It is so easy to get lost in the humongous amount of face painting products! There are at least 20 manufacturers of professional paints, a dozen manufacturers of brushes. Now add the glitter, sponges, stencils, and even brush tub options — all you need to turn nuts! LOL
But don’t worry! We have an EASY and READY TO GO solution for you!
As a team of professional face painters with 10 years experience, we’ve tried and tested almost all existing products on the market and found out THE BEST ones.
In this one-of-a-kind guide we’ve prepared two kits that fill suit your needs 100%:
⭐️Beginner’s face painting kit — a starter kit consisting of the main important products to help you achieve amazing results even instantly!
Buy the Beginner Face Painting Kit
🌟Professional’s face paint kit — a complete professional kit, including Olga’s favorite products. It is basically almost the same kit that Olga has built for herself over years of practice and is the best face painting kit you can buy.
Buy the Professional Face Painting Kit
Best thing?
You can now purchase the full kit in one place thanks to our partnership with one of the best USA stores JestPaint.com. Worldwide shipping is available.
~ Quick Navigation Content Guide ~
- BEGINNER’S KIT
- PROFESSIONAL’S KIT
- Childrens Face Paint Kit
- Face Painting Kit For Adults
- Face Painting Kit For Parties:
BEGINNER’S FACE PAINT KIT
Paints
White for linework: Fusion Body Art Face Paint — Prime Paraffin White 50 gr
Black for linework: Fusion Body Art Face Paint — Prime Strong Black 50 gr
Glycerin white for background: Superstar Face Paint | Line White 161 — 45 gr
A palette of singular colors: Fusion Body Art — Sampler Face Painting Palette
One rainbow split-cake for sponging colorful backgrounds: TAG Face Paint Split Cake — EXCL Big Happy Swirl 50 gr #9
One small split-cake for one stroke for painting easy rainbows: Fusion Body Art & FX — Split Cake | Leanne’s Rainbow (neon) by Leanne Courtney 30 gr
One pearl (metallic) white for making any regular color softer and shimmery: Fusion Body Art Face Paint — Pearl Fairy White 25 gr
Did you just discover the incredible world of face painting? Then you will definitely find this Ultimate Face Painting Guide for Beginners super useful! 😍
Brushes
Round brushes for linework:
Art Factory Studio Face Painting Brush – Round #1
BOLT | Face Painting Brushes by Jest Paint – Crisp Round #3 – two pieces
Art Factory Studio Face Painting Brush – Round #4 – two pieces
One brush for double-dip flowers: Paint Pal – Pretty Petal Face Painting Brush
One flat 1-inch brush for painting one stroke rainbows and more: Art Factory Studio Face Painting Brush – 1″ FLAT
One filbert brush for building up shapes, larger teardrops and blending: Face Painting Brush – TAG – Filbert #6 (7/16″)
Check out our dedicated article to Best Brushes for Face Painting for more details.
Sponges
You will need sponges for quick paint application on large surfaces.
Splash Face Painting Sponge by Jest Paint – Tear Drop (6 pieces)
You will find more useful tips and tricks and also suggestions for other sponges in our Best Sponges Guide.
Stencils
Bad Ass Mini 1005 – Face Painting Stencil – Scales
Ooh! Face Painting Stencil | Snowflake Wrap #1 (W07)
Ooh! Face Painting Stencil | Star Wrap (W02)
Face Painting Stencil | Tribal Wrap (W14)
TAP 044 Face Painting Stencil – Skull with Crossbones
Glitter
Amerikan Body Art | Loose Chunky Glitter – Cosmic Collision (1oz)
Water tub
Faber-Castell Clic & Go Foldable Water Pot (181520)
Spray bottle
Spray Bottle – Water Bottle with Light Misting Spray Cap 2oz (0028-14)
So you wanna be a face painter… well, the lazy days of getting by with painting simple ladybugs and hearts on kids cheeks are long gone. The jig is up!
And shows like Skin Wars and websites like Instagram and Pinterest are showing the masses just how amazing the world of face and body art can be.
So how do you make your mark amongst a sea of talented artists?
How are you supposed to compete?…
Read “How to start face painting” in our expert article and let the fun begin! 🎉
PROFESSIONAL’S FACE PAINTING KIT
Paints
White for linework: Fusion Body Art Face Paint — Prime Paraffin White 50 gr
Black for linework: Fusion Body Art Face Paint — Prime Strong Black 50 gr
White for background and blending: Superstar Face Paint | Line White 161 — 45 gr
Black for background and blending: Superstar Face Paint | Line Black 163 – 45 gr
An assortment of regular (prime) and metallic colors, including a couple of neons:
Regular (prime or base) colors — we recommend TAG Body Art.
Pearl (metallic or shimmer) colors — we recommend Superstar.
Neon (UV) colors — we recommend Global.
Check out our Best Face Paints Guide for more information on paints types and tips on how to use them.
Olga’s favorites:
Superstar Face Paint | Ziva (Blue) Shimmer 220 – 45 gr
Superstar Face Paint | Petrol Blue 173 – 45 gr
Paradise Face Paint By Mehron – Red 40 gr
Paradise Tropical Face Paint By Mehron – Mango 40 gr
Superstar Face Paint | Berry Wine 227 – 45 gr
TAG Face Paint – Pearl Old Gold 32 gr
TAG Face Paint – Pearl Copper 32 gr
Large split-cakes for sponging colorful backgrounds:
1. Blue combination for Winter (Frozen) and Ocean themed Halloween makeup kit designs:
Fusion Body Art Face Paint — Rainbow Cake | Frozen Shimmer 50 gr by Jest Paint.
2. Green combinations for Mermaids, Dragons:
Fusion Body Art & FX — Rainbow Cake | Mermaid Splash 50 gr by Jest Paint.
3. Coral-red combination for Tropical designs, Dragons, Tigers etc:
Fusion Body Art Face Paint – Rainbow Cake | NEW Glowing Tiger (no neons) 50gr by Jest Paint.
4. Pinky-purple combinations are great for Unicorn and Princess Halloween face painting kits:
Silly Farm Face Paint Rainbow Cake — Purple Sprite 50 gr.
5. A rainbow split-cake for all those rainbow-lovers:
Fusion Body Art Face Paint — Rainbow Cake | Bright Rainbow 50 gr.
Learn what types of sponges you need to make the best use of these colorful split-cakes in our article Best Sponges for face painting!
Tip: Want more quality designs like this one? Get inspired by designs, tutorials, and videos from top face painters from all over the world in our Ultimate Face Painting Ideas Guide! You’ll thank yourself.
Split-cakes for one stroke:
Fusion Body Art & FX — Spectrum Palette | Tropical Collection by Leanne Courtney, a palette with all main color combinations you may need, with very vibrant colors and amazing paint quality.
Brushes
Art Factory Studio Face Painting Brush – Round #1 – 2 pieces
BOLT | Face Painting Brushes by Jest Paint – Crisp Round #3 – 3 pieces
Art Factory Studio Face Painting Brush – Round #4 – 3 pieces
Take our free “Improve your linework in 3 days” Free Online workshop to learn how to master round brushes like a pro!
Art Factory Studio Face Painting Brush – 3/4″ ANGLE
Art Factory Studio Face Painting Brush – 5/8″ Acrylic Handle Angle
Paint Pal | Face Painting Brush | Beautiful Butterfly – 3/8″ Angle
Paint Pal | Face Painting Brush | Romantic Rose – 1/2″ Angle
Prima Barton | Creative Series Face Painting Brush – Flat 1″
Face Painting Brush – TAG – Filbert #6 (7/16″)
Paint Pal – Pretty Petal Face Painting Brush
The Face Painting Shop Brush – Flat Pointy – Flora #8
Cameleon Face Painting Brush – Medium Filbert # 2 (short green handle)
and Cameleon Face Painting Brush – Blender # 1 (short green handle).
Want to learn how to use blending brushes? We study it in detail at the International Face Painting School and these two designs are part of the curriculum. You can learn how to paint it too!
Take a class to find out how! 😍
Sponges
Splash Face Painting Sponge by Jest Paint – Tear Drop (6 pieces) – 2 face paint sets
Jest Paint – Hydra Face Painting Sponge
Finger Dauber Face Painting Sponge – 6 units
Face Painting Kits with Stencils
Bad Ass Mini 1005 – Face Painting Stencil – Scales
Ooh! Face Painting Stencil | Snowflake Wrap #1 (W07)
Ooh! Face Painting Stencil | Star Wrap (W02)
Face Painting Stencil | Tribal Wrap (W14)
TAP 044 Face Painting Stencil – Skull with Crossbones
Bad Ass Mini 1206 – Face Painting Stencil – Dots
Diva Stencils | Face Painting Stencil | Forehead Henna Bits (00648)
Half Ass Face Painting Stencil Set – Organic #0
See more suggestions in our Ultimate Face Painting Stencils Buying Guide.
Glitter
Amerikan Body Art | Loose Chunky Glitter – Cosmic Collision (1oz)
Liquid Bling Face Painting Glitter Gel – Brilliant Gold 1/2oz #1
Liquid Bling Face Painting Glitter Gel – Chrome Silver 1/2oz #2
Tip: We compiled two detailed blog posts about glitter and gems for face painting and body art! Check out our Glitter Blog: types of glitter and adhesives and Festival Glitter Shopping guide articles!
Chunky glitter creme
Amerikan Body Art | CHUNKY Glitter Cremes – BIOSPHERE – 10 gr
Amerikan Body Art | CHUNKY Glitter Cremes – VENUS – 10 gr
Amerikan Body Art | CHUNKY Glitter Cremes – ASTEROID – 10 gr
Amerikan Body Art | CHUNKY Glitter Cremes – PISCES – 10 gr
Want to become a professional face painter? 😎🏆
Then you certainly need to check out our Ultimate Guide for Professional Face Painter where we’ve covered all essential topics.
From safety, techniques, designs, insurance, business license, and even self-promotion.
Water tub
Loew Cornell Face Painting Brush Washer | BRUSH TUB II
Spray bottle
Spray Bottle – Water Bottle with Light Misting Spray Cap 2oz (0028-14)
Additions
TAG Display Face Painting Brush Wallet
Art Factory | Lush Brush Liquid Soap – 5oz
Now you know exactly what you need to either use face painting for a fun experience with your friends or to prepare your entire professional face painting kit for becoming one of the best artists in the industry.
Childrens Face Paint Kit
Does your child love face painting alongside you? Or maybe they’re the beginner face painter in the family and not you?
There are many cheap children’s face paint kits advertised online. However, we recommend investing in a small but quality set to set your child up for success and reduce the likelihood of bad reactions to poor-quality face paint.
We love this Fusion kit with everything your child needs to get started creating some fantastic face paints.
The individual colors range is good, a larger sized black and white, some glitter, 5 great one-strokes to experiment with and some sticky stencils.
These stencils are great for kids as they stick to the skin making application much easier (no stencil sliding around when they try to add the paint). Note though that they should be single child use and not shared amongst children as the sticky side cannot be cleaned.
Buy it here: Fusion Body Art | Perfect Face Painting Kit
In addition to this set, if the budget allows we would add a 1-inch flat brush and some finger daubers or firm, high density sponges for the stencils. The cosmetic wedges supplies don’t wash well and are more likely to harbor germs and mold as they won’t dry through.
One flat 1-inch brush for painting one stroke rainbows and more: Art Factory Studio Face Painting Brush – 1″ FLAT
Kryvaline – Small “Never Stain”* FIRM Black Face Painting Sponge – 1 Half
Finger Dauber Face Painting Sponge – 10 units
Face Painting Kit For Adults
Have you been asked to paint at your kid’s school, local church community event or want to give it a go at your kid’s birthday party? Not sure what you’ll need to get started? Don’t worry we’ve got you covered with everything you need to know.
First, we know it’s tempting to buy cheap kits from online megastores but we only ever recommend buying and using professional, approved, and tested face paints.
Read our face paints blog for all of the information on why: “Top-Quality Face Paints for Every Skill Level“.
To get started, we recommend purchasing our custom-built beginner’s kit from Jest Paint.
It has a good selection of single colors for creating a large range of popular designs, a great rainbow one stroke for adding to many designs, extra black and white, some quality brushes in various sizes, some sponges, glitter, and a star stencil.
Buy: International Face Painting School | Custom Build Bundle – Basic Face Painting Kit
With this kit you can create some fantastic designs. Not sure what to paint with your new paints?
Then head to our Face Painting Ideas page for the most popular designs.
If you have a little extra to invest in your kit, we would also recommend the following products:
- Fusion Body Art Face Paint – Rainbow Cake | Bright Rainbow – use this big rainbow cake with a sponge to apply a base for colorful tigers, butterflies, and princess crowns.
- Fairy & Mermaid stencils: these are two very popular designs and your life can be made a lot easier with a good stencil outline of a fairy and a mermaid to quickly elevate a design.
- Animal Print stencil: a good animal print stencil can be used on a range of designs to add instant texture, think dragons, dinosaurs, and monsters.
Face Painting Kit For Parties
Depending on the type of party you’re booked for, you might want to adjust your kit by scaling it up or down.
Here are our top tips for having your kit party ready:
- Ensure you have a good indication of the number of guests and have enough sponges for one per face.
- Organize your stencils so you can easily find them between kids.
- Bring a collapsible bucket to empty your dirty paint water into and empty at the end of the party.
- Bring stickers you can number and hand out to kids so they aren’t spending the whole birthday party sitting (or not!) waiting for their turn to be painted.
Halloween Face Paint Kit
For your classic Halloween looks you’ll need everything from the Beginner’s Kit plus a few extras to help make your designs howl.
Spooky one strokes
Here are our top color combos for spooktacular Halloween designs:
- Black/Grey/White: great for skulls, wolves, and ghosts.
Buy: Mehron Shadow
- Dark to light greens: perfect for monsters, zombies and witches.
Buy: Silly Farm | EZ Strokes by Susy Amaro – Turtle Green
- Orange hues: perfect for super quick and defined pumpkins.
Buy: Superstar Face Paint | Dream Colours Rainbow Cake – SAFARI
- Purple hues: can be used for witches hats, cats and bats.
Buy: Silly Farm | EZ Strokes by Susy Amaro – Purple Lavender
Fake blood
Fake blood can be handy for spraying effects on clothing to give a good amount of splatter.
However, for facial fake blood you can use a good deep red face paint like Paradise Red.
Watery paint consistency works great for creating squirted and dripping blood. A drier consistency can be used for smudged dry blood and scrapes.
Premade prosthetics or Halloween bling
There are some great premade prosthetics that you can add to designs such as elf ears, monster horns or deep cuts and wounds that can be attached with cosmetic glue.
If that feels a little daunting considering adding some fun spooky gem clusters to your designs or make your own silk clay monster horns that can be attached with medical tape.
Halloween Stencils
Make your Halloween events spectacularly spooky with this fabulous set of Halloween Stencils by TAP Stencils:
Buy: TAP Stencil Bundle | HALLOWEEN BUNDLE
You can buy all of your Halloween supplies from the Jest Paint Halloween Makeup Store.
For all of the design inspiration you need, head to our Halloween Face Paint Ideas and Tips blog.
Joker Face Paint Kit
Are you picking up the paints for the first time this Halloween? Does hubby want to go as Joker and you’ve been nominated as face painter because you know “makeup and stuff”.
With the popularity of the Dark Knight and Heath Ledger’s iconic performance as the Joker, we’ve put together the need to have items to recreate this look.
Need to know how to recreate the iconic Dark Knight Joker face paint? Follow our online tutorial.
Dark Knight Face Paint Kit:
- Rigid Collodium – scar maker:
- Cameleon Pure White
- Cameleon Strong Black
- Jest Paint – Hydra Face Painting Sponge
- Cameleon Blood Red
- Cameleon Neon Green
- Fake Blood
- Round brush #2
Two other iconic Joker looks are Jack Nicholson as the Old Joker back in 1989 and Joaquin Phoenix as the new 2019 Joker.
Read our Joker Face Paint for Beginners blog for detailed guides on how to create these looks along with links to the supplies you’ll need.
Skeleton Face Paint Kit
Skeleton face paints are popular all year round but extremely popular for Halloween. If you want to create this spooky design you’ll need some key basics:
- Glycerin-based white for a nice smooth base. Try Mehron White
- For a softer black detailing try a metallic black such as Superstar “Graphite Shimmer”
- A wax-based white for teeth and highlights. Try Tag White
- A wax-based black for line work and detailing. Try Tag Black
- A pack of Half-circle yellow sponges
- A small Filbert brush for the eye socket, nose and cheek hollows such as Little Drop Paint Pal brush by Silly Farm
- Number 4 Round Brush for linework – Paint Pal Swirl #4
- Number 2 Round Brush for linework and detailing – Art Factory #2 Round Brush
- A blending brush to create a more realistic design we love the #1 Cameleon blending brush
There are some optional extras you can use to create some more depth and highlights such as metallic blue over the eye socket, browns to add extra depth to the skeletal structure and a yellow or green for the teeth. A stencil can also add extra texture to your design.
However, the above is the base kit to get a fantastic looking skull design.
Need a tutorial and design inspo? Check out this amazing skull design by Face Painting Instructor, Elodie Ternois.
Skull Face Paint Kit
Another great option is the Skull Mask face paint using one-strokes for the key outline of the skull base. This allows for a quick base to be laid down and then you can focus your time on the extra spooky detailing like these fantastic blood-splattered staples.
Find out how to recreate the above look in our blog: Skull Mask Face Paint for Beginners
Materials you’ll need to recreate this skull mask are listed below:
- Black, grey and white one-stroke cake for the base – Swan from Cameleon
- Wax based white for teeth and highlights – Superstar White
- Wax based black for nose and detailing – Diamond FX black
- A 3/4 inch flat brush or angled brush to apply the one-stroke – ¾ flat brush — Nat’s gold edition
- A flora brush is perfect for creating flawless teeth – Flora bruh #6 by KingArt
- A round #3 for line work and detailing we like the Round brush #3 from Paint Pal luxe swirl brush set (same as yellow handle #3 from the discontinued Loew Cornell 795 series which is now available as KingArt round #3)
- Half round sponge
Optional for extra detailing:
- Wax based red for blood drops Superstar Fire Red
- Shimmery blue for adding extra definition to the skull base Superstar Shimmer Baby Blue
- Finger dauber
- Graffiti eyes stencil – BAMS 1206 “Dots”
Animal Face Paint Kit
One of the best things about being a face painter is the imagination of our little customers and the creations they request. Some of the most creative and most popular designs usually stem from the animal category.
Some of the most popular and common requests are tigers, dinosaurs, unicorns, butterflies, cats and dogs, dragons and snakes.
With such a huge variety of animals requested a large professional kit is usually needed.
Some items you will want to make sure you have a variety of:
- Split-cakes for bases:
- Rainbows – for butterflies, tigers, to cover eyes for unicorns
- Blues – artic foxes, butterflies, snow leopards
- Oranges & Yellows – tigers, foxes, lions, leopards, cheetahs
- One-strokes for more detailed designs:
- Rainbows – unicorn manes, butterflies
- Greens – snakes, dinosaurs, dragons
- Browns & Creams – dogs, bears
- Stencils:
- Scales – one for dinosaurs, dragons and snakes
- Stars – to complement butterflies and unicorns
- Unicorn horn or silhouette – for an easy and quick unicorn design
- Brushes & sponges:
- 1 inch flat brush – so versatile for unicorns, snakes, butterflies, dragons
- 1/2 inch or 5/8 inch angle brush – for butterfly wings, unicorn horns
- Round #4 & #6 – great for tiger stripes, double dip flowers for added details
- Finger daubers – for stencils
- Half round sponges – for blending bases, applying rainbow backgrounds
Head to our Animal-Themed Face Paint Designs blog for every animal design you could think of plus many many more!
What’s next?
Make these buddies do the best job for you!
Take a class at the International Face Painting School and achieve impressive results in no time!
