Makeup Trick Using Eyelash Curler ~ Tutorial

IVC Tutorial Month ~ Tutorial #1

I was watching DDLJ (Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge- the greatest Bollywood movie of all time) on a Saturday night sometime in February, and during the following scene....

Raj: "Suno, jisse tumhare shaadi hone wali hain...uska naam kya hai?" (Listen, The one you're marrying....what's his name?)

Simran: "Kuljit Singh."

.....this idea occurred to me. I paused the movie, went to make tea, then I went upstairs try it out. I worked!

Nowadays I use it almost every time. It makes it super easy for me to achieve that precise Cut Crease look, especially since I don't have a deep & defined crease line.

Click to enlarge

1. Place eyelash curler on the outer corner of your eye, aligning it from the bottom lash line straight towards the end of your eyebrow. Place the tip of curler till your crease, or where you want to wing of the eyeshadow to end.
2. Press curler a little, and apply your eyeshadow using the edge like a ruler.
3. Now place the top of curler over your lid. The curve is almost the same as a crease. Apply eyeshadow right on top of it.
4. Move the curler around your lid to adjust it to the curve of your eye, until you reach the inner corners.
5. Fill in the center with the same brown  eyeshadow. You can apply all over, but I chose to leave a half moon shape bare.
6. If you want a sharp cut-crease look, you don't need to blend the edges. But if you want a blended look, apply a lighter eyeshadow (beige or taupe) by placing the curler right on the previous brown line, and running the brush right on the top of the curler. The curler will help you stay only on the line that needs blending.
7. Since I have hooded lids, I decided to apply a shimmery e/s (Urban Decay YDK) on the bare part of my lid.
8. You can apply eyeliner on the top lash line, but here I just tightlined the roots of my lashes with a black kohl and applied some on my waterline (bottom lash line)
9. Applied mascara in bottom lash line.
10. DONE!

Remember, you can use any other eyeshadow colors- black, purple, teal, etc. I used brown, because it's more everyday-wearable.

This is a suitable look for all eye shapes:

• If you have a crease socket ~ you can use the eyelash curler just for the outer V. If you want a softer look, fill in your lid space with a light eyeshadow color. If you want an intense smoky look, you can go all out with a black eyeshadow. 
• If you have monolids ~ Don't leave any space in your lid area, fill up the entire lid area with the brown eyeshadow.
• If you have hooded lids, like I do, you can apply eyeliner on your top lash line, but it's better to make it very thin.

Products Used:

• Matte Brown e/s- Urban Decay Faint from Naked Basics Palette
• Matte Taupe e/s- Urban Decay Tease from Naked 2 Palette 
• Lakme Kohl Ultimate pencil
• Max Factor 2000 Calorie Curved Brush Mascara. 
• Brushes ~ Too Faced Smoker Brush, Inglot  10S, Sigma Pencil Brush.
• Eyelash Curler ~ QVS.

I wasn't going to put a full face look, coz my hair was dirty & I had a tired face, but I wanted to show you that this look makes eyes look smiley....

Lipstick is Deborah Milano Rosetto Red #2. Shown here

♥ 

Hope you liked this tutorial. Idea occurred in February, tutorial done in June. I don't really remember what happened in between.

Enjoy your weekend! I will make aloo gobi (potato + cauliflower), and watch Breaking Bad Season 2 all night.

P.S. If you enjoy reading this blog, and like my tutorials, hope you have VOTED for Indian Vanity Case in Cosmopolitan Blog Awards 2013 HERE. It would help a lot. Thanks!

Tutorial Month Starts Tomorrow!

I will slog, and you will be a PRO! 

[That's just for dramatic effect.] 

Video Tutorial: How I Created My Look In Cosmopolitan Magazine

Over 1 month later than promised, here it is! It went up on my Youtube Channel after 11 pm IST last night....after I waited over 3 hours for it to upload on YT. But it's okay

Pics from the magazine issue here, in case you're new here.

Why this delay? Computers are to blame for this. The laptop I edited this video on didn't work without the charger anymore (battery spoilt), so I decided to take Mr.CZ's old laptop to India, as there used to be daily power cuts in my hometown. I quickly transferred video, and happily thought I'd upload it from India after I'd seen the magazine issue. I found out in India that video couldn't be played in the other laptop...maybe coz it's Windows 8...I don't know! Then the hurried move to Scotland happened....and then the wait for broadband. The End.

Still, I apologize for the delay. 

Anyways, hope you like the video....and think my editing is a little bit better than my purana (old) videos =D

*The lighting is bad in some parts because the sun was shining in my face.

I was going to do a voiceover, but I couldn't do it right. I bought a mike attached with funky headphones and everything- like a DJ's, but then the background noise (including vibrations from the fridge) was deafening. Hoping I'll learn all the techie stuff before the next video. 

Do you know what's arrived? My birthday month! Hola! I better start looking for things to wish for & lust after... I mean material things.... I know Zayn Malik is too young for me, okay- even younger 20 days from now! ;p (Gosh, if malik of my heart and soul sees this....)

Kevyn Aucoin's Makeup Pictorial #1: Smudged Smoky Eyes For Different Eye Shapes

When I went to my abandoned apartment in Gurgaon (Delhi), I took a few makeup items that I'd left there, and I made sure to take my makeup books. I was missing them a lot. Unfortunately, they're too heavy to take to UK with me, and I also didn't have time to go through them properly while I was there, so I just clicked pics of a few pages. I rarely read them again while I was living there, but now I badly want to go through them- thoroughly. See? You don't value something until you don't have it anymore.

Men-Who-Don't-Appreciate-Their-Wives&GFs, do you hear that? Yes, you. Your beautiful girl is sitting right next to you, and you're checking out other girls?! One.Tight.Slap.

Anyways, I thought I'd share some pictorials from the books of the MUA I learnt a lot from- Kevyn Aucoin. These illustrations are from either Face Forward or Making Faces, I'm confused. I've done a post on makeup books here & here

Hooded Eyelids: Hooded lids means you have a chunky piece of skin that covers your lid space. Ya, my eyes are a good example of hooded lids. You must have seen that I always draw a line on my crease- or rather the area where my crease should have been. Also, I can't pull off a thick eyeliner without contouring my crease area.

Featured In COSMOPOLITAN Magazine

And we are blogging from New Delhi again! Still very sleepy and exhausted, but I don't want to sleep! I'm loving the pleasant weather and it's so good to hear the sounds of honking traffic outside. Our neighborhood in Newcastle is on mute compared to the streets in South Delhi.

So on our flights back from UK, my mind was dominated by mainly 2 things:

1. Masala Maggi Noodles ~ Because I've missed it since November. You can get it in the UK, but you have to order it online (3-4 times the price in India) or go to some Indian shops...forget it.
2. Cosmopolitan Magazine March 2013 Issue ~ Because it made one of my teenage dreams come true!

When Cosmo's Features Writer, Priyam Chaturvedi, asked me to create a look and a step-by-step picture & video tutorial based on one of the hottest SS13 Trends, I was more than excited to do it! Her one email put a smiley with two-tone lips on a very un-Christian Grey grey February sky. I think she put this story together brilliantly, and I'm so happy she picked this photo from a few others that I didn't like so much =)

How I Conceal Pimples ~ Pictorial

IHaveABigAnnoyingPimpleThatIsProbablyGoingToScarArgh!!!

I hate pimples. I hate them. I never had them during my teens, but now it's every frickin' month! Adult acne, or just the side effects of being a beauty blogger who tries out almost everything? I believe it's the latter.

Possible Culprits:

• My new toner ~ L'Oreal Re-nourish Velvety Toner
• Wearing Garnier BB Cream & Rimmel Wake Me Up Foundation together.
• Another reason I will share with you in another post.

2 Holiday Makeup Looks ~ Red 'Vs' Coral

Merry Christmas, Everyone!

This was supposed to be up yesterday, but we were busy, and I was exhausted by evening. So I decided to just sit back and do nothing..... listen to  Last Christmas & All I Want For Christmas Is You....and wait for Christmas Eve!

I couldn't decide which lippie color I wanted to wear, so I wore 2. You know, I don't usually smile wide in my FOTD's because I always end up looking too enthu... like, too much teeth.... sometimes too goofy. But a Holiday/Christmas-themed look is an exception =D

Christmas/Holiday Eye Makeup Tutorial ~ Nancy Ajram Inspired

I've wanted to do a Nancy Ajram inspired makeup for a long long time- since last year, to be precise. This year, on 6th April, I seriously planned to do the look, but I guess I got sidetracked again. I know the exact date coz I'd written the post in a Notepad.

Who's Nancy Ajram? She's this Arabic singer. I'm obsessed with only one of her songs - Fi Hagat. Not the song exactly, but the music video. I have watched it a hundred times, I think. So this is kind of a tribute to the song ;) Pic of her makeup in the video......

We have very different eye shapes, so I had to do it to suit my eye shape. She had her eyeshadow right up to her brows, but that would look very weird on my hooded lids. If you have a deep pronounced crease, you could do it exactly like hers.

1. Apply eyeshadow all over lids & Lower lash line I used Maybelline Color Tattoo Permanent Taupe. You can straight away apply a chocolate brown eyeshadow. I didn't have a dark brown matte eyeshadow.
2. Take a brown eyeshadow on a blending brush. I used Sigma E25.
3. Apply the brown eyeshadow on top of the taupe cream eyeshadow. Also apply on lower lash line. I used Urban Decay Buck from Naked Palette.
4. It should like that.
5. Take a shimmery taupe or bronze eyeshadow. I used Maybelline Color Tattoo On And On Bronze.
6. Pat it gently with your ring finger in the center of your lids as shown. Make sure not to touch the edges.
7. Pat a little bit of gold eyeshadow on top of the bronze.
8. Reapply the brown eyeshadow making it darker on the outer corners
9. Get the color in the hollows under your brow bone and blend using circular motions.
10. Blend & soften the edges of the brown shadow with a fluffy blending brush. I used Sigma E40. Blending Tutorial here.
11. Line very close to your lashes with black gel liner & an angled liner brush. Start from the outer corners, then line from inner corners by pushing the brush on your lash line, and then join them in the center. I used Maybelline Lasting Drama Gel Liner & MAC 266 angled brush
12. This is optional: False Lashes. I used Eylure Katy Perry Lashes in Sweetie Pie. Skip if you have naturally full lashes or a darn good mascara.
13. Apply black mascara to blend the false lashes with your natural ones. I used Maybelline Colossal Smokey Eyes Mascara.
14. Darken the brown eyeshadow on your lower lash line. I mixed Urban Decay Buck & Blackout because I don't have a dark brown eyeshadow with me.
15. Apply a bit of the shimmery eyeshadows you used on the lids just on inner half of inner corners of lower lash line. I used only Maybelline On And On Bronze with a pencil brush.
16. DONE! 

 My brows look dusty (in pics only) because I used cold brow wax. Big mistake >.<

Red Lipstick suggestions: Here she's wearing a YSL Rouge Volupte Lipstick (as shown in the video) - probably in Red Taboo. Other suggestions: Maybelline Pleasure Me Red & MAC Russian Red.

♥

The Video:

Stupid stupid man, isn't he?  =D

Fi Hagat means 'There Are Things'. Translated to English (because I'm that  interested heehee):

"I can't ask you to make my world sweeter, to change how things are

No matter how close you are to me.... How dear you are

I can't tell you how I want our life to be

Know, on your own, how I want our life to be.

At times, it seems that I'm content

That I'm calm, that I've accepted everything and got used to it

That doesn't mean you can believe that I gave up."

[Full song translated here - if you're interested.]

I love her makeup in last scene as well. Suggestions: 

Eyes: You could use the same taupe Color Tattoo I used here, or any matte taupe eyeshadow.

Lips: MAC Angel Lipstick

I will post a full LOTD with these eyes in a bit, but it will no longer be Nancy Ajram inspired. Hope you found the tut helpful.

Post Updated: 

More pics here 

♥ Cynthia Z *.*

 

 

Easy No Blending Glitter Eye Makeup Tutorial [HAPPY DIWALI!]

This is super quick impromptu look I did & I wanted to put it up asap, coz some of you might want to wear it tomorrow- Diwali! =)

*I will keep this short for now, and come back later to edit. 

Products Used:

• Too Faced Shadow Insurance eyeshadow primer
• Bourjois Effet Smoky Pencil in Smoked Brown
• Maybelline Color Tattoo On And On Bronze
• Collection 2000 Glam Crystals Dazzling gel Liner in Funk
• L'Oreal Super Liner Instant Impact Felt Liner
• Lakmé Eyeconic Kajal
• Maybelline Colossal Volum' Express Smoky Eyes Mascara. 

Tutorial: Eyeshadow Application Using Only Fingers

I know that good make-up brushes are so expensive. I know. I've had my eye on these cute cute makeup brushes for a long long time, but they're just so frickin' pricey! 

So, I thought I'd do a tutorial using only my priceless God-given tools. Hopefully, it'll come in handy to students & those who don't want to waste 'fashion' money on brushes.

I've been wearing this look a lot lately, and it's very very easy to do! Takes me about 2 mins to do everything. Both eyes.

Mint Eyeshadow Tutorial

I have not done a tutorial for you guys since the Black Smokey Eyes I did in....in....May! No wonder I was beginning to feel uneasy.

I wanted to do something bright, and decided on MINT- the hottest color of the season. Really, I can't get enough of the color! I keep dreaming about a mint tea set....and mint handbag.....and mint cotton candy (just to look at, not eat).....and I'm looking for a mint t-shirt for Mr.CZ. I know, I'm going mintal.

Black Smokey Eyes Tutorial

Here's the tutorial of the eye make-up I wore here & here. I'd just like to say, as always, it's very easy- easier than it looks.

Things you'll need:

• Matte Black Eyeshadow- I used Urban Decay Blackout from Naked 2 Palette, but you can also use Bourjois Intense Eyeshadow #10 
• Matte Light Brown Eyeshadow- I used Buck from Urban Decay Naked Palette
• Shimmery highlight eyeshadow- 
• Business Card - You'll know why =)
• Black Kohl - I used Lakme Kohl Ultimate
• Eyelash Curler- I used QVS Eyelash Curler
• Mascara- I used Bourjois Fast & Perfect
• Too Faced Lid/Smoker brushBrushes- Too Faced Lid/Smoker brush, Sigma E30 pencil Brush, Sigma E45 Blending Brush

Basic Eyeshadow Blending Tutorial & Tips

I have been meaning to do this post for a long long time! I did do one last year in September (!!!), but I did not like the photos & the lighting & my brows looked so untidy....let's just say I wasted a few hours & a pictorial.

When I say "What is blending?" I can't help saying it like Channel [V] VJ ~ Lola Kutty:

"Whaaht ees theese blanding?", with a hand gesture to go with it.

The reason I'm doing this tut is because I feel silly writing in my tutorials: "Blend well/ blend the edges" I always imagine someone reading my blog thinking- "Yes woman, blend, but howww???" I would be thinking the same if I didn't already know. Like in cooking, you can't just say "Cut the tomatoes julienne" without explaining how to do it. I don't really know what 'julienne' means, I learned the word from Monica Gellar. You remember her job interview with the creepy perv? "Are they, uh,  firm?..... I like it dirty" - about tomatoes & lettuce.

The main aim of eye shadow blending: To blur out the prominent edges so you don't really know where the color begins and ends. In most cases, the goal is to make it look like a gradient. Blended eyeshadows look more natural, especially when bold colors are used- a vibrant blue eyeshadow looks less trampy when blended well. With good blending, you can make 10 colors look like 3-4 colors.

I use only 2 blending techniques: 

Blending Technique 1: Windshield Wiper Motion- Place your blending brush on the line, and starting from outer corner of your lid, move the blending brush in a windshield wiper motion. Left-right-left-right......moving with the curve of your eyeshadow. This won't be hard to do if you have a deep defined crease. Most times, this technique is not enough, so you do the next technique in-between or after, whichever way you are comfortable with.....

Blending Technique 2: Swirling Circular Motion- In this, you make little circular swirls quickly. Start from outer corner and work your way inwards. This blending technique works well especially if you're applying one color on inner half of lid & another on the outer half, and you want to blur the prominent line in the middle where the two colors meet.

Kareena Kapoor's Eye Makeup Tutorial

I showed you a preview of Kareena Kapoor's Eye Makeup here, and today I will be showing you how I did it. It is very very easy, no kidding. Products used are also not a lot:

• Plummy brown eyeshadow
• Black Eyeshadow
• Black kohl pencil (Lakme Kohl Ultimate)
• Eyelash Curler
• Black Mascara (Bourjois Fast & Perfect Mascara)
• Brushes: Fluffy blending brush, angled liner brush, pencil brush.  

Illamasqua Sophie-I Collection & Technique: Video Tutorial

Illamasqua works very closely with the Sophie Lancaster Foundation and the latest collaboration with them has produced the Sophie-I Collection and Technique, now developed further with a look by Creative Director Alex Box.

About Sophie Lancaster: Sophie Lancaster was beaten to death, in 2007, for dressing different (Gothic). Sophie sustained brutal beatings while trying to protect & cradling her boyfriend, who was knocked unconscious. You can read more about the heartbreaking story here

Neutral Everyday/Office Makeup Guide (From Unpublished Video)

Good Morning Everyone!

Hey, I never greeted you that before! I either got up very early (New Year's Resolution) or I scheduled this post last night.

So.... this was supposed to be a video which I filmed last year...in April! Actually, I edited parts of the video but every time my computer would freeze & conk out in the middle, then I went on vacation, then I bought a new laptop, then old laptop couldn't be turned on....I gave up. I have a lot of unedited videos btw >.<

A few days back, I could turn the darn thing on again! I finally transferred all important files, including this one. I decided to put screen shots so my effort wouldn't go wasted. 8 months later!

Winged Eyeshadow Tutorial

First of all, this is a very easy technique. I feel it's even easier to do than a basic smoky eye. Second, sowwwie I didn't post this during the weekend, like I said. I was just so busy with....well, nothing haha... you know what I mean ;)

Let's begin.

Look Of The Day: Winged, Warm & Cozy

I finally did a tutorial on the Winged Eyeshadow, which many of of are waiting for, but I've yet to edit the photos so I'm posting  full face photos today, so you get an idea of how the winged eyeshadow look gets along with my whole face. Will post the tutorial before/during the weekend. 

By the way, how cold did it get suddenly?! Time to take out me fuzzy socks :)

Smokey Eyes For Karwa Chauth ~ Tutorial

Here is Karwa Chauth step-by-step eye makeup tutorial some of you requested. I am using some random colors, so feel free to use any other colors for this look. You could use a shade that matches with your outfit. The main colors I used are pink & purple from a Revlon palette I have been ignoring for a long long time. 

Let's begin:

Part 1:

• For a smooth application & to make eyeshadows last longer, I used MAC Painterly Paint Pot

• Revlon Illuminance cream black shadow as eyeshadow base. This will intensify the look. Blend the black on your hand first before applying it on your lids, this will prevent mistakes & make blending it easier.

• Apply it all over you eyelids up to the crease line. I have droopy lids, so I like to take color over my natural crease line.

• Blend the harsh edges with a blending brush.

• With my ring finger, I mixed purple & pink eyeshadows together & patted them on top of he black base. Again, blend the edges.

• It should look like last pic.

Make Up For Ever Très Vichy Look & Tutorial

Better late than never! I've thought about doing this look since January, when I first saw the promo of Make Up For Ever  Très Vichy Collection. I had bought the gingham fabric since then, but couldn't make the bow lashes, coz the fabric with smaller checks didn't match this fabric I'm using right now. Yup, I'm a perfectionist obsessive that way. But thanks to the wonderful Rashmi, who sent me these lashes (post here), I was able to do it without any worries.

Très Vichy was a spring collection and we're almost touching fall, but I'm a bow enthusiast. It would be wrong, almost sacrilegious, if I didn't do it. 

Très Vichy ~ Very Gingham. Prepare yourself for a lot of gingham! :)