Technical Post: Shaping and contouring the face

To highlight and contour the face:

1. Apply your base as normal, but DO NOT powder. You are applying more grease based products, so there is no need to powder just yet.
2. Using a small rounded brush, choose either a foundation or concealer that is two shades lighter than the skin.
3. Feel the models face to get a good idea of where her bones in her face are structured. Start to apply your highlighting shade. Always go on with your highlighter shade first. It gives a cleaner application, and this applies to everything including eyeshadow.
4. Apply the highlighting colour along the cheekbone- make sure it is ON and ABOVE the bone. Make sure the highlighter is blended extremely well, you should not be able to see any streaks at all. Blend the colour right along the contour under the eye, down the centre of the nose, centre of the forehead, along the jawbone, on the cupids bow and anywhere else you want to bring light to the face- such as the brow bone or the inner corner of the eye.
5. To contour the face: choose a foundation or concealer that is 2 shades darker than the foundation.
6. Get your model to suck her cheeks in, and dot the colour underneath her cheekbone. Make sure to blend down, not up- you NEVER want the contour colour to go over the cheekbone. Blend the contour colour anywhere you want to shade the face, such as under the cheekbones, through the temples, and under the jaw. You can contour the sides of the nose to make the nose appear slimmer- make sure you stick to the sides and do not go onto the bridge of the nose. To make a long nose appear shorter, blend a tiny bit of contour colour onto the end of the nose. For a wide forehead, contour along the temples.
7. Add blusher. If you are using a powder blusher, make sure you powder the skin first at this stage. If you are using a cream blusher, put the blusher on first.
8. To add blusher, get your model to smile, and apply the blusher gently along the apples of the cheeks, and upwards towards the top of the ear. Make sure to blend the blusher extremely well, and avoid any harsh lines of streaks.
9. At this stage, if you wanted to add any extra powder blusher you can, or powder contour to emphasize the work you have done. You could also continue to bronze up the face at this stage of you wanted to warm up the skin.