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Wednesday 1 March 2017

Contouring - Five Brushes, Five Ways


Everyone loves a good bit of highlight, don't they? The glowy look has been super-popular for ages now and I have to admit, I certainly count myself as a lover of all things highlighting-related too. Whether it be a minimal look (or as 'minimal' as you can be with highlighter - you know how it goes) or quite literally slathering nearly my entire face with it - I love a good glow-giver for adding some extra radiance, dimension and just extra 'glam' to my makeup. I have many, many favourites in terms of products - as I'm sure you'll all know - but I also have probably just as many top picks when it comes to brushes for the task in hand, too. Surprisingly, there's a lot of different ones out there that are either catered especially for the task in hand, or that you can use for it anyway and over time, I have built up quite the collection of favourites. They all do the same job of highlighting, but all in slightly different ways and with varying finishes too. Wanna take a look?

THE 'PROPER' CONTOUR BRUSH (Real Techniques Contour Brush) - I'm dubbing this the 'proper' contour brush as both in name and in nature - this is probably what most would deem to be the most 'traditional' version of a tool used to sculpt out your features. A medium-sized, round brush that's fairly dense and ever-so-slightly tapered off towards the tip - this would make for the ideal contour brush for beginners. It fits snuggly into the all the nooks and crannies and manages to place the product down just where you want it, yet still blend and buff it out at the same time. The one downside? The density of the bristles does mean that you can get a lot of product on at once if you're not careful - perhaps look into a brush mentioned later if you're after something offering a more sheer, controlled application...

THE ANGLED BRUSH (Real Techniques Sculpting Brush) - Though a rounder brush does work well at getting into all the areas of the face you want to, if you're after something even more fool-proof, perhaps look at a slightly angled brush instead. The shape in which it's cut fits even more so easily into the contours of the face and the dense bristles make it a dream to work with creams, liquids and powders too. You can get a variety of different applications simply by varying the way in which you hold and position the brush head and I love it.

THE FLUFFIER BRUSH (Real Techniques Cheek Brush) - If you want to contour and sculpt you face, but in a less specific way - look no further than a brush like this one. This is the biggest brush here and so works great if you don't want such a 'harsh' look to your contour or want to go over a more defined application to soften the edges and make it less noticeable. The larger size also means it can possibly work as a bronzer brush too if you want to add colour to the face, as well as definition at the same time.

THE DUO-FIBRE BRUSH (Real Techniques Duo Fibre Contour Brush) - For a more sheer application of contour or simply allowing you to build up the product gradually - a duo fibre brush is the one for you. The bristles are less dense, giving you the chance to go in with a lighter hand rather than a tonne of the stuff at once and so it makes for a great option if you don't want to contour very heavily, or are perhaps a complete newbie to the whole thing and aren't very sure of what you're doing just yet.

THE NOSE CONTOUR BRUSH (Real Techniques Highlighting Brush) - Something I've gotten into more recently is contouring my nose ever so slightly. I've definitely not perfected the whole thing just yet and it's certainly not something I do on the regular, but when I do this is the brush I like to use. This - as the name suggests - is actually supposedly designed for highlighting, but I really rather like it for adding a little extra shape and structure to my nose. The dense, flat shape makes it ideal for running along the sides of my nose to define and slim, before using a more fluffier brush to buff things out and I really rather love it.

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