A-list make-up artist Adam J Breuchaud already works the red carpet-look with Anne Hathaway, Bryce Dallas Howard and Vera Farmiga so we were surprised to find him in the desert, on an actual runway, in a trailer, with big planes buzzing overhead.
He’s on set to create the look for the HTC One Free Fall Fashion Shoot advertising campaign in Arizona. That’s right – free fall as in jumping out of one of those planes. The concept for the commercial is that you see a beautiful model backstage in front of a mirror being made-up for a fashion show. She gets ready to walk the runway but as the camera pans back she steps out of a plane followed by make-up, cameramen, lighting guys and smoke machines.
It’s a world-first free fall fashion shoot captured on HTC One X mobile phone and the shots are uploaded before the model hits the ground.
Adam gives us the inside scoop on how he created the look for the model and world champion skydiver, Roberta Mancino’s futuristic make-up, prepped and ready to stand up to winds of 120 mph and heights of 14,000 ft.
He has created strong looks before and had been up skydiving a handful of times on his own, so he knows what it’s like to work under this kind of pressure.
Here’s what he told us about the look:
‘I get asked to do commercials but a lot of them are ‘plain jane’ make-up, where the brief is for the make-up to be ‘like a mother or a neighbour.’
So to get to do a high fashion shoot is great for me and, ultimately, the skydiving aspect drew me in.
Originally our look was very high fashion but it needed to fit around working behind goggles, with hair in a helmet, and that could be seen and photographed in the sky. We are going up at dawn and dusk so the light is very low up there.
Immediately we knew it had to be more either an eye or a lip. The client wanted more of an eye so we went for a bolder, darker eye.
What are the challenges of make-up at the height?
Being up in the sky the make-up doesn’t move the way it would by wearing it throughout the day. It definitely changes the consistency and texture. We have about seven to 14 minutes in between jumping, reloading and sending the model back up. So it’s quite a time constraint to keep it looking fresh and new every time. One of the difficult things was having the eye make-up move around the face at those fast speeds.
Adam says that ‘if we were down on the ground the whole time, I might not powder at all and just leave the make-up moveable so I could mould it; but we needed to really powder it in order to go up there and keep it in place. Once you’ve got powder then it is difficult to add layers over it and it just ends up cakey.’
Keeping Roberta’s lipstick on was also quite tricky.
You can see her final look here, feathers and all
Here’s how Adam created the look:
For the main colour and shape on the eyes he used the Chanel eye quad, Prelude with a purple/taupe brown with a touch of shimmer, but Adam first primes Roberta’s eyes with a MAC Cream Color Base in Fantastic Plastic for some staying power.
Serge Lutens makes an amazing palette that has one of the blackest blacks you’ve ever -seen – that’s where the dark, dark comes from. So those two palettes are the bulk of what I do eye-wise.
Then we darken her brow with the Anastasia Brow Wiz in a Medium Ash.
Then I put a little bit of black mascara in her brow to darken it and separate the actual hair itself.
Skinwise I am mixing a little of the Armani Luminous Silk Foundation in 4.5 and 5.5 between sand and natural beige with Chanel Universal Creme Bronzer and Stila Cream Cheek Colour in Camilla and Armani Bronze Mania 1 in golden brown.
For the lips it is a mixture of YSL Rouge Volupté Radiant Lipstick SPF 15 in #2 ‘Sensual Silk’ and the Stila cream colours to hold into the lip. And a really great Lip Liner from Giorgio Armani in a Silk Lip Pencil #1.
The big challenge for Adam was working around the eyes.
‘My only specification for the goggles was that they were as big and clear as possible. A lot of the goggles have black rimming around the edges or down the nose panel. We needed to see the biggest amount of the eyes possible.
We did a couple of tests beforehand to set the look and we did go up in a wind tunnel to see about maintaining the look. Obviously her eyes are behind the goggles so that make-up moves the least, it’s more her skin and lips we had to maintain.
I brought some reference photos from my own work so we were pretty lucky to land the first time with with a definite look.We went for the classic dark eye and nude lip which I tweaked a little, as since she’s flying through the sky to add another colour.’
The very friendly Adam tells us he mostly does editorial and press stuff with celebrities. ‘I work with Anne Hathaway, Bryce Dallas Howard, Julia Jones from The Twilight Saga, Vera Famiga and help with their appearances and press junkets.’
The last red carpet he did was The Oscars for Angela’s Ashes actress Kerry Condon who will next been seen as a jockey in a new HBO show ‘Luck.’ The series also stars Dustin Hoffman and Nick Nolte.
Adam says ”Everyone is so great but I work with Michelle Monaghan quite a bit and I like her a lot, and also Liv Tyler.”
What’s next for you?
‘For Spring/Summer one thing that no one ever talks about is sun block. I’m really into it and cream bronzers, cream cheek colours to keep the fashion look dewy. And a bright lip, a pink or tulip – something bold, be bold for sure.’
The HTC One Free Fall Fashion Shoot airs globally Spring 2012 and we’ll have more exclusive content and reports from the set so stay tuned!