Makeup and Beauty Blog | Makeup Reviews, Swatches and How-To Makeup

Here’s a tip I discovered recently, and it’s been very helpful! If you’re using pencil liner for smoky eyes (or just using pencil liner in general, really), start your application in the middle of your lash line. That way if you accidentally apply too much (she said, accidentally applying too much for probably the one millionth time!), all you have to do is drag the excess left or right.

Control! — it’s one of the toughest things about makeup for me. Controlling the product.

Of course, I probably have some minor control freak issues (more like definitely), so this could be a bigger issue for me than it is for most people, but I like to know that if something should go wrong, and Murphy’s Makeup Law says that if something can go wrong, 99% of the time it will, at least this way I can correct it.

I used to always start applying my pencil liner in the outer corner, and then when I’d accidentally apply too much, I’d turn it into improv winged liner, but when I start my liner in the center instead, it’s easier to control how much product ends up in the inner and outer corners.

Just a quick thing to try if you ever have a hard time with pencil liner.

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen

P.S. Totally not liner or smoky eye related AT ALL, but The Unauthorized Full House Story on Lifetime is REALLY GOOD (please don’t judge).

Well…good for a Lifetime movie, LOL! But this one isn’t good because it’s so bad that it’s good… It’s actually good! I think so. Even El Hub, who vigorously begs me to turn the channel whenever I start watching a Lifetime movie, could not look away!

Basically, it’s what you expect. It’s a dramatized behind-the-scenes look at Full House, which I watched and loved back when it was first on TV in the ’90s.

It’s not brain food or complicated like War and Peace, but if you’re in the mood for candy-coated sugary brainlessness, it’s satisfying. 🙂

Next time you do a smoky eye look, if you’re not doing it already, try smudging a little shadow along that lower lash line, babe. It’s a revelation! — especially when you do it with smoky eye looks.

If I were forced by a sorcerer stylist/cosmetics conjurer queen to wear just one type of eye look every day this winter and fall, I choose smoky eyes (but winged liner would come in a close second).

They’re my favorite eye look of all. You can go messy and grungy, super polished and perfect, soft and subtle, or dramatically diva with them, and they range from simple (a cream shadow with a smudgy kohl) to complicated (with hella shades in the crease and on the lid).

They’re very versatile and pulsate with personality, and I think they’re fun to do.

There’s usually a lot of stuff going on when it comes to smoky eyes, but some of the biggest bang comes from the subtlest touches. They’re the little things that can take your look from “pretty good” to “DAMN, GURL! Did you get your makeup done at the counter today!?” 🙂

One of those high-impact subtle touches: smudging shadow along your lower lash line.

In the before picture at the top, my lower lash line is bare. There is a little liner on my lower water line, but that’s it, other than concealer, and I think the eye looks slightly top heavy and unbalanced.

Not a lot though. It’s not a big deal, and I don’t think anybody is going to stop me on the street to shake the living daylights out of me and yell, “Excuse me, miss, but you need to fix that top smoky situation!!”

At least I hope not.

But compared to the after eye on the right, where I’ve smudged shadow under my lower lash line, I think that eye looks more balanced. The smoky effect envelopes the eyes, making it look larger, better balanced and more dramatic.

[Continue reading…]

Of course you can skip wearing eyeshadow primer when you’re doing smoky eyes, and if you do, the world as we know it will not fall apart.

EVERYTHING WILL BE OK, PEOPLE!

But I do think that primer is usually a good idea, especially when doing smoky eyes, because primer makes your lids smoother, which, in turn, makes your eyeshadow less patchy. Primer also extends the wear time of your eye makeup. Both are good things!

Since smoky eyes usually involve a lot of layering and blending — you do a little layering, then a bit of blending, more layering, more blending — and they’re a big part of the fun, you don’t want to be working *too* hard, you know? And that’s another way in which wearing primer can help, because it makes your life easier. By enriching the color of the eyeshadows you apply on top of it, primer makes those shadows more vibrant and more intense, which in turn equals less layering!

So, on top of all the other good things primer does, it also makes smoky eyes, as well as many other eye looks, easier and faster. That way you get to spend less time on your makeup, and more time harassing your cat. 🙂

Nowadays, there are many different kinds of eyeshadow primers out there and different ways to use non-primer products as improv primers. Classic eye primers that are dedicated to priming your lids are available from most of the big brands, and my favorite one for the past few years has been NARS Pro-Prime Smudge-Proof. I think it’s seriously the best one out there now, hands down, and I’ve yet to find one better, particularly for smoky eyes.

[Continue reading…]