burn tutorial?

Ok, I didn't take any WIP photos of this one as it was done in educationalpurpouses for a makeupstudent of mine; there was no time=/

Anyways, I thought I'd explain alittle what to do to get this result, and go through the process:


First off rip of a couple of papertowel-pieces the size of the desired 3rd-4th degree burn (the curtled and open skin/wounds).

Apply a coat of wet latex to the skin (shave the area and wash with alcohol or something like it first) and applty the first layer of papertowel evenly over the skin.
(Use nontextured soft papertowels for this)

cover the applied paper with a thin layer of latex and apply the second layer of paper, this time you either stretch the skin and previously set layers of paper+latex in the OPPOSITE direction the nervthreades and muscles run across the body (in this case the muscles run from the elbow towards the hand, and so you need to stretch the skin across the arm instead of along it) and apply the paper, or you shape the paper as such before you let it dry. Cover with latex.

Last layer of paper. use small pieces of paper this time and apply them with latex in a NON-even fashion. You can mass them up into small disgusting sausages or rip them up as you go, either way, the unnaturallook of this last paper-layer will be mended by more latex

If you want some heatblisters or open wounds in this part of the wound cut them up now. Take a pen or something not lethally sharp but not rediculously blunt and peel a hole in the paper/latex. Now either cut a hole of it with like a nailscissor or something if you want the skin to have fallen of (fourthdegree burn only) or peel a little hole and fold the edges in to make a heatblister (mainly third degree burns). The one I've made in the middle is a radically big Heatblister (to explain and show how to do it to the people present) and the smaller ones are skin losages.

Do all of your desired BIG wounds at this point and when you are done lay a coat of latex over it all. Thin coats in the wounds and thick coates over the 3rd layer of paper (to smoothen the surface into a base from which to process further later on)

Be sure not to latex more than like a cm out from the paper to ensure you have enough space for the 1st and 2nd degrees later on.

If you have bigger wounds like the one on my arm there you might want to start reflecting over how the flesh or even bone underneath would react to the damage. Now as I said, the one in the picture is a compliation of various methods to educate people in different ways of work, but if I would have followed a specific line I would have probably made the bone underneath the skin somewhat burnt as it is so exposed and the 2nd degree burns more "wet", but enough about my life for now, just imagine(or google... ) what a real wound would look like and how the body reacts to this type of offence.
Where does it bleed the most? what type of skin roasts first? how deep does the bone lye in this part of the body? etc etc.

smoothen the edges of the wound with latex (still dont extend the area of the latex furthur than necessairy) and lay another coat over the surface of the 3rd degree and dry with hairdryer.

Once the latex is dry its time to start putting makeup on this layer (in order to propperly be able to cover it with more latex in other colors) Start of with a layer of black on the 3rd degree. make sure it enters all the cracks of the latex (for this, black is good because, even though RED will be the basecolor here, its allways better to have a darker color "shine" through than a light one, atleast when doing injuries). On with some fix-powder to settle the black color.

Now do an equal layer of red over all the black and fix with powder. This red color will now serve as our base or unhandled naked skin/musclemass. Take your allready used sponge of blac makeup and "drybrush" (WH-fans will know the meaning of this expression) black onto the textured surace, leaving the red color filling the cracks and gaps. Powder.

Now spray the wound with siliconespray and let dry. Powder again. Take a wet cloth and gently wipe and "clean" all of the powder and spray of (this will take some of the makeup off with them, but no worries, more will be applied later)
This procedure has now rendered the top latex surface unmergable with another layer. Place ONE more layer ontop of the 3rd degree (NOT IN the wounds) and dry with a hair dryer.

Once dry, peel open the top layer of latex to create a last brigade of normal skin, rendered cinged and ripped on top of it all. Redo the process of putting makeup on the original wound to refill the gaps left by the cloth (but not too much, a little white latex showing looks great as i reseambles burned, pigmentless skin). ExTREMELEY carefully drybrush someblack over the peeled last layer of latex.

Now the basig BIG one is done, place two layers of latex around the wound (leaving aprox 1cm of untouched skin between the latexed 3rd degree and these new layers in order to be able too more easily peel ut the 2nd degree burned skin) let dry. Peel the two-leyered latex upp from the edges facing the wound. You can also make spontanious blisters along this process with some more latex, or peeling the alleady existing latex into holes of thin skin.

Put a thin just "blushing" layer of red makeup where the skin is supposed to have peeled up from. powder...

Do this proces again with just one layer of latex and peel up. Don't put any makeup on it yet though. This skinlayer is just suppose to serve as the layer of skin the body is allways ready to peel in case of "emergensies" so no redness or blood yet.

Now take a piece of papertowel and put minimal amounts of red in it. Use this to genty flush the skin around he wound into an irritated, reddish color to give impression that the body is now working to control this wound and fix it. Put that amount x 2 inside the 2nddegree burnpeels. N

Now take your fines brush/sponge and gently drybrush all the peeled up edges in black; the closer they are to the burn, the blacker they are. Ergo, the outer peels are almost not black at all exept in the "middle" of the peel which is the one area that has been most exposed to heat.

Take the black sponge (need a sponge for this) an gently just tap the sponge around the wounds. This ccan e done randomely, just no more than afew shades (overdid mine...).

Now goooh! I use vaseline or siliconegel mostly. Apply a thin coat of whatever you are using furstof all in the cracks of the 3rd degree. Secondly in the heatblisters and thirdly in the vasinity of the peels (right where the skin is supposed to have peeled up fro, to create a oozing effect.

Last effort: Blood. irst of we are to line the inside edges of the open wounds with "scratchblood". This is a type of bloodeffect used to create scratches and other shallow wounds and cauterized bleeding. Apply this only to the inside edges of the wound.

Brush Unmixed theatrical blood (dark) in the open wounds (not much, this "burn" type of injuries cauterize the bloodvessels almost immediatelly and leave little or none left to actually bleed).

mix theatrical blood with scratchblood and alittle (!) fixingpowder in a small container. This creates a lightred bloodcolor to then be painted in under the peels and blisters. Take a brush and paint it on, and use a finger or unused sponge to even it out and erase some (creating a great effect of newly effected naked skin bleeding shallow from every vessel) focus on the already vaselined areas near the peels


If you wanna create the effect i did on the bottompicture, just pull some latex off and paint this bloodmix underneat, thass awl


Hope somebody understood and learned something!