Dressing head to toe in the best camouflage is pointless unless your face and neck are covered, too, which is why camouflage face paint is essential.
The slightest movement of a bare face and neck can be a dead giveaway as your skin catches the light. How does one combat this problem, you might ask? By wearing the proper face paint.
Learn more about this type of face paint below.
The Basics of Camouflage for Your Face
To completely blend into your surroundings, you may want to consider wearing a camo mask or using face paint.
CAMOUFLAGE FACE MASK — Masks are good options for a couple of reasons: they are incredibly convenient, as they can easily be taken on or off. The other is that they keep your face warm in colder hunting temps. However, masks can be a bit of a burden. Make sure the mask you use doesn’t block your peripheral vision, that it is comfortable for all-day wear, and that, if you’re bow hunting, it won’t snag your bowstring.
CAMOUFLAGE FACE PAINT — Camo face paint requires a lot more effort to put on and take off; though, you don’t have to stress or fuss over the fit. Hunters enjoy using face paint because they can experiment with the patterns, colors, and techniques. The combinations hunters come up with can lean towards the practical side, while others like to blur the line between fashion and function.
Practical Face Paint — Practical face paint is used to cover up shine, break up harsh outlines, and blend into the surrounding scenery. You can easily achieve this by using face painting random patterns on your face in several different colors. By applying blotches of brown, tan, black, and green paint to your cheeks and forehead, you’ll disappear into the background.
Another method with practical face paint to consider is a technique inspired by nature called countershading. Think about when a light is held over an object; its top or higher points appear lighter, and its bottom looks darker. This gives the object an obvious silhouette. Countershading, however, reverses this effect. When you countershade your face, by applying darker colors to the high points of your face, such as your nose, chin, cheekbones, and forehead, and color your lower points in lighter colors, like the hollows of your eyes and cheeks.
Fashion Face Paint — For the creative and experimental hunters or someone who wants a more photogenic look, fashionable face paint might be more your speed. Your creativity is your only limit when it comes to fashion face paint, but to get you started, here are a couple of ideas:
Rock and Roll: Similar to rock band makeup, use black camo paint to paint a wide bar across your face, over your nose, and below each eye, and smear your fingers down your cheeks.
Striped Tiger: Draw diagonal strips down your face from the top of your forehead to your jawline in whatever camo color you’d like.
