It had been quite a while since we had last caught up with Charlie as he had been out of the country in LA speaking with production companies who may be potential sponsors for the film. Paige and I were acutely aware that with designing coming along nicely and our fibre glass heads almost complete it would soon be time to begin sculpting and we needed a concrete decision from Charlie regarding the final designs as well as a list of numerous other things that needed to be discussed.
Final Fight Scene
Charlie had dropped a slight bombshell just before he left the country in mentioned that he was now envisaging the final fight scene between the orcs and rangers to be a lot bigger and include up to 50 people. I was quick to explain that it was completely unrealistic to expect to be able to make around 30 Orc make-ups. Although the idea of purchasing pre-made plastic orc masks was initially mentioned, Charlie eventually decided that it would be easiest to cheat the camera and have all of the background orcs wearing helmets and hoods to hide their faces.
Hair
I was becoming more and more concerned that very few of the actors appearing to be taking their roles seriously and had been cutting their hair, despite the fact that they had all been asked to grow it longer for the film. The most concerning of these discoveries were Liam (Billy Ferny) and Neal (Roran) as both of these characters in initial meetings Charlie had requested to have very long hair. Liam's design was fairly easy to amend as Charlie felt that by slicking his hair back to look greasy and having his costume include a hood which he would wear up, it would add to the image of him appearing dark and ominous. Neal, on the other hand was a real concern for both Charlie and myself. Even if Neal agreed to co-operate and not cut his hair between now and the beginning of shooting it would still not reach the length that Charlie wanted, and he did not want to compromise and have one of his primary characters having a modern haircut that clearly did not fit with the context. The option of a wig was briefly discussed although I made it clear that I did not have the time or ability to make one myself. I recommended a number of other students who might be able to do the work if Charlie contacted them but he felt that money would be too much of a concern as budget was already tight. In the end Charlie suggested that if Neal could grow his hair to a reasonable length over the next two months he could perhaps get extensions put in. I explained that I did not have the expertise to do this myself, but that he could probably be taken to a hairdressers to have it done.
Face Casts
Charlie had initially requested that there be 6 orc make-ups created, and as it stood, we only had 5 actors cast. We therefore requested that a time be arranged when the final actor, Ben O'Shea, could have a full head cast done in order for us to sculpt a makeup that could be turned into a basic latex mask. It was, unfortunately, also necessary to re-do a face cast for Liam as the nose on his cast was so badly deformed that it would be unusable. Instead of doing a full head cast for a second time we made the decision to just do a face cast as his make-up would be made up of only closed mould prosthetics and flat pieces so a full head would not be necessary.
Teeth and Contact Lenses
In previous meetings we had discussed the purchase of false teeth and contact lenses for the orcs that were going to be prominently featured on screen. Budget was a slight issue and Charlie did not feel that we could afford to purchase bespoke teeth for the Hunter Orc, he was however keen to purchase some generic teeth that could be moulded to fit the actor's mouth and possible personalised with some teeth stain and fake blood perhaps. The other two featured orcs' teeth would depend entirely on how much one set cost and the state of the budget. We did however agree that contact lenses would be a must have as Paige and I felt that it would ruin all of the effort put into the make-up if the eyes still looked human, but as these would be cheaper, Charlie was happy with this.
Weapons
Upon reading the script previously, Paige and I were aware of the obstacles facing us with prosthetics as at one point the Hunter Orc needs to be shot in the chest with an arrow. The arrow used would need to be incredibly light weight in order to sit on a plastic base beneath a layer of silicone without causing the flat piece to lift up with the force of the weight. Charlie assured us that he had got a model making student named Sean on board and he was currently working on the production of the arrows, so we would need to liaise with him.
Tribal markings on Hunter Orc
Charlie had mentioned that he would quite like the Hunter Orc to include some form of tribal markings - scarification/tattoos/piercings but had not been very specific as to what this meant. I drew out a design that included a large number of different options and gave him the option to pick elements that he wanted. He asked if he could speak with John, the actor, and get back to me which he did later that night. John and Charlie had agreed that they would like a 3-line scratch down the right hand side of the face, narrowly missing the eye and a brand on the shoulder, the design of which would soon be confirmed.
Charlie appeared satisfied with all of the designs shown to him and Paige and I left feeling like we had a much more clear idea of what we would be making from this point forth.
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