Thread: Best way to cover scab/burn for performance? (or other blemishes)

Hello my ladies!

I was hoping that some of you could help me cover a large-ish black burn that I have on my shin for a performance tomorrow.

In ballet we always would just slather the thing in concealer or make-up, or just use the sticky sides of a band-aid (cutting out the middle part that makes it look like a band-aid just helps to hide exactly what it is, but sometimes you end up with a painful removal of said camouflaged band-aid if it sticks to the wound to much). Plus most of the performances we would then wear tights of course...oddly enough one of my hardest things to get used to in Middle Eastern dance has been dancing with bare legs all the time, as then I feel my skin has to be perfectly flawless, where as tights can cover many an imperfection, even cover unshaven legs well at times.

What are your tried and true secrets of the trade to cover scabs or burns?
Thanks!!

I used to be like you when I first started! (I'm also out of long term classical training) I have gotten a lot more relaxed about things but I do have some tips. The easiest thing to do is use your costume to your benefit. If you are wearing a bra belt set then you can layer a pair of harem/genie pants under the skirt and your legs will be completely hidden, especially with darker colors.

If you really want to wear a leg exposing look I dunno. With bruises, which I almost always have on my knees due to my affinity to turkish drops, I find that using either airbrush leg or self tanner on my leg and leaving out the bruises or covering the bruises only once with it and twice the rest of my leg works wonders. For a burn or scab though this might end up infecting it or making it worse. I have used copious amounts glitter to disguise scabbed up scratch marks all over my chest once (I wanted my cat in her carrier, she resisted) and it worked really well but depending on how big the scab is it might not work. Anyways good luck!

Here are some of the ideas I share with my students when they ask about this sort of thing:

1. Wear concealing makeup over the wound
2. Wear tights that are the same color as your skin
3. Wear a skirt or costume pants that cover that part of your leg
4. (If it's a permanent scar that has already healed) Get an artistic tattoo that covers it

I hope this helps! And I hope your injury heals soon!

You can also make a quick garter out of that stretch sequin stuff... put a bandaid on your burn/scab and then put the tight stretch sequin garter over it. It might feel weird at first, but it might look a little flirty too. At least it's a glam way of covering up a spot if you are wearing a leggy costume. Otherwise, I'd do harem pants under a skirt and bedlah.

The first thing I would do is spray it with a liquid bandage to protect it, then try a concealer like Dermablend.

Could you possibly wear tights? Something more heavy-weight like dance or skating tights, if you could find a shade that would match your skin tone enough to not be really obvious? In shoes, footed would be fine; if barefoot, you could wear footless or stirrup tights. Then through the tights it might not show up quite so much.

Like others have said, I'd be wary of putting makeup over it unless it's healed, but I like the liquid bandage idea with makeup over that (if you think it wouldn't be too painful to remove later--I don't know how easy that stuff is to remove).

The liquid bandage would probably stay on through the make-up removal after the show.

I second dermablend. when i fell and skinned my knee last year. I bought amazing cosmteics cover up. I put liquid bandage first then the cover up. And i just reversed my skirt so slit was on the other side

I am certainly not a newbie to ME dance, or performing as a whole, having logged in many, many hours on stage in the past 20 years, even clear to the National level with synchronized swimming...haha, well technically that would be in the pool, and a while ago beginning in aerial arts (trapeze, silks, lyra, etc...all Cirque du Soleil like) there are just certain tricks to the trade within each one surprisingly.

Due to time constraints, I wasn't able to buy anything I didn't already have on hand. While costuming certainly did not allow for me to wear anything under the nice and hip hugging Pharaonics skirt such as harem pants, and being a terrible stickler for the continuity of lines I have yet to find any tights that match my skin tone close enough (PALE Scottish red head here), or end at the right spot on the foot/leg to not cause a visual disturbance due to my issues with perfection when at all possible. But I hope this thread will be of value to other newbies who maybe haven't had as much performing experience as some of us.

I just stuck with my tried and true remedy of concealer and makeup. Normally I would just cake it on to blend it in, and the remove the scab along with the make-up afterwards, I had never thought to use liquid bandage beforehand...us ballet dancers always have that stuff on hand for our terrible feet, but I've never heard of it being used it to protect our other sores when covered in makeup. Sadly since I retired from the professional ballet scene over 6 years ago, my bottle was all dried up....and I had thought of buying it the other week when I was picking up more first aid supplies for my skin rips from aerial training, so I certainly wished I had listened to my intuition that I would want it quickly some day!

Last night I just removed the old blackened gross scab hoping a lighter color one would grow in if I controlled the healing environment, which it did. Now I've just got a much more sore spot on my shin from the make-up as usual, so I'll probably just scrub it clean, instead of removing the scab again like I've always done in my past, since I just did so last night. Even though I have much experience in many different dance-like performing arts on land, water, and in the air through out the years, I still have never relaxed much from being such a sticker for perfect lines and being really fastidious about how I look.

Hope you all are having a great beginning to your February, and thanks for taking the time to give your input. Hopefully others can use this thread for when they need help with something similar, or when they aren't happy just settling for a band-aid.