Reflection of final images

This blog entry summarises the process to making the character by reflecting on the final images with a SWAIN (Strengths, Weakness, Aspirations, Interest, Needs) Analysis.

Figure 1 & 2

SWAIN Analysis:

Strengths:

Although not enjoying and having prosthetic making as one of the students’ strong skillsets, they are pleased with the outcome of the images. The application went better than expected as the student had doubts about their ability. The sculpting for all the prosthetics is the students strong point within the whole process start to finish, also unexpectedly discovering an interest in costume design and making during the creation of the character.

Weaknesses:

Being very self-critical the student can find many faults with the final look. Such as overall looking at the images the character appears very warm toned and could fit on a theatre stage, this is the opposite of what was desired. The student wanted a cool toned grungy look to the character and a more mystical appearance. This could have been achieved with a darker colour palette and painting more black into the costume aswell as black lipstick.

Another weakness of students work is the snap core prosthetic, unfortunately the best run out of 3 was a piece that had a thick edge of silicone with no cap plastic. This made it difficult to blend into the skin, therefore the student used sculpt gel to try blend the edge out.

Aspirations:

After this character design the students aspirations have remained the same to progress their career in fashion makeup and high fashion designs. The process of making prosthetics has not interested the student enough to change their route into the makeup artistry industry. Although sparking interest in the costume side of the design the student may about going down that route instead.

Interests:

Throughout the process to get the resulting character, the areas that sparked the most interest were the designing processes, sculpting prosthetics and costume making. Unexpectedly the student enjoyed creating the costume for the character more than making prosthetics. The long drawn-out process and chemicals for prosthetic making was not in the students best interests. However, the creative side of making the parts of the costume interested the student so much they are considering doing a course on costume design and creation as a possible change in career path.

Needs:

The needs that are required to be fulfilled for the student to progress are to complete another prosthetic makeup to prove to themselves that they can create a perfect piece that will bled seamlessly. This would satisfy the student and also confirm their opinion on prosthetics.

The student also needs to design and produce more costumes in the future to explore the interest sparked within this process, this could change the future for the student in discovering something that inspires them and brings enjoyment more than makeup artistry.

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Figure list:

Figure 1 - (Radfelder A, 2021) close up image of final character look, York College

Figure 2 - (Radfelder A, 2021) Final image, York College