Production Makeup · Tampa Bay · Chicago · Los Angeles · Nationwide
Complete on-set beauty for commercial, corporate, editorial, broadcast, and brand productions in Tampa Bay, Chicago, Los Angeles, and 22+ markets nationwide. A key artist, a team, men’s grooming, and touch-up continuity through wrap — licensed, insured, and comfortable with whatever your procurement team sends. Since 2006.
Quotes within one business day · Short-notice calls welcome · FL Talent Agency License TA1765 · COI with named additional insured on request · NDA & vendor onboarding ready
Who We Work With
Most of the production work we book comes from someone who has been handed a shoot, a budget, and a date, and needs the beauty department to stop being a variable.
Complete On-Set Beauty
Most productions hire these separately and spend the day mediating between three freelancers who have never worked together. We staff all of it as one department, with one key makeup artist answering to your producer.
Production Types
On-set hair and makeup for broadcast spots, digital campaigns, and branded content in Tampa Bay, Chicago, Los Angeles, and nationwide. Key artist plus additional artists staffed to your talent count, with continuity held across setups and shoot days.
Headshot days, executive portrait sessions, conference and keynote prep, panel and press readiness. The work that has to look effortless because the person in the chair is not a model and does not want to look made up.
Magazine, lookbook, e-commerce, and campaign imagery. Editorial makeup artists who can build a concept from a reference deck and hold it across an entire run without drift.
Anchor and guest makeup, livestream, press conference, and media tour support. Built for hot lights, long sits, and the reality that there is no second take. Clients include CBS, WGN, and Windy City Live.
Glam bars, pop-ups, product launches, convention booths, and influencer events. Throughput and brand discipline under a queue — a different skill than a quiet shoot day. Lollapalooza x Budweiser VIP: 50+ guests per hour, 3 festival days.
Credits & Credentials
Brands, networks, and publications have put our production makeup teams in front of a camera since 2006 — including American Girl, Radio Flyer, Nickelodeon, CBS, WGN, Women's Health, and Fortune 500 clients across commercial, editorial, and broadcast.
How Booking Works
A call sheet if you have one. If not: date, location, call time, talent count, and what the footage is for.
Within one business day: recommended artist count, artist day or half-day rate, travel, and a kit fee only if your brief requires specialty product.
A signed agreement and itemised invoice on every booking. Fifty-percent retainer to hold the date; balance due thirty days before the shoot. COI, NDA, W-9, and vendor portal cleared before the booking is confirmed.
First looks, continuity notes, touch-up coverage across setups, and a clean load-out.
How We Quote
We quote to your budget and your schedule rather than publishing a number that ignores both. Here is every component that goes into the estimate so you can build a realistic line item before you speak to anyone — including us.
Quoted per artist. A half day covers up to five hours on location; a full day covers up to ten, inclusive of prep and load-out. Overtime is billed hourly beyond that and is written into your estimate before you sign, never discovered on the invoice.
Standard production days do not carry a separate kit fee. A kit fee only shows up when your brief needs items we do not stock every day: SFX and prosthetics, character or period looks, bald caps and lace, unusual skin-tone ranges, airbrush body coverage, or anything bought in specifically for your shoot. When it applies, it is on the estimate with a reason.
The key artist owns the look and continuity and carries a higher day rate. Additional artists execute to the key’s direction. We recommend the split; you approve it before booking.
Stated up front for anything outside the Tampa Bay, Chicago, or Los Angeles metro. No surprise mileage lines after the fact.
Makeup, hair, and men’s grooming are quoted by the coverage you need, not bundled blindly. Some days need one artist who does all three; some need a dedicated groomer and a key for the women. We will tell you which — and it is usually cheaper than you assumed.
A two-hour minimum applies per artist on short calls; activations and volume days are quoted as packages. Contract and itemized invoice on every booking. W-9s, certificates of insurance, and vendor onboarding portals are routine here.
A fifty-percent retainer is required to hold your date; the remaining balance is due thirty days before the shoot. We provide certificates of insurance with named additional insured and specified limits, execute NDAs, and clear vendor portal registration and W-9 before the booking is confirmed — not after it. If your AP team has a specific onboarding workflow, send us the link on the first call.
Service Areas
Tampa Bay and Chicago are our two full-bench home markets. Los Angeles is our newest and expanding market. For productions anywhere else we source, vet, and stand behind local artists on your behalf — one point of contact, one accountable production makeup team, wherever the shoot is.
Tampa, St. Petersburg, Clearwater, Sarasota, Ybor City, Channelside, Water Street, and the surrounding Gulf coast. We work regularly with regional production companies, agencies, and studios across the Bay area, and travel statewide for location work.
Also serving Bradenton, Lakeland, and Orlando on travel terms.
The Loop, Fulton Market, River North, Gold Coast, Lincoln Park, and the greater Chicagoland production corridor. Our Chicago bench handles volume days and multi-artist activations without borrowing from outside the market.
Also serving Evanston, Oak Park, and the North Shore.
Everywhere Else
We have trusted production makeup artists across the country and full-service sourcing for the rest. Send us a call sheet in Los Angeles, New York, Texas, Miami, Nashville, or a location we have never shot in, and we find the right people, vet their book, their insurance, and their reliability, and put our name on them. You do not run a search — we become your in-house beauty arm for that production.
Recent out-of-market work: Los Angeles, New York, Austin, Dallas, Houston, Miami, Nashville, Atlanta, Las Vegas.
Questions Producers Ask
Production work is quoted per job, not per person, because the variables that actually drive cost are talent count, call time, shoot length, and whether you need continuity coverage through the day. We quote a day rate or half-day rate per artist, with overtime and travel stated in the estimate rather than discovered on the invoice. Send us a call sheet or a rough schedule and you will have real numbers within one business day.
Kit fees are not automatic. Standard production days do not carry one — the artist’s working kit is included in the artist day. A kit fee only appears on the estimate when your brief needs product or equipment we do not carry every day: specialty prosthetics and SFX, character or period looks, unusual skin-tone ranges, bald caps and lace, airbrush body coverage, or anything we have to buy in specifically for your shoot. When it applies, it is stated up front with a reason, never discovered on the invoice.
The working rule for a standard corporate or commercial shoot is one artist per three to four talent for first looks, assuming a normal call-to-camera window. Tighter turnarounds, wardrobe changes, character looks, or grooming-plus-beauty splits change that math. Tell us your call time and your first shot time and we will tell you the staffing that actually fits — including when you need fewer artists than you think.
The key artist owns the look. They build it, approve it, maintain continuity across setups, and are your single point of contact on the floor. Additional artists execute against the key’s direction to keep the day on schedule. On a one-talent shoot you may only need a key. On a twelve-person campaign day you need a key plus a team, and the key is what keeps face nine looking like face one.
Yes. City Lights Beauty Agency holds Florida Talent Agency License TA1765, carries general liability coverage, and works to a documented sanitation standard. We provide certificates of insurance with named additional insured and specified limits on request, execute NDAs, and handle vendor onboarding, W-9, and procurement paperwork that larger brands and networks require. This is the part most beauty vendors cannot clear.
Yes. Tampa Bay and Chicago are our two full-bench home markets and Los Angeles is our expanding market. For a call that lands anywhere else — New York, Austin, Dallas, Houston, Miami, Atlanta, Nashville, Las Vegas — we source and vet local artists on your behalf and put our name on them. One point of contact, one accountable team, wherever the shoot is. We remove the search from your plate entirely.
Two to four weeks is comfortable for most corporate and commercial work, and we regularly clear short-notice and next-day requests when the bench allows. Multi-day campaigns, large talent counts, and activations during convention weeks should be locked earlier. If your date is tight, call rather than email.
We staff both union and non-union productions and will tell you plainly which of our artists carry which status before you book, so your production manager is not resolving it on the day. If your project has specific local union requirements, raise it in your first message and we will confirm compliance before quoting.
A call sheet if you have one. If you do not, five things: date, location, call time, talent count, and what the footage is for. That is enough to quote accurately. Wardrobe direction, references, and shot lists help us prep but are not required to get you a number.
Yes, and it is a distinct discipline. Activation beauty is a throughput problem as much as a beauty problem: you are serving a queue of guests on a clock in a public-facing branded environment. We have staffed Lollapalooza, McCormick Place, and branded glam bars at 50+ guests per hour. We staff glam bars, pop-ups, product launches, convention booths, and influencer events with artists who hold quality at volume and stay on brand while doing it.
Local Pages
Studios, venues, and production companies we work with regularly in each market. Everywhere else, brief us directly and we source.
Tampa, St. Petersburg, and Clearwater — Westshore, Water Street, the EDGE District, and the Tampa Convention Center. Statewide location work on travel terms.
The Loop, Fulton Market, River North, and the Gold Coast. Stage work, McCormick Place activations, and the collar suburbs.
Our newest and expanding market. Commercial, editorial, and brand production work with vetted artists placed by our team. One contact, one accountable department.
For Repeat Buyers
Producers, creative directors, and agencies who use us across multiple productions can prepay a block of four, six, or twelve day rates and hold a preferred rate across the whole block. What that means in practice: priority on the calendar when everyone is competing for the same dates, the same key artist on every job so continuity does not reset, one master contract for the year, and a single retainer schedule — fifty percent to hold the block, balance due thirty days before your first shoot. No re-quoting every time a project lands.
Request a Production Quote
A call sheet is the fastest path. If you do not have one yet, five things will do: date, location, call time, talent count, and what the footage is for. Real staffing and real numbers within one business day, with no obligation attached. Serving Tampa Bay, Chicago, Los Angeles, and productions nationwide.
Have a call sheet ready? Call (888) 619-0628 and read us the five lines — we will have staffing and a number back to you before end of day. No form required.
Short notice or tight deadline? Call first, form second.
