Eyes

Guess who found a college graduation picture of herself at her parents’ house last weekend from 1998 (!).

OK, there’s sooooo much to talk about here, between the hand on the hip pose (why?), to the wanna-be Rachel haircut, to the brows (OMG, I just can’t!) and the lip, around which, if you look closely, you’ll see a carefully unblended darker lip liner (believe it or not, that was totally on purpose).

But I’d really like to direct your attention to the under-eye situation, namely 1) the lack of dark circles, and 2) the lack of concealer.

I WAS LIKE WEARING ABSOLUTELY NO CONCEALER.

I mean, it blows my mind! Seriously, though, you don’t know what you’ve got ’til it’s gone.

Fast-forward to today, and you’d literally have to pry the concealer out of my T. rex claws. Ain’t nobody taking away my concealer without a fight, but getting full coverage that doesn’t look heavy is a pain. All I want is to cover my dark circles without it looking like I’m wearing a 10-layer cake.
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Instead of holding your blending brush like a pen or pencil on the ferrule (the metal part on the end with the brush head), try holding it waaay back on the other end instead.

Just to try it.

You might find yourself naturally applying less pressure on the brush head and making nice, soft circles with the bristles.

Sometimes when I hold the brush up near the ferrule, aka the standard way, I press really hard without even realizing it, like, I dunno…I’m trying to literally force the eyeshadow particles into my skin. Holding the brush from the other end, though, encourages lighter pressure, which makes for nicely diffused eyeshadows and gorgeous gradients.

It’s one of those tips I picked up somewhere along the way but promptly forgot about (whoops!), but I’ve started doing it again, and now (again!) blending is a completely different world. I feel like the brush is doing the work now, instead of my fingers and wrist, if that makes any sense. Try it sometime! And let me know how it goes. 🙂

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen

Oh, my gosh! So helpful. Give this a try one of these days when you’re doing your eye makeup: use a flat brush, instead of a domed or fluffy tapered brush, to apply your crease color.

I’m serious, MIND BLOWN. I watched a makeup artist do this recently, and to put it mildly, it was a freakin’ revelation, like with the clouds parting and the choir of chubby cherubs singing in five-part harmony, aaaaaah!

It’s just a tool thing, but it’s been incredibly helpful, and I think it could really help with your application if you have limited lid real estate on which to work, and/or you have a shallow crease (I have both of these issues).

It seems like most people apply their crease colors with fluffy tapered brushes or domed brushes, and that’s what I always did, too, because…well, it’s pretty much what most people do, ya know?

Whenever I’d see someone doing their makeup, fluffy tapered brushes and domed brushes were standard operating procedure for crease work.

And they still are.

But whenever I use a fluffy brush to do my crease makeup, I almost always end up getting color where I don’t want it. The fluffy brushes work great for generally placing color in the crease and quickly diffusing edges, but I have a hard time using them when I want to be precise. Whenever I use one, I end up taking my shadow too high up into the crease or too far into the outer corner.
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