iamthewitch.com

Posted: 04 Sep 2011 08:12 PM PDT

Can’t believe a week of holiday just FLEW passed! Time does fly when one is having fun, doesn’t it? Anyway, I figured I haven’t be writing about my Amber Chia Academy experience for quite some time now and it’s good for an update. I have recently completed the 4 lessons of make-up, starting with 2 lessons for basic nude make up and another 2 lessons for smoky eyes make up. During my third lesson, Sharon, the make up instructor told me to tie my hair up in a neat bun. It was my first try so it did not look that neat.

Hair up in a bun

Smoky eyes make-up required all the basic steps of nude make-up, except that extra steps were added for the eyes. The previous technique of applying make up base, foundation, loose powder, blusher, bronzer (shading powder) and mascara were all used in this make up.

Smoky Eyes

Make up brush set

Eye shadow palette

Sharon would teach me by applying eye shadow for smoky eyes effect on one of my eyes. Then, I was to repeat what she did on the second eye, which usually looked easier than done.

Smoky Eyes

Before make up

Everyone has different shape of eye lid and for my case, I had to put on the double eye-lid sticker to make my eyes bigger. This was then followed by applying a layer of eye make-up base which was cream-like with white or nude colour. Then, using a suitable eye shadow brush, dab on black eye shadow and start applying starting from the corner of the eye inwards. Continue doing this until it’s completely black at the edges of the eye lid, then slowly blend the colour upwards towards the eye socket. That would be the area of shading that we need to cover.

Smoky eyes

It was also important to note that the edges of the black eye shadow should be as soft as possible. This means no hard line in between the shaded and non-shaded area. For me, the challenge was making the colour look evenly blended from the bottom to the top. Since this was black colour, any unevenness was very obvious and it was easy to risk looking untidy. If you look at the picture below, I’m sure you could tell which was side of eye was done by a professional and which was done by me!

Smoky Eyes

Can you guess which was eye was done by Sharon and which was by me?

The next step was applying liquid eye-liner along the edges of the eye lids, from inner eye outwards. Then, a light dab of white eye shadow just below the eye brow to create the deep-set eyes effect, before finishing with a layer of black eye shadow just beneath the lower eye lashes. That’s it!

Smoky eyes – first trial

Last but not least, for a more dramatic effect, apply fake eye lashes to make the eyes even bigger. This is quite a troublesome process for me as I find it hard to stick the lashes at the correct place. But practice makes perfect, and I think I’m getting more comfortable with it now. But remember to curl the lashes before applying the falsies on or it’d look like you have 2 layers of eye lash.

Smoky Eyes

With false eye lashes

During my fourth and final class, I was given a free hand to do my own make-up from the beginning to the end, without any guidance from Sharon. I was supposed to apply all that I’d learnt from the previous classes and demonstrate to her in a complete smoky eyes make-up. Thankfully, I managed to do a better job at blending the black eye shadow during my second try.

Smoky eyes all by myself!

Final smoky eyes make up

If you’re wondering, the whole make-up process took me about 30 minutes, with more than 10 minutes on the eye make-up alone. *gasp* I believe it can be done in a shorter time especially after learning how to blend the eye shadow better. What do you think?