My foundation routine for oily skin: highlight+ contouring + blush + full face make-up : step by step (products only)

A brief run down of how I do a full face make-up and what products I use...its pretty basic, full coverage, yet flexible enough that changing a product or two can totally make it medium coverage or even natural no make-up look.

This is ofcourse only products only, as I am not, and will never never be comfortable with sharing my pic in public. Deal with it :)

Cleanse:
So first of all, I just wash my face with a oil control face wash and apply watered down witch hazel, which is what I am using as a toner these days...Since my skin is bit flaky, I always do a thorough oil cleansing the day before I'll apply foundation. Or whatever product I use, there will be flakes..hated it..but oil cleansing method has solved all the problem

Moisturize:
I have super oily skin, so for moisturizer, I prefer something gel. Right now, my fav moisturizer before foundation is Garnier Moisture Rescue.

MoM for Oil Control:
Wait 5 minutes for the moisturizer to absorb. Than I put a very thin layer of Milk Of Magnesia, paying special attention to T zone. This will stop my face from getting all shiny and make-up from melting, even in Bangladeshi summer. I dont have to use any blotting paper for hours.

 I wrote a elaborate post on MoM, long ago, In case you're interested...
(By the way, I dont use any primer, but if you do, this is the time to apply it)

Tone correction:
I have really bad under-eye circle with blue tint. No matter what concealer I use, it always shows, a greyish tint over the concealer. So before concealer, I need color-correction. You need orange or salmon color to correct blue...

So I use this NYX orange concealer on my under eye, around my eyes really, around my lips where there are also some blue-ish tint. I use a concealer brush to both apply and blend the product.

Concealer: 
Oh there is always one or two redness/marks in places caused by pimples on my face. You need blue to counteract red. So I use the cyan colored one from Coastal Scent's eclipse pallet to cover the redness first. Again, I use a different concealer brush to apply and blend this product.
I am really digging this concealer pallet, I didn't like it first, but the coverage is like wow.

So I take the concealer shade closes to my skin tone (multiple shades actually, I have facial tans, so concealer shade I would use on my forehead, which is comparatively tanner, is a bit darker than the concealer shade I'd use on my cheek. So again, having a concealer pallet with different yes close shades help...at times I even mix 2-3 shades to get the exact match.
I put the concealer over the blended out orange/cyan corrector and blend some more. I rarely ever apply concealer directly on skin, always a corrector first to neutralize the concealer. 

Eye Make-up:
About now I'd do my eye-make up: basic eye primer, shadow, eye liner, mascara etc..the reason I do eyes before face is all the eye shadow fall out cant mess up the foundation.

Foundation:
I always, always, always contour my face. Reason being I have a round face really round face and contouring makes a huge difference. I also have facial tans, like I mentioned before, therefore using multiple foundation shades makes it look natural.

So here is your basic facial contouring, the white lines on the nose, forehead, chin, around nose are the highlights, obviously. You highlight the high points of your face. Then there are the dark lines, they are for contouring. Contouring is used for defining the facial bones.

But first of all, I apply foundation:

 This covergirl outlast 855 is not a perfect match for my skin-tone..but its close...specially for the places where I have tans. One thing though, I always apply everything dry, foundation, compact, even my brush and sponge, always dry, never wet them. I am not sure but I think wet product/applicator may mess up MoM and I dont want to take the risk. Everything will be ruined if my skin turns oily.
So anyway I take some foundation on my palm, apply it on dots using my finger all over my face. Then use a stripling brush in anti-clockwise motion to blend. To this date, this gives me the best finish.

Highlighting and Contouring:
Then I take a new concealer brush and use the Revlon colorstay foundation, on nude, which is like 2 shade lighter than my skin tone, to highlight first.

I would like to take a moment and point that I didn't use any compact to set the foundation. That is because contouring, highlight, blush these can be done in two ways, you can use powder based product or cream based product. The trick is to apply the cream based product before setting powder and the powder based product based product after setting powder to make sure that one thing doesn't mess the other thing up. Also it will stay longer this way.

So for contouring, I mostly use the dark shades from that same CS pallet and follow the picture to draw the lines, using a new concealer brush. You can also use a eye shadow brush to draw highlight and contouring lines, but concealer brushes are a littler wider which, in my opinion, helps.

Now I will use the same stripling brush I used to blend the foundation to blend the highlight and contouring liners. There shouldn't be any hard edges, so blend blend blend until I get that finish.

Blush:
Same principle really, if I am using a cream blush, apply it before setting powder and for powder based blush, after setting powder. I mostly like cream blush if I am wearing foundation and powder blush if I am not. Oh yes, I wear a bit of blush with bb cream, sunscreen or even only moisturizer. I love blush.

I use a angled blush brush to apply the blush, not on the apple of my cheeks but the place on my cheek between the highlight and contour (see the above contouring picture). Then I use the same stripling brush to blend the brush with the conotour and highlight...

If done right, the highlight, the blush, the conotour will give a perfect finish, a flush and a conjoured cheekbone that is both highlighted and defined.

Setting powder:
Finally, I will take a new stripple brush, take some setting powder product on the blush and apply and blend all over my face at the same time.

I must say stripling brush helps to minimize my pores like nothing else.

Optional powder highlight/contour/blush:
Just for the record, if I use powder based highlighter, contouring and blush, I would have skipped that part and applied the setting powder immediately after foundation.

Everything else is basically the same, I would use the same brush and tecnique to apply brush highlighter, blush and contoured shades..just after the setting powder.
One thing about the highlighter, even if I used a lighter foundation to highlight my feature, I would apply some powder highlighter again at this point, if its a night look, because it kind of illuminates the face at night. For day time though, shimmer is a no no, everything is matte, matte blush and contouring product...you can never find a highlighter without shimmer though therefore lighter foundation is your only option. 

HD powder: I have never used any other kind of HD powder, but I really love what coastal scent's silica powder does to my skin.

Finally I will take a all over face brush, put a little bit of product on top of it and lightly brush my face, it minimizes my pore even more like magic.

Lips:
The only thing left is to apply lipstick and or lipgloss...I hardly ever line my lips so yeah there you go.

I dont use any setting spray, but I suppose one can be used right about now to seal everything off.

So thats about it. The whole process takes me about 15-20 minutes (not counting the eye make-up). This is not really that high coverage, mostly because the foundation are pretty medium coverage and looks really natural for both day and night.And ofcourse, its pretty flexible, I dont always follow the same steps.
For example, I sometimes skip foundation and highlights use a bb cream and setting powder and then powder matte brush and contour a bit and it looks even more natural and perfect for day time look.
Then I can just add some powder highlighters and transform it to an evening/ night look.
It all depends on mood, time of the day, the kind of time I have etc really.

I think the secret to perfect make-up lies in the concealing. Correcting all the tones and applying concealer not just to even the tone out but to match your tone to the point and finally to blend well so that all these are practically invisible can give you that flawless finish. 

I have learnt this whole routine/ in bits and peices from different youtube make-up gurus and I am utterly grateful to them...1-2 years ago I was a total make-up novice and right now, I know how to play with make-up :D

Let me know what you think about it...or any question or comment or anything

Visit facebook fore more comments Justifying Shopaholism