Trend of Highlighters and Strobing in Makeup!!

There was a time when matt and subtle were considered to be the most high end and elegant makeup looks, but these days era loves to have dewy, glowing, luminous radiant on their face. Nowadays it is very difficult to describe the most beautiful or glowing skin because the concept of whitening is out of the picture and the slogan of “Love your complexion” is in trend. Hence a complexion which looks “lit from within” is considered to be the most amazing skin in the world and to bring up that look highlighters were launched.

Earlier blushers used to have some shinny particles in it which brings glow to the cheeks, but only that much glow was not enough for makeup artists so they started using silver or golden glitters on highest points of the face like cheek bones, tip of your nose, cupid bows and between your eyebrows.

                                     

History of Highlighting….

Nobody ever realized the need of highlighters in makeup because in 20^th century in Hollywood where most filming was done outdoors in daylight and the sunshine naturally defined an actor’s face by reflecting off her cheekbones, nose and jawline. Once filming moved to indoor studios, makeup artist then realized lighting is just not enough to highlight the face ,since then highlighters took a special place in the makeup vanity. It became famous in around 2014 when Kim Kardashian brought up the concept of contouring and with that highlighting also became famous.

Highlighters Comes in Two forms…

Powder Highlighters                                           Liquid Highlighters

•      These are light in texture, easily dust off excess. •      Best suited for oily skin.         •      With a very light hand, it can blend into your makeup seamlessly. •      It is strongly pigmented and can easily overdo it. •      They are mostly to highlight highest points of your face.

•      They are creamy or runny in texture, comes in a tube or in a bottle. •      Best for dry skin as they provide moisture with shine. •      They are less concentrated so it can be used for multipurpose like mixing it with your foundation and getting an overall glowing look. •      These are best to achieve dewy finish.

   

Few years back highlighters were not available in India as their use was hardly known to people but now you can easily find different varieties of highlighters in drugstore. Companies like Revlon, Mac, Bobbybrown, Colorbar, Chambor , Faces etc. all have different varieties of highlighters, generally these come in the contour palette like Freedom has 3 in 1 palette where you have a blusher, contour and a highlighter. In case you don’t have any highlighter don’t you worry as you can take any of your shimmer eye shadow palette pick the white shade from it and you are ready with the shiny and dewy look, by any chance you want the effect of liquid highlighter then just spray some makeup fixer or simple water on your brush and then pick up the shade and you are good to go.

STROBING

After reading about highlighting if you think now you have mastered in makeup, then you are wrong!!  As there is also one technique which is quite different still not so different from Highlighting and that is STROBING. When we talk about highlighting it includes highlighting your highest points of face along with contouring your face which gives definition to your cheeks, jawline and nose and overall enhance your features ,But Strobing relies only on highlighters which means use of only highlighter on the face and let the reflect of light defines your features. Although both the techniques include highlighting your face and make it look glowing and lit from within but Strobing gives more dewy and shiny finish special thanks to makeup sprays, serum mixed in foundations, shimmer moisturizers etc. whereas Highlighting gives more balanced look as the use of shimmer is not much as compare to Strobing. If you are confused which look to carry in the next party or event then as per some makeup artists Strobing is more beneficial for dry skin as it gives very glowing and healthy look to the skin. If you want to go for Strobing and don’t have liquid highlighter or any kind of highlighter then one can always mix some shimmer or a pinch of glitter to your foundation or cream and apply on your face  moreover with that same shimmer particles you can highlight your face as well.

Picture depicting difference between Highlighting and Strobing.

                                        

Thanks for reading!!

Love....

Divya!!