About skin types and PM techniques on each of them

Ekaterina Fastovets , silver medalist of the PM 2016 AWARD championship in the highest category "master stylist", participant and speaker of PM conferences, author of the dot work technique on oily skin, winner of the main prize at the "Picturesque Beauty" championship (2017), winner of a special prize from Svyatoslava Otchenash at IBF 2017, official coach of PlasM in Ukraine

Even in the case of a solid experience of the master, there is a high probability that the skin will not react to the PM in the way we want, and the pattern will not be perfect. To prevent this from happening, it is important to pay attention to the type of skin and, depending on it, choose the technique of work.

My topic concerns the eyebrows most of all, since it is in this area that different skin types dictate the use of various micropigmentation techniques.

In commercials and photos, all masters demonstrate beautiful works in various techniques. For the client, in fact, it remains to choose the drawing she likes and come to the procedure (each of us has met a client with a photo on the phone, “who wants just such” eyebrows). But the specialist, before proceeding with the procedure, should find out what type of skin he is dealing with, and understand which technique on this skin will look more attractive and realistic, because lately we have been striving for naturalness and realism in creating an image.

Remember, it used to be fashionable to shave and draw thin, slightly surprised eyebrows? Today, one is considered beautiful work when no one guesses that this is a tattoo, but rather, they think that the eyebrows are slightly tinted with decorative cosmetics.

Skin types

So, in PM skin can be divided into five types: dry, normal, sensitive, oily and combination. As for the techniques of applying PM on the eyebrows, there are a lot of them, because each master tries to stand out and find his own technique and come up with a beautiful name for it (the latest masterpieces I have seen are “nano-brows” and eyebrows using the “smoky-blond” technique) .

Nevertheless, all techniques can be reduced to four types of eyebrow micropigmentation:

• spraying (pixel/powder technique) ⎼ is applied with a slight “pendulum” movement, due to which a number of points are formed, while a large area of skin is injured;
• hardware hair ⎼ due to slow reciprocating movements of the hand, an imitation of natural hairs is created;
• microblading ⎼ manual non-device method of drawing hairs;
• dot technique ⎼ filling the eyebrow pattern with dots.

And now I propose to consider what type of skin what technique of applying PM will be most suitable.

Normal skin (Asian skin can be a good example of such and dry skin) ⎼ clear, smooth, dense, without blood vessels, peeling and blackheads. This skin is suitable for absolutely all micropigmentation techniques, including microblading. It is on such skin that permanent makeup looks most beautiful ⎼ both immediately after the procedure and after healing. Also, on normal skin, PM rarely needs correction. It is the works on such skin that the masters brag about and attract customers.

Hairs (photo 1) and dusting (photo 2) on normal skin. Photos provided by the author

Dry skin ⎼ smooth, matte, tightened. Such skin does not shine, slightly peels off, pores are not visible on it. On such skin, all techniques for applying PM can also be used, the only condition is that the master needs to take into account that this skin is much thinner than normal skin, so you need to work carefully and superficially to eliminate the risk of deepening the needle into the skin.

Sensitive skin (we also include age-related skin) - transparent, rosaceous, prone to redness and rash. Such skin is sensitive to soap, water, cosmetics, as well as to temperature changes. This is the most dangerous and difficult skin in the work of PM masters. In addition to the risk of deepening, we can send the client after the procedure with red eyebrows, as this skin reacts with redness to any injury. This will definitely happen if we "scratch" the skin with our favorite "pixels". Microblading is also very dangerous, since the epidermis is almost transparent, with a blade we can easily reach even the hypodermis. But the hardware hair, made superficially and carefully, will be very beautiful both immediately after the procedure and after healing. But if a client with this type of skin wants powder shading, then it can be done pointwise, getting an excellent result ⎼ and you can do without correction.

Oily and combination skin in the eyebrow area is equally prone to acne, has wide pores and oily sheen. On such skin, the hardware hair may immediately look thin and harmonious, but in a healed form, it is likely that it will blur and turn into a blot. Microblading on this type of skin threatens scarring. Spraying, on the contrary, may look good in healing, but immediately after the procedure, the appearance of the eyebrows may be burgundy-purple, with excessive ichor and bruising. The point technique will look most advantageous on this type of skin, where by filling the form with dots, the tissue nearby is not injured. The eyebrow will retain an atraumatic appearance immediately after the procedure and will look beautiful after healing.

Spot technique on oily skin

Oily skin is the most difficult

I want to focus on working with oily skin and the dot work technique. This is my author's technique, although I borrowed the name from my fellow tattoo artists (translated as dot - “dot”, work ⎼ “work”).

It is this technique that causes the biggest misconception among the masters and objections such as “we will fill in the points for a long, long time” and “I won’t be able to manage until the morning.” I will reveal all the secrets, and you will love working in this technique on oily skin, as I love. First, let's take a closer look at oily skin types.

85% of Slavic women have oily skin. This is one of the variants of the norm, and with proper care, the skin of this type retains a young and fresh look much longer, wrinkles begin to appear on it later. For a permanent makeup master, this skin and working on it is considered difficult. To understand why this is so, we can imagine or try to draw a thin and beautiful line on an apple and on an orange. Result: with an orange, work is both more difficult, and not such a beautiful result.

How can you tell if a client has oily skin?

• The skin looks rough and thick due to sebaceous overflow.
• Outwardly, it is really similar to an orange peel due to enlarged pores.
• She has a history of frequent inflammatory processes and irritations (let me remind you, by the way, that PM cannot be applied to inflamed skin until the inflammation has completely healed).

The most common causes of oily skin problems are:

• puberty;
• hormonal disbalance;
• wrong way of life;
• heredity.

Women and girls who suffer from acne and enlarged pores do not even suspect when they come to us for a procedure that permanent makeup looks and wears differently on their skin than those with dry or normal skin. Since the body has to constantly fight infections, all skin regeneration processes are much faster, so the pigment is perceived as a new irritant and the body tries to reject it. This leads to the fact that permanent makeup can not hold well and spread.

However, all this is not an absolute contraindication, and PM can be applied to such skin, but with the condition of proper care and periodic correction.

D ot work: easy, fast and high quality

Having studied all the nuances of oily skin and having tried many application techniques, I came to the conclusion that dot work is the most convenient technique for working with this type of skin.

Advantages over other techniques:

• the skin near the point is not injured; immediately after the procedure, we get a neat, precise filling with a shadow transition instead of a purple-purple blot with abundant ichor and inflamed skin around the PM zone;
• in healing, points that are slightly leaky (if any) will turn into a beautiful, uniform shadow filling, unlike hardware hair, where leaky hairs will look like spots;
• no risk of scarring unlike microblading;
• really fast filling result.

The essence of the technique is to create a “powdery scattering”, or “pixels”, with dots.

Main accents:

• we work with a needle 1 RL;
• average (soft) speed of the device;
• angle of entry of the needle into the skin ⎼ 90°;
• we set the points in a concentrated manner, do not scatter them. The desired result will not be achieved if the points are set randomly, order in saturation is needed;
• fingers move, not the hand: the hand needs to be fixed and only fingers work. Important: you can’t put dots with a swing of your whole hand;
• The movements are similar to those of a sewing machine needle. Approximately we repeat its movements: a point near a point;
• pressing is minimal, we control the depth, since the needle 1 R ⎼ is the most traumatic (it is possible to release ichor, but not blood!);
• we start filling from the tail of the eyebrow in order to control the light head, that is, fill this place less with dots and make a smooth transition.

Eyebrows in the dot work technique: before the procedure, after the first pass, after the second pass

Here, in fact, is the whole procedure. By following these tips and practicing hard, you can fill in your eyebrows in two passes, spending 30-40 minutes on it.

In general, care recommendations are standard:

• the first three days ⎼ in absolute dryness;
• from the third day, with discomfort and tightness of the skin, lubricate (vaseline, atonium, bepanthen-ointment);
• avoid overheating, getting wet, do not peel off the crusts;
• do not use decorative cosmetics for 5⎼7 days.

The material was first published in Permanent