bare looking makeup with lovely lashes.
And this Agnes Morehead photo is the reason I love black and white so much, the lighting is perfect and her eyes are incredible. The hint of a smile and ever so slightly raised eyebrow gives the look some personality, maybe a hit of challenge.
This is Louis Brooks with the boxy cut, smokey eyes and little doll baby lips. She looks sad to me, I think it's the eyebrows and the vantage point of the camera.
This isn't an especially vintage shot, but I found it very striking in pure black and white. Her cut is extremely blunt but that adds to this ultra precise look. Of course this look could be created in photo shop where all the stray details could be edited out.

I was invited to a costume party and with these images in mind, I decided that I wanted to go as a character from a black and white movie desperately trying to make it into the world of color. That was mainly because I had some great accessories in a beautiful shade of crimson, a scarf, earrings, and matching nail polish and lipstick... all of that was stuff I had on hand. I dyed the scarf and made the earrings recently (there will be a post on those earrings coming soon - promise.) Hubby was nice enough to snap my photo before I left (and before I put on the crimson lip color.) Now that's pale!

I had to take one shot inspired by the woman with the hand over her eye. I thought the vintage glove with the ice rink was a nice touch. You can see that the white from my skin has worn off on the dress at the neckline.

I started out with mineral makeup ingredients, mostly titanium dioxide which is much nicer to the skin than clown white. It stayed put pretty well actually, I didn't notice the color sifting or rubbing off, I was pleased.

I used spray color to take my hair black but didn't do a great job covering my skin and didn't get great coverage but that spray color is nasty stuff so I didn't mind much. I ended up needing to take off some of the white and patch the blotches from over spray... note to self: do the black hair first... THEN the white skin.
Glad to see October come to a close and it's time to see what November has to offer.

I spent part of the day at double tech for a local stage production of "Tuesday Mourning." I'm one of the makeup crew for a very small cast, nothing challenging but I'll enjoy getting out and about each evening this week.

BTW, this is post #198. To celebrate my 200th post I'll put a few things together to give away in my 200th. "Followers" of my blog are eligible to win, just click the link at the right and you'll be entered in the drawing.

Thanks for dropping by and checking out my blog. You never can tell what I'll be creating tomorrow. Peace and Creativity to you all, and goodnight.

Makeup Artist

Over the last year I’ve done makeup for a number of theatrical productions locally.

This gentlemen was playing Heinzy in The Pajama Game.
She was also in The Pajama Game, and what a cutie!
How do you like her hair? That was fun and she loved it!I did makeup for Annie, I did the bald cap for Daddy Warbucks.
And this guy was a riot, I can't remember which character this was though. Every night of the production his look got a little stranger.
Daddy Warbucks had started to melt that evening, but I was enjoying play with the spare bald cap.

And I think that blue thing on my head is actually a skirt or something, that was funky.I won a costume contest with this vintage 1950's style look. We had a lovely dinner and entertainment that evening, and a guy rode through the dining room on a motorcycle!
This one is the creepiest one I've ever done: I don't use clown white, I used pure titanium dioxide and lots and lots of it. It wasn't easy to get off but still better than that clown white stuff. I call it "white girl in purple." This photo is kind of a fluke, it turned out overexposed and I decided that I liked it. These days I don't use regular makeup on myself, I make all my own mineral makeup from the foundations to shadows that I blend myself. It's easy and I enjoy playing with the colors!
These photos of me in pink are still some of my favorites that came together by accident. I took one look at my hair in the mirror one morning and clamped that hat on my head and left for work. I opened the gallery and looked in the mirror and decided that the hat needed the pink scarf and rose from one of the displays in the shop. A little later on I made the pink necklace to match. And by the time I made it home it was kind of a fun look so I had my hubby snap some photos out back. The house that we lived in at the time had been built by a crazy artist witch and she'd splashed that pink paint in various places on the outside walls (it was mainly glass, metal and concrete!) so of course I had to stand right in front of one of her big splashes. I loved that house.
This one almost looks like a 1920's flapper style look. Almost.
There wasn't anything on my to-do list that I felt like doing this afternoon, so I pulled out this Picasso painting and decided I was going to play around with this bizarre look. When I was finished my husband couldn't even stand to look at me, so I deduced that Picasso didn't like women very much. I suppose this is the strangest look I've ever done. It was fun though!
Now to decide who to be for the costume party Saturday evening! I have the mineral makeup, pigments and mica to mix just about any color, but which one? If you have some suggestions, leave a comment.
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PS... This is blog post number 197 and my 200th post will be a giveaway. To be eligible, just become a "follower" of my blog, link in the sidebar to the right.

Makeover and Head Shots

My friends know that I will try just about anything, so when my friend Rachel asked if I’d consider helping her create “head shots,” I said I was interested!
I cleared a day and she came over. We started with her hair, I didn’t intend to give her a hair cut that day, but that was the way it worked out.
Then I did her makeup and we went outside for a few shots. It was a dreary overcast day but we got a few good shots outside anyway.
Later we moved inside to my quilt studio, I cleared off my design wall and set up some lights and we got to work.
I finally let her go home last evening sporting her new ‘do and I sat down to see how the photos had turned out.
It was a pleasure to work with her, she has tons of natural charm and charisma and her hair was so fun to work with!
I’m pleased that we got some good photos!
PS, the jewelry in the photos is all work I’ve created, doesn’t she make a lovely jewelry model?!
Don't you love it when the breeze helps?
Hope she likes them. It was a fun day! She's a lovely soprano, I hope these help her get the opera gigs she'd like!

Display and Dis Play

I’ve recently become Exhibit Chair at a local gallery. I create the displays and make sure the new work has a new home. (It has nothing to do with chairs – lol!) So I started working on the gallery ages ago doing planning but drove up yesterday to begin work on the more serious aspects of the transformation. I couldn’t finish the work yesterday so I had made the drive again today. And this afternoon at around four I finally had to quit because I had somewhere I had to be.

There are some forty artist’s work that I’m fitting into a modestly sized gallery in an old Art Nouveau building. I’ve only got a limited number of linear feet of wall space for wall stuff plus the 3D stuff that needs display fixtures and such. It’s a real juggling act and some people are supportive and (so far only one though when she speaks she says “we”) some are not. So I’m working hard at getting things put together in a way that works, trying to please people and hoping to be successful some of the time. Looks like I’ll need to go back for another day tomorrow because there is much to complete. The scale of the project is a little overwhelming, and so are some of the personalities.

This evening I went off to the theater. I’m one of three makeup artists working behind the scenes on a local production of Annie. We have a cast of 65, and all but one are between the ages of 3 and 20. I’m the one doing the bald cap for Daddy Warbucks and it is an adventure each evening. I’ve pinned more maid’s caps than I care to count as well as repeated makeup and hair changes between scenes. We’re taking people into full wig and makeup, and then back out again – all during the show. Many of them play a variety of roles, some even require aging for one scene and then going back to their youthful look in the next. It’s crazy back stage but it is fun.

This production is far more involved than the last one. I did makeup and hair for The Pajama Game (a cast of 26) and it was very straight forward. Once I finished the cast’s makeup and hair at the beginning, I could stay for the show or go home. Then I still had the evening to get some work done if I chose. In this case I’m working solid from around 4:30 until nearly 11:00. I put Ed into the bald gear, work through all the character changes and then take off the bald cap and clean him up at the end.

Theater and Gallery work are both excellent opportunities to express my creativity, so I'm enjoying it. It did make for a really long day.

Just a few items from the flurry

I have been very busy since my last post. And there is almost too much water under the bridge to fit in one post. I’ve posted my line of Garnished Poems on Etsy and also on my website. Going back through these was an interesting exercise since I haven’t looked at them since early this year. And some of them still feel very fresh to me. As always there are some I like better than others. Here is one favorite.

I’ve also posted my black and white alphabet photography series on Etsy and also on my website. I really love how graphic and quirky these alphabet photographs are when made into words. It is so fun to choose the letters that fit best from a visual perspective. It took quite some time to get all those photographs resized down to little tiny internet files but I’m happy with how things look. I had to add copyright protection information which I found rather annoying but it’s wise to protect the investment from those who would just save and print out my work as if it were their own. Anyone coming from my website can get to the Etsy page to make the purchase. I hope it’s an easy interface for most folks. I love the whole idea of these photographs. Actually, this has really led me to fall in love with the alphabet all over again. Seems strange, I know, but I love the simple graphic elements of the alphabet. It has me transfixed and I have projects waiting in the wings for a little time to complete them. More alphabet photography! Yes! I’ll be having more of that!



All the work on Etsy and my website has led to a complete overhaul of the site. An completely new look and I’ve tried some things I’ve left alone in the past. Surf on over and let me know what you think. CarmenRoseStudio.com

I’ve also been busy in the studio making soap. And I have a major event this weekend or else I’d spend some time making photos of the latest soaps and post them. I want to get that product line posted on Etsy and my website as soon as I can but it won’t be this week. I’ve gotten some reactions to the soaps now and am delighted to see that they go over beautifully. I’ll be selling soap and mineral makeup at the local Farmer’s Market. I wouldn’t have considered that a year ago but now it seems like it may be a good way to meet people in the town I call home these days.

Yeah, I make the mineral makeup that I wear but am still in the beginning stages of making a product line. I gotta tell ya, I love the products that I’ve made so far! I’ve made a skin care (not a cosmetic) combination of minerals, green tea and vitamin E that I wear under my makeup and at night. I’m completely amazed by what the simple combination has been able to do for my skin. Plus… since all mineral makeup is NOT created equal and there are a lot of products out there touting “Mineral Makeup” that actually have ingredients that are HARMFUL and known irritants… well, let’s just say I’m delighted to be making a product that I know is good for my skin and just happens to look great on me. Plus, I managed an exact match to my skin tone. You can’t say that everyday… my makeup matches me! Yay! Anyway, how did I get on that tangent?

I have a big event this weekend that has completely hijacked my schedule and I don’t mind a bit. It will be a great opportunity to share my work with a diverse group of people and support a great cause.

A thunder storm is blowing up and I must get home and let the border collies inside so they don't freak out completely.
ta ta