My first week down in Southampton was quite the adventure, almost every task I was undertaking was challenging me on various different mediums. During this week I was very rarely in a position where I considered myself within my comfort zone, consistently being pushed to be innovative and independent in areas that are mostly alien to me personally. Despite the fact that I was surround by people in exactly the same situation as me, I cant say that it made things a whole lot less intimidating, especially when presented with an independent task with little to no time for preparation. Planning ahead is something that I have realised I took for granted in my lower levels of study during this first week and that over this short time I have come to the conclusion that working with out preparation is not playing to my strengths. However, I still think that I gave this first weeks tasks my best shot and provided impressive outcomes under the circumstances.
Mood Board
The first task that I completed for induction week was done over the last few weeks of summer. This obviously gave me time to plan what I was hoping to achieve as well as the time necessary to carry it out, which allowed me to produce a piece that I was confident in portraying what I intended it to. We were set the task of creating a mood board that represented where we wanted to be in 5 years time. We shared these mood boards within our groups in one of the first sessions, and I found it interesting to see what different people were aiming to achieve from their time at university and how much it varied from person to person.
My mood board shows my current indecisiveness towards my future career. There are numerous different aspects of media hair and makeup styling that I currently would like to explore and find my likes, dislikes, strengths and weaknesses in. I like the idea of doing beauty work in editorial magazines or behind the scenes on runways, as well as having a strong interest in film and theatre makeup and hair design. I also aspire to maybe have my own make up line one day in the future and be an independent business owner. Until I have experienced working in all of these aspects of hair and makeup then I don't feel I will know for sure which of these career paths I would like to take, which is exactly why I'm here and what I'm aiming to learn.
I drew an image for this mood board as its something that I enjoy doing and that I feel is a strength of mine, also its something that I can manipulate to be specific to my portrayal. Each aspect of the drawing represents an area in which I would like to work in the future. The prosthetic ear in the piece represents film and theatre work, the big hair and her makeup represent my aspirations to work in these two fields whether it be as an artist and designer or a business owner. The other pictures I compiled were all related to the career paths that I intend to explore in the future, I found these in magazines such as Elle and Vogue and others I gathered from the internet.
Having taken a small trip to the library in the first few days of my arrival, I found that the it is most likely going to be one of my major sources of knowledge from this point onwards. Its a lot more reliable than I find the internet to be and it held a surprisingly large amount of information on various different areas of the topic at study and I intend to utilise these resources.
Style Review
As well as our mood boards we were asked to analyse the styling of one iconic film from a long list provided. The film that I chose to review was The Great Gatsby (2013). It was only a few months prior to writing this review that I had seen the film and fallen in love with the aesthetic of it. Yet I found this task quite difficult to carry out, as writing is not one of my strong points as I am sure you will come to learn from my blog. One of my biggest weaknesses being that I tend to concentrate on issues that aren't always particularly important, for example I feel as though I didn't pay enough attention to the impact of the styling of the hair and makeup for this review, which was the main focus of the brief. However, being capped at 300 words for this review was overall helpful to me although it being quite a challenge. It forced me to cut out some of the information that wasn't specific to the point that I intended to make. I feel that continuing to analyse books, films and images in future, as well as reading other peoples reviews, I will develop my writing skills and become more precise, as this is something that I feel I need to focus on.
Review by Kate Hall
Alter Ego
One of the first tasks we were set during induction week was to create a mask that acted as an interpretation of what we considered to be our own personal alter ego's, using nothing other than magazines, some crepe paper, pipe cleaners and a brown paper bag.
We had no more than half an hour to produce our masks which instantly made my brain shut down. For the first 10 minutes I was rapidly flicking through magazines, tearing out anything aesthetically pleasing in the hopes that an idea of who my alter ego might be would just come to me like an epiphany. To my surprise, it did. I noticed that everything I was ripping out was brightly coloured, it was bold and glittery and shiny and eye catching. However, personally I present myself in a way that's almost the opposite of this. The colours in my wardrobe range from black to grey, occasionally some white or navy if I'm feeling adventurous but never much colour. This is where the idea for my alter ego came from. My alter ego is the part of me that confident enough to wear the glitter and bright colours that I like but feel that I couldn't ever pull off. She's loud, bold, and glam and I think I did a reasonably good job at portraying this with my mask, especially considering the time frame given to consider this project. The standard at which I was still able to work in this small period of time made me realise my abilities are greater than I think, as well as helping me to understand the way that my mind works through accepting and changing ideas and looking for alternative inspirations.
Three Photos
Kryolan Demonstration
Probably my favourite part of this induction week was when we were given a Seminar by Kryolan makeup artists. We were talked through different techniques that we could use with different products, given general tips on how to achieve particular looks and also given a demonstration on how to create an editorial look using some of the Kryolan products that we had in our kits. We were also spoken to about achieving the job that we wanted in the competitive industry that we are trying to imprint on. I have come to realise that I won't instantly fall out of university and into the career that I want to have, when I finally make up my mind what it is that I want to be doing. Through hard grafting and creating opportunity's for myself I may be able to get my foot in to the door and get to where I want to be but that may mean I'll be sweeping up dust in a makeup shop for a few years before I begin to move up the business ladder.
The notes that I made during this seminar I will definitely be referring to when I come to create my own designs as well as attempting to apply some of the techniques demonstrated.
Despite it not being what I'm used to and feeling thrown in at the deep end, it doesn't mean that I didn't have fun, I actually had an incredible first week at Solent.
Mood Board
The first task that I completed for induction week was done over the last few weeks of summer. This obviously gave me time to plan what I was hoping to achieve as well as the time necessary to carry it out, which allowed me to produce a piece that I was confident in portraying what I intended it to. We were set the task of creating a mood board that represented where we wanted to be in 5 years time. We shared these mood boards within our groups in one of the first sessions, and I found it interesting to see what different people were aiming to achieve from their time at university and how much it varied from person to person.
My mood board shows my current indecisiveness towards my future career. There are numerous different aspects of media hair and makeup styling that I currently would like to explore and find my likes, dislikes, strengths and weaknesses in. I like the idea of doing beauty work in editorial magazines or behind the scenes on runways, as well as having a strong interest in film and theatre makeup and hair design. I also aspire to maybe have my own make up line one day in the future and be an independent business owner. Until I have experienced working in all of these aspects of hair and makeup then I don't feel I will know for sure which of these career paths I would like to take, which is exactly why I'm here and what I'm aiming to learn.  |
| My mood board drawing |
Having taken a small trip to the library in the first few days of my arrival, I found that the it is most likely going to be one of my major sources of knowledge from this point onwards. Its a lot more reliable than I find the internet to be and it held a surprisingly large amount of information on various different areas of the topic at study and I intend to utilise these resources.
Style Review
As well as our mood boards we were asked to analyse the styling of one iconic film from a long list provided. The film that I chose to review was The Great Gatsby (2013). It was only a few months prior to writing this review that I had seen the film and fallen in love with the aesthetic of it. Yet I found this task quite difficult to carry out, as writing is not one of my strong points as I am sure you will come to learn from my blog. One of my biggest weaknesses being that I tend to concentrate on issues that aren't always particularly important, for example I feel as though I didn't pay enough attention to the impact of the styling of the hair and makeup for this review, which was the main focus of the brief. However, being capped at 300 words for this review was overall helpful to me although it being quite a challenge. It forced me to cut out some of the information that wasn't specific to the point that I intended to make. I feel that continuing to analyse books, films and images in future, as well as reading other peoples reviews, I will develop my writing skills and become more precise, as this is something that I feel I need to focus on.
The Great Gatsby – 2013
The plot of ‘The Great Gatsby’ portrays both drama and romance, making it fall
under both genres in my opinion. After numerous
failed attempts of portraying the book through film in 1926, 1949, 1974 and
2002, the 2013 depiction was the first to do so successfully, winning various
awards and making this film so iconic. Catherine Martin was the costume
designer for ‘The Great Gatsby’ who won awards for her work on the production, alongside
Maurizio Silivi and Kerry Warn; hair and makeup artists who won BAFTA’s for
being best in their fields.
The heavily beaded, nude flapper dress that Adelaide Clemens
(Catherine) wear’s, is what defines the style of this film for me, as well as
the ruby red lipstick, black smoky eye and finger waves worn by most women in
the film. This particular adaptation of ‘The Great
Gatsby’ was released in 2013, almost 90 years after the book was written and
based in 1925, meaning that the styles and fashions shown in the film are not reflective
of the styles that are most popular today. However, over the past two years the
styles worn in the 20’s have made a comeback prior to the film being released. Drop
waist dresses, decorative head bands and T-band shoes are all worn in the movie
and these can be seen worn with a modern twist on catwalks and sold on the high
street currently, making this film iconic in terms of style and fashion in my
opinion.
Leading man Leonardo DiCaprio was very likely
chosen for the role due to his already pre-existing classic style and look,
however, his role in ‘The Great Gatsby’ has been noted as one of his most
iconic, alongside his work in the movie ‘Titanic’, bringing him back into the
eye of the media and putting his personal style back into high demand. Review by Kate Hall
Alter Ego
One of the first tasks we were set during induction week was to create a mask that acted as an interpretation of what we considered to be our own personal alter ego's, using nothing other than magazines, some crepe paper, pipe cleaners and a brown paper bag.
 |
| My Alter-Ego |
Three Photos
 |
| Photo 1 |
 |
| Photo 2 |
This task was one of my favourites. We were essentially given the day to explore Southampton having been asked to take photos in black and white of places or parts of Southampton that we thought were picturesque, artistic or that just appealed to us. We were to pick three out of the how ever many pictures that we took and post them to Facebook, tagging another member of our group, aiming to post an image a day for the next three days to come. I didn't travel too far from what I already knew due to the fact that I'm very inclined to getting lost and terrible at following directions, however I still discovered a lot. Having only arrived in Southampton the day before, I hadn't yet had the pleasure of looking around the place that I was planning on living for the next three years of my life, so it was nice to begin familiarising myself with the area. I'm not the best photographer but I tried my best and I think they all look pretty good considering they were all taken on an iPhone with no retouching.
Kryolan Demonstration
Probably my favourite part of this induction week was when we were given a Seminar by Kryolan makeup artists. We were talked through different techniques that we could use with different products, given general tips on how to achieve particular looks and also given a demonstration on how to create an editorial look using some of the Kryolan products that we had in our kits. We were also spoken to about achieving the job that we wanted in the competitive industry that we are trying to imprint on. I have come to realise that I won't instantly fall out of university and into the career that I want to have, when I finally make up my mind what it is that I want to be doing. Through hard grafting and creating opportunity's for myself I may be able to get my foot in to the door and get to where I want to be but that may mean I'll be sweeping up dust in a makeup shop for a few years before I begin to move up the business ladder. 