BA (Hons) Make-up for Media and Performance

BA (Hons) Make-up for Media and Performance gives you the skills that you need to play a key creative role in performance, fashion, film or television.

Our recent graduates have worked on television and film productions (such as The Last of Us, The Marvels, Paddington in Peru, The Gentlemen, Thor: The Dark World, Wheel of Time, The Crown, Ted Lasso, Doctor Who, Coronation Street, and Casualty), theatre productions at the Royal Shakespeare Company and the English National Opera, musicals (such as Tina, Wicked, Mary Poppins, Matilda and Priscilla Queen of the Desert), and at London Fashion Week and Warner Bros. Studios, Leavesden.

The make-up artist is an important member of any production team, and you’ll have the chance to work with students who are studying BA (Hons) Acting, Film Production, Costume, Design for Costume and Performance, Commercial Photography, Visual Effects, Fashion and Fashion Communication to create ‘live’ collaborative projects. On this course, you’ll learn a diverse range of make-up skills. You’ll study make-up and hair design for drama, ballet, opera and music. A different perspective will give you the skills for fashion and photography shoots. You’ll also construct wigs and hairpieces and create prosthetic make-up FX for film and television. In short, you’ll develop skills that are a real asset to a wide range of performance industries, from theatre to TV, and from the music business to the world of fashion and film.

All undergraduate courses at AUB offer an optional placement year, to be taken between your second and third years of study.

If you’re unsure about this optional placement, you don’t need to decide now. Once you’re here and studying with us, the course team will discuss the placement options with you, so when the time comes, you can make a decision that’s right for you.

Students on BA (Hons) Make-up for Media and Performance have the chance to broaden their horizons through exciting exchange and international summer programmes. These opportunities allow you to study abroad at one of our brilliant partner institutions, experience different cultures, and enhance your academic journey.

The first year (Level 4) of the course is designed to teach you the fundamental creative, practical, analytical and critical skills needed by make-up artists working in various media and performance industries.

Workshops and practical projects will help you to extend existing skills in make-up, wigs and hair design and application through learning about postiche. Interpersonal, communication and employability skills are developed through these units since you will carry out practical make-up and hair projects on one another, models and performers under direction and supervision.

The units will also introduce you to formally recording your work through developing a professional make-up portfolio.

The development of analysis, critical thinking, research, reflection and writing skills are an important part of the course and link with the development of your practical and creative work.

The second year of your course enables you to build upon the skills and knowledge that you have gained at Level 4 and gives you the opportunity to consider the specialisms and career pathways that you would like to explore in more depth during Level 6 study.

Employability and professional skills are developed through exploring professional make-up contexts, digital technology in make-up, industrial links and collaborative engagement.

You’ll refine your technical abilities and knowledge of the place of the make-up artist within the creative team. You’ll work on a variety of live projects including live performances, shoots and make-up events – an important aspect of the course.

You’ll develop a contextual understanding of the art of make-up transformation and performance work though research.

Your third year provides the opportunity for you to formulate and identify your particular professional and academic interests.

Risk and ambition within the field will be crucial to your individual development and intellectual and academic integrity will be further encouraged through written work and ‘thinking through practice’.

The structure of Level 6 is made up of units that will further develop your potential to become intellectually motivated and increasingly autonomous professionals.

There is a strong emphasis on balancing conceptual thinking skills, research methods, practical and technical skills, working independently and as part of a team and acquiring lifelong learning skills.

You’ll develop your specialist areas of interest such as prosthetic transformation. You’ll extend your portfolio of work within a range of professional contexts through live projects and collaborations.

You’ll investigate your own practice and develop a philosophical understanding of key critical and contextual issues.

The opportunity exists within the curriculum to graduate with one of four named awards. The named awards available are:

• BA (Hons) Make-up for Media and Performance
• BA (Hons) Make-up for Media and Performance (Hair and Make-up for Fashion)
• BA (Hons) Make-up for Media and Performance (Hair and Make-up for Stage, TV, and Film)
• BA (Hons) Make-up for Media and Performance (Prosthetic Make-up Effects)

2024

• Winner | The Prosthetics Event, Body Art
• Finalist | International Beauty Industry Awards, Global Student award

2023

• Winner | International Beauty Industry Awards, Global Student award
• Winner | The Prosthetics Event, Body Art
• Winner | The Prosthetics Event, Prosthetic Application

2022

• Winner | Grand Prize, Stan Winston Character Make-up Competition
• Winner | TikTok Creative Revolution

2021 – Winner | BBC Three's Glow Up, Series Three – Sophie Baverstock

2019 – Winner | Body Paint Pro (Warpaint Magazine) at the North Make-up Championships

Career opportunities will focus on working closely with directors, designers and other creative departments in film, television, live performance and fashion which could include CGI technicians, photographers, model makers, sculptors, animatronics designers, visual effects artists and fashion stylists.

As graduating make-up artists from AUB, your professional options are wide and varied. With this in mind, the course has been designed to prepare you for a professional career in a diverse range of specialist roles thus giving you the necessary skills to take full advantage of an inspiring and exciting career.

Our Careers and Enterprise Service is dedicated to supporting you in turning your creativity into a great career.

Opportunities that our recent graduates have undertaken include:

• Make-up trainee – Paddington in Peru
• Make-up assistant – Ted Lasso
• Prosthetic department – Wheel of Time
  
• Make-up department – The Last of Us
• Make-up trainee with Lan Nguyen
  
• Head of Wigs and Make-up – Shrek the Musical
• Wig assistant – Witness for the Prosecution
  
• Wig assistant at The Wig Store
• Wig assistant – Moulin Rouge
• Wig technician at Pete Own Wigs, Bristol
• Wigs and make-up assistant for the Royal Shakespeare Company
• Mould-making technicians for the Harry Potter tour
• Ministry of Masks, London
• Shepperton Film Studios
• Millennium FX prosthetics studio, London
• Square Pegg Prosthetics
• BGFX
• Pinewood Film Studios
• Wigs and Make-up Assistant – We Will Rock You
• BBC – Doctor Who

Previous graduates have gained employment on the following projects:

• Films – Paddington in Peru (2024), The Gentlemen (2019), Maleficent II (2019), Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald (2018), Redcon-1 (2018), Beauty and the Beast (2017), Star Wars: The Last Jedi (2017), The Mummy (2017), Star Wars: Rogue One (2016), Spectre (2015), Cinderella (2015), Pan (2015), War Machine (2014)​
• Television – Bridgerton (Netflix), Ted Lasso (Warner Bros., Apple TV), Wheel of Time (Amazon Prime TV), Carnival Row (Amazon), Coronation Street (ITV), Rellik (BBC), The Durrells (ITV), A Midsummer Night’s Dream (BBC), The Secret (ITV), Little Boy Blue (ITV), Three Girls (BBC), Casualty (BBC), The Keith and Paddy Picture Show (ITV), Episodes (Channel 4) ​
• Fashion Promotion and Editorial – MAC cosmetics, Charlotte Tilbury, Illamasqua, Bobbi Brown and London Fashion Week​
• Theatre Wig Department and wigmakers – The Royal Opera House, Shrek the Musical, English National Opera, Royal Shakespeare Company, Miss Saigon, 42nd Street, Hairspray, La Cage aux Folles, Cabaret, Mary Poppins, Hairspray, Mamma Mia, Dirty Dancing, Peter Owen Wigs, Welsh National Opera and The Wig Store​
• Prosthetic makers, designers, waxworks – Square Peg Studios, BGFX, Mark Coulier, Millennium FX, Kristyan Mallett Make-up Effects, Altered States FX, KMFX, Harry Potter Studio Tour and Madame Tussauds

As part of BA (Hons) Make-up for Media and Performance, you may also get the opportunity to take part in course trips. Previous trips have included:

• New York
• London
• Venice
• Budapest

*These trips are optional and some may incur additional costs