Eye Balls and Gauged Eyes
So back last year I had the pleasure to be brought onto a feature for some SFX work, this feature was called ‘The Curse of Witching Tree’ due for release very soon .Based on cursed plagued children who haunt the present day family who live in the middle of nowhere I was extremely excited for this was my first feature, and a horror, YAHOOOO!! I especially have my friend Paul Jones to thank for getting me on the production for he was a part of the producing team and recommended me, another example of networking and it’s not what you know but who you know!!
I was on the film for I believe it was around four days, I met the cast and crew, who were all lovely and welcoming with me coming on set. Now when it comes to my job I like to be as organised as possible, so I’m clear on how long I have ,what needs to be done and what will the audience see, is it a close up (CU) so keen detail work, wide shot (WS) or Medium (MCU) blah blah blah, you get the picture. I also like to try and keep effects as real as possible, so as this was ‘plagued’ children I researched into symptoms, what a plagued victim would look like, fatigue, buboes the lot but when the main child needed to show signs of the plague unfortunately his sweat glands of his armpits were covered and through research it was very rare buboes would appear anywhere else than the pit gland or groin so using ‘Artistic Licence’ I made an infected looking buboes positioned on his neck.
Looking back that wasn’t the best place to put it as for one using the wax the piece kept falling and due to delays of this particular scene the skin is getting hotter and the wax is releasing making it want to slide off. Nearly a year on I would of prepped a piece ready to apply and colour, not wax haha! With the other children, I blackened their fingers a common plague symptom but I then added some blood to the tips to give it a horror effect.
On this film I faced new challenges, for being an extreme low budget you have to come up with low costing effects that can pass as believable, this film wanted a gauged eye! I love challenges so I researched different ways on what people have done in creating a gauged eye and tried a tweaked version to myself and blimey it worked and was relatively comfortable. Using masking tape, Black greasepaint, assortment of bloods I discovered less is more, if you over exaggerate the eye socket it can look fake you want to try and keep the shape, a build up of redness showing swelling and soreness around the eye, then of course the blood. Another challenge was stitched eyes, which I made out of normal cotton thread and applied with eyelash glue, nasty cut to the head, bleeding eyes, fake eyes, and I think that was it, may have been more I can’t quite remember.
I loved this production, really hope I get to work with these lovelies again one day, also a quick plug ‘The Curse of Witching Tree’ Directed by the wonderful James Crow is out on release from 18th May 2015!!!