Feature: sweetgreychaos

Feature: sweetgreychaos from DeviantArt

This girl is amazing! Her Nightmare Before Christmas design 

actually inspired me to do mine. I love how different her work is! 

She's extremely talented and I'm so happy to share her work with you guys! 

1. How did you get started with makeup?

When I was a kid, I liked to make bruises out of makeup- find reds and blues and blacks and mix them together to try and make big, ugly black eyes and wounds to freak out parents at slumber parties. I suppose most people turn to makeup to improve their looks- I wanted to mess ‘em up. That turned into making challenging Halloween faces, which turned into volunteering to paint faces for a local theater at their fundraising events. It wasn’t until college, the first year I had a room to myself, that I got bored at nights and thought “hey, I have some leftover Halloween paint and makeup… let’s do something funky.” It’s evolved into the beast it has become from there.

2. What is your all time favourite brand? What's your favourite product from that brand?

Generally I don’t use a lot of real makeup, to be honest. Even when I’m doing a street makeup look, I use a high quality face paint for liquid eyeliner. (Though I adore Milani brow powder- the one thing I use every day.) My favorite brand is Wolfe Brothers Face Art & FX. My favorite product from that brand are the hydrocolor essentials.

3. Where do you get your inspiration from?

Strong emotions, underlying bone structure and shapes that I find attractive or interesting, collages, movies/books/things I enjoy, appealing color combinations, and sometimes I get in the mood to do the ‘unpretty’- something unusual, scary, maybe even ugly.

4. Favourite tool?

I live by tiny, square-ended, stiff bristled paintbrushes. I must have fifty paintbrushes in my cup and I probably only ever use the same five over and over again.

5. Have you gone to school for this? Or is this more of a natural talent?

I don’t think there’s a school for the kind of crazy ephemera I play with, but if there is, point me to it! ^_^ Self taught, with far too much practice.

6. Do you make a living off of your work or is it more of a hobby?

Pure hobby, though I do a few paying jobs a year. It more than pays for the habit. In real life I’m a gifted education specialist and teacher.

7. Which design of yours is your favourite?

Hardest. Question. Ever! Since I create my pieces based on how I’m feeling, some of the images I’m so technically proud of, but they remind me of a hard time in my life. Due to that, they’re not my favorite... and vice versa- some look like a hot mess but I recall the wonderful emotions that spurred them into being. Oh, and my favorites are NEVER, EVER the most popular images. I do not have a bead on the vein of public interest. I guess right now, I’d have to say my favorite design right now is Triage. I was feeling so much… anger and loss and fear and love during this time, I look at this image, and it screams at me how complicated it was then. On top of that, it's something so different for me visually, and I'm able to rise above the emotion to be proud of it.

8. How long do your designs usually take?

Anywhere from half an hour to six. I’d say 75% of them take place during the span of a normal movie, however. I time my projects by what I’m watching during their creation.

9. How long have you been doing this?

In this fashion/style? Five years.

10. Any advice for beginners?

Respect your style. Give it time to develop, realize that it’s foundational and important and unique. Don’t compare yourself to others, but rather, use inspiration and the community of the people who have had more time to develop their own styles in order to grow. Try new things, and don’t be discouraged when they come out lookin’ like a damn mess. Increase your success rate by doubling your failure rate.

 

Want to see more of her amazing work? Visit her at sweetgreychaos