"Walking Dead" FX Guru: How to Be a Killer Halloween Zombie

Directions

1. Shade the skin with a dark burgundy color for shadows, then go over the whole thing with a yellowish, jaundice color called 'dead' to create a realistic, multi-colored look rather than just white and black.
2. Mix red and yellow powdered food coloring with corn syrup to create fake blood; add a little liquid soap for easier cleaning, and add caramel color for a darker, more authentic zombie blood tone.
3. Apply fake blood by splattering it to convey violence and action, ensuring it sprays up under the chin, across the cheek, and across the face, rather than applying it with a brush or as small droplets.
4. Keep the skin dull and dirty to remove the shine of life; use a mixture of food coloring and black cake icing swished around in the mouth to make it dark, as a pink mouth signifies life.
5. Use conditioner in the hair to make it look greasy, flat, and matted down, simulating hair that has been rained on and dried in the sun repeatedly.
6. Create mummified skin or wounds by applying liquid latex to the skin, placing Kleenex or cotton on top, modeling it into wrinkles, drying it with a hair dryer, and adding two or three layers; then rip the tissue and paint the wound red inside.