The Man Upstairs - Final Pictures

Babysitter - Final Images

Concept of Overall Shoot

I took my inspiration for the overall shoot from looking at pop art and comic books.  I wanted to really bring this to life with my own twist for the layout of my shoot.  It has strong references to the period I'm shooting with artists such as Any Warhol creating iconic pop art images in the 60's.

Although i'm not directly copying Andy Warhol, I definitely wanted to bring the use of the background into my shoot.  The reason I decided to go with this look was because of my decision to use a lot of fashion references.  I still want to get the story across so I thought speech bubbles in a comic style would do this perfectly.  My original idea came from looking at an amazing book called "SuperHeroes - Fashion & Fantasy", it has great references to pop art and really got me thinking about how I could make this work.

The Man Upstairs - Sketches & Face Charts

Sketch of man upstairs 

Face chart with product list

The Man Upstairs - Hair, Make-up & Styling

I wanted to simply shadow and emphasise the bone structure of my model Joe's face.  I wanted to make all the areas of his face look heavy to give him a more psychotic look.  The hair was really simple I just groomed and gave him a side part.  For his body I wanted it to look defined under the camera so I added baby oil.  To make it look like he had just killed somebody I added Fake Blood to a water spray and covered him in appropriate areas.  I covered to knife in blood to give extra effect.

Before

Mid stage

Oiled up

Blood sprayed on 

The Man Upstairs - Overall idea

American Psycho

American Psycho

Twilight

For my overall concept of the Killer/Man upstairs I wanted to grasp the feel of a psychotic killer but bring a sexual twist to the forefront.  I love Christian Bale in American Psycho, he is extremely handsome but at night he is a psychotic killer - perfect! That is exactly what I want to achieve.  I thought I could make the look have a more sexual feel by simply doing it topless like the boys from Twilight do very well!  

Psycho

American psycho

All the psycho films capture the essence of what I want to achieve.  Its all about the look from the eyes.  That is why I want to make sure I get the correct model to give me that psychotic pose.  The sexiness within the shoot will just soften the whole concept a little and make a little less horror/gore. 

Babysitter - Sketches and Face charts

Sketch of my chosen look

Face chart listing products used

Babysitter - Make-up

Twiggy

60's eye make-up

I wanted to create a look similar to the 60's.  Using Twiggy as one of my references, I wanted to create heavy eye lines and heavy lashes, but minimal eyeshadow.  As there wasn't much colour in my babysitter shoot, I wanted to add colour on the lips.  With strong lips I had to makes the eyes a focal point but not too much.

I tried some looks on myself before the official shoot.  I confirmed that too much eye make-up with such a strong colour lipstick was a little over the top.  As the shoot was aimed at being a babysitter I still wanted to capture some of that element, rather than looking too over done.

Before

Lips

Eyes

From carrying out the trials on my self first I knew exactly where I needed to go with my make-up.

I like the above pictures as they capture what I'm trying to achieve.  I want a bold statement lip, with a little depth to the eyes to give that 60's feel. My model Alex is 18 and has quite blotchy kin so needs good ceverage to look clear.  She has a well proportioned face but needs contouring to add definition.

Before

Base done - mid-stage

After

After

The dress for the shoot was one of the models own.  We wanted again to capture the kind of 60's feel with a print and long sleeves.  I feel the dress we decided to go with works well with the look I was trying to achieve.  I wanted her to look like the babysitter but from a fashion point of view.  I wanted her stlyed and groomed to the max, this is also fitting for the overall comic theme I'm going for.

The Dress

The Dress on the model

Babysitter - Hairstyles

Brigitte Bardot

Adele

Louis Vuitton

The top picture is an original version of a 60's beehive on Brigitte Bardot, an icon of the time.  The two below I suppose are more relevant to what I'm trying to achieve with my look.  I want to almost create a version very similar to the Louis Vuitton spring/summer 2013 catwalk show.  Its got a slight beehive, but is softened by the pretty bow headband.  

When creating my look i started by clipping out the front section.  I then backcombed all the hair, moulded and pinned into the shape of a beehive.  With all of the hair left out at the back i created a soft roll and pinned to hide all the clips used.  I then clipped and pinned my front section to create a sweeping fringe.  Finally I added a hairband and a pinned in a bow to create the look similar to  the Louis Vuitton spring/summer 2013 collection.

Creating the Babysitter

When a Stranger calls - 2006

For the overall look of my babysitter I want to capture the fear through expression.  That is the only real horror element i want to bring across.  After looking at the films from the 60's right through to the 00's the thing that lay most strongly for me, was the element of glamour and sexiness within the movies.  I really want to bring this element to life with my images.  As its also a fashion inspired shoot for a music video I want to give a reflect on whats current in fashion and surprisingly and fittingly its the 1960's.  Im going to try and show elements of this with a modern twist within my shoot.

I love the Louis Vuitton spring/summer collection 2013.  It really captures the look I want to achieve.  It has so much reference (if not direct) to the 60's.  I love the use of prints, the hair, the styling etc.  In particular, I love that this image is super styled yet still has a youthful innocence to it, which I am definitely trying to portray in my images.

Jennifers body

I love Megan Fox in Jennifers body.  Although i'm not using this as a direct reference to my overall look.  I like the essence of the image, its sexy but has a darkness to it.  I want to bring a little of this essence to my overall concept.

Barbarella

Rosemary's baby

I particularly like Rosemary's baby and Barbarella, predominantly for the styling and the era they were made in.  They both have a great use of 60's style which is exactly what I want to use.  I want to achieve 60's inspired horror with a modern twist.