Below the Line | Below the Line: To bring the character of Auggie Pullman (a boy with severe facial deformities) to fruition in the film Wonder, makeup effects artist, Arjen Tuiten researched children with Treacher Collins syndrome. “Most of the time, they had a very similar look,” Tuiten stated. “Very distinguished. To create the illusion, I knew Auggie was going to need full prosthetics.”
4 comments:
First off I was very excited for this movie to come out but knowing now that the actor doesn’t have any facial deformities in real is upsetting. I was looking forward to the movie as a way to get people like the character Auggie Pullman into the industry. Unfortunately theatre is such an image based industry and was hoping this movie was a step in the right direction. That being said I think the creativity of Arjen Tuiten is amazing. It takes a lot of inventiveness for coming up with this idea and probably a lot of trial and error. It was interesting to hear Tuiten’s process of how the idea came to him at 3 am because I think this is something that happens to a lot of people in my class. It is nice to know that industry professionals have brilliant ideas in the middle of the night than us. It proves that we aren’t that far away from the industry, even though we still have a lot to learn.
I am so intrigued by this article because I actually read the book that this movie is based on, Wonder. The prosthetics behind the face are so incredibly detailed and molded to fit just his face, which, I thought this was really interesting, grew so much from April to September that it couldn't fit the actor’s face anymore. I do wish they had said how much all of the prosthetics cost, and also, how much the total cost of makeup was from time spent creating these prosthetics, to the 90-minutes every day they had to spend getting him to look the part and blend in the prosthetics to make it look realistic enough for television quality. I do, agree with the end of the article, where they make a subtle comment that states that two surgeons thought the actor had Treacher Collins syndrome, but why didn’t they just hire someone with that syndrome? Hiring an actor with that disability would make Hollywood a more diverse and more authentic place.
The makeup created for this movie is absolutely unbelievable. Treacher Collins syndrome is a terrible thing with a very visual outcome. The lengths that the makeup team went through to create this effect with entirely practical effects is incredible. Especially due to the fact that they were working with a nine year old. When I was nine years old the only way I would sit still for 75 minutes, let alone 90, would be if I was absolutely engrossed in a book. In addition to the normal difficulties of creating such a detailed piece that has to be worn for so long, it also is to be worn by a child which means it is of a smaller scale, and also it needs to be able to expand over time as the actor’s head grows. On top of that I imagine that working on something like this could be taxing on your mental health. To need to work on something so sad every day for so long would be too much for me without the support of others.
Prosthetics and makeup has come so far in the past couple of years. I always find it interesting what people decide to do with makeup versus with CGI. This article reminds me of that article posted on the PTM blog a while ago of the velociraptors in Jurassic Park. They created a velociraptor costume for a human to wear that would make them move and look like a velociraptor. They could have chosen to generate them through CGI, but someone decided to go through the trouble to make a costume instead. Although there is an art to CGI and all things on the computer, going through the work and effort to make a costume or prosthetics in real life is something that is becoming more obscure and less relevant in the age of technology. I really appreciate the people that decide to go the non-digital route. It always seems somewhat more impressive in a way!
Post a Comment