FTM - manlier face in 2 steps.

[Guest K-Night]

I don't know if I'm posting in the correct section...

anyway

Recently I've been really frustrated with my facial structure (leaning more towards round). I'm pre-T and op, everything, so I'm only relying on hiding my physical appearance.

So I looked up tutorials on how to use make up to create the illusion of having a manlier face structure. Reading and watching the tutorials looked easy. I mean, hey I'm an artist! This is just like brush and paint on canvas! I can do it too! How wrong am I! Make up is nothing like paints. Nope. Not at all. I had some make up stuff from long ago (I used it only once for my prom night in high school and I dressed like a punk rockstar anyway). I tried. It kinda fail. I see no difference... I'm just bad when it comes to make up. It took me a while to figure out what is foundation, concealer, contouring blush, etc. etc. I had those stuff bought cheaply and the skin tone doesn't make a difference. I don't understand why the palette has a darker color than my skin but it didn't show on my face. WEIRD.

In the end, I figured out a much simpler way that a makeup idiot like me can do. And I only need one item: dark brown eyeliner pencil. Well, maybe you already know that to make a manlier face, you need to darken the underside of the cheekbones, temples, eye area, brows, etc. (I'm not gonna go into details) and in all the tutorials I saw, this is achieved by using shades of blush.

My method:

Step 1: color the area with eyeliner pencil

Step 2: smudge/blend

Done.

It's not perfect but it did the job. I'm an artist, but not a makeup artist.

Hope this might help all those guys out there who know zero about makeups like me.

[Guest Lupi]

Guyliner is a man's best friend.

[tracy_j]

Just a thought - I too love art - the face is a 3D object so would be fundamentally more difficult to change than a 2 dimensional canvas anyway due to (for instance) real, not depicted, shadow etc

[JJ]

Makeup can be tricky stuff. I am also an artist and made the face I was stuck with living female my lifelong canvass. It wasn't really me anyway so I made it the best it could be. One of the huge problems with makeup is the drastic and dramatic changes that can take place in different lights. You can do a makeup that looks great and blends making you look more masculine and then go from the light in a home to daylight and look like you are getting ready for a part in a zombie movie.

I had a couple of college courses in stage makeup that really helped me for the rest of my life to understand how to change appearance and the principles about what to use for what effect. Like green to neutralize red etc.

Also have found that attitude and confidence with male posture make a huge difference. More than makeup can do or offset.

Presentation for us pre T can be a big challenge because if we look like we are wearing makeup we immediately make the opposite impression than we are wanting. It can help but only if flawless and undetectable which takes a lot of practice as well as checking how it looks outside and inside both.

Johnny