The best visual storytelling doesn’t always announce itself. Sometimes, the audience doesn’t even notice it. They simply feel it.
Think about the last film that completely drew you in. You probably remember the characters, the story, perhaps a particular scene. But did you notice the makeup that made the characters believable? Or the set design that made their world feel real?
That’s the interesting thing about makeup and production design. When they’re done right, you don’t see the work. You believe the world.
For award winning production designer and makeup artist Jessica Hemanth Peter, these are two of the most overlooked pillars of visual storytelling.
“I see them as two sides of the same story. Makeup tells you about the person; production design tells you about the world they’ve been living in. Both give the audience information without having to explain anything.”
Makeup, particularly special effects makeup, goes far beyond making someone look different. It can suggest years of hardship, a sleepless night, a physical transformation or an entire history written on someone’s face. Production design does something similar on a larger scale. The furniture, colors, architecture and objects in a room can tell us who lives there, what they value and what their world looks like.
Peter experienced the magic of that process firsthand while designing and building the set for Country Song II by The Thing, a music video project with Sony and NYFA.
“It was surreal. I had a few days to design and execute the set, and when it was finally built, I remember walking through it and almost not believing I’d made it happen. I’d imagined it, worked through the details, figured out how to bring it together — and suddenly I was standing inside it. Even I couldn’t quite believe it.”
That moment captures something essential about production design: the leap from imagining a world to physically creating it.
It’s also why Peter enjoys the relationship between her two disciplines. One transforms the character; the other transforms the space around them. Both require curiosity, research, imagination and an eye for details that others might overlook.
“A room is never just a room. I always wonder who has lived there, what has happened there and what the objects around them might say. I think the same way about makeup. Every detail should have a reason to be there.”
For independent filmmakers especially, these crafts demand creativity and resourcefulness. Budgets and timelines can be tight, but the visual world still has to hold together. That often means experimenting, improvising and finding unexpected solutions.
And perhaps that’s the beauty of it. The artists put so much thought into details that the audience may never consciously register. A little texture, a particular shade, a worn-out object or a line on an actor’s face might seem insignificant on its own. Together, they make a story feel real.
“That’s what I love about filmmaking. When it’s working, the audience isn’t thinking about how we made it. They’re just there, inside the story. They don’t necessarily see it. They feel it.”
And sometimes, that’s the greatest compliment a visual storyteller can receive.
