The Perfect Contour.

Alright buttercups...here's the deal. I have had a lot of customers and girlfriends ask me to do a tutorial about facial highlighting and contouring. I usually do small demo classes with my customers because demonstration is SO important with something like this. Hands on teaching is the best way to master this technique.

First, let's talk about what facial contouring and highlighting is. Basically, it's manipulating the light by using certain make up techniques to thin your nose, thin your face, make your cheek bones pop and the list goes on. There are many reasons that people contour and highlight and I am going to give you a very basic example of what I do for a natural/smooth contour and highlight.

Why do I contour? I contour because I've been cursed blessed with these huge, round Dutch cheeks. On my face and on my caboose. Haha. No amount of contouring will help my back side, BUT I highlighting and contouring most definitely helps me have some definition to my otherwise very round, chubby cheek face :-) I'm not ripping on myself, just owning what I've been given and showing you how I add some definition.

First step, you need the right products. Of COURSE I'm going to endorse Mary Kay products since that's what I use and sell, but whatever you use that's similar to what I'm about to show you, should work perfect. Here's a list of what you'll need...
- Foundation Primer
- Flat Foundation Brush
- A shade of foundation that is a few shades lighter than your skin. I like to use a luminescent foundation for the highlighting portion
- A shade of foundation that about 5 or 6 shades darker than your skin tone. ALWAYS use matte for this step. Do NOT use bronzer for this part of the contouring because otherwise you will be sparkly like a vampire in the light :-)
- Cheek Color
- Finishing Powder (whether that be mineral, finishing, luminescent)

Before I share anything else...let me warn you ahead of time. There are some naked face pics of me on this blog post. And it's quite scary. No judgement please. It's all for the good of teaching the amazing highlight/contouring technique.

Step 1: Cleanse and moisturize. If you are not doing this on a daily basis when you get up and AGAIN before you go to sleep...SHAME ON YOU. For everyday that you don't wash your face, that skin ages 17 days. Do the math. We already start losing collagen elasticity before the age of 16...so please, do yourself a favor and wash your face, moisturize your face and for the love, use a firming eye cream!!! For my soap bar washers...just remember what your family members wash with that bar of soap. Then you're washing that bar on your face...? Sick! Ok, wow...total squirrel trail there. Step 1....cleanse and moisturize! Then add your foundation primer and let it dry. If you don't have a good canvas to start with, no amount of make up will look good.

Ah! Don't judge people...

Foundation Primer. Like silk for the face. Same idea as priming on the wall before you paint

Step 2: Had your highlighting color (lighter one) and your darker contour color on hand and have about a dime size amount set aside and ready to go. You want to add your highlighting foundation on the center of your chin, straight down your nose (gives the illusion of a thinner nose), under your eyes and directly below (see pic below for exact placement) and on the front of your forehead with a dash above each eyebrow. PS, I am NOT naked in these pics...I have a strapless dress on while doing this :-) 

 

See those huge Dutch cheeks?! 

Step 3: Add your darker contour color. Now remember, what this is doing is manipulating the light and shadows to create darker spots on your face and bring certain spots forward, To either highlight or hide certain parts of your face. You want to add your darker contour foundation to right underneath your cheek bone, a bit down the sides of your nose, and along your hairline and jaw line. It'll be dark, DON'T freak out! We will blend away in a few steps!

Haha...oh lawd! So bad but necessary for you to see

Step 4: My favorite part!! Grab your flat foundation brush (see below) and start with the dark color. Basically, the best word I can describe this action with is buff. Just buff the color into your skin. NOT all over, only where you've put the dark color. We will meet and blend with the lighter after all dark contour is finished. 

Flat Foundation Brush 

Step 5: See? In all my creepy pics?? It's blends right in. You WANT it to be the darker color in those areas. For me, it's because I want to create a shadow on the chubbiest part of my cheeks and face. :-) Next, you want to work into the lighter highlighting foundation. Buff it all over where you've placed it and then work it around to meet the darker areas. What you'll see is a nice air brushed finish with some natural contouring. Some people probably will think this isn't drastic enough, BUT I also don't want my customers or myself to look like a walking advertisement for a bad self tanner. 

Blended vs Not Blended 

Step 6: Once you've buffed all the colors together and are now a paint buffer genius, you can admire your work. Maybe take a selfie?! ha! Ok now, contouring can only do so much for your cheek bones. I used to HATE wearing blush because of my reddish skin tone and fat cheeks....but now that I've messed around and have practiced enough I think I have it down pat. A few rules with cheek color. Blend blend blend. Don't use only one color. Blend two together. I use a darker/brown tone mixed with  a lighter pinkish tone. It will give your cheeks and face more dimension. Think about it like a painting, what group of evergreen trees would look better? A group that was painted with one shade of green? or a group that was painted with multiple shades? That's what I thought. Same rules apply for cheek color and especially eye colors. Anyway, grab your cheek brush and mix your blush colors together, tap off the excess, and do "the suck". See where exactly your cheek bones are. You will want to start there by buffing the color up your cheek bone line and lightly work your way up to just below your temple area. Then, at the end of that, you want to buff a little bit on the apple of your cheek. Not a big blob, be cautious with the blush. Use sparingly. 

Blend together!

Step 7: Grab that translucent powered and buff some around the areas where you used your highlighting powder! If you would like some more definition as far as where you used the darker contouring color, add in some MATTE bronzer and brush that baby on there. Finished product below! 

Translucent Powder 

Yay!!! It's subtle, maybe too subtle for some of you. But most of my customers are pretty conservative and want to be able to change some things on their face without surgery. Contouring is THE BEST way to achieve this. You can literally change the way your nose appears to people simply by contouring. I hope this was helpful and simple enough to follow. I will have pics of my products that I use below. Enjoy!! Happy contouring! 

Products: