EDMONTON — Perusing through her Facebook photo albums you will find a sequence of images of Charlen Middendorf slowly transforming into an animated skeleton. In the first photo she appears as herself with a cap over her head that gives her the appearance of having gone completely bald. The next shot shows Middendorf smiling a vivacious smile as a white base-coat and black shading around the eyes are added. The skeleton design comes full circle in the next few shots as cheek and jaw shading are added, and finally a gaunt mouth of teeth is painted on over her real lips. Voila! A living, breathing, bright blue-eyed skeleton stares back from the mirror as Middendorf congratulates her classmate on her work.
Middendorf’s portfolio features photos of herself, friends and former classmates made over as grotesque ghouls, macabre monsters and trauma victims with facial wounds so realistic that you would think they were severely assaulted.
Rest assured, these outlandish beings are make-believe; they are the products of several tedious hours of makeup, prosthetics and faux flesh application, just as Middendorf was while sitting in as the guinea pig for her fellow classmate’s skeleton face design. These are the creations of a skilled makeup effects artist — a profession that is slowly becoming endangered in the realm of motion picture arts.
