Comic-Con Scholarship Winner Jake Webber Visits CMS to Share His Inspirational Story

Jake poses with CMS grad Wayne Anderson and Wayne's booth demo "Draxian."

Comic-Con’s “International Masquerade contest, presented by HBO, is one of the annual convention’s most-attended events. This year, Cinema Makeup School joined the masquerade tradition, presenting a $1,000 scholarship for tuition to the costume entry that demonstrated the best use of makeup.

High School student, Jake Weber, was chosen as the winner for his wolf-bat costume. Jake visited Cinema Makeup School recently to tour the facilities and meet with CMS instructors and directors to learn about the school firsthand.

Jake’s curiosity for makeup began at an early age. Jake says that his first exposure to special effects makeup came by way of his late Father.

“My dad used to do a lot of creature special effects makeup and he did some on me and for Comic-Con. He has made me Davey Jones, Ghost Rider, Bumble Bee, Avatar, and Spawn. He also did low budget B movie stuff. I was always around that. I would see him pumping fake blood on the patio and I was always curious and asked what he was doing.”

Jake credits legendary effects artists Patrick Tatopoulos and Rick Baker as his biggest influences and is a true fan of the artists and their work.

“I’ve met Rick [Baker] four or five times now. He’s the coolest guy. Every time it just gets cooler and cooler. When he won the Oscar for Wolfman, they had the beauty [makeup] going on and then there was Wolfman. When they announced him as the winner, my dad and I went wild! An actual creature won an Oscar. It’s been awhile.”

Jake remains very humble and says he was shocked when he was announced the winner.

“When they were going to present the award to me, they don’t tell you what you win but just tell you that you won something. And when they announced the award, I was practically crying. I thought this was awesome!”

Jake says his main passions are special effects artistry and acting. He hopes to one day work in both industries, and enjoys performing in his own makeup.

Since Jake’s father passed away, doing makeup has taken on even more meaning. This past Halloween, he used his dad’s old makeup kit to turn himself into a zombie. For Comic Con, Jake took on the entire masquerade project by himself for the first time. Jake says it was important to him to keep up the tradition of creating makeup for Comic Con to honor his father’s memory.

With the big win, Jake’s ambitions will get a boost in the form of a world-class makeup education. Jake plans on using the scholarship money to take CMS’s Creature Maquette Sculpture course in the near future to help develop his design skills and learn sculpting techniques for future projects.