We first met James at this years IMATS convention. Browsing the IMATS Makeup Museum we came across the most adorable sculpture of a monkey in a space suit (Which you can check out on HERE), whilst admiring this sculpture we were approached by the artist himself. No points for guessing that it was James Olney, AKA Ripped from the Crypt. it didn't take long before we realised how talented, passionate and very sweet James was. We were lucky enough to host his very first demo at this years United Makeup Artist's Expo. James, although new to the makeup scene is humble and genuine, we expect big things. (no pressure James!) You can read all about the concept, design, construction and application of James's makeup below! What was your inspiration for the look?It was a few things really. In a former life I owned a comic book shop and one that always grabbed my eye was The Nocturnals by Dan Brereton. His watercolour style and retro character aesthetic, combined with the supernatural was enough to win me over.We spoke about a few looks including an elephant God like creature, what made you settle on this idea?When you asked me to demo (ps thanks, you guys rock) I knew I wanted to do a complete character but at the same time I didn’t want to do so much of a transformation that you lost the identity of the model under the makeup.While I would love to do a Ganesh-type character I decided to rein it in. I knew I would be hitting this project off the back off a very strenuous seven weeks of work and wanted to be sure it was something I could deliver on. Also the practicality of not having easy access to a foam-latex oven forced me down the silicone route, and no-one wants to wear a silicone trunk weighing three stone. After drawing up a very long list of ideas I whittled it down to Starfish, an aquatic gunslinger from the comic mentioned above. She’s sassy, subtle, green and most importantly has never been done.We’ve also spoken about your past life which included you owning a comic book shop and being a professional graphic designer, do you think this influences the makeup you choose to create?Ha ha I should have read ahead! Totally! I’m a massive nerd and certain things will always appeal to me. Quite simply if it doesn’t make me smile then I don’t think it’ll make others smile, so what’s the point? At the end of the day this is an art-form. It’s entertainment with a purpose. As you mentioned I also went through career 2.0 in the design industry (both as a designer and project manager). Running and juggling projects for the likes of Disney teaches you a lot of discipline. If you can’t do it on time and on budget and hit the brief then you’ve failed. Those thoughts never go away. There was no way I was going to turn up at UMAE without all my ducks in a row.For the demo you brought the lovely Charlotte Trendell in to assist with the beauty makeup and hair. Was this always the plan or was there a point that you released that you wanted to bring someone else in? OMG without Charlotte I would have drowned. She’s far more experienced than me and so level-headed as well as being super-talented. I knew due to the time available and the amount of pieces I would potentially be applying that I couldn’t do it alone. And also I just don’t have good enough beauty and hair skills. I’m not above recognising my shortfalls and know that the best way to achieve the best is to surround yourself with amazing people. She came to mind instantly. And she’s a great friend and I had wanted the opportunity to work with her for a while - I bet she regrets it now!You created everything for your look, from the costume, pieces and the props. What was your favourite part to create?I really enjoyed turning a vodka shooter (who knew these things existed?) into her six shooter. I was apprehensive if the venue would allow it due to incidents in America but i’m glad we could. Another fun but slightly gross part was making hair accessories out of real starfish. I deliberately didn’t tell our model “soooo you’re going to be wearing dead things in your hair”...With regards to the prosthetics I got the biggest buzz from sculpting the ears. I hadn’t done them before but had been hankering to for a while. Also in the comic they are literally not much more than pointy so this was an opportunity to add a little extra to an existing character without throwing away his wonderful designs. How long did it take you to prep the makeup? Including the sculpting, moulding and costume?Hmmm, the makeup consisted of 11 pieces (webbed hands, arm fins, ears, eyebrow blenders, brow antennae and a top lip). I probably sculpted those in a week but the moulding and casting took perhaps double that due to some interesting challenges (how to make arm fins stand up, could I embed quills into the brows during the encapsulation process, can I cope without sleep, and so on).The gun, holster, hair accessories and t-shirt probably took another two days. It sounds like it all happened rapidly but I couldn’t properly start until five weeks before and my teaching and freelance commitments kept getting in the way so the reality is I didn’t finish everything until about 36 hours beforehand.During the application did you experience any hiccups or problems you hadn’t accounted for?Problem number one - my airbrush wouldn’t cooperate. At all. No consistent pressure meaning I just couldn’t lay down the green anywhere near as thoroughly or quickly as I would like. The plan was to include lots of shades and stenciling but after stripping it and cleaning it twice during application I couldn’t waste anymore time on it - it’s in a landfill site now, and me and my shiny new Iwata don’t miss it.The second problem was a strange one. I encapsulated the pieces with Baldiez (Acetone is used to dissolve it). They cast nicely with no silicone anywhere it shouldn’t be, and yet on the day I had huge trouble with a couple of the pieces, they just wouldn’t part company with the flashing (other pieces went perfectly, maybe the product was too old or maybe the gypsy curse from my childhood kicked in) which resulted in some ropey edges, particularly on one of the brows. It looked ok from a distance but it didn’t stand up as well as I would have liked to close scrutiny.The other issue was our lovely model on the day was actually model number three! Model number one I chose to replace simply because she had a lot of commitments in this country and abroad and I wanted to be remove that worry from the equation (at no point did she cause any problems and was thoroughly lovely but I needed someone we could contact easily in the build up to UMAE).So we then looked for a replacement, and when I say we I mean Charlotte. That woman is a whirlwind of proactivity! A replacement was found, measurements were taken, everything was set and then seven days before she got a better offer and we were left in the lurch.A call was put out on social media and loads of kind people offered but at the same time we found an experienced model (Eden Tredwell) who could make it that weekend. Crisis averted, buttocks unclenched, but certain pieces (the brows and lip) were made to fit another model and there simply was no time to change that. Charlotte saw her for makeup tests but we had to cross our fingers and hope the prosthetics fit well enough. They did, but it wasn’t ideal and added to our stress on the day.So it wasn’t a walk in the park but we had a job to do and we did it. It was a great experience, and frankly if nothing had gone wrong I wouldn’t have much to say in this section ;)Top 5 products you couldn’t create this makeup without:European Body Art alcohol airbrush coloursPlatsil Gel 25Key 22 (for the moulds)JT Makeup GlitterDead sea creaturesIf you had the chance to recreate this look again would there be anything you would change?Hell yes! I would have ditched the idea of lots of subtle pieces and would have sculpted a full face to be less pretty and more sea creature. I was too wary about overly-redesigning the character and it would have made for a far simpler application.I also would have ruled out the airbrushing and gone old-school bodypaint for her green bits. It would have been faster and far less unpleasant for the model.I’ve learnt a hard lesson about models. I know these things can happen but in future I’m going to stick to tried and tested people who are used to these kind of applications and events. It won’t guarantee no hiccups but the last minute stress we had was immense and potentially avoidable.But despite all the grumbles we had an absolute blast and if we could do it again tomorrow we would! I’m planning a very different joint venture for IMATS 2019 with a friend from the other side of the globe which is doing away with “subtle” entirely. The lessons learnt at UMAE were priceless and we couldn’t have done it without the support of The Makeup Armoury. Thank you! You can see more of James and Charlotte's work through the links below - http://www.instagram.com/rippedfromthecrypthttp://www.charlottetrendell.com