Sunday, January 29, 2012

Highlighting and Contouring Basics

One of the easiest ways to bring some dimension onto your face is with contouring and highlighting. You basically want to darken the areas of your face that you feel should sink back in, and apply a lighter color to the areas you want to bring forward. There are many products that you could use, including darker/lighter concealers, foundations, eye shadow, or bronzing and highlighting powders. Lots of women do this to look their best, including business career professionals, students, and stay-at-home mothers.

To contour, you want to place a darker color into the hallow of your cheeks to slim the appearance of your face shape. If using bronzing powder, try to avoid using very shimmery powders because this could draw attention to the area you are trying to make sink back into your face. Smile and find just below where the apples of your cheeks are because this is where you want to place your contour powder/foundation from the middle of the cheek and blend it up towards your temples. Once you have blended, you can apply blush above this on your cheeks. I enjoy using ELF contouring and blush duo, the price is amazing at $3. To demonstrate, I used green lines to show where I contour my rounded face to give it more dimension. If anyone has a double chin such as I do, you could apply contouring powder to help diminish the appearance. Other areas that you could contour include your forehead and nose to slim your nose. I like using the shimmery bronzing powders with peach blush to give a sun kissed appearance. I take a large and fluffy brush to sweep it across the top of my forehead, down my nose, and a touch on my chin.

When you highlight, you want to draw attention to features of your face. The area I like drawing attention to is my eyes, I demonstrated this using purple on my picture. I use either a lighter colored concealer or a shimmery powder. I recently picked up Physicians Formula Mineral Glow in Translucent Pearl. Using a small brush, I applied their shimmery light powder around the tear ducts, under my eyebrows, just above where I applied the blush on the tops of my cheek bones, and on my cupid's bow above my upper lip. Other areas some women like to finish contouring are by blending some highlight powder down their nose or their chin.

No comments:

Post a Comment