These days it seems like if contour and highlight disappeared the world would stop spinning. Everywhere we turn there's new contour and highlight products being released, which can make it hard when picking out the right products for yourself. I think we'd all be lying if we said we hadn't been sucked into the craze. These are the different products I have tried and tested and I'm also going to share my own everyday contour and highlight routine. I'm just going to warn you now that this post will be a long one, so grab a drink or a snack and get comfy.
The first product I bought when I first started out with contouring was a basic palette from eBay, which I know most people are sceptical about. It can be hard to find the right contour shades for your skin tone, picking the wrong one can either make you look like you've rubbed a wotsit or dirt over your face. This palette has good colour range, as it's original purpose is to be used as a concealer palette. Now I used this palette mainly for contouring and as you can see from the picture, the darker shades are the ones I used the most. The pigmentation of them is very light, which is why so much product has been used. Even though it's a cream kit they're actually not that creamy so I had to really get my brush in there to pick anything up, so I'd recommend mixing a small amount of moisturiser or even Vaseline, just to make the texture easier to work with. Now these do have a very powerful smell when you open it, it's kind of like those cheap paint trays you used to get when you were little in those hard plastic trays, so just keep this in mind. You can buy this product on eBay for as little as £2 just search for cream contour kit, but I would recommend this more for those starting out in make-up. I have gotten rid of this product personally so I don't have an image or swatches.
The next product is the Maybelline master sculpt. This is a 2-in-1 contouring product. I first saw this product on instagram and I just had to get it and try it. This little square beauty retails for £6.99 and is available in 2 shades, 01 light medium and 02 medium dark. Now with any products I buy I automatically float towards the lighter shades. Boots isn't always reliable when having good testers to look at, there's always those few people who just take the testers instead of buying the product. So when looking I had to just rely on eye and I got the 01 light medium shade. Now keep this in mind if your looking at buying this, the 01 bronzer is more of a warm shade and 02 is more of a ash grey tone. I think you should buy whichever one based on personal preference rather than the shade of your skin because as you can see from the image on the right it does have an orange tinge. It's very pigmented so if you do pick up this product use a light hand. The highlight is ok, but its not a sheen it has alot of fine glitter running through it and is very powdery as you can see from the swatch. Now for those who like that, then this would be right up your street, but for me I find through the day the tiny glitters fall to the rest of my face. Both are just as creamy as each other, but the highlight is not as pigmented as others out there. One bonus you get with this contour kit, is that if you lift the product up you have a brush underneath witha mirror attached to the underside, the size of the packaging and these extra things really make this product travel friendly.
Collection 2000 speedy highlighter in 01 pearl sheen is one which I didn't even know was on the market. Even though there is such a high demand for cream highlighters in the drug store, brands just aren't producing them. I actually bought my one from Tesco, but these are available also in super drug and retail for £3.99. Now this highlight stick is supposed to be a cream stick, but I find it more to be a cream to powder formula. It has a very strange consistency. The colour is very pearlescent and is good for us fair people as it gives you the glow without leaving a stark line of colour across your face, but gives us that glow when the light hits your face. Don't use a brush to apply this product, the way I apply is it by rubbing it across the places I want it straight from the stick, then using my finger just to blend out the edges. This is the best way to get as much pigmentation as possible, because when using a brush it's like it doesn't pick up any product. I found myself reaching for this less and less, because when you blend this in, the sheen tends to disappears and leaving behind a line of glitter. I would say this is better for young teenagers which are just starting to get into make-up. This would be perfect as the product never allows you to apply too much.
Now w7 is a range I have never really explored alot. It's one of those brands that you see it everywhere in those random make-up areas in stores, but you never think to pick up. My family actually bought me this for Christmas and it's the w7 The CHEEKY trio. This trio comes with a bronzer highlight and blush. I actually got this in a set with two w7 eye shadow palettes and because this was a present I don't know where this was from or how much it was but you can find these on there website and I'm sure they'd be sold in places like B&M and Amazon. I haven't really used this alot just because I have a select few holy grail products which I use everyday. I'm absolutely in love with the packaging though, and I know if I ever drop this it won't break. This product has a strange fragrance to them, kind of like a flowery scent which I don't mind. The bronzer and blusher have a medium pigment, the bronzer glides on smoothly and when blended is a nice warm brown shade. Its not too ashy and it's not too orange it's like the perfect neutral bronzing shade. The blush is a typical rosy pink shade, but it's a little chalky but when it's blended in it looks fine. Don't use too much though as this is the most pigmented out of the three. The highlighter however really lets the trio down. In the tin it doesn't really have
any kind of a sheen to it, it looks more like a setting powder. Even when swatched it looks chalky like a beige kind of coloured powder that disappears as soon as you rub it in. In the swatches on the left I did swatch the highlighter, but as you can see nothing has shown. The swatch on my finger above, I rubbed my finger in the product in quite abit and this was the most pigment I could get from it. One thing I love about this though is that each pan has a shade name, I'd still recommend trying this as it is a budget brand but I wouldn't buy this for the highlight.
This post is starting to get rambly and long so I'm going to group the next two highlighters together. These highlighters are from Makeup Revolution. These two highlighters we're actually ones I got in my Makeup Revolution Christmas advent calender. The first one is a baked highlighter and is in the shade pink lights (left in images). This is actually a lilac coloured highlighter and because it's a baked one this it's got ALOT of glitter in! I really don't like this highlight because of that and the fact it's purple as well. I just don't really want a like of purple sheen and glitter along my cheekbone. This one I am not a fan of.
The next one I have from this brand is a pressed highlighter in the shade hidden lights (right in images). This is a gorgeous golden highlight which would suit any skin tone especially those of you with darker skin. It's like a golden sands colour and is very similar to The Balm Cosmetics Mary-Lou Manizer. The Pink Lights highlighter is available on the Makeup Revolution website and also in some super drug stores. For all of you who love the glitter you'd love this. For everyone who likes a more natural glow I fully recommend the Hidden lights highlight but for some reason I can't find this on the Makeup Revolution site but there is one called Golden Lights which looks identical so maybe they just changed the name.
I hope this helped some of you and gave you an insight into the world of highlighting and contouring, thanks for staying and reading.
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