What is it like to be a Costume Designer?
A lot of people ask me about it. What should I do when I take part in making a movie? When you are watching a film, it looks like these actors are so natural in the clothes they are wearing, but how do you manage to create this effect?
At first, when you’re given a scenario, you need to read carefully and decide if you want to take part in the project. Then the next step, when talking specifically about costumes, is to define all the characteristics of each character from reading character outlines and the script. Then the whole team gets together with the director to discuss these finer details.
When you have all the information you can start to find inspiration; it can be movies, photos, pictures or music. Now you start to draw sketches for the characters. Sometimes directors give input to the vision but we also have a screen test before making our sketches. This happens with the actresses and actors walking in so that we can analyse their faces and figures.
Once the sketches are completed we need to discuss them. There are four main people that create the visual part of a movie: the director, cameramen, artist and costume designer. Together we need to make the entire perfect picture, which can be problematic if we cannot speak the same language or be a good team.
The next, and very complicated step, is to find or to make the costumes. Costume designers need to understand all the delicate aspects of suit cut and the history peculiarities of costumes, as the history of clothing could affect a periodic drama for instance. Also, we need to understand the character of the person because every actor and character is unique (age, figure, nature of the persona). Sometimes the only option is to sew a costume and for that we have a special team. When this is the case, we need to know a lot of aspects about the textiles in question.
When the costumes are finished. What is the next step?
We try it on...and…the actor or actress transforms! It is like a miracle, it really is fantastic as they start to move and speak differently. That is the magic of costumes! They enable them to alter their whole being.
There are a lot of differences between costumes for theatre and for the cinema, but the main difference is that we can add a lot of details in films as the camera work will pick up these subtleties, whereas for the theatre we need to make the costumes a lot brighter so that the people in the last row can see the actors.
When filming a movie, once an actor is out of frame you need to look after the costume, making sure that it is the same for each take and this can cause continuity issues for the editor.
Finally, the most pleasurable thing is to see your costume on screen; to understand that you played a small part in the film and it wouldn’t look that way if it wasn’t for your input.
So, our students aren’t ready to start on any full costumes just yet, but those in the High School made their own elf vests last year for the Christmas Show and have been creating their own pillow cases this year.
These steps help them to see how long the process is and how each step is important in order to produce a fine finished product that can be used and shown off to family and friends.
Mrs Alex, Art Teacher
