The “So You Wanna Be A Pro Artist” series is original content conceived and written by Tania D. Russell, all Copyrights reserved.

My collection of Set the Pace Publications

At this point you’ve studied – either via school or DIY, you’ve built your kit, and you have the beginnings of a portfolio. You have now reached the point of the big NOW WHAT?

Well, young Grasshopper, Now What is marketing and promoting yourself to get work. Welcome to the Rest Of Your Life as a freelance makeup artist. This is the point where the rubber really hits the road. There are a sad number of really great makeup artists who do not work, and there are a lot of good not great makeup artists who work all the time. The difference is that whether you’re amazing or good or even not that great; those who are smart and who work hard at their careers will persevere. Whether or not one will make it to the lofty heights of the Pat McGraths or Joanna Schlips of the world is unknown (and to get to that level you really do have to be a great artist), but you can certainly be a working artist if you put your mind to doing so. For too long I, personally, fell into Group A: Everyone thought I was really good and really talented yet I didn’t work. This was because I am a naturally shy person and putting myself “out there” is not one of my favorite activities. Well, let me qualify, I’m actually a singer and I have no problem getting up and singing in front of people. Put a phone in my hand and tell me to call someone, however, and to this day I still have to psyche myself up to it. The difference is, of course, rejection. Yes. You will be rejected. Be it for meetings, jobs or tests you will not always get what you want when you want it. But as the Rolling Stones said “…you can’t always get what you want but if you try, sometimes, you’ll get what you need”. Eventually you have to eat and pay bills so you’ll have to decide – as I did – to either pursue your career with gusto, or go back to the office grind. With that said, here are my suggestions for getting yourself going… Continue reading →

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The “So You Wanna Be A Pro Artist” series is original content conceived and written by Tania D. Russell, all Copyrights reserved.

In this the 8th installment I was going to go into the basics of marketing yourself as a media makeup artist (which was going to be my last installment), but a lot of you wanted me to go back and pick up on what I wrote about Testing.

The difficulty testing is the practical reality of what makes a GOOD test. Seasoned artists already know most of what I’m going to say so I’m going to assume that most of the fine people reading this are newer artists to the game. Here then are my suggestions for putting together portfolio worthy test shoots.
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Happy New Year!

I trust that you all had fabulous Holidays. Like everyone, I always enter a bit of a reflective mood at the start of the New Year. Generally speaking media work is a bit slower so I have a bit of time to stop and think about what I’ve accomplished and where I want to go next. Generally speaking I split my Career resolutions up from my Personal resolutions. Since we’re all here to talk about beauty and not about how I need to wake up earlier in the morning, here are my Career Resolutions for 2010; Continue reading →

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When Makeup to Go was conceived, it tried to be a clearing house for all the little makeup services that fell outside of what I book through my agent. Through it’s evolution, however, two distinct services emerged; my services for private individuals, and my Lessons for Aspiring Artists™. The Lessons for Aspiring Artists™ was started out of the belief that it’s better to learn how to be a working makeup artist from a working makeup artist. Firstly, trends change and an artist who was working 20 years ago may not be current with what’s happening today. Secondly, how to get work has significantly changed in even the last five years, much less the last 20. Then lastly, at the time Makeup to Go, Makeup Mentors and other such services were started, time were a lot of fly-by-night schools with unqualified (or totally unknown) instructors. Well, it must be daybreak because a lot of these schools have flow off never to be seen or heard from again. All too typical. All of the legit, stable schools are staffed with working artists as teachers.

But what about schools? Well, I’m not at all anti-school, I went to one for film makeup. Continue reading →

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The Powder Group’s Makeup Show (TMUS) vs. Makeup Magazine’s International Makeup Artist Trade Show (IMATS) 2009

This post is intended for all the aspiring pro makeup artists in the house. Every industry has it’s trade shows and the beauty biz is no exception. Being a professional in the industry, I’ve always felt a need to attend them as often as schedule permits, if only to shop and walk around and see what’s new in makeup-landia. IBS – the International Beauty Show – services the salon professional. Being a media artist (Print, TV, Film) I never really attend IBS. However there are two shows vying for attention in my spectrum of the business; The Makeup Show (TMUS) and the International Makeup Artists Trade Show (IMATS) Continue reading →

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After a few months, we’re up and running on our new web home. I’m sure you’ll agree it’s been worth the wait. Many thanks again to the ladies of Girly Blog Designz for their fab work on creating this site for me.

Makeup to Go has undergone a number of significant changes since it’s inception and I’m excited to see where we go from here. Changing over to a Blog format website will – hopefully – allow me to keep the content fresh, lively and topical. So set a spell, won’t you? Thanks again for visiting!

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