 For today's Monday Makeup Lesson, I'm going to show you how to create a classic smokey eye. It's one of those looks that looks so good on so many people and I have lots of tips and tricks to show you guys to make sure it works perfectly for you. So let's get started. The first step to a perfect smokey eye is to make sure you're priming the lids and you can use eyeshadow primer or concealer but you really want to make sure you're completely covering the lid from the lash line up to the brows to create a blank canvas. This is to disguise any discoloration that we might naturally have on our lids and also give the eyeshadow something to hold on to. So you actually want to leave your eyeshadow primer or concealer just a little sticky. This will actually grab hold of the shadow. However, I do have a little trick to make sure you also get a good blend so we'll get to that in a second. With any eye makeup look, the main areas of the eye would be the crease area and the crease area is really important in a smokey eye. If you think of what smoke is, it's that deep dark color that then fades into nothing and the crease area is where that fading into nothing happens. The crease area is basically where the lid creases into the eye shape but it stops just underneath the brow bone and of course you have the lid as well and for a smokey eye I actually divide the lid into an upper and a lower part. Now as far as eyeshadows go I've created a little smokey palette for us and you want to adapt this to work with your own skin tone. So the first shade is what I refer to as the base shade. So this is very similar to your own skin tone. It could be a little lighter. We then have our contour shade. This should be a few shades darker than your own skin tone and then you have your mid-tone and your mid-tone is probably the most important. A lot of people refer to this as the transition shade. This is somewhere in between the base and the contour. That's why I call it a mid-tone because it's a middle tone and then we have our smokey shadow. So our smokey shade is basically whatever type of smokey eye that you want to create. I'm going to create a black one. So let's get started with this look taking a blending brush and our base shade. And this is my little trick to get that perfect blend. We're basically going to start at the crease of the eye and then work up underneath the brows. So you want to pack on this base shade to create a silky powdery effect but avoid the lid. We want the lid to stay a little tacky from the concealer and the primer. But we want that crease to be really powdery really easy to blend over. By applying that powder we're basically going to create an easier softer blend. Remember how I said concealer and primer gives the shadows something to hold on to? Well this powdery base will make sure we have something to blend over and that's how you get that perfect soft blend. Just make sure to avoid the lid. Don't come down too far. Keep it from the crease right up to the brows. For the next step we're going to keep with that same blending brush and I haven't cleaned it off and we're going to go in with our mid-tone. So our middle tone or our transition shade. And we're going to start over everything that we've already applied but we're going to stop under the brow bone. So the first shadow went from the crease right up underneath the brows. Avoid in the lid. And use this little diagram as a representation of what we're doing here. We're starting in this crease area and then softly blending upwards. If you're not sure where to stop and start your blend you basically want to keep it in between these two parallel points. It looks really complicated but it's basically using the edge of your eye nose and brow on one side and then creating a parallel line on the inner corner. If you blend outside the lines don't worry because you can always clean up at the end. Just use this as a guide. Then we're going to take a clean blending brush and I always keep a clean blending brush handy for every look but in particular when you're doing smoky eye go over everything that you've applied to soften out any harsh lines. No additional product needed just soften out those lines. Now we're going to move on to applying the contour and I need you guys to take a brush that's got a lot of control in it. So maybe a flat brush or a pencil brush or a brush like this which is somewhere in between it's one of my favorites and picking up a little bit of that contour shade which is one of the darker shades from this palette we're going to apply this all over the lid area. So I want you guys to keep this just to the lid bringing it up to where that mid tone starts in the crease but don't go beyond that point. Really focus on the roots of the lashes and softly blend this over and back covering the lid. Try to avoid blending this up too high because that can ruin the look. You want to keep it nice and deep and low. So what we're going to end up with is a deep dark look right at the roots of the lashes that then fades upwards fading into that mid tone into that crease and up underneath the brows. Next I want you to take a small flat brush something that you have the most control over and I want you to take your smoky shadow so whatever smoky shadow that you're using I'm using black and there's two ways that you can apply this. You can bring your hand down onto the lash line or you can come at it straight on. As you can see my hand is pretty much at the level of my nose as I'm applying this. I'm applying it using the lash roots as my guide and follow the natural shape of your lash line. If you have your hand too low at this point you're going to blend that black up too far and I don't want you guys to do that. So try to keep it at around the cheek level or bring your hand over the top and press downwards onto the lash line. Either way just imagine that you're creating a liner look. Just coat right by those lashes and really pack it on there. Get in between those lashes right onto that lash line. It's really important. We have to imagine that that black is coming from somewhere so it has to start really dark at the base. Now for shaping wise I like to have it slightly thicker just in the center. It's almost like an oval shape. This will create that classic round shape that you get with a smoky eye. So it's slightly tapered on the inside and the outside and highest in the middle. Before you go any further what I want you to do is take your fingertip and really press on that pigment. Push it right at those lashes. No smudging, no blending. Just pushing that on there. This will remove any fallout while also making sure we're really packing that pigment right at the roots of the lashes. Once you've done that you can then take your small blending brush or a pencil brush and softly and lightly smudge this out. Watch for your hand placement here. What I want you guys to remember is that if your hand is low your blend will be high. And that's good at the start because we want to bring that black from the roots of the lashes upwards to about the halfway point of the lid. But if you keep your hand this low throughout the entire smudging process you're going to end up pushing it up too high. Bring that brush slightly upwards. As you start to smudge regain control over that brush and very softly sweep over and back. And this will prevent you from blending it up too high. You do not want it to surpass the lid and get into that crease area. Depending on the look that you're doing of course but particularly for a classic smoky eye. Keeping it nice and low by the lashes is the best way to get that classic look. I usually split the lid into two sections so I have a lower part and an upper part. I'm making it sound really complicated but it's actually not that complicated but if you learn these techniques it will become easier even though it sounds like I'm making it harder than it is. The next step is really important and it's to really darken in between the lashes. So apply a pencil liner on your waterline which is the upper tight line of your lid. What I like to do is just look down in a mirror and just kind of push upwards between the lashes. This will create that dark smoky look. You have to imagine where this smoky depth is coming from and it should be coming right between the lashes. So try getting that pencil right in there. Another important thing is to coat those lashes. I actually brush my lashes downwards to make sure it's really dark right at the roots. Once again to create the illusion of the depth coming from the lash line. Essentially it looks like we just have really thick lashes. If you want to go an extra step you can always apply invisible liner. If you watch my videos a lot you'll know that I've talked about this. It's basically lining very very thinly right between your lashes as close as possible and I also went ahead and applied some falsies. Once again this creates the illusion of a deep dark look right at the roots. So that's pretty much all of the work done but we've still got a lot of work to do. You have to clean up underneath the eyes because keeping it as clean and bright as possible will create that contrast with the smoky eye. So don't neglect doing this. You also want to clean up underneath the brows by taking a little bit of the base shade and a small brush and applying this on the brow bone. We have already applied this but reapplying it will actually brighten this up. And you can also pop a little bit of this shadow on the inner corner of the eye too. I like to imagine that this smoky eye is coming from my lash line and you don't have lashes right in there so try brightening it ever so slightly. Finish off with lots of mascara to balance out the top. And there you go. A classic smoky eye and you can use these techniques to create any number of different looks but I love that deep dark look starting at the roots of lashes and blending upwards. If you try out this look I would love to hear from you guys. You can also send me a picture and if you have any problems I'm always here to help so just leave a comment and I'll try and get back to you. Check out the other videos on the screen. Hit that like button if you learned something. 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