And not even the whole week. This is just Friday and Saturday! Like I’ve said, I’ve been a busy beaver, flogstars.
Friday was the early early call time of 8am to do makeup for a short film being made by Barrowland Ballet.
I went along with two of the Belfast Babes (Saoirse and Magda) to do the very neon makeup of 4 lovely lady dancers.
Oh my god it was cold in that warehouse. It was also cold on Saturday in the studio where I did a bit of bodypainting on a 3-months pregnant model, but I wasn’t the one in the buff so I shouldn’t really be complaining about the temperature.
not sure what your WiFi’s like Chris, but this is for you 🙂
I realised the other day that I’m not worried about money. This isn’t to say that I have enough money or that I shouldn’t be worried. My mind’s just been on other things. Also currently not overly fussed about bum size. What’s going on?
It’s true that the early risers, by default, have ended up setting the schedule for the rest of us dreamers. We were too busy snoozing to stop them. Which is kind of annoying if you think about it. I think there should be a revolution to overthrow this cruel regime in which people are expected to BE PRODUCTIVE in the morning. Mornings are for eating croissants and taking your sweet time waking up, don’t you think?
or pancakes
The problem with the ‘morning people’ is that they say things like “I just can’t stay in bed past 8am, even on the weekends! It feels like I’m wasting the day.” When people say something like that, what I hear is “I am terrified of being alone with my subconscious, and I am also oblivious to the fun that can be had in a bed at any time of the day”.
And ‘wasting the day’ – what pish! What about wasting the deep, dark, glorious night? You’d have to be a bit evil to go to bed at 7:45pm so you can bounce out of bed at 5:30am the next day for no reason other than to lord it over everyone else.
Or maybe the morning people aren’t sinister at all, maybe they’re just scared of the dark, maybe they just like first go with the newspaper before it gets big splodges of jam on it. Who’s to know? So long as they can mask their amusement/disgust at my genuine emotional agony, as I stumble around the kitchen, blind, bloodshot and whimpering, seeking the coffee by smell and touch alone.
Anyway. The reason I’m telling you all this is because I have to BE somewhere at 8am on Friday for a (work experience) makeup job. I say ‘somewhere’ because I don’t know where it is, all I know is it involves a train-ride (sounds miles away doesn’t it) which will mean leaving home at … what, like 6:30am potentially? That’s the middle of the fucking night! But it’ll be good. This comes at a time when lots of fun and interesting makeup work experience opportunities have just sprung up.
On Monday just gone I helped out at a photoshoot that a handful of photography students from my college were doing…
me doing mega-babe Victoria’s makeup
DSLR magician Sharon shooting up a storm
being really helpful holding the light reflector thingy
In fact there are quite a few fun and exciting shoots coming up, so brace yourselves for some … significantly more professional-looking photos of the makeup I do. It’s funny, just recently I was really freaking out about where to find the models and photographers I knew I’d need to whip up a decent portfolio. Now it seems, uh, doable. It’s because I’m so well-connected.
Don’t worry flogstars, the photos might get more professional, but we’ll still be playing it pretty fast and loose here at Imogen Maxwell Dot Com. No matter how fancy and professional the photos become, they’ll still be accompanied by my sparkling banter and a bit o’ not-related classic rock or hair metal. Which brings us to tonight’s tune… oh what shall I pick?
A bit o’ not-related not-classic-rock-or-hair-metal! I heard this lil number whilst meandering around WordPress, and it’s been stuck in my heid for a few days, which as you’ve probably noticed is the most important factor in deciding what goes up on the ole flog here. ENJOY.
I didn’t give a damn about Pinterest until WordPress (hosts of this here flog) told me that if you’re blogging – or in my case, flogging – about subject matter with a highly visual element, such as makeup… then Pinterest is potentially one of your biggest referrers.
That means if I have pretty pictures of my makeup work on Pinterest, and people click on them… they’ll land right here. More site traffic = faster track to world domination. So now you can have a wee squizz at my finished works all in one place, if you so fancy. Quicker for when you’re telling someone about how brilliant I am, for example.
Pinterest, for those who don’t know, is an online pinboard where you can store and share pictures and ideas. Think… mood-boards for weddings, home decoration ideas…
does the carpet match the curtains?
…recipes, crafts, architecture, nail art, tattoos, photography… you get the gist.
I started an account a while ago with the thought that it would come in handy for college somehow, but only really started using it the last week or two. I just didn’t really get it before, but it’s fun and there’s loads of cool shit on there.
You can have as many pinboards on the go as you like, and I’m finding it handy for organising the pics/ideas that I use for inspiration in my makeup world. Plus, it’s yet another medium through which to obsess about David Bowie.
You are just perfection.
Speaking of inspiration. My own creative river hasn’t been flowing for a while now and I’m starting to get worried.
Makeup Is Art by Jana Ririnui and Lan Nguyen
I just bought this book on Amazon to try and rectify the situation. Do any of you out there have a favourite art/design/makeup book that you refer to during ideas-droughts? Let me know!
And so to bed. Tomorrow brings with it my first photo shoot of this year, and I’ve got brushes to clean!
Here’s Mick and the boys twerking in sailor suits to send you off to the land of nod. Sweet dreams, flogstars XX
look at my new boots vying for attention in the corner there!
He is my skull ring. He was named after Dana Carvey and it’s just a coincidence that his last name is Scully like Agent Scully from the X Files and he’s a skull. Regular readers will recognise Dana from every photo of my left hand. Sometimes he’s on my thumb. He’s with me always. He’s a cheap piece of shit I bought from http://www.emp-online.co.uk which is where I get a lot of my cheap, badass stuff.
Once I’m rolling in the kind of money that will come with my imminent glittering career in makeup artistry, I’ll be adding to my collection via German designer Thomas Sabo and The Great Frog – home of wow. Most coveted at the moment is this skull cuff:
I love you, why are you so expensive, will you ever be mine and do you love me too?
… and next thing you know I’ll be rocking up to work in one of these:
for illustration purposes only, not actual mode of transport, it’s an ornament calm down everyone
In that top photo of my hand, if you look closely you’ll notice that my nails have weird ridges in them. That’s because I bought a miniature angle grinder masquerading as an electric nail buffer, for £3 on Amazon. I do not recommend. It’s going to take ages for my nails to get back to normal, and thanks also to my Quik-e-Mart job ravaging my hands they’re not going to grow out any time soon either. UGH! I miss my claws.
Anyway. Time to get off the internet and go meet Chloe for lunch. Happy Sunday, flogstars – hope you’re keepin’ it lazy like you should be.
I’m alive and well, flogstars – I’ve just been a lazy bastard. A busy one actually, and over a week has passed without a post because I’ve been flat out like a lizard drinking (apologies, just getting my Australian lingo back up to scratch for the imminent visit home).
Here’s a quick recap of … some things I did.
Flog devotees (hey, you) will remember how hard I had made Chloe slave in the lead-up to the body painting assessment. The day came and I was as prepared as I could be. I’d burnt though nearly a whole cake each of orange, black and white Snazaroo paints in the practice sessions. Chloe’s torso was practically raw from having stripes scraped onto it with my cheap shitty brushes.
Doing the design plan right before I started the painting. Yes, that’s a toothbrush in my mouth. Imogen Maxwell: Eleventh Hour Calm is what I shall call my first autobiography.
And it came together pretty well. I had pulled together some good accessories – the black claw-nails, white fluffy eyebrows that I’d originally procured to use on Agi for the doomed oompa-loompa wig assessment, tiger ears headband, vampire fangs that wouldn’t bloody well stay in so I ended up Blu-Tac’ing them to Chloe’s incisors.
It’s really hard to get a wide shot in the bodypainting studio without there being like a MILLION boobs in the background.
All in all pretty happy with how it came up, and I passed, which is all that really matters.
That same day, Chloe stayed for the afternoon to be my model for Asian bridal makeup. Heehee.
International heartbreakers
In non-makeup but Chloe-related news, it was her birthday this week so I made a tiramisu…
… and we went out for drinks with Loz.
That’s all for today, my beloved flogstars. I’ve got a bit to catch you up on so will post again soon. And I’m thinking of completely changing up the format of the flog, so strap yourselves in.
And now, to bed… here’s Darren Hanlon with a lullaby to send you soundly to the land of nod.
Today at imogenmaxwell.com, we’re celebrating one year, one hundred posts and almost ten thousand views. To commemorate, I thought we’d go over a few of the highs and lows we’ve been through to get here. Well, highs really, we don’t really DO lows at imogenmaxwell.com.
My site stats reveal some interesting, if completely unsurprising things about you all.
The most popular search engine terms that lead people to this, the greatest flog in all the land, are as follows:
Imogen Maxwell (who is googling me and why, is what I want to know)
Cutepolish face (sorry everyone, I’m not the enigmatic Canadian of the fabulous nail design channel on YouTube)
Pink mascara
Big boobs in dirndl
Tan body white face
Good to see our priorities are all in order, then. I was also flattered to find that the 3 most clicked-on photos ever on this site are:
any swelling?
would it bother you to know that I was butt naked when I took this photo? You should see what’s cropped out of it. How far down did I paint myself green?… I’ll never tell!
So you guys have a thing for a lady in costume with her baps out, eh? Boy, are you in luck. Halloween’s right around the corner, this is YOUR time of year!
And last of all, the three most-viewed posts in order are:
Tan body white face – perhaps I should delve more into this topic seeing as you are all so interested in how to look uniformly pale like me?
Body painting, Week 1 – pipped at the post by THREE views, as of today, and no bloody wonder – the only actual nipples to appear live on imogenmaxwell.com! A big thanks to Jen for raising my stats, if you know what I mean.
BRAvissIMO! – me appearing in my bra on the internet for the first time (that I am aware of)
…and Call me crazy, in which I’m in my bra yet again, this time in aid of marriage equality.
What a journey we’ve been on, dear reader. You’ve seen me blossom from amateur makeup artiste wannabe in my bedroom in Oban, to amateur makeup artiste wannabe in my bedroom in Glasgow. From backpacker queen extraordinaire, applying all sorts of crazy slap to my friends… to … makeup school attendee who doesn’t really have any friends so now has to practice makeup on herself all the time instead.
Every click, every like, every “you are SO hilarious!” that you bestow upon me (in my dreams)… this flog is nothing without its devout readers, and I thank both each and every one of you for your ongoing support. I will be sure to mention you all in my Academy Award acceptance speech which will probably be in 2022, but if you can hang in there with me you will get the recognition.
Here’s Boston with More Than A Feeling. Tune up those air guitars and let’s do this thang.
In the chair is my college, carpool, Facebook, and real life friend Sinead. We spray-painted each other new cheekbones and all.
you can’t tell from the photo but my jawbone was contoured to within an inch of its life. Sinead looked at me in the mirror when she was done, and said “hmm… I’ve just made you look more like David Bowie than you ever meant to, I think.”
to anyone who thinks beauty therapy and makeup artistry aren’t brain surgery, you are wrong.
who wants a lash tint? Cos I can do that.
So as you can see, I’m doing lots and learning lots and having fun. Happy days 🙂
Our (your, not my) respite from hair metal continues, dear reader, but not for much longer. Today’s bangin’ tune is relevant because Rome WASN’T built in a day, and I’m also going to see Morcheeba with my other new friend Aoife. Yep, I’ve fallen in with the Belfast Babes (finally, my dream of joining a gang and click-walking through the corridors is coming true).
Why doesn’t she wear her hair like that more often?
What’s the shite all over her face?
Why would anyone put a photo of themselves online… looking like THAT?
Well, best beloved, let me try to answer some of those questions for you… now. I don’t wear my hair like that more often because of my enormous fivehead. I put this photo up online for your laughing pleasure because we’re not that vain here at ImogenMaxwell.com
And that shite all over my face is a mixture of crushed aspirin, water and honey. Save your WTFs until after you’ve read this, from hilariookie beauty-blogger extraordinaire, Michaela Williams (who is, apparently, incidentally, a distant cousin of mine. Check out her blog at http://www.latherrinserepeat.com.au).
So, since you’ve read all about aspirin facials now, I won’t bother going into detailed explanations here. As regular readers will know from my use of Vegemite as makeup and constant references to makeup I “bought 100 years ago in Australia”, keepin’ it cheap is part of my whole deal. Suffice to say that aspirin facials work, and they’re cheap. Which sounds much more like us, now doesn’t it?
That Will Smith song has been in my head for days, and now we must all suffer. Let’s get it out the way at the beginning of the post so we can put it behind us, move on and never speak of it again. So Thursday was a big day – a visit from […]
I strongly dislike airbrushing. It’s frustrating. The guns we use at college aren’t the best, and it’s impossible to clean them properly. That, and our class is 20-odd chicas, so we all have to share. Everything. All the time. There’s one of each thing we need, and 20 people wanting to use it at the […]
Which is why I find myself covered in aspirin and honey, and a head full o’ bleach on a Sunday night. I went to visit Melissa and Che in Edinburgh last night, cos I’m spontaneous like that. We watched Pretty Woman, Che and I got drunk and Melissa didn’t because she’s pregnant, and I made […]
Only my second week at makeup school and I’ve shaved my eyebrows off. Remember kids, if you DO shave your eyebrows off, you’ll need to learn how to quick-draw your emotions. This week, I have also been learning AIRBRUSHING! In the chair is my college, carpool, Facebook, and real life friend Sinead. We spray-painted each […]
If you’re an avid Imogen Maxwell fan, you’ll have noticed an unusual amount of activity on my Instagram recently. That’s because I am unemployed and have no friends. But considering I am unemployed and have no friends, I’ve been keeping quite busy. Let me tell you about my first week at college. The journey there […]
digital imologue 