The claim

Pictures emerged of an “injured person” being made up for photography or filming. The claim: Ukraine faked pictures of war victims in order to influence “the West”.

Our conclusion

The photos were taken during an exercise in which field medics are trained. Fake blood and modeling clay are used to make injuries look realistic.

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The accusation that Ukraine is faking images and videos of injured people in order to continue receiving financial support from “the West” is not new. Propaganda and counter-propaganda are part of infowar, which now represents an important front line in times of social media and microblogging. In recent months, Russia, or at least bloggers loyal to Russia, have questioned authentic images of injured Ukrainians ( missile attack on Kyiv ) or framed the filming of music videos and documentaries as evidence of Ukrainian lies.

A few days ago, pictures appeared again that supposedly spoke a clear language. In a collage of four pictures you can see a woman in a uniform being made up as a seriously injured woman. In the background you can see a backdrop made of pressboard. The women have fun and create a zombie scene in the third picture. The last shot shows the protagonist, who has her makeup on, being looked after by uniformed men.

Where do these images come from?

Without additional information, it is difficult to say where the pictures come from or when they were taken. No army vehicles can be seen in the pictures. The background of the image is also not particularly helpful for a search. In the image reverse search, the four images can only be found in this collage. No date. No further clues? But. The “makeup artist” has a badge on his shoulder that could possibly belong to a Ukrainian military unit or a volunteer battalion.

coat of arms
The shoulder badge you were looking for

After a long search - the reverse image search doesn't work at all for small, pixelated images - we finally found what we were looking for. It is the coat of arms of a medical training center, the 44 НАВЧАЛЬНИЙ ЦЕНТР in Kyiv. On the About Us page, the 44Center describes itself as follows:

Our team actively cooperates with the units of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, the National Guard, security forces, volunteer battalions, the Ministry of Internal Affairs, patrol police and civilians. […] Since the first waves of mobilization, we have been actively involved in military training at the Desna, Perlyavka, Tuchyn, Shirlan and Yavoriv training areas. […] We conduct professional and corporate training in tactical medicine, first aid and special medical training.

MIMIKAMA
Workshop participants show who they were allowed to learn from, February 2020

For the fatherland: service with weapons and makeup kits

In addition to training civilians and employees of various government organizations, the 44Center also trains field medics. To ensure that such an exercise feels as realistic as possible for the trainees, the skills of makeup artists are also used. Here is an example of a made-up injury from the training center's Facebook page :

MIMIKAMA
Makeup artist Yulia Melnychenko with one of her “victims”, 2018

There are many, many photos of the 44Center's countless exercises and training workshops on Facebook and also some on the homepage. However, the four images from the photo collage are not included there. Maybe they come from a private cell phone? In any case, the two protagonists were still on other exercises:

MIMIKAMA
44Center tactical medicine instructors during a weapons exercise in July 2016

The combination of makeup and assault rifles is not as unusual as it might seem at first glance. Many armies use makeup artists to simulate combat injuries. An article from the US Army Reserve gives a good insight into how soldiers on the other side of the Atlantic are trained in wound makeup.

Update November 26, 2022

An email response has now been received from the training center confirming our research. The recordings are from June 2016.

We are pretty sure that the emblem on the shoulder belongs to your organization. Furthermore, you don't see any made-up wounded people from the war against Russia in the photos, but shots taken during a field medic exercise. Is that about right?

Hello) Absolutely right)
It's photo from 12.06.2016 Kyiv

Our question and the answer of the 44 НАВЧАЛЬНИЙ ЦЕНТР

“We're pretty sure the emblem on the shoulder belongs to your organization. In addition, the photos do not show any made-up wounded from the war against Russia, but rather photos taken during a medical exercise. Is it correct that way?"

“Hello) Absolutely correct)
It is a photo from June 12, 2016 in Kyiv”

MIMIKAMA
Further impressions of the exercise from June 12, 2016

CONCLUSION

The pictures come from a training course for field medics at a Ukrainian training center and were taken several years before the war in Ukraine. Many armies have makeup artists under contract to make injuries appear more realistic.

http://44center.com (homepage of the medical training center)
https://www.facebook.com/44TC.UA (Facebook appearance of the 44Center)
https://www.usar.army.mil/News/News-Display /Article/1176367/behind-the-scenes-makeup-and-mannequins
https://apnews.com/article/fact-check-Russia-Ukraine-war-759530997743 (Fact check on video clip from the documentary “Region of Heroes”)

More on the topic: Supposedly staged war images for a music video shoot

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