Cosmetics Tutorial

First, we have the basic eyeshadow. I go straight down from the middle of the eyebrow to the eye, and angle in a bit when going from the ouside end of the eyebrow to the eye.

Here, I've reduce the opacity to 50%.

Now let's try something a bit more dramatic. Here, I used a palette. The darkest colour is closest to the eye.

Since it was more dramatic, I wanted it to be more obvious, so the opacity here is 75%.

Now let's get really dramatic. Yay for changing colours! On the left, I've gone blue at the bottom to purple at the top, and on the right is red to yellowy-orange.

The blue-purple has an opacity of 55%, and the red-orange has an opacity of 75%. The blue-purple is darker, so I have to make it lighter, or the effect is ugly. The red-orange ends up as a light colour, so I can make the opacity darker.

Now for something less dramatic, more pretty. I've used a dark blue where her eyelid would show, and a bluey off-white for the rest.

The light part at the top is supposed to be very faint, so I used 50% opacity. The darker bit at the bottom should be, well, darker, so it's at 75% opacity.

Sometimes, we want something really subtle. Here, I only covered the eyelid.

Opacity 75%.

First, your basic lipstick. If you have any sort of colour change tool (MS Paint doesn't), select the doll's lips, and use that; it saves time. Here, I've used a darker colour, and made them slightly more red.

And here we have her zoomed out. Since I used the Hue/Saturation Tool in Adobe, I didn't need to change the opacity. If you floodfill a colour over top, you'll have to fiddle with it slightly.

But what about those crazy goth dolls? When using black lipstick, it's best to make the colours contrast a bit more (Adobe has this great Brightness/Contrast option).

If it was all black, can you imagine what her lips would be like?

Now let's do lip gloss. I made her lips a bit more pink and a bit lighter, then upped the brightness and the contrast.

Perfect if you're trying to do a typical high school student. :)

Now, since I'm a gradient addict, I've done a lovely little gradient lipstick example. For this, we're back to playing with opacities. First, draw over the lips (on a new layer) using your gradient palette.

Now reduce opacity. I used 70%.

Ok, so the basic blush. For this, it helps if you have a mirror handy. Basically, smile, and look at where you cheeks come out. This is close enough for our purposed to where the blush goes. Remember, you want the blush further back and closer to the eyes than the mouth. Also, notice how I only drew the blush on one side? When I blur it, I then copy it to the other side, and flip it, so I get it semetrical.

See how I blurred it, and made it subtle? Beautiful, eh?

Now, sometimes we want something different then your typical reddy-pink blush. Here, we have a shinier, bluey-white blush. This is good for faeries.

It adds depth without making her reddy. Just a little something to play with.

Now, you know those crazy circus clowns? For them, use a slightly hard paintbrush, and don't blur.

See? The perfect clown.

But what about gremlins? Here, we have a green base, and I'm using blue blush, using the same technique I used for the basic pinky-red blush.

It helps that blue goes into the making of green. Colours that are far apart on the colour wheel (like blue and peach) don't work so well.