Yes, you read that right—colored primers. No offense to transparent bases, but the way of the cosmetic future points to a time when we will be parading pastels on our faces.

 

If elementary art classes taught me anything, it’s that complementary colors on the color wheel cancel out each other.

 

Nah, just kidding, I thank Google for this amazing insight I’m now sharing with you.

 

Beauty experts are my new art teachers, and brands have picked up on the science —and craft—of it all.

 

Smashbox, for example, has applied a few color-correcting hues (i.e. peach, yellow, green, and violet) to its Photo Finish Foundation Primer line.

 

What they do is blur out your imperfections (facially, at least) based on specific color interactions.

 

Your rosacea is acting up? Get the green. Purple veins are making a comeback? Snatch the yellow. It’s 2016, there’s almost always an answer to everything.

 

Now navigate the beauty store with me. Japanese brand Koh Gen Do has a limited line of only up to three colors.

 

But its botanical ingredients and creamy formula that’s said to specifically address the demands of the HD camera make up for its lack of diversity.

 

In other words: Perfect selfies, here we come.

 

The Clinique Superprimer Colour Corrector is your type of rainbow. Each shade caters to a certain blemish you wish to be gone. Silicone-based, these little guys apply easily on skin like lotions for your face.

 

MAC steps up its game with the Prep+Prime Fortified Skin Enhancer line. Each tube does multiple duties as color corrector, moisturizer, face primer and UV protector.

 

Make Up For Ever, meanwhile, has a generous range of different-colored Radiant Primer Glow Bases that not only evens out color, but is also formulated to fit your skin type.

 

Lesson for the day: If you really want to succeed in having a beauty look, start by getting your base right.

 

These are the basics to master:

 

1) Green cancels out red areas. Good to use on pimples, rosacea, broken blood vessels—in fact, any part of the skin that is experiencing some sort of redness.

 

2) Pink or Brick cancels out purples normally found in the under-eye.

 

3) Yellow works on olive to dark skin to cancel out purple-blue under-eye circles and dark skin discoloration.