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As a professional make-up artist, you will find that when I am working in doing make-up, I am always mixing colours. Yes, there are very few occasions that one colour does the trick, but often times, make-up art is about mixing & blending colours in eyes shadow, brows, concealer, foundation, blush, contouring, and lips.
Trust me, sometimes a very simple & natural looking foundation job is a result of at least 3 different shades, not to mention the use of other shades for highlighting and contouring shades on top of foundation & concealer.
For that matter, a commercial (regular consumer type) of eye shadows / blush / concealer / foundation that comes in one container or compact type of packaging does not work so well for make-up artists’ kit. Most make-up artists like to shop for cosmetic products and often times, the artist would end up with tons of products in the make-up kit, and it’s just impossible to carry everything to every make-up job.
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The idea of a make-up artist palette is to condense as much colour products into one palette as possible, so when the artist is working, he or she can just open up the palette and do all the mixing and blending effortlessly. There is no need to carry lots of different products. It takes too much time to look through colours, to open up different packaging–it’s just not very make-up artist user friendly at all.
For a make-up artist kit, you want to select the essential professional products that are adaptable: versatile and multi-use.
For my eye shadow palettes, I used to have several of them, and I categorized them by colour scheme: Neutral, Pink + Peach, Yellow + Green, Purple + Blue, and Professional-Use colours. I put them in the black colour M·A·C pro palette containers. I made labels on each pro palette case top, so I know which one has what colours inside. And I do the same for blush colours.
I then find most of the time, I am only using certain colours, so when I found out about Z.Palette at IMTAS (International Make-up Artist Trade Show – Vancouver, Canada), it made my colour palette job even easier. They come in clear lid top, so right away I can tell which ones have what colours inside without labeling them on the case top.
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The size that I bought are larger than my M·A·C Pro Palettes, so it fits even more colour inside. You can actually de-pot the eye shadows / blushes and put a “Pre-Cut Magnetic Stickers” in the bottom so it adhere to the palette. This is definitely a great tool to use if you are looking to condense your make-up kit!
Make sure to label the names of the shades after your depot them, so when you are finished with a particular colour, you will know what to purchase for the refill.
As seen in the image below, Z.Palettes makes 4 different sizes, which provides more versatility for regular make-up consumers use, or for professional use. Make sure to check out their Tips & Tricks page so you know what can be customized better inside with the popular cosmetic brands in the market.
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VIDEO: How to Depot M·A·C Eyeshadows without Heat
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So now I have two customized Z.Palettes filled with more M·A·C eye shadow colours that I use often for my freelance make-up jobs, instead of 5 palettes that I have to carry. And it’s so amazing that Z.Palettes even offers a PRO/Dome size which is created deep enough to fit the mineralized and baked dome-shaped shadows / blushes / powders (as seen in the image below)!
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VIDEO: How to Depot M·A·C Mineralized Powder Products
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Now, M·A·C Cosmetics makes their pro palettes in clear top as well. The palette size is still the same as before, but with clear top and without the insert palette at inside. So I transferred my blush colors into the new M·A·C pro palettes, I also custom made another shimmer & glittery eye shadow palette with this new one. It looks so pretty, and now you can see the colors with its clear lid!
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You can still have the option to purchase the Insert Palette to put inside the M·A·C Pro Palette, and the inserts are sold separately. The options available include:
- Empty Pro Palette (US$18 / CAD$21.50)
- 15-Pan Eyeshadow Insert (US$9 / CAD$11)
- 6-Pan Blush Insert (US$9 / CAD$11)
- 12-Well Cream Insert (US$9 / CAD$11)
- 24-Well Cream Insert (US$9 / CAD$11)
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With the 12-Well or the 24-Wells Inserts, you can customize your own palette with powder, gel, or creams products. I would say the most ideal products to put in there are cream formula products such as foundation, concealer, color corrector, or lipsticks.
For my make-up artist lip palettes, I custom made it with Japonesque 35-Well Double Sided Palette with Divider.
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To make the lip palette, what I do is I scrape out the lipstick colours and pressed them into the wells with a metal spatula. Just like the eye shadow palette, the benefit of organizing a Lip Palette is that I can just bring one palette with me for any make-up jobs, open it and have tons of colours to choose & blend, without having to go through the trouble of pull out & looking through tubes!
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If you want to make your lipstick palette look all nice and clean, do check out this YouTube how-to tutorial video:
VIDEO: Lipstick Palette DIY
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My Lip Palettes
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Related blog posts in Tommy Beauty Pro:
- Make-up Palette Tips
- Makeup 101: Colour Theory & Make-up Artistry
- GLAMCOR Classic Lighting Kit
- Make-up Artist Kit Essentials
- The 10 Sexiest Nude Makeup Palettes
- Taiwan Makeup Artists’ Favorite Cosmetics Products │ 台灣彩妝師愛用的高回購率彩妝品
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what brand foundation have you put in the palette in the first phototgraph?
I have several types of foundations that I like to use and try… in terms of foundation palettes, that one is from Eve Pearl brand, but I also have another one that is MAC’s Full Coverage Fuondation.
Amazing! Its genuinely amnazing article, I have got much clear isea
regarding from this article.
I realize this post is old, but I just started doing makeup and this article might save my life. I spent so much time yesterday going through tubes and individual pots trying to find the right color of lipstick, foundation, blush, etc. Plus, I was packing so much stuff. This will make my life so much easier! Thank you! xx
Would like to know where can I buy makeup artist pallet
Z Palette: https://www.zpalette.com/
MAC Cosmetics – PRO Palettes: http://www.maccosmetics.com/modular-pro-palette
Japonesque: http://japonesque.com/implements-accessories/palettes