Makeup Tricks Only Pro's Know!

There are some makeup tricks that everyone knows, but then there are some makeup secrets that only professional makeup artists know. The kind of tricks that make your skin smoother, make you look blurred, expensive, saves the mascara you thought or you normally would throw out. Like there's so many different things that we do when we're out on set or like working in general or working with clients that we have learned along the way through experience. A lot of it is kind of thinking outside the box because you get faced with so many different challenges that you didn't expect. Sometimes you forget things so you have to figure out how to actually create the product that you need. You know there's all sorts of things that happen or have happened throughout any professional makeup artist career. All those different things that we've learned kind of accumulate and they become these kind of like little secrets that we know and they become so kind of just a part of everyday life in work for us that we forget that for the normal everyday person it's actually a really good hack. So it's not something where I would say that makeup artists don't want to let anyone know about. It's more so that it becomes so normal for us that it's not normal for a normal person. Do you know what I mean? So it's not normal for someone who's not a makeup artist. So that's what I want to share with you today. I want to show all these different tricks that makeup artists use that help your makeup to last longer, work better, blend better, look better, everything just generally better. If you're new here I'm Nina. I'm a celebrity and professional makeup artist and a beauty educator. I've been doing this for over two decades and I have a lot of experience to share with you guys. Now if you love learning about makeup in general then please do hit the like button, subscribe to my channel and hit the bell button. Three things that aren't going to cost you a thing but they actually genuinely help my channel so much so thanks in advance. First one is dusting powder over your skincare. This really confuses people until they actually try it. After you've done your moisturiser and SPF which by the way I have to apply it. I just realised I didn't apply my SPF. This is my One One Skin Repair Sunscreen. Basically after all of your skincare you're going to get a fluff brush and you're going to dust a very light finely milled setting powder over your skin before you apply your foundation. Now why? I hear you asking. The reason being is because it mattifies skin that has texture or maybe a little bit oily. Oil tends to get shiny through the day and ensures that nothing will slip when you're applying it. Like your foundation is not going to slip. Everything is just going to sit. It's just going to like grab hold of it and just stay put all day. It helps your base grip really nicely and like I said it helps to smooth texture. This is an amazing trick for textured skin. The result is a very smooth base that by the way is still hydrating because you've got all of your skincare underneath. Your setting powder that you're using on top of your skincare is basically locking your skincare in. So continue to use your normal hydrating skincare. Go over with a dusting of powder which we're going to do now. So some of these tricks I'm going to show you by the way but some of them I'm going to talk through because I can't do so many all at the same time. So I am going to just kind of like show you some and talk through some. So this is my Laura Mercier Translucent Setting Powder in Ultra Blur and I'm going to get my hourglass veil brush. I'm going to get the smallest amount on my brush, dip it into the lid. So it's just a very light dusting. You can see all the shine all over my face right. Now I'm going to dust this powder over. You can be very specific by the way like as in you don't have to apply all over you can just apply to the areas that you know you struggle with which may be like your cheek area or like t-zone. See how that has mattified my skin immediately. Now the next trick is to add a bronzing glow to your skin before you apply your foundation and this gives you a really nice red carpet glow. I've used this red carpet trick on clients so many times and it honestly is a game changer and it almost just gives you that luxe look to your skin. What you're gonna do is use a bronzing liquid or illuminating liquid. So I'm using my Charlotte Tilbury. This is in actually five. I want six because I want it to be bronzed. We're gonna add this all over. You can apply however much you want. I'm not applying too much today and then you're just gonna smooth it over. See that we've got this really nice luminous kind of radiance all across the face which is very slightly bronzed. This is almost like underpainting. It adds warmth, dimension and glow underneath your base. So it comes through your base but in a very subtle way. It's a very soft focus effect. It kind of ends up looking like you've just had that really expensive facial before a special event. So that's the kind of look it gives you. That lip from within kind of radiance that looks like you haven't relied on just a liquid product to give it to you. You can use any type of bronzing glow but I personally love the Charlotte Tilbury one. I think it sits perfectly, isn't slippery and slidey. Like it just stays put really well especially if you do it over that first trick that I showed you. If you like all of this kind of like very quick kind of beauty tips and tricks kind of stuff then you're really gonna love my other channel which is Nina Ubi Beauty and Fashion Reviews where I cover fashion as well but it's a lot of kind of quick fire videos that just give you all the information you need. Less focused on tutorials and more focused on product reviews and what's hot what's not and yeah head on over and subscribe. Another trick I want to show you which I can actually put on and show you is that a lot of the time, I would say most of the time, concealer is used by makeup artists not only to conceal. It's actually very strategically used to lift certain areas and I know this is generally I would say quite a common thing now like you've probably seen it quite widely on YouTube but it is something that we do so I still do want to share it. So I've got my Tarte Shape Tape here and what I want to do is just apply this to certain areas to lift. Now I'm not actually going to do my eyelids because I just want you to see how this makes a difference because I always feel that once you do your eyelids, even though I would usually do my eyelids right now, once you do your eyelids it's very hard to see the effect of the rest of the concealer because you've already kind of diminished some of the kind of dark circles. So let's leave that area and just focus on the lift that I'm trying to show you. So let's apply this on certain areas. Now we haven't applied foundation yet because obviously I'm going to show you. I'm going to go through another trick with you or technique more so. Right let me just show you where I've applied this and I generally apply my concealer this way anyway but usually I would do this on top of foundation so I want to just kind of like make it very kind of bare for you so you can really see the results. Okay so let's go through where I've applied it. First we've got it on the corners of the eye. Now this here is going to help to lift. It makes a huge difference by doing in this direction because what we've done is we've gone upwards and that's going to basically lift the whole eye area and it does make a big difference by the way because if you don't do it I've seen a massive difference with how my face ends up looking. Everything is very lifted this way. If I don't do it like this and I just focus on the coverage and I don't actually focus on strategically placing my concealer for lift then I feel like I don't look as lifted and it just looks a little bit you know drab. This here is going to help for the coverage and then here I've got some more lift there. Now I like to spray my beauty blender. Let's just buff this in. So I just bounce the sponge like so and that's blended in. Okay then I start blending this and I buff and then I basically go up into this lift here. See that? That whole area is lifted there and do you see what I mean by not doing the eyelids? You can really see the lift a little bit more. Okay let's do this side. Great lift. So this is how you can give yourself that lift with your concealer. Don't focus so much on just the concealing. Place it very strategically because you're going to get your conceal like you're concealing anyway. You're going to get all that. You're going to cover what you need to cover anyway. Why not do it in such a strategic way where you're going to get that lift as well at the same time? The lift creates a bit more of a fresher finish to your face and it makes you look a little more awake. It's my favourite trick for downturned eyes because imagine that it's lifting it all if you're feeling tired or you're just looking really dull and tired. I would always go with something which is just a tiny bit brighter than your skin tone so that you can really get that brightness as well as the concealment. Now the next technique I want to go for is underpainting. This is something that a lot of makeup artists do and it's something that gives you that instant soft focus finish to your look. So what I want to do because I've got concealer on, underpainting is basically add my blush and anything else that I want to add before my foundation and that is underpainting. Underpainting is when you apply all of your cream products before your foundation. You then finish with your powder after. So what I'm going to do is add a little bit of blush right now. I'm going to use my Dior Forever Blush Soft Filter in Lily and I'm just going to put this on the back of my hand. This is like this really nice pink like pale pink and I've got my Hourglass 15 brush. We're going to get it on to the brush. Now you can go a little bit extra with this by the way. The great thing about underpainting is you can go brighter and heavier. Not heavier so much but like just bright like as in more vivid with your colours because it's all going to get a little bit diluted once you put your foundation on top. So don't be afraid of using bright colours. Right next I'm going to get my Dior Contour Stick in Tan. I'm going to do some contouring here. There you go. Let me just go through my contouring. I have got a little dash there that's to help lift as well on that whole eye area. Then I've got it here at the top of the ear that's going to help to sculpt the cheekbone. Then I've got it right below my jawline that's going to sculpt the jawline. Then I've got a little V here that's going to help to make the tip of my nose look smaller. Then the two lines on the sides of the bridge of the nose are going to help to slim down the bridge of the nose. So let's get my brush which is my Charlotte Tilbury Hollywood Complexion Brush and then slowly buff in this contour. It doesn't matter if it's a little bit too dark because again like I said everything's going to get diluted with the foundation. Okay smaller side of the brush for the nose. Okay so this is where we want to go in with the foundation but it's very important with underpainting that you use a light coverage foundation. Light to medium but nothing heavy nothing full coverage because then what happens is if you're using full coverage you're just covering everything up and it's going to look too cakey. What you need is a very thin coverage so that all of this that you've applied underneath can come through a very small amount. I'm going to use my NARS Light Reflecting Foundation in Barcelona and I'm going to get this on the back of my hand and this is where you're going to use a sponge and I'm going to make sure it's damp and we're going to just get a thin layer on the sponge. We don't want a lot of product on the sponge by the way. So let's start from the forehead and then go down. You've got to like buff because if you drag you're basically disturbing all of that work that you've done underneath. A very thin layer you don't need a lot. Okay so can you see we've got a thin layer of foundation but I can still see hopefully you can see because I know camera dilutes a lot of product but all like vibrancy but I do hope you can see that the blush is still coming through but in a very subtle way and the contour is still kind of it's still that sculpted look but it's very subtle so everything becomes very kind of soft focus. So now we're going to get rid of this foundation, put this aside. Right so next would be you set your face with powder but I'm going to incorporate another trick that I want to share with you which is using setting spray for everything but setting. So this is where you can use your setting spray for so many different things. You've already seen me use it to dampen my sponge so I actually don't use water to dampen my sponge. I use the setting spray. This one in particular I love. I don't believe that it actually does set your makeup but I love how it helps to kind of just almost, it does kind of help to set things but in a very subtle way but I definitely would not rely on this to set my foundation in any way whatsoever or to extend the life of my base in general. I do feel like if you apply over foundation like over your setting powder that it's only doing so much. I think the real magic with this product is using it for so many other different things and one being dampening your sponge like I mentioned, the other being using it in between layers. So right now we're adding a layer of this. We're going to let that dry down and then we're going to move in with our setting spray. Now what this does is it actually helps to set the foundation a tiny bit before we actually go in with full-on setting that's actually going to work. Like this level of setting right now for the foundation is just enough to be able to focus on the base and then the setting powder is focusing on all of it right so it's extending it a little bit. It's also really good to be able to refresh your base through the day. If you feel like anything's looking cakey, spray that on your face and then keep a sponge on you to just keep buffing into the areas that are looking cakey and it should kind of like almost like soften it up a little bit so that it doesn't look so cakey anymore. So the other way that I like to use this, I'm going to explain in a second. Let's just set my base first so I'm going to use my Huda Easy Bake just because I really like this powder for myself. This is my banana bread. Now I am going to make sure that there's no creasing so this is like after like this is what you do when you're under painting so after applying your foundation you can use your setting spray and then you go in with your powder. So with our powder we're gonna set this. You can use the puff wherever you want or you can just use a brush to press it in. I like to use the puff okay then I use my Real Techniques brush. You've probably seen me do this so many times because I do do it on nearly all of my videos but I like to just repeat it in case there's anyone new here. Then dust away the powder from everywhere else and then just add a bit and set this. So just gonna add a bit of powder. Now moving from the trick that is under painting into the other trick that I mentioned which is using setting spray for everything but setting. You can also use this to spray on top of your powder to melt your powder into your skin so it doesn't look so powdery. It's the easiest way to go from that kind of very powdery look into that lived-in look. Let me do my brows quickly and I'll be back in a second. Okay so I've done my brows and I've put a little bit of mascara on but my next trick is something that I know you're gonna love. I didn't need to do it because my mascara is fine at the moment but it's a really easy way that makeup artists extend the life of the mascaras that they have. So for example because we use mascaras so often and by the way no one, well they shouldn't be, using mascara with the lid in and out onto different clients. This is what we do is use disposable mascara wands. So I have one here which is actually for my lashes because I had lash extensions done but we will keep disposable ones in our bag. Good quality ones, not like this one, but good quality ones like curved ones, different ones that you get that you usually see in mascara wands. We'll keep them, we'll put it in once and use it on a lash and if we need to go back into the mascara we get a new one and we put it in and then use it. We will never double dip. That is the way to do it but you know if you see a makeup artist double dipping that's not right. So you need to be hygienic about it but obviously you as a normal everyday person who's using your own mascara on yourself all the time you will go back and forth into it. When we feel that it runs out quicker or it goes dry pretty quickly it's not necessarily because it's out of date because with makeup artists because we keep the lid open because of the fact that we're going in with different wands it's left open and it dries out quicker. So what we do to extend the life of the mascara is you can get the Inglot Duraline which is this clear liquid and you put one drop in it and then you basically just shake it a bit and that will extend the life of your mascara. So that's a really good product to have in your makeup. Whether you are a makeup artist or not the Inglot Duraline is absolutely amazing for softening things, for just bringing things back to life, for maybe turning a powder into more of a liquid cream base. There's so many different uses for it and I know you're going to love it. The next trick is a blurred lip using a blush and balm. This is what we do. We use a balm. I like to use my Dior Lip Maximizer. You can put this on right at the beginning of your routine if you want and let it sit. I usually do that but I dry down a very little amount by the time I get to my lips. But I'm going to leave it as this because I'm going to show you what we do. So this is a really cool trick. So you add your clear lip balm, right? Then you go in with a favourite blush, a blush that you really like. Now I'm going to use this one here. I'm using my Dior Forever Blush Soft Filter in Peony and you're going to get a fluff brush. So I'm going to use this one here. This is my BK Beauty 212 brush. I'm going to go into this blush, this cream blush. I'm now going to buff that on to my lips and this will give you the most beautiful lip colour. And you're really kind of like going into the lip but you're not worrying about it going over the lip line a little bit. And this fluff brush and this like really nice blush create this beautiful blurred lip line but with colour. So basically it's kind of faded into the lip line. No harsh lines, just softness, a very very nice blurred lip which is great for everyday wear especially if you don't want to wear a lip liner. Plus if you've got the same colour on your cheeks it ties in really nicely as well without it looking too matchy matchy. Okay this next trick is something that I didn't realise was something that people would see as a trick because I guess like I said you get so used to doing these things. I do it on myself all the time but it is putting your mascara on before you apply your eyeliner flick. And the reason for that is because it actually gives you a really good guide as to where your flick should be and I find it so much easier doing it this way. So I've already got my mascara on. It actually helps you to follow your natural lash direction a lot easier. It's surprising how much of a difference it makes so please try it because I can honestly promise you you're going to love it. It's going to be a game changer for you. So if I get a brush, what brush do I want? Here we go. I've got my BK Beauty 208 brush. Let's go into a eyeshadow because I like to use eyeshadow as eyeliner. I'm going to use my Makeup By Mario Mastermattes Neutrals Palette and I'm going to use the shade 10 which is this really dark brown. I'm going to go into that, dab onto the back of my hand and then basically I look straight ahead and then I press this really close to my lash line and it's so much easier to create that little flick. There you go. Tiny natural flick that I've done. See what I mean? Look at the difference. And you'll find that it's actually really quick doing it this way as well. So let's do this on this side. I guess the reason it makes it easier is because you can immediately see what it looks like. It's not like, let's hope this looks good with my mascara on. There you go. Okay, so let's talk about a couple of more tricks that I think you're going to love. One is mix a moisturiser with your foundation. If you feel like your foundation is a little bit too heavy for you but you love the pigment, you love the colour, then mix in a tiny bit of moisturiser with it because what that's going to do is just soften it up and make it a little bit more fluid and it's not going to look as heavy on the skin. It's also going to boost some hydration in your skin. So if you feel that you have mature skin and you like your foundation but you just want it to be a bit more fluid or you want more hydration in there or your skin is a little bit drier in a particular phase, like maybe you love your foundation but recently your skin's been feeling a bit dry, mix a little bit of moisturiser into your foundation and it will completely change it and give you what you need while still keeping the benefits of the foundation. Next trick, mix a little bit of setting powder in with your foundation for longevity and if you suffer from shine through the day or if you want a little bit of extra coverage. If you have a foundation and you feel like, you know what, I love it but I want it to be a bit more high coverage or on a particular day you maybe want more of an evening look and you want more coverage, you want something that's really going to stay put, mix a tiny bit of a fine milled translucent loose setting powder in it. The Laura Mercier Translucent Ultra Blur would be a good shout too. Mix it in it, make sure it's properly mixed and then buff it onto your skin with your foundation brush. You're going to get a really nice flawless finish, it thickens the texture very slightly, increases the coverage and gives you more of a soft matte finish to your skin. The next trick is an underrated glow trick. It's moisturised bronzed skin before your foundation. So you remember how that other trick I told you about which was you apply a bronzing liquid over your skin before your foundation? Well, another way that you can do it if you need extra hydration for especially mature skin is to mix some moisturiser into that bronzing liquid that you're using. So you still continue your skincare as usual beforehand but you do add a little bit of either a moisturiser or a primer in with your bronzing liquid. That way you're going to get that boost of hydration if you mix a moisturiser in with it and if you use a primer mixed in with it, you're getting that kind of smooth finish with it because sometimes a liquid luminator or bronzing liquid can end up enhancing texture and if you suffer from all this but you still want to make the most of having a bronzing liquid on before your foundation, then mix it in with a little bit of a kind of like mattifying primer or a blurring primer. That will give you a really nice finish, it almost tints the primer for you. Don't forget that I do have a beauty publication called thebeautybreakfastclub.com. I'd love you to head on over there. It's everything to do with beauty, health, mindset, style, wellness and you're going to love it. I write a newsletter every two days and it's published every two days. You're going to love it. It's consistent, it's so educational, so much information on there. It's free to subscribe but if you do opt for the paid version that gives you access to the entire site including the group chat which means you can ask me questions directly and I can answer you directly and it literally costs you the same as getting yourself one coffee a month. I hope to see you there, I hope you've enjoyed this video today. Don't forget if you have any questions let me know in the comments and also everything's listed in my description. I will see you on the next video.