Colors are complicated even for me as an artist. You would think it would be so easy for me to do makeup since I already paint on canvas and also know about color theory but makeup is not as simple as that.
I've never really used foundation before because they would always look weird on me. Aside from it being expensive, I really just haven't "discovered" the right foundation shade for me and I kept on blaming it on the local companies only catering to light and fair skin tones even though there's a higher percentage of tan Filipinos.
Recently since I've been learning stuff about make up, I kept on buying the wrong shades of foundations for me despite testing it at the mall or being mindful with the undertones and stuff like that.
You can see how wasteful it is to spend on something then still get the wrong shade. I was already losing hope until I researched that olive undertones exist!
As you can see, I have these foundations and they all look weird to me. One is a medium coverage (Maybelline Fit me) and the rest are full coverage. I also have two The Ordinary foundations that I forgot to take pics of lol.
Mew wanting to be in the pic
With my research, if your foundation looks too orange or yellow, you might have an olive undertone which not a lot of brands have them in their foundation shades. That's why it is a struggle for me since only a few brands have the shades for olive skin tones. Even Mac only has about 3 shades for their liquid foundations.
What they (olive undertoned people) would usually do is just add these LA Girl foundation mixers to get the right shade. I got the blue and yellow pigments to give it a try!
From left to right: Maybelline Fit Me 228, Maybelline Superstay 220, Maybelline Superstay 312.
You see, I want to cover up these dark spots and have a nice even color on my face but the foundations don't seem to cooperate. 😂 The one on the right is too orange and dark on me. The one on the middle looks grayish and when I blend it all over my face I just look dead (apart from it being too light as well).
The one on the left looks like a good match with my neck but is still a little bit orange. This is the one I use often but even so, I still think there was something weird with it and I couldn't figure out what or why.
From left to right: Mac Studio Fix Fluid NC35, Mac Studio Fix Fluid NC25
These are my most recent purchases and I even went to the Mac store at the mall to get my shade. I was matched with NC25 and it looked okay on me but when I got my order and was able to test it on my whole face, it looked too light and orange! (right)
I don't know what happened, it must be their lighting there that it looked okay on my face and cos I didn't test it out on different lighting. I still go the NC35 (left) as a backup cos I didn't want to miss the sale and still ended up being orange haha.
There are different undertones you need to know to get your perfect shade. Some have red undertones, some are yellow, and some are green. It's a bit tricky figuring out olive undertones because they can be warm and cool, but also the green is just subtle.
Looking at my skin tone, it looks like a yellow-golden on the surface so I kept on buying warm toned foundations which ended up looking too warm on me. I don't know if you can see it but my skin is very yellow with a subtle green to it.
I researched about some clues on how to know if you have olive skin tone and they were all spot on.
Mixing them with pigment
In color theory, to desaturate a color, you will need to mix the complementary colors. The opposite of orange on the color wheel is blue.
The foundation is too orange on me so to make it less orange, I mixed the blue pigment with it. As you can see from the swatches on my face, it immediately became better than before although still not perfect. My iPhone camera is so good with balancing out the colors so it was hard to capture the true color as what my eyes can see in person. XD
I struggled a lot with mixing it before I got to the shade that looks natural on me.
You can barely tell I'm wearing a foundation here cos it just blended with the color of my body :D
It took me about 1hr and 30 min to finally be able to mix the right shade for me! All I did was add a lot of blue and also a bit of yellow to give me "life". My orangey foundations have a lot of red to it so I had to add a bit of yellow as well. Basically adding green (blue+yellow) but it was better this way so I can control the amount of warmth.
The olive skin tone is described as a skin with less red tone to it. That's why it looks ashy, green, or too yellow on some lightings. So if your foundation has more red to it, it just looks weird, which is what's in my situation.
Skin is so weird. I'm wearing the same shade of what's in the back of my hand on my face. I thought it was too green at first but then when I put it on my face it just looked okay lol.
That's why makeup has really a bit of a learning curve to me even as an artist cos there are also several factors involved that could affect the results too. Like how much coverage the foundation could do, how the foundation reacts to the oils on your face, your undertone, etc etc.
I tested it out on different lighting because in some lighting I look pale for whatever reason and on some I look really tan. I'm glad to say I got the right mix! :D
It's just so annoying that I have to mix everytime I want to use a foundation lol but this is a lot better than buying new ones and wasting more money. I'm even thinking of just mixing them in batches and just keep it in a separate container but I don't know how I could do that without contaminating the foundation hahah.
It's also important to note that my skin tone changes a lot. I get tan so easily even though I'm only under the sun for a few minutes lol and when I don't go out of the house for weeks, I look pale. And that's one of the signs of being olive. :D
So there's really not one fixed foundation shade that will work for me and I'd have to mix them at some point anyway lol.
This is also me wearing the Maybelline Fit Me 228 without mixing blue in it. You can see it's a bit too orange or yellow or saturated on me compared to the rest of my body. It's not that obvious since iPhone camera just balances the color out but you can tell there's something weird about it.
Do you have the same problem as me? You might have an olive undertone too but just don't realize it. Learning about these things made me appreciate my skin tone and I hope you do too!