07/29/2026
🎥 NCIS: Origins Season 2 🎬
Heres some BTS of the process! Great GREAT job, team!👏👏👏
Repost from Jenny Lin
“Wait… was that a real frozen dead body?” 🧊
That’s one of the biggest compliments our Makeup SFX team can literally receive!!
For this very sad frozen victim on Season 2 of NCIS: Origins, the process started long before cameras rolled. With the tight turnaround of network TV, we did a makeup and lighting test to ensure the paint scheme/tones, frost textures, and iridescent detail I wanted would read correctly under the exact lighting planned for the crime scene.
From underpainting to multi-sized ice application, Hair, Costume, Stunts, SFX, Camera, and Director, every department played a role in selling this horrible illusion.
The challenge didn’t stop there. This makeup had to evolve through multiple stages of the story. First, Michelle appeared frozen solid at the crime scene. Later, in the morgue, the medical examiner began thawing the body, and we had to preserve the makeup through hours of water effects while maintaining all of the frozen trauma details. One of my favorite moments was revealing the broken capillaries in her eyes during the examination.
By the end of the episode, she was fully thawed on the morgue table with a full Y-incision w/ lividity settling, marking the final stage of her transformation. One victim, multiple looks/ timelines, and a crazy amount of collaboration/ talent between departments to track every detail from beginning to end.
What audiences see as one frozen victim on screen was the result of an entire village. Makeup, Hair, Costume, Stunts, SFX, Camera, Directing, and a patient stunt performer willing to spend hours covered in ice, water, full airbrush paint and prosthetics by Autonomous F/X to help tell the story.
Featuring the amazing Michelle ✨❄️
