Selling a Smile

Last month I spent almost $200 to see one of my favorites DJ’s perform at a night club on Miami Beach. I fought myself when buying the ticket because I think paying $200 for general admission is ridiculous, but I have been waiting for years to see Tiësto up close and live.

So I saved my tips from my face painting jobs and treated myself. My sister and I got there early, we wiggled our way to the front of the dj booth, and 2 hours later we were waiting patiently for Tiësto to take the stage. I was so excited that I ignored the fact my feet were burning from my ‘too cute to walk in’ heels. Another hour passed and still no sign of Tiësto. It was now 2 am. I was irritated, tired, and questioning why I wasted $200 to see someone that might not even show up.

TiëstoAt that moment, Tiësto and a cannon of confetti lit up the club. I couldn’t believe I was 2 feet away from the world famous DJ Tiësto. With one glance at is face, I was no longer upset. All my feelings were swept away in a glow stick trance and all I could focus on was the biggest smile on his face. Tiësto spun for 5 hours after that. By 7 am I was almost in a coma from being so tired and deaf. I took a picture of Tiësto right before he left the stage and he had the same kool aid smile 5 hours later. I began thinking to myself, “He really loves what he does, it’s written all over his face”.


Heather in HollandI’m writing this blog from 30,000 feet in the air. I’m heading home after teaching three awesome classes in Holland. I asked the organizer of the classes why he wanted me to teach and not the other great talents of our industry, and he said because the people of Holland call me smiley. They enjoy the fact that I smile from start to finish while I teach and always welcome them with a smile. I never really thought about it, but a smile can be a game changer.

A smile speaks a thousand words in any language. A simple smile can invite someone to conversation, cut the tension, welcome communication, and make someone feel important.

One of my favorite business role models, Jeffrey Gittomer, once advised to put a mirror in front of your office phones and look at yourself when you are talking to customers. Try to smile the whole way through the conversation and see how different the conversation will be. Our faces wear our emotions, so when you are frowning, in a bad mood, or can’t muster a grin, the customer can feel it. So, that mirror still sits on my desk. I practice a smile every day. As silly as it sounds, I contribute much of my success to my smile. (Time to get Veneers, lol)

Wearing and using a smile is a small move in the right business direction. Think about times where a good smile has won you over, and how it changed your mood at that moment. Think about Julia Roberts in pretty woman or George Clooney and his seductive grin. Think of President Obama and how he smiles when he looks at his wife and children…. Those moments are contagious and memorable. I know it may sound cliche, but start with the man in the mirror. When you are on your way to a gig, getting ready to knock on the door of a party, or meeting the crazy birthday mom, check your smile first. There is always a reason to smile, let success be the biggest motivator!

Happy painting friends!

Witch Hat – Face Painting Tutorial

Face Painter Lisa Joy YoungWe’re sure some of you will recognize this tutorial. Lisa Joy Young’s youtube has quickly spread through-out the face painting world as one of the go-to channels for design ideas and tutorials. If you can’t get enough of Lisa from her Youtube tutorials, don’t forget that she is a FABAtv Instructor and has two classes out and more on the way!

Here’s one of her latest tutorials, a witch hat with spider webs in the background. This is a great design that can be used on kids or adults for your next Halloween gig!


Lisa Joy Young on FABAtv

Autumn Eyes – Face Painting Tutorial

Autumn Eyes - Post ThumbnailThis tutorial caught our eyes here at Silly Farm. Our New Zealand fans might recognize some of the work from Daizy Design. This appropriately named design, Autumn Eyes, comes at the right time for everyone in the norther hemisphere. Halloween is around the corner and Thanksgiving will soon be following. Time to practice those fall designs!

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Did I mention that the painter responsible for this tutorial, Christy, is a new FaBAIC 2013 instructor?

Christy, AKA Daizy, has been making tutorials on the reg. You can check out her youtube for more face painting tutorials, and give her facebook page a like while you’re at it.

Zombie Love – Special Effects Tutorial

Zombie Love - Special Effects Tutorial
Keeping in theme with the month, here’s another Halloween inspired design. This is a quick, 2-3 minute zombie teeth design using Mehron Tooth FX, Wolfe Face Art & FX’s black & red, a stipple sponge, and some fake blood. My model today is my hubby, Henry! This is a great technique to pair with another design, as it compliments the character and brings it to life even more. Check out my last zombie tutorial you can use this with!
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  1. Clean the zombie, werewolf, or whatever fanged horror monster’s teeth and make sure they are dry. Make sure their lips don’t touch the Tooth FX for at least 20 seconds once applied.
  2. Apply the mehron tooth fx on their teeth. Remember you are blacking out the teeth to create a sharp, fanged tooth appearance.
  3. Next, apply some wolfe red and black to give a stained blood appearance.
  4. I finished this quick design using a stipple sponge and dabbing some fake, stage blood around the lips, chin, and even on the teeth for some fresh looking blood effects.

It looks like our zombie just had his first bite!
Share with us your creations that you used this technique with. We’d love to see your pictures! Post them to our facebook page or send us a tweet!

Henry's Zombie Teeth

How To Get More Business

Creativity Takes CourageThere comes a time in every entrepreneurs journey where the road splits and we have to shift gears from operating as a hobby to full throttle sales. Many of us start off small, clients here and there, passing out the occasional card, and answering calls at our leisure. Problem with that is, at the same time, we have invested in hundreds and even thousands of dollars in supplies that aren’t generating income. So the real question is, “How do I get the business I want and need?”.

*Disclaimer: The thoughts, advice and information provided in this post are solely the opinions of the author and should be followed up with due diligence prior to holding them as truth.
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  1. Determine the level of business you are looking to pursue.
  2. If you want to do the occasional birthday or town event, or if you only want to work one weekend a month, I don’t suggest that you flood the town with business cards. If you are looking to work every weekend and possibly a restaurant or two during the week, then your strategy will differ. Some of us have BIG plans for our face painting businesses. We want to bring in the bucks, book tons of good paying gigs, and paint till our hands hurts. But it’s important to weigh the pros and cons. Typically a face painters busiest days of the week are Saturday and Sunday, which are also the days we like to spend with family, catch up on house chores, or attend our own personal events. Are you ready to commit your weekends to work? If you are, I will tell you how to get more business, but if you don’t want the responsibility of booking, invoicing, inventory, and working on the weekends, then you will want to consider working through an agent that will book you based on availability.

  3. There are no shortcuts to being successful in business.
  4. Investing is one of the most crucial aspects of business success and growth. When I refer to investing, I’m not just talking about in product. I am talking about investing your time in marketing (meeting people), volunteering, doing research and learning.

  5. Marketing yourself in most cases is free.
  6. Marketing involves putting your people skills to work. Get out there and network. Talk to your neighbors, teachers, friends, and get involved in your community events. Visit a local family restaurant and offer a family night to drum up business. That alone gives you the opportunity to network with other families in your area. Invest time in people and those people will turn into customers.

  7. Planning can mean the difference between success and failure.
  8. What am I talking about you say? Suppose it’s a busy weekend and you have three parties booked back to back. Rather than waiting until the day of to punch in the addresses in your GPS and drive frantically from event to event, map out your day on Thursday. Call the party mom’s or event managers to confirm locations and ask for any special instructions. Planning early will eliminate the surprise factor that can cause you to run late, mess up an address, or forget about a road closure that may take you 20 miles out of the way.

  9. Research is another core component of being successful.

Creativity is a way of LifeI spend no less than 20-24 hours a week researching trends, color schemes, browsing the web for ideas, new products, reading blogs, answering questions, watching you tube, teaching myself new skills and finding inspiration. If you are a newbie you will want to spend your time browsing the net looking for pricing ideas for your region, local events to market, research what services others are offering and at what prices, and how you can possibly collaborate with local agencies. Being prepared is important because when push comes to shove knowing your worth will mean the difference between ending the day in the red or the black.

Every year I face paint at the largest Hispanic festival in south Florida. Over 100,000 people attend this festival and being prepared pays off. I am hired to face paint the public at no charge. For me it’s a great event because I get paid whether I paint 10 people or 100 people. The difference is that we are allowed to accept tips. So it’s in our best interest to move the line. After several years of doing this event, I have my system down packed. I have a limited display and work from a board. I can paint almost 20 people per hour based on the board designs. I print off the flags of the various Hispanic countries, laminate the sheets and offer them as designs. This formula works to my advantage because I can move quick and my customers are happy.


open your mindLast year a local new painter decided to set up shop at the festival. Her first mistake was that she failed to do her research. One, you have to have a permit and insurance to set up a concession at a city festival. Two, she did not bring a table to set up her supplies, so she asked me to share mine. My client that hired me did not want her painting next to me because she didn’t know if she was using proper materials or had proper paperwork, so she made her move. Later that afternoon I saw the poor girl using an empty box as her table. Third, she didn’t come prepared. She did not have pictures for the people to choose from, she had to “look up” the flags on her iPhone, and she didn’t have extra water to use to change out her cup.

After the festival I walked over to her to talk to her and introduce myself. I handed her my card and told her to give me a call and that I’d help her. At first she seemed put off. Perhaps she was slightly embarrassed or didn’t know what my intentions were, but that call is the reason she is now running a successful face painting business.

If she had taken the time to visit the festival and do her research to find out if there were painters at the festival, what designs they were offering, what they were charging, if she was legally able to just show up and paint, what products they were using, etc.., she would not have faced the embarrassing challenges she brought upon herself.

Lastly, I want to stress the importance of learning. I have taken well over 300 classes on just face painting. I try to use any free time I have to watch a FABAtv lesson. Learning helps you be prepared, helps you service your customers better, and helps you gain an advantages over the other painters that only paint three designs or cheek art. For example, one of my favorite customers called and asked me if I could paint her daughters synchronized swimmers team and she was looking for water proof make up. Luckily for me I had just watched a class by Nix Herrera about airbrush make up application and that gave me the knowledge on what to offer her.

Another time when I was hired to paint at a boy scout convention. I stayed up till 3:00 AM watching classes by Mark Reid, Lynne Jamieson, Sammie Bartko, and Wiser just to brush myself up on the designs boys love. Learning is what engages us to try new things, explore beyond our comfort zone of butterflies and princesses, and can open up doors of possibilities. If you are struggling with speed, invest some time in learning techniques to help you speed up your designs without compromising quality. If you are uncertain about how to file your taxes or incorporate as a business in your state, invest time in reading and learning about it on the SBA website or business blogs. Don’t underestimate the importance of investing in yourself. You are selling yourself and your services. It makes perfect sense to be prepared with the right tools, the right knowledge, and the insight about how to do the best job possible.

Having those tools will certainly take you 10 steps in the right direction to create more sales, gather more clients and grow your business.

I write these articles to share my knowledge and help other artists grow. Please feel free to share you business advice with me and our community of painters. If you wish to write for the Faba Blog, contact us.

Happy Painting!

Creativity never goes out of style

Zombie Skin Special Effect Tutorial

Silly Farm Zombie

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The Halloween season is upon us and many gore filled nights lay ahead of us face and body artists! This gory zombie design is perfect for teens and adults that want to be transformed into the living dead for a night of fun.

I started with tearing my tissue/toilet paper into smaller pieces and applying them to the face using Spirit Gum. The spirit gum dries relatively quick. Right after that, I used the zombie skin and brushed in around the edges of the tissues, where the skin was still showing. Don’t just coat it nice and smooth, give it some texture! After the zombie skin dried, I took my FAB makeup and applied black to the eye socket then used my plum(burgundy) paints to give it a bruised look. I applied more color, judging where to apply it based on how the skin should look when it’s torn or bruised. I applied my Mehron 3D Blood Gel in areas that I wanted the blood to pop more or to look like it’s dripping. Finally I used my stipple sponge with my stage blood to give the final effects of bruised and scraped skin oozing blood.

Freebies – Business Cards, Tutorials, & Consulting

This article is a submission from Artist Alley. Click here to view it on Artist Alley.
When you’re just getting your business started, the onslaught of expenses can be staggering. After all, it takes money to make money – right? Definitely…but sometimes the best things in life are FREE!

Getting Started

Every new business needs a website, which I found to be one of my most daunting tasks. Web designers are expensive, and it’s easy to get taken advantage of when you don’t know much about web development. Check out our last article about websites and you’ll be well on your way to getting started for free, with minimal technical knowledge.
Business card examples
Business cards
are an absolute essential for networking; you never know where you’ll be when someone asks for your information. Pulling out a stylish business card looks much more professional than scrambling to jot down your number on some scrap paper you found in your purse. Vista Print and Zazzle both offer free business cards, with plenty of design templates to choose from.
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If your business involves selling merchandise, check out the United States Postal Service‘s array of free shipping supplies. You can “purchase” your supplies online, and have it shipped right to your door.

Education & Designs

The education process is endless. You may have already “learned” your trade, but keeping up with the latest trends and techniques takes some serious dedication. While I recommend saving up for workshops and conventions, it’s understandably expensive. Keep your skills fresh between classes by dabbling around on Youtube; there’s tutorials for everything from cheek art to prosthetics, henna, and more. Some of the biggest names in face & body art keep active channels, full of advice and tutorials.

Check out Silly Heather and Jinny for starts!
Heather Green - Face PainterJinny Makeup Artist

Business Consulting

Even with all of the right supplies and talent, a small business can fizzle out if you’re not prepared for the management end of things. SCORE (Service Corps of Retired Executives) is a nonprofit consulting service for entrepreneurs to help you build your business from a solid foundation. In addition to their free business counseling services, they host low cost workshops and webinars.

Managing your money and resources from the start will afford you more success in the long run. Fancy business cards and high end websites are great, but pace yourself! Grow your business thoughtfully; every penny matters.

Wishing you all so much success,
Caitlin St. Angelo

Dark Bat – Face Painting Video Tutorial

The Dark Bat Face Painting
Everyone always asks for more boy designs, so we’re dedicated October to boy designs! This is a quick batman inspired face painting mask that I created and can be done in a quick 3-5 minutes. Add your own variations or copy it line to line!

The model requested that I didn’t paint over his eyes so I created the mask around his eyes without making him close his eyes during the process.
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  • I start off laying down background color with my rainbow cake, and then painted the mask on top and around his eyes.
  • I added the details, some tiny bats and a moon.
  • I finished the design off with a little glitter and VOILA! A fast and simple design geared towards all ages!

Dark Bat & DragontalesWatch the Dark Bat tutorial on Youtube.
Want the tutorial for this other design? Find out how to create the ‘Dragontales’ design!

DIY Website Building

Website Savvy

This article is a submission from Artist Alley. Click here to view it on Artist Alley.

With the ease and availability of search engines, the World Wide Web has become a cornerstone directory of information. And you – as an upstanding professional artist – should be on it! People want to know about you before they promise you money: They want to read about you, find great reviews, and scope you out a little bit before allowing you into their homes.

Now, I am not the most tech savvy person. My initial foray into website building was long, laborious, and fraught with disappointments. Hiring a reliable web developer on a budget seemed impossible, so I joined the ranks of DIY’ers (Do-It-Yourself’ers). Here are some of my favorite website building resources and tools – designed specifically for the tech-illiterate!

  • Wix – A drag-n-drop style editor for beautiful Flash or HTML5 websites.
  • Carbonmade – Focuses on creating sleek, stylish, online portfolios.
  • WordPress – A very SEO (search engine optimized) option, based on a core “theme”, customized by the addition or deletion of “plug-ins”.
  • Godaddy – Offers free design templates, pre-made websites, and a website builder with a slew of additional tools.
  • Blogs, such as Tumblr or Blogspot, also allow you to add pages and connect to a domain name of your choice, giving the benefits of a website with minimal effort.

Most of these allow you to build your website for free, only charging you if you choose to upgrade to a higher package. Freebies are great for the nonexistent budget of a budding entrepreneur…however, I have found that upgrading to a paying package has been well worth the professional appeal it offers.

Remember that a website reflects you and your business; You might be a fun, lighthearted person, but an unkempt or unprofessional looking website can derail your efforts to be take seriously. Here’s some things your website should include:

  • Functional, easy to navigate pages
  • A professional aesthetic
  • An “About Me” section
  • A list and explanation of services
  • Photographs of your work
  • Contact information

From there you can always expand. Adding additional pages, comment widgets, interactive Google maps, or payment integration, is much easier than you’d think! Look at the design and layout of other successful websites for some inspiration. FABAICWolfeFXKryolan, and Mehron all fit the bill.

Happy Painting!
-Caitlin St. Angelo

All logos are intellectual rights and trademark of their respective owners.

Spotlight Artist: John Place

John Place Headshot

Tell us a little about yourself, where are you from?

Hi, my name is John Place I recently turned 26 years old….. and EVEN MORE recently turned 35. I am from Sunrise, Florida. I was born and raised in South Florida, which is rare, because most people from South Florida move north and vise versa.  I have 3 children,  2 boys and a girl.

Are you an artist full time or do you have another job?

I don’t know if I consider myself an “Artist”, I have many jobs. I am the Producer of FABAtv, I do all of the shooting and editing, and I have a few other business that I do also. Zombie Ice & Zombie Dogz are two food trucks I own that specialize in shaved ice and gourmet hot dogs. Green Box Studios is my video production company. We create corporate and web based videos for companies all over the world. I also do graphic design and printing of flyers, brochures, business cards etc. I guess I really am an artist in many forms.

Special FX Gore Neck Wound by John Place

What type of face and body art do you specialize in?

I LOVE gore and special FX makeup, prosthetics and body paint.

How did you get your start (in face and body art)?

Ok, ready? Here we go. Balloon Artist James Changefield introduced me to  Heather Banks-(Green now) a few years ago. I did my first Face Paint DVD video project for her and it took FOREVER, like 19 hours of shooting and 60 hours of editing, from that moment I NEVER wanted to do another face paint again. About a year later Heather came to me again with an idea to do 1 hour online face and body art class videos and to do 5 per month. At first I was not really too excited, how could we do that if it was going to take 80 hours of production per class? After many meetings and lots of trial and error I figured out how to do it in less then half the time.. so in March of 2011 we launched FABAtv.com. Lets go back in time for a second to little John Place in kindergarden….. I hated to color, I actually got put into pre-first because of my hate of art and coloring. That trait stayed with me throughout my adult life. Back to the present. Like the Ninja Turtles to Master Splinter, after watching countless hours, shooting, editing, watching again, I started to learn from the Masters of face and body painting. My first real interest in this art was when I shot the class for Nix Herrera’s lingerie class. After watching him, I thought, “WOW, I think I can do that”. So after spending lots of money on supplies, brushes, compressor, paints, etc, I painted my girlfriend and I was surprisingly pleased with the outcome. I posted the photos on Facebook and people were giving me great responses. I was hooked. Next was Brady Neher, Mark Reid, Wiser, just to name a few… It wasn’t until I did a class with FX and gore artist Pam Trent that I knew where my niche would be. There is something about the raw emotion that people have when they see realistic gore FX makeup out in the public. I have been posting photos of my work on my Facebook wall and have been getting responses from people around around the
world.

FABAtv LIVE October 16th with John Place

What’s the most enjoyable part of what you do?

WOW.. that’s a hard one. I guess meeting people from all over the world and seeing their excitement when they talk about their art. OH and the fact that my studio is at Silly Farm Supplies, there are 24 women, me and one other guy in the office. It’s awesome, except for one week a month, I don’t even come into the office… lol This will probably get edited out. (Editors Note: Nope!) :) I also enjoy grossing people out, I don’t really like doing gore or FX when it’s close to Halloween. I like it in May, when people don’t expect to see someones eye or face busted open. It’s Awesome.

Werewolfe Special FX Body Paint by John PlaceJoanna - Johns alter egoBloody Eye Special FX by John Place

John hard at workDo you attend any conventions, like the FABAIC?

Well, I kind of attend. I am usually very busy shooting FABAtv Videos at that time. We have the best of the best in town, so we try to shoot as many people as possible. It’s long days for me in the studio during the FABAIC.

What would you like to do more of, art or otherwise?

I would like to travel more. I never get out. If anyone would want to invite me to Vacation/Holiday you can reach me at silly farm ;).

Outside of art, what do you do for fun?

For fun?…. I work 24/7. I LOVE going to the movies.

Do you have any pet peeves? 

No, But I have a pet Chihuahua. His name is Taco. (Editors Note: I thought you gave Taco away cause he kept chewing your computer cords?)

Where do you see yourself in a couple years?

Traveling the world teaching gore and FX would be cool, but even more, retired and sipping on cold non-alcoholic drinks by the pool.

Do you have any projects going on or in the works?

Just launching my new Zombie Ice food truck. It’s a lot of work.

What do you think of FABAtv?
FABAtv???… I am a true testament that FABAtv WORKS!!

Bloody Neck - Special FX by John PlaceWerewolf Back - Special FX by John PlaceMinced Hand Bloody Special FX by John Place

Remember to tune in to FABAtv LIVE on October 16th at 8:00pm EDT for a free live class by John Place on Special Effects!