This Halloween, I decided to be a deer. Now, this was kind of a big deal for me. Contrary to the spirit of the holiday, I don’t usually enjoy dressing up in a costume; I can be a bit of a perfectionist, and I start to feel pressured to get the costume tuned to perfection. However, I figured a deer would be a good choice: simple makeup, easy clothes and pretty unrevealing.
Though finding the actual costume was (relatively) painless, the challenging part came when I realized one crucial detail: I still needed to learn the makeup. Soon, I was knee-deep in YouTube videos, with ten tabs of fawn-faced females chattering on about how to do the perfect deer makeup, remembering my makeup skills were severely lacking.
I’ve never understood how someone can watch a video of another person doing makeup and immediately be able to perform the same design on themselves. To the people who can’t follow a tutorial video to save your life… this rant is for you.
1. The language of makeup is a foreign one to me.
The only distinction I can make between makeup brushes is to recognize that some are bigger than others. I don’t know the correct eyeshadows used to create the perfect smoky eye—my attempts usually look like I’ve given myself a black eye. I’ve been using the same CoverGirl bronzer for about a year, simply because I’m too intimidated by the wide variety of others available. Besides, what shade of bronzer does one buy? From my limited understanding of its purpose, bronzer is supposed to be darker than your skin tone, but at the same time, it shouldn’t look like a bad tan streaked across your face. This walks a fine, fine line. Literally, the only thing I can do is a cat-eye with liquid liner, and ain’t nobody got time for that in college.
2. My makeup budget is smaller than the amount of free time I have each week.
It’s entirely possible that I’ve been watching the wrong tutorial videos, but in the ones I’ve seen, the products used are completely unfamiliar to me—so I, of course, Google them. And when I do find them, many are expensive and not what I’m accustomed to (my makeup products are largely limited to CoverGirl, Maybelline, and the occasional Revlon eyeliner).
3. When it comes to makeup, I just don’t know.
Since I lack makeup knowledge and spend most of my money on books, watching makeup tutorial videos mostly makes me feel discouraged. As soon as they mention an eyeshadow palette I know I don’t have and won’t have the funds to buy, I give up. As pathetic as it may sound, I simply don’t know how to translate the products that the girls in the videos are using to a more affordable type.
4. My lack of art skills carries over to my makeup abilities.
To put it simply, I’m unskilled when it comes to makeup. Aside from the aforementioned cat-eye, I seem to be incapable of performing anything with more than a few steps. How does one manage to fit four shades of brown onto one eyelid?
5. Why doesn’t it look the same on my face as it did on hers?
The deer makeup I attempted on Halloween turned out to be somewhat of a disaster. The bronzer I bought turned out to be a mosaic of face powder—it didn’t change the color of my face at all. I ended up using the bronzer I originally had, which turned out looking more orange than a brown-fawn color, and the white highlighting crayon was sparkly and see-through. Luckily, it was dark and rainy, so my face was mostly hidden beneath an umbrella. Did it look anything like the one in the video? No.