Halloween Makeup Tutorial for Total Beginners: Cat, Vampire, Witch — Three Looks You Can Do With Everyday Makeup

Halloween makeup beginner tutorial: cat, vampire, witch, three looks you can complete with everyday makeup

To be honest, every year the week before Halloween, I do the same thing: search the whole internet for tutorials, save twenty videos, and then open none of them

Because those tutorials either require body paint, special effects blood, or false eyelash glue, all things you never use normally, spending fifty dollars on a bunch of makeup you can only use once, then using it for ten minutes, and leaving it in a drawer to gather dust for the other eleven months, not worth it

So the goal of this piece is clear: use only what you already have in your makeup bag to complete three Halloween looks, foundation, eyeliner, eyeshadow, lipstick, blush, that's it, no stroke requires professional skill, no step requires you to watch the video three times before starting

Cat makeup: one black eyeliner, ten minutes, from passerby to the hottest at the party

Cat makeup is the most cost-effective of all Halloween looks, one black eyeliner, a face you already have, and you're done, and it has an advantage other looks can't match: you can go light or heavy, depending on how wild you want to be at the party

What you need

Black eyeliner or black liquid eyeliner, that's the only must-have, if you want to add a little color, lipstick or blush can help, that's it

How to do it

Start with your normal base makeup, don't make it thick, cat makeup doesn't need flawless skin, it needs dramatic eyes

With black eyeliner, start from the outer corner and draw a cat eye slightly more dramatic than usual, pull it out and flick it up, if you usually only draw a small line, today extend it one centimeter more, HOLR Magazine suggests extending the liner to near your temple, but you don't have to go that far, just more dramatic than usual is enough

Then draw the nose tip, use the eyeliner to draw a small inverted triangle on your nose tip and fill it black, that's the cat nose, don't make it big, too big looks like a clown, not a cat, experienced bloggers say you can also use mascara for the nose, same effect

Next are the whiskers, draw three lines on each side of your cheeks, extending outward from the sides of your nose, with the spacing getting wider, put a small dot at the end of each line, this detail makes the whiskers look like real cat whiskers, not just three random lines

One last key choice: lips, for sweet and cool, wear a nude or light pink, looking like a not-too-happy but pretty cat, for dark, wear a dark lipstick, deep red, wine red, even black all work

Why cat makeup is beginner-friendly: you don't need symmetry, cats aren't symmetrical anyway, your two cat eyes drawn at different heights, no problem, it looks like a cat with personality, whiskers drawn crooked, cat whiskers aren't measured with a ruler anyway

Vampire makeup: you don't need fake blood, you need a dark lipstick and a powder foundation lighter than your skin tone

The core of vampire makeup isn't bloodsucking, it's looking like you've been dead for a long time but still handsome, this look is much easier than you think

What you need

A foundation or pressed powder one shade lighter than your skin tone. Loose powder works, setting powder works. The goal isn't to paint yourself white, it's to make your skin look bloodless

Dark brown, burgundy or black eyeshadow. The one you normally use for a smoky eye is fine

Deep red, burgundy or berry lipstick. The darker the better

A lip liner one shade darker than your lipstick. If you have one. It's fine if you don't

How to do it

Start with your base. Use the foundation you normally wear, but press an extra layer of loose powder onto your forehead and cheeks so your skin looks a little duller, a little more matte, a little less alive. Coloween's advice is blunt: focus the powder on your cheeks and forehead to make your face look pale, matte and ghostly

Eye makeup is the main event. Blend dark brown or burgundy eyeshadow across your crease and outer corners for a smoky effect. Soften the edges instead of leaving a hard line. If you have black eyeshadow, you can deepen the outer corners just a little, but don't paint your whole eye black. Vampire eyes are deep and intense, not panda eyes

Lipstick. Go for a deep red, burgundy or berry shade. If you have a lip liner, first outline your lips in a color one shade darker than your lipstick, then fill them in. This detail gives your lips more dimension and makes you look more like a movie vampire

If you want a touch of blood but don't want to buy fake blood, use a dark lipstick to draw two thin lines from the corners of your mouth outward, trailing down just a little. You don't need to go overboard, two lines are enough

A bonus step many people overlook: highlighter. Dabbing a tiny bit of highlighter on the highest point of your cheekbones makes your face look colder and harder. A vampire's cheekbones are sharp, and highlighter makes that sharpness stand out more

Why vampire makeup works for total beginners: it doesn't call for any drawing skill. You're layering color, not shaping lines. Eyeshadow blending doesn't have to be precise, and if your lipstick goes crooked you just wipe it off with a cotton swab. Dark shades are also far more forgiving than bright ones: a slip with dark eyeshadow reads as intentional, while a slip with bright eyeshadow reads as a total fail

Witch makeup: dark eyeshadow plus a dark lipstick for maximum presence

Witch makeup is the most flexible of the three looks. You can go for an elegant witch or an evil witch, depending on how much dark color you use

What you need

Dark eyeshadow: black, charcoal gray, dark green or purple. Any dark eyeshadow you already own will do

Black or dark eyeliner

Deep purple, black or dark berry lipstick

How to do it

The heart of witch makeup is depth in the eyes and intensity on the lips

Start by laying dark eyeshadow across the whole eye socket, blending upward from the lash line and fading as you go. Avoid any obvious boundary line. Witch eyes look out from the depths, they aren't a drawn-on frame

If you want to look a bit more evil, deepen the outer corners with black eyeshadow, then draw a sharp eyeliner line and pull it outward. HOLR Magazine's advice is to add a sharp eyeliner wing for extra definition

You can draw your eyebrows darker and thicker than usual. A witch's eyebrows are powerful, not soft and natural. Fill them in a bit more with an eyebrow pencil or dark eyeshadow and make the shape slightly sharper

Choose a deep purple, black, or dark berry lipstick. If you normally don't dare wear this color, today is the day to wear it. Fill it in fully and outline the edges with a lip liner to make your lips look sharper

A hidden bonus for a witch makeup look: below the outer corner of your eye, draw a tiny spider web with an eyeliner, three straight lines radiating out from the outer corner, then connect them with small curves. You don't need to draw much, one corner is enough. This detail takes only thirty seconds, but it will make people who see it ask how long you spent drawing it

Why witch makeup is beginner-friendly: it doesn't need fine lines, doesn't need symmetry, doesn't need to look accurate. A witch is a vibe, not a pattern. Your eyeshadow not blended evenly enough? That's called a smoky feel. Your lipstick not applied neatly enough? That's called dark aesthetics

The shared logic of the three looks: your makeup bag is already enough

When I was putting these things together I noticed a pattern: the products used for these three looks almost overlap

Black eyeliner: essential for cat makeup, optional for witch makeup, optional for vampire makeup

Dark eyeshadow (brown/black/burgundy/purple): works for all three

Lipstick (nude/dark red/deep purple): use nude or dark for cat makeup, dark red for vampire makeup, deep purple for witch makeup

Foundation or setting powder lighter than your skin tone: essential for vampire makeup, optional for the other two

Blush: for cat makeup you can sweep on a little to add a living cat feel, vampire makeup and witch makeup can skip it

This means you don't need to buy three sets of makeup for three looks. Those few things in your makeup bag are enough

A few practical reminders every beginner must know

First, do your eye makeup before your base makeup. Dark eyeshadow powder will fall onto your cheeks, and if you've already applied foundation, the fallen powder will dirty your base. Do your eyes first, then use a cotton swab to wipe away the fallen powder before applying your base

Second, cotton swabs are your lifesaver. Drew your cat nose crooked? Dip a cotton swab in a little makeup remover, wipe it off, and redraw. Eyeliner too thick? Pull outward with a cotton swab and the edge blurs, making it look intentional

Third, don't chase symmetry. Halloween makeup doesn't need to be as symmetrical as an ID photo. A cat's whiskers aren't symmetrical, and a vampire's smoky eyes aren't symmetrical either. When you draw it slightly differently, it actually looks more real

Fourth, dark shades are ten times more forgiving than bright shades. If you're torn between going darker or lighter, go darker. Dark eyeshadow applied heavily looks like you're intentionally setting a mood. Light eyeshadow done wrong looks like you don't know how to do makeup

Fifth, if you only have ten minutes, choose cat makeup. One eyeliner, one nose, a few whiskers, done. Cat makeup is the fastest, least likely to go wrong, and most easily recognized of the three looks

One last thing

When it comes to Halloween makeup, you don't need to be a makeup artist to join in

What you need is a black eyeliner, a dark eyeshadow, a dark lipstick, and the courage to not be afraid of mistakes, if you mess up, wipe it off and start over, if you can't wipe it off, just call it a design, Halloween is a day where the weirder the better

Cat, vampire, witch, three looks, three sets of logic, one makeup bag

Try one tonight, there's still time until Halloween night