Former ‘zombie werewolf’ shows you how to turn yourself into a zombie

MANILA, Philippines – Halloween is just around the corner, and if you’re looking for great and easy costumes on a budget, why not try turning yourself into a walking, rotting, blood-bathed zombie?

I first tried out being a zombie when Outbreak Manila, a “zombie-infested obstacle run,” called for auditions. After joining a similar run as a non-zombie participant, I didn’t think twice about auditioning – it was my turn to scare people. My friends and I got in and the rest was history.

During my first Outbreak (Outbreak BGC in 2012), I just tore up my dad’s old medical patient robe that he got when he was confined in the hospital. We had professional make-up artists to work on our look at that event.

The next Outbreak event would be on Halloween at Enchanted Kingdom. The thought of a carnival themed zombie run just challenged me to make my costume more unique and unforgettable. I thought, what if I zombify a werewolf for the Halloween event?

Although most of the make-up and fancier prosthetics for the 4 Outbreak Manila events I’ve been to were done by make-up artists, there’s a lot you can do at home to achieve similar effects. Proof: My Werewolf Zombie costume was done at home.

Here are some easy steps and tips to zombify yourself:

Things you need:

• Prosthetics – tissue, glue,
• Blood – Pancake syrup, red food coloring
• Make-up – Liquid and pencil eyeliner (black), concealer/bb cream/foundation in your skin tone, eye shadow (white, black, brown, red, violet, yellow), lipstick/lip gloss (red)
• Tools – sponge/brushes, paint brush, pallet, hair dryer, hair spray
• Face paint (red, black, white)

Wounds

Conceptualize the kind of zombie you’d want to look like. Paint the location you want your “wounds” to be with glue, then put tissue paper on top. You can wait for it to dry, but to speed it up, you can also use a hair dryer.

When it’s all dry, you can rip the excess tissue off. Repeat this until you have a good 4-5 layers. Be patient!

Once all your layers are dry, cover the mold with the BB cream, concealer, or foundation in your skin tone.

Start tearing your scar in the design you prefer. For more precise cuts, you can use a cutter, a blade, or scissors, but of course, be careful!

Paint the inside of the “loose skin” with the concealer you used to cover the mold.

Brush the inside of your wound with red lipstick, then top it off with a coat of red lip gloss to seal it in and give it a wet, shiny look. Its optional, but you can put a layer of black face paint down first before the lipstick to make them look deeper.

Outline the edges of your wound with black liquid eyeliner to give it more depth, too.

For a more realistic look, add more detail to your loose skin with the red lipstick and black eyeliner. Try your best to really even out the color of the mold with your skin too.

Makeup

Then, its time to mess up your face. Use black eyeliner and dark brown or black eye shadow to create shadow and depth. 

You can create effects like bruises by plotting violet, black, and red eye shadow around your face. I looked up tutorials on how to make fake bruises too, like this one: 

 

Don’t forget to always include your neck – and the rest of your exposed skin – when doing your makeup, for consistency. Add bruises, scars, blood, and dirt on those areas too.

Finally, you can cover your lips with your skin tone makeup to make you look paler.

Blood

To make blood, just mix your red food coloring with pancake syrup – its that simple, and tasty!

With the tip of a paint brush, let the fake blood drip inside your wound – apply just enough for it to look fresh. Let it drip down your face too. You can even put some in your mouth, on your lips, and let it drip out.

Once you’re satisfied with your face you can go crazy with everything else.

Hair

Give yourself a messy look and tease your hair by pulling chunks of hair tightly away from your head, and then lightly brushing towards your head. Use hairspray to hold the style.

If you want to color your hair but don’t have white or grey washable hairspray, you can use baby powder. I can’t guarantee it will last very long, though.

Costume

Rip your clothes. Get them dirty with fake blood, makeup, face paint, or even dirt. Sometimes, burning parts of your clothes can make them look better too.

Practice makes perfect. Once you’re all done, never forget the most important part: always be in character.

Once you know the basics, go wild! You can reference iconic characters and zombify them. You can also make other props like fake intestines or guts by stuffing stockings, tying them like sausages, and then soaking them in fake blood. Others use contact lenses to make the experience scarier.

To create my werewolf zombie costume for the Outbreak event at Enchanted Kingdom, I used the same process for the wounds. I used red contact lenses and fake fangs, which you can find in toy stores.

I also modified my makeup and drew werewolf features with scars. There weren’t a lot of werewolf tutorials on YouTube back then, but you can look up tons now, like this one:

 

I used chains as props, and any spare clothes I could tear in my wardrobe.

I used a homemade wig for the costume, but it was just an experiment and I wouldn’t recommend it – I had problems removing it. What I can suggest is to mess your hair and use colored hairspray, or if you can, use a real wig and style it.

There are a million zombie looks you can play around with, with just a little imagination. 

Good luck and Happy Halloween! – Rappler.com