Contouring and Highlighting- What products are best?

For a matte highlighter, try YSL’s Touche Éclat.

I know you said you don’t like shimmer, but Smashbox’s liquid highligher, “Artificial Light”, leaves more of a dewy sheen rather than anything overly dramatic. Use it very sparingly and over a liquid foundation that has yet to set so it can be blended in as much as possible.

sorry I meant to say make sure you were!

I always use a moisturiser and a primer. They help make the foundation more even. I’d be more concerned about over applying foundation.

The only tip I could give you is if youre using powder, make sure your cheeks are completely matte before you apply any colour, as I’ve found that if I don’t and my skin is still oily/tacky from foundation, the colour grabs unevenly to my skin and is so hard to blend out.

When I do it with foundation I put ‘stripes’ on the contour areas, blend out. Then my regular foundation and lastly the highlight areas. If you finish with translucent powder it should stay very well.

Oh and sometimes i do contour – highlight then my regular foundation.

If your having trouble blending them out maybe your either using to much product or are you applying a base/primer or moisturiser before you start?

Yes, I am using a moistureiser and primer before, so I’ve gotta skip them huh?

Thnanks for your great advice, I’ll give it a go.

When I do it with foundation I put ‘stripes’ on the contour areas, blend out. Then my regular foundation and lastly the highlight areas. If you finish with translucent powder it should stay very well.

Oh and sometimes i do contour – highlight then my regular foundation.

If your having trouble blending them out maybe your either using to much product or are you applying a base/primer or moisturiser before you start?

If you get the application of the contouring and highlighting a little bit too strong to look right on their own, then use the base colour over them, you tone them down and it comes out okay while helping to blend the edges much better. Likewise for blush.

It might not be the best technique out there, but it’s fairly quick and it’s worked okay for me for years. 🙂

thank you, I’ll give it a go.

If you get the application of the contouring and highlighting a little bit too strong to look right on their own, then use the base colour over them, you tone them down and it comes out okay while helping to blend the edges much better. Likewise for blush.

It might not be the best technique out there, but it’s fairly quick and it’s worked okay for me for years. 🙂

I also get that unnatural silvery sheen when highlighting too, and as for bronzers I too find them orangish or too shimmery. I think I might try the pressed powders in different colours like AliceJaneInN… suggested, but won’t dusting over the top in the end with a powder that matches your foundation cover up all the hard work you’d just completed?

Thanks for the tips everyone.

I use small amounts of my face foundation colour to contour my cleavage before applying the paler foundation that I use on my neck and decolette.

I use pressed powder for both contouring and highlighting, and apply using blush brushes. Once I’ve done all of the contouring and highlighting plus blush, I dust my entire face over with a powder that matches the face foundation, and my neck and decolette with a powder that matches that foundation. By going over the whole lot, I don’t have to spend as much time blending. 🙂