The Art Of Makeup

A series by Jim Bridges

Part 1

I will start with how to select eye shadow.

Many of the people I talk to are misinformed about selecting correct eye
shadows to enhance their eyes. I still see a lot of people that select an eye
shadow to complement whatever it is they'll be wearing. This really is not the
proper way to go about it. You want to enhance your eyes, not your clothes;
what you wear will speak for itself.

The best way to enhance your eyes is use colors that are in the eye itself.
This way they work as a background for your eye so when you walk into a room
your eyes are what project first. Your eyes are what people notice, not so
much your eye shadow.

The whole idea of wearing eye makeup is to have somebody tell you how
beautiful or how sexy your eyes look, rather than have them say, "Gee, I like
that eye shadow. Where did you buy it?" That's not what your doing this for.
You want to enhance your eyes; make them project. I can't over emphasize how
important it is to make the eyes project.

When I ask people what color eyes they have, 9 out of 10 will say they have
"boring brown" eyes. No one has boring brown eyes! Take a hand mirror, go over
to a window, and stand directly where you get good natural lighting. Take a
close look at your eyes and you will see that brown eyes have tiny little
flecks of green, gold, rust copper and brown. All of these colors are in a
brown eye, and more predominate in hazel eyes. So, your color selections
should be one or more of these beautiful colors. People with brown or hazel
eyes can wear almost any shade of eye shadow with any spectrum of color and
it's going to look pretty damn good, as long as they apply it correctly.

People who have blue eyes are a little more limited in eye shadow selection.
Brown eye shadows should be your basic color palette for the simple reason
that brown makes a wonderful contrast to the blue. It makes the eye just an
electric blue. It makes it project and really enhances it more than any other
eye shadow that I can think of. Other colors that work for blue eyes are
lavenders, purples and plums. These will still be effective and look good, but
they won't make the eyes project as much as brown.

Never use a blue eye shadow with blue eyes. It's an artificial blue next to
the natural blue of your eye. When somebody looks at you they will
automatically focus in on the eye shadow and not on your eyes.

People with green eyes can follow the same color scheme as people with hazel
eyes and brown eyes. You can use a shade of green as long as it is something
that has some gray in it; khaki, moss, or a deep teal. You don't want to use
something that is an "electric" green or a bright jade because, again, it's
too artificial against the green of your eye.

Once you have made your palette selection, it really doesn't matter what
shades or colors you decide to use, but you should, however, select three
shades/colors: a dark, a medium and a highlight. The highlight will be the
lightest of the three you have selected. You always want to go from dark to
light; this is what opens the eyes up and projects them. I know I use
"project" a lot but that's what you want.

I recommend starting with the eyes before the rest of your makeup. No matter
what product you use or how careful you are, as you apply powdered eye shadow
little specks will flake off and drop onto your cheek. If you have done your
foundation first, as most people do, the flecks will fall on top of your
foundation. If you then try to remove them, you will streak and smudge your
foundation and blush. Then you have to go back and spend time repairing it.
You can eliminate all these problems by starting with the eyes first.

Start with a light dusting of translucent face powder on the eyes. It will
absorb any natural oil on the lid and traces of moisturizer that might still
be on the eye. Otherwise, your shadows will get a streaky, splotchy look
because where there is oil on the lid, the shadow spots and will not blend.

Now, take the darkest shadow and start on the outside corner of the eye. Apply
it approximately halfway in and halfway up the lid. Stop, take your blending
brush, and blend this area. When I say blend, I don't mean you have to go over
the entire lid with the brush. You only want to make a few, small, simple
brush strokes, blending the outside edge where you applied the shadow. So,
take your brush, start from the outside, and blend very lightly to the inside
of the eye towards the nose. You have all this color on the outside of the eye
and if you start blending from the inside outward toward your ear, you're
going to end up with color halfway to your ear and look like Cleopatra.

Do this for both eyes, then go on to your second shade which will be medium.
This color should start at the inside comer of the eye and it should be
applied, again, about halfway up and toward the first color, your darkest one.
You bring it just to where you stopped with your dark color so that they meet.
Then you take your blending brush, starting from the inside corner of the eye
this time, and blend toward the outside. Again, you don't need to brush all
over the lid; you'd just be dragging a lighter shade over the darker and end
up with mud. You don't want a sharp contrast between the two colors. You want
them to blend lightly one into the other.

Once you have that done on both eyes, take the highlighter, the lightest
shade, and apply from the inside corner of the eyebrow, right under the
eyebrow, all the way to the outside corner of the brow. It's like an arch. You
want to lift the eye; open it up. Don't bring the highlighter down too far,
because you will overlap the outside comer where you applied the dark shadow.
You want a definite contrast. Again, that opens the eye up.

The secret of great looking eye makeup is blending. Once you have learned
where to apply the three colors, the next step is to learn how to work with
that brush so you can make them blend very smoothly, one into the other
without sharp contrast. You do, however, want there to be a noticeable
difference between your dark, medium and highlight colors. If you just blend
and blend and blend, you end up with sort of a muddy look and that's not what
your going for.

  Next time: Finishing the look. Eye liner and Mascara.



The Jim Bridges Boutique is located at 11480 Cumpston St., N. Hollywood,
Calif., Phone: 818-761-6650. Call for an appointment, or catch Jim at one of
the many tg events around the country.


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