Man Up!

Posted by: Steph

Today, I totally Stumbled onto this video, where a woman uses makeup (black and white eyeliner and eyeshadow) to transform her look into a man, specifically Jared Leto. And I was BLOWN. A. WAY. I've learned a lot of tricks to play with the contouring of a woman's face to make it look leaner or make the nose look longer and all that jazz, but I never thought of being able to do something like this!

http://thoughtcatalog.com/2010/woman-transforms-herself-into-jared-leto-in-6-minutes-goes-viral-on-youtube/

It got me curious, were there any makeup tutorials out there on youtube which could teach me how to do something like this? After some searching, I only found a few videos of non-exceptional illusions and speed throughs like the one above. None of them near matched the quality of transformation, however.

On a side note, I found it interesting that there were a large variety of male to female videos and very few comparatively of female to male. Very interesting.

What I loved about this idea is the perception of gender as defined by slight and almost imperceptible differences in just shadows of the face! Of course, I now had to take my shot at it. I pretty much followed selfOblivion's process on the video. Although I used browns instead of blacks because my hair is much lighter. It made for a slightly less rock-star look in my opinion.

I didn't have a short hair wig, so I wanted to use a hat, but I only had a cowboy hat. Thus - scraggly cowboy. 

Less Rockstar... More habitual drug user, who seems pretty masculine! 

Clearly, it's not perfect. In fact, my boyfriend seemed offended by my "bad beard" as he called it. (He does have a full beard he wears proudly.) However, I am so excited by this optical illusion that I am thinking of doing this for next Halloween. I realize, yes, that it is far away from the time I write this post. However, that gives me a lot of time to perfect! My costume might be - Dressed as a guy who is dressed like a rockstar. So when people ask me who I am, I will say I'm a rockstar and they (hopefully if I am good at my makeup) won't know I'm a girl! SO excited!

UPDATE: After watching the Jared Leto vid, I knew I could do better. So I tried again and here's two pics. A little more shadow-y and angle-y with my smoldering good looks.... ?

Gangsta o

contemplating on how to look sexy as a man

PS: Here's a pretty normal picture of me to compare:

Doll is Gaga all over you

Posted by: Steph

Going through my internet related tasks, I realized that Katie and I had left this blog a-hangin. I am about to remedy that. For last halloween, I decided to be ... a creepy doll! I wanted to be more russian pocelian doll rather than plastic barbie, so that is sort of what I was going for. My inspiration included:

Let's face it. Dolls are creepy. My mom has a child-sized one hanging out in the spare bedroom and I am scared to go to bed at night when I stay over. I can just see it looking around with its beady eyes just waiting to giggle and then murder me.

The creep factor comes from the child-like proportions - mainly, I think, in the eyes. The eyes are huge! I researched TONS of doll costumes others have done, and most stuck with their own eyes. Actually, most were of the Barbie persuasion. Until I found the two videos that inspired me the most. The first was a Lady Gaga Bad Romance make-up tutorial which introduced me to the optical illusion of bigger eyes, and the second introduced me to the concept of hiding your eyebrows for major transformation!

(Lady Gaga)

(Broken Doll from Petrilude - HUGE inspiration)

I tried the process a few times in September just to make sure it would work for the big Aitch-Day.

creepy, right? Don't worry, it gets better. 

 Here is it all coming together on the big weekend:

Erasing my eyebrow. God I look creepy. Also, I used some flesh putty to extend my forehead to make the wig look less awkward with those big eyes. Right now, it looks like my whole face is a mask because of it, and I could just RIP it off! 

I have eyebrows again! 

Final product! Got a $10 dress at Savers, used a $7children's tutu for my neck poof thing, and bought accessories to make a wonderfully creepy doll! 

Not everyone knew that though. I was asked a lot if I was Lady Gaga, or someone from Alice in Wonderland. I guess I could see both of those. 

Here's a shot with my eyes closed (on accident) but you can see how hidden my brows are. Shiny, but hidden. Katie looks so excited about it too. 

NOW I look Lady Gaga-esque. 

Overall, I could not have been more pleased with the outcome. Months of planning and hard work definitely paid off! Now... let's start planning for next year!

Autumn Leaves

Posted by: Katie!

Fall is my favorite time of the year, so when I went on a walk today all I could think about was how beautiful the leaves were, and how awesome it would be to make a fall themed costume using the beautiful fall colors.

Since there's no such thing as an original idea, of course it's been done:

http://www.buycostumes.com/Autumn-Nymph-Adult-Costume/19200/ProductDetail.aspx

http://purpleslinky.com/offbeat/15-absolutely-bizarre-halloween-costumes-for-grown-ups/ 

(actually, all the costumes on this site are awesome -- especially the cookie monster one!)

So then I started thinking, what a great group costume the four seasons would be...

Guess what?

 

I still think this idea is super fun, and there's so many different ways you could go. Glamorous, sexy, funny, some combination of the three.  Good luck agreeing who in your group gets to be what season, though!

Finally, I came up with a vague idea which I think has some promise. For many people, the beauty of fall is tainted by the threat of winter around the corner. Is there a way to personify this dread? Personally, I love snow, but I think a lot of people would relate. What if someone was dressed up as beautiful, happy fall from the front, and they turn around and it's evil winter, with dangerous icicles? Or split down the middle of their body between benign fall and scary winter? Any ideas?

I hope you enjoyed following my flight of idea. Sorry I didn't have a cool drawing like Steph did!

P.S. I'm in love with that Cookie Monster costume. Is there a way to do that with say, Edward Cullen?

P.P.S Someone came into work the other day wearing the bottom half of a ghillie suit:

There's got to be some way to make that into a costume. Heck, it already is a costume!

Cute as a Bug?

Posted by: Stephi!

Are bugs cute? Halloween thinks they are. Take a look:

Kohl's Reversible Costume

This post's inspiration comes from an umbrella that I thought was cute at Target, however - ladybugs?? So overdone - take a look at this screen shot from my search: 

Although I do think the cute little doggy lady bug costumes are cute!
Anyway -- overdone, right?!

Then I got to thinking about how I don't even like ladybugs, and I rather hate them. Really it's ironic that people dress like them because if you look at them close, they are really not cute. Blach.

They gross me out, mainly due to horrifying experiences with them when I was younger.
Anyway, the costumes don't even look like bugs.
They really should look something more like this:

Find this costume here. 

Scary right!?

Lady bugs are scary. And bite. And draw blood sometimes. Sort of like vampires. 

Lady BLOOD is born! Take a look at my very elementary computer sketch of what this would look like (since I guess no one has actually done it and posted it on the internet! Can't imagine why...)

1. Get some black antennae. And not the ones with hearts attached. Preferably ones that look even a little segmented for a creepier feel. 

2. It's hard to tell, but this is pointing to her face. After looking at some pictures of ladybugs, I realized they have huge white looking eye things on the sides of their "face". So you ought to put some there too. Face paint the rest of your face black so it your huge white eyes will stand out. You can kind of see where you eyes would be (I drew the human face parts in grey for better visuals). 

3. So... these are pincer thing-a-ma-jiggers are not entirely based on reality... but Lady bugs/bloods have to eat somehow! Make these by using horn-like things you can get from a Halloween shop - or make them yourself by paper mache` or something else creative! Attach these to the face by spirit gum junk or anything else creative you can think of. Oh and tip the with blood of course... 

4. So lady bugs have three legs, so you can either add three arms or two arms and counts your legs as a set of one. I thought three looked a little more bug-like. You can make these scary claw-arms yourself by googling it on the internet. I have seen a number of different variation for different costumes that usually involve a backpack of some sort - take a look at the Shiva costumes here.  Make sure the arms and claws are black true to ladybug-ness

5. add some blood to those claw hands! You are lady blood after all! 

6. wear a red dress and add some black spots. You can figure out how to be creative with it. Also, I would probably wear leggings because I like leggings. Or you could be more sexy and wear thigh-high stockings. Or a less obvious sexy and just bare your legs. Or wear black all the way down your legs I suppose.

7. throw on some "killer" shoes. My choice - black pumps or red heels. 

8.  I forgot the hair part so I added it at the end - I would make it crazy and wild and teased up! Or you can have however you like... 

Now add some bug noises of your choice (I'm not sure what they would be - hissing?) and add that to your costume all night long. Yeah! Lady Blood! 

There you have it - another unique idea for Halloween! Choose this costume and you'll be as cute as a bug. Er... 

Hallo!

Katie here. I hope I can live up to Steph's two very enjoyable posts.

So, I was trying to figure out what costume(s) to write about for my first post, but I couldn't find anything as creative or interesting as Steph did. Just a lot of overdone, obvious things. So I gave up and decided to describe the one semi-creative costume idea I came up with all on my own. I haven't used this idea yet, though it's been in the back of my mind for a while. The costume is called . . . .

Princess Escaping From Dragon's Lair

Basically, one would just need to buy a generic princess dress like the one below:

Any gown would do. I chose this one (from costumesinc.com) for two reasons:

1. it was one of the first ones I saw, and

2.it has sleeves, which gives more flexibility for the second step of creating this costume.

The Second Step: tear that dress up! (Actually, the gown above is $119, so I don't recommend using this particular dress).

This princess ran from a dragon do you think her dress survived unscathed? I imagine a lot of small holes, and tears from it getting caught on stuff, to perhaps some claw marks where the dragon almost got her (could play with blood here, too). Finally, some creative burning would be marvelous. Add a messed up princess-y updo, a bent, beat up crown, and some dirt and soot, and the costume is complete.

I've been sitting on this idea for a couple years. Why haven't I used it yet? Partly because I tend to wait until the last minute to throw a costume together and this one requires more time. Mostly, though, I have such a clear mental picture of the finished product, I don't feel like my actual attempt to achieve it would live up to my expectations. -shrug- Maybe I'll use it some time in the future.

Sorry there were no puns in this post . . .

What's Black and White and Halloween all over?!

Can I interest you in a probably-too-long backstory?


I'll take that as a yes, please. :)

Okay, so I was at work today cashiering for Target, and this cute couple are purchasing a kid's costume - a boy and girl versions of gnomes! I fell in love with the idea --- it's so whimsical and fun - even/especially for an adult. Additionally, I don't know how popular gnome costumes are with infants, but I haven't seen too many adult gnomes or gnomes costumes out there, so it would be a unique way to celebrate Halloween! Here's the Target costume:

Courtesy of Target.com

Isn't it adorable?!
Here's a link to some fun homemade adult adaptions

I don't know if I love any of these examples especially, however there is definitely some room for creative growth! (I do like the lawn-ornament costume set - ha ha!)

So you might have thought that was the end of the story and have been very sad because of it - fear not! I continue:

So here I was doing some gnome research, and an ad in the corner of the screen catches my eye: "$1 Costumes!"
I highly doubted it, but well, what if it were true? I might as well take a quick peek. It lead me here.
Meh. Not impressed. And kind of figured.

So the next part that happened involved some inexplicable connections of Halloween synapses in my brain to jump from me browsing through the clearance sections (not impressed) to a "EUREKA!" moment!

SOMEHOW my brain jumped from the mostly floozy outfits of that website to a truly inspired idea. Truly unique. Truly fabulous. Truly one that I may try next year! Truly the awesomeness of this idea is black and white.

Black and white!

Like a classy vintage (to us) actor from the ancient days of non-color television. (Would that be considered b.c.? Before color...)

This costume would be along the lines of the movie "Pleasantville" where the entire world was in black, white, and shades of grey. You could dress up totally cute and vintag-y, but the black and white would be a fabulous punch of unexpectedness on the Halloween scene. Check out the photo above ^ I found it at a cool website with a bunch of pictures and ideas along these lines: http://www.365halloween.com/black-white-costume-ideas

The picture above is someone in a silent film! They carry their board around and white messages all night - so interactive!!!! I double ell LLOVE it!

In conclusion, that is how I was inspired by two fabulous Halloween costume ideas today.

Now tell me a story - what do you think!? Bad ideas? Good ideas? Gnormal ideas?

Spooktacular!

Prepare yourself to encounter many cheesy Halloween sayings as we search for the perfect idea and execution of Katie's 2010 Halloween costume!

I will be posting fabulous ideas and links to things that my dear friend, Katie, might find inspiration from. For instance, the profile picture of mine (not my pic, found it... somewhere... (?)) Chuckie!

Hi, I'm Chucky. Wanna play?

I LOVE the optical illusion. Why in the world does that person look so freaky?! Can you figure it out?

...

...

... 

The cartoony-eyes are painted on her eyelids all the way up to her eyebrows! Not only is it a fun costume, but it is so well executed! I like that it isn't an absolute literal translation of Chuckie (everyone's favorite nightmarish doll) but incorporates elements that is similar and works with this person to make it hers. The hair for instance - love! The eyes.eyebrows - you know I love it! Even the outfit manages to be really cute! And the blood - well that makes it Halloween! 

So there's my first blog post attempting to inspire my dearest friend in her quest for Halloween perfection. Now your turn - thoughts?