Halloween Skull Makeup Tutorial

With Halloween in a few days I thought I would share a tutorial with you all.  I wanted a more realistic skull rather than the more cartoon skulls or day of the dead skulls.  I didn't want to stick with the plain black and white.  I'm pretty happy with how it turned out so let me show you how I did it.

Items used:
Beauty Blender knock off sponge from Ebay
Real Techniques Expert Face Brush (you can use any foundation brush or just a sponge)
Kryolan Supracolor - 070 can be purchased here (or you could use a really light foundation)
Revlon Colorstay Whipped Foundation - 150 Buff
Benefit Hoola Bronzer (any cooler tonned brown bronzer or eyeshadow would work)
Rimmel Stay Matte Powder - Transparent (any light face powder or eyeshadow will do)
L'Oréal Hip Eyeshadow Duo - Enchantress (Any decent black eyeshadow will do but I would recommend using one you don't mind getting dirty as it will inevitably get some cream makeup mixed in)
Rimmel Scandaleyes Waterproof Kohl Kajal Eyeliner Pencil Black (any creamy black eyeliner will do)
MAC Blending Brushes 224 and 217 (any blending brushes will do, I recommend at least 2)
Griffin & Row Enrich Moisturiser (I got this in one of my Bellaboxes, it's just a thick, night moisturiser to smooth out the skin.  I combined it with a primer for some oil control).
Australis Primer (Use whatever moisturiser/primer you prefer, it's just to make the skin smooth/soft for application)
Rimmel Eyebrow Pencil - Hazel (Any brown eyeliner/eyebrow pencil will do)
NYX Jumbo Pencil - Black Bean (Any cream eyeshadow or paint would work here.  I wouldn't recommend using a standard eyeliner pencil as you would use a lot of it).
Real Techniques Accent Brush (used for blending brown on teeth and white highlighting/teeth/detail work), Domed Shadow Brush (used for white only for larger areas),  Base Shadow Brush (used for black eyeshadow filling/blending).
You could get away with just a sponge, one blending brush for brown, one blending brush for black and a fine detail brush for white and one for black.  But you could clean the brushes in between black/white/brown application if you have minimal.

Yes I look very charming I know but it's all for the tutorial.  I started out by mixing on my hand some of the white makeup and the Revlon foundation as I didn't want stark white and they blended together really well.   I applied it first with the buffing brush and then blended it out with the sponge. I then mapped out on my face the basics of the skull ie the eyes, nose, jaw and teeth, using the Rimmel eyebrow pencil as I didn't want to use a black in case I messed up.  I found a human skull picture I liked, used that as inspiration and also tried to follow the contours of my face.  

I lined my upper and lower waterline with Rimmel black eyeliner pencil and filled in the black areas with the NYX jumbo eye pencil.  I then went over the black with a black eyeshadow to make it more intense and last longer. (I didn't use an eyeshadow primer here but I would recommend using one as this did crease on the lids). I made the black circles go over my eyebrows so that I didn't have to try and conceal them with lighter makeup.  You can see that I have also done some blending here with Benefit Hoola bronzer, some black eyeshadow and some Rimmel face powder to blend it out.

Now to fill in the darker areas, it's important to reference your image here or my final skull makeup image and blend, blend, blend!  I used two blending brushes, one for black eyeshadow and one for the bronzer because it's very easy for things to get muddy very quickly.  

You can use any bronzer or brown eyeshadow you have, just make sure it's not too orange or red based but a more neutral brown.  You can also use a grey eyeshadow here if you don't want to use brown.  Here I am using the MAC 217 blending brush and I used the 224 to place down some black shadow to give more depth.  To make the bronzer blend out smoother I used  the Rimmel face powder as a transition colour (blend out near the softest/lightest part of the bronzer.  I used my 217 that still had the bronzer on it and it worked fine).

Once I was happy with the shading I started on the mouth.  I usually leave the mouth until last as a girls go to eat and drink etc and it's also the part that will wear away first.  I painted on the white paint with a Real Techniques domed shadow brush, you can use any brush/sponge that is a suitable size, and then outlined the teeth with the brown pencil.  I started the teeth in the middle and worked out.  

The teeth in the middle are bigger and then get smaller as they get to the jawline.  I also left a gap and had the bottom teeth finishing before the jawline as I thought it looked more realistic.  The mouth also curves down slightly, it's not straight across or smiling, as I thought that this made it look  more like a real skull would.  I also went away from the line I originally mapped out and it was easy to go over the brown and the white.

I then went over the teeth with the black eyeliner pencil which isn't that dark but I darkened it up later with the black eyeshadow.  Once the black was in place, I then used the Real Techniques accent brush (you just need any tiny/detail brush here) and blended out the bronzer and at the root of each tooth so that the whitest part was towards the center of the mouth.  

I think this looks more realistic because I don't think a decayed skull is likely to have pearly whites, I haven't seen one before but I'm guessing they wouldn't.  As you can see in the above image, I also blended some bronzer above each tooth up towards the nose and under the bottom teeth towards the chin.  I used the 217 on it's side to get a thinner line.  This leaves a highlight in between each tooth and really makes it look more like a skull.

So it should now look something like this but we're not done yet.  Just as we have done contouring we need to do highlighting to make it pop.  

Apply highlights with a small, clean brush.  Apply them around the nose, the eyes, cheekbones and areas you want to stand out and come forward.  Again referencing your image or the final photos in this tutorial.

Don't forget to contour and highlight the sides of the face as well.  I did some black under the jaw for some definition, well because I need it ;)  I didn't go down the neck or shoulders, I just wanted to concentrate on the face.  You could easily go past the face if you like, just use the same principles and reference.

The finished look, I think it looks more impressive in photos if you close your eyes.  You can see that the black has creased so I would recommend an eyeshadow primer underneath.  You can always go over any areas to make them more intense.  If you are wearing this look for an event I would recommend to take a black and white eyeliner pencil for when around the mouth wears off. 

I'd love to see any looks you created for Halloween!  Email: littleblacklipstick@gmail.com

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