In 1996, a Michigan boy with a penchant for slasher films and rock n roll packed himself up and made for the living, breathing epicentre of California. Today, he resides in Australia teaching one of the most important elements in a makeup effects artist’s repertoire: Blood. Emmy award winning FX Artist Chad Atkinson is taking his bloody expertise and offering it to aspiring artists in his new workshop Bloodlines, Bladders & Blowup Heads. Chad spent a significant period of his career at KNB EFX getting his hands dirty and beams with pride as he talks about being an alumni. With an impressive resume to boot, Chad condenses decades of film experience as a lab technician and on-set artist into an eight hour class demonstrating a variety of practical makeup effects that use blood.
Having recently hit a milestone of over 20 years in the industry, Chad decided he wanted to do things his own way by constructing a workshop to satisfy his love for gorey makeup effects. It’s unashamedly authentic, mischievously chaotic and pays perfect homage to old school practical effects from the era without digital dependancy.
In his workshop, students of all levels will learn tricks and techniques for blood rigging, throat slashing and head exploding. Basically anything that is guaranteed to make a mess. This class really does cater to all types as it offers not only fun gags for halloween enthusiasts but also tried-and-true film techniques and advice for industry-keen creatives. At the end of the day though, Chad ensures that, “Nobody leaves without getting red on them.”
These days, the world seems to feel smaller everyday, with makeup schools popping up in almost every major city across the globe. So why did he create this workshop? Chad was inspired to design this workshop after doing a run of demos around the country at various film festivals. Observing that young filmmakers were in need of budget friendly effects, he set about making that information available to them. Despite teaching lots of different classes on prosthetics and prop making, he desired the chance to teach students about old school practical effects that could be done easily and without a high cost. He respects how the craft was taught in the past, and is bringing it back into the light.
Chad explains, “We are getting so accustomed to CGI that younger fx artists are missing the essential training for good on-screen tricks. Getting a crew’s real reaction to an exploding dummy head or a throat slash let’s you know if the gag works or not.”
Since the start of this year, Chad has hosted in 3 locations around Eastern Australia, with more workshops to come over the next few months. Interested in attending one of these classes? Check out all the details below and if you don’t already follow him, shame on you! Head over to his Facebook and press that LIKE button!
BLOODLINES, BLADDERS & BLOWUP HEADS
Emmy award winning prosthetic artist Chad Atkinson is bringing his Bloodrigging workshop to you! Students will see up close the techniques and materials of creating horrific throat slashing effects, throbbing bladder uses, soft prop rigging, the ghastly exploding prosthetic dummy head and much more.
Perth | March 19, 2017
Location: My Pet Supplies Warehouse and Kirkside Products
Gold Coast | May 7, 2017
Location: Albert Waterways Community Centre
More coming soon! Follow the Facebook to keep updated or contact for more information.
