Amy Mills

Among the growing number of standout women in our industry is Amy Mills, whose husband Chris is also a makeup effects artist; together they run a company called Silver Shamrock Lab, Inc.  Halloween is almost a religion in their home.

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Amy, Doug Jones
Image reproduced by permission of Amy Mills

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Anthony Jeselnik in fat girl makeup for The Jeselnik Offensive.
Image reproduced by permission of Amy Mills

From Ottawa, Canada, Amy has always had an artistic bent.  She attended the Fine Arts program at York University, receiving numerous awards recognition for her makeup and costuming at the national level at the annual Dramatic Arts competitions.  Amy used any excuse she could muster to slap some makeup on an unwitting friend or family member, and credits her parents with being instrumental in fueling her love for makeup.

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Amy and husband Chris applying gore for How I Survive the Zombie Apocalypse.
Image reproduced by permission of Amy Mills

Following graduation from college, Amy moved to Burbank, CA to attend MUD.  She graduated in the top percentile of her class and proceeded to dive headlong into the industry. Amy works in all aspects of makeup; photography, commercials, television, live performances and movies.  Her work has been seen on CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, Criminal Minds, Wilfred, Deadliest Warrior, and several Hallmark Channel, History Channel, and Biography Channel programs.  She’s worked with Cirque du Soleil, and on a number of indie films, and was the department head for the Emmy-winning show @Midnight for Comedy Central.  Her company, Silver Shamrock Lab, has developed a propriety design for ballistic gel human simulants, which are being used by everyone from the US military and television documentaries, to medical training facilities and shows like Deadliest Warrior and Forged in Fire

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Ballistic gelatin torso
Image reproduced by permission of Amy Mills

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Krampus for @Midnight on Comedy Central
Image reproduced by permission of Amy Mills

Amy was fortunate to spend 6 months working in Egypt on a medical drama called Critical Moments as the head of the SFX department, and joined the Makeup Artists and Hairstylists Union [local 706] in 2010.  From time to time Amy teaches at her old school MUD, in the areas of beauty and character makeup.

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Out-of-the-kit prosthetic—third-degree and cotton for Critical Moments.
Image reproduced by permission of Amy Mills

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Age makeup on Billy Baldwin for episode of Wilfred.
Image reproduced by permission of Amy Mills

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Finished age makeup on Billy Baldwin for Wilfred.
Image reproduced by permission of Amy Mills

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Makeup for Criminal Minds.
Image reproduced by permission of Amy Mills

Brian Wade

Brian started his career in special makeup effects when he was still in high school in Studio City, California, helping makeup effects master Kenny Meyers. Continuing to work with Meyers after finishing high school, Brian got a call one day from Kenny’s assistant, Erik Jensen, to work on John Carpenter’s 1982 effects masterpiece The Thing for Rob Bottin.

"That was an amazing time in my life; working with Rob Bottin, having lunch during the week with Rick Baker and his guys who were doing Videodrome at the time ... Man, life was perfect."
Like many artists in the field of makeup effects, Brian worked for a number of makeup effects shops, each working on different projects. It was, as he calls it, the heyday for makeup effects; it was pre-CGI, so everything was live action and in camera. During those years, Brian met and worked with many of the industry’s best, on projects including The Terminator, Harry and the Hendersons, Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Blade, Bicentennial Man, Stuart Little, Van Helsing, Hellboy, and Chronicles of Narnia 2: Prince Caspian.

In addition to his makeup effects skills, Brian is also exceptionally adept at Pixologic’s 3D sculpting software ZBrush, as you can see from these images of his 3D work. In 2002, pal Miles Teves lured Brian to Prague, Czech Republic, for a gig, where he remained for several years.  Brian moved back to California in late 2010 and continues to work steadily.  Character designer Patrick Tatopoulos (Stargate, Independence Day, I-Robot, Face-Off judge) agrees. "To be a good designer I think you need to have a wealth of knowledge about artistic and cultural styles, about biology, anatomy, and different types of animals. You are constantly observing these things. Then when you draw, you don’t need to think about these things; they will inform your work almost instinctively."ⁱ

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ⁱRichard Rickitt, Designing Movie Creatures and Characters (Focal Press, 2006).

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