Review: MAC Face and Body Foundation, Mineralize Concealer

A bottle of liquid Photoshop.

Recently I went on a bit of a makeup binge. Binge being a relative term - I don't like spending money on makeup. To give you some idea, my most expensive makeup purchase before this was probably ten whole pounds. I cried myself to sleep for a week.

So this was the first time I'd gone to a proper makeup store (MAC) instead of just Boots. There were two assistants on duty at the time, both wearing impeccable faces of makeup. One of them was ruining the effect slightly by giving me the most almighty stink eye, but luckily the other was really helpful and nice. She matched me to an N2 in foundation, and then promptly covered my face in it!

I loved it. Light and comfortable on the skin and blended perfectly. No SPF. Skinlike finish. The pricing scheme was a little less lovable - there are only two sizes of bottle, 50ml and 120ml, priced £21.50 and £27 respectively. Ouch. I would have preferred to have gone with 50ml until I was sure it was right for me, but at those prices, I chose the big bottle.

I was also looking for a concealer. I previously used MAC Select Moisturecover and was going to ask for that one again, but the assistant suggested MAC Mineralize. Another colour match to NW20, more makeup on the face - but this too looked really good, covering my dark circles well without being cakey. I couldn't see prices anywhere, and it's probably a good thing I couldn't, because the tiny 5ml tube cost £16.50. Eep.

And so I handed over £43.50 that day. *sob* At least while I was starving on the streets I'd have smooth skin, right?

I needed this stuff for a 'natural' look in a headshot photo. So this is the foundation with blush, concealer, mascara and eyeliner:

Photo credit to Matt

Looks pretty smooth! Beyond that, I'm happy to say that the stuff is long-wearing and hasn't broken me out or made me oily. Definitely my favourite foundation and concealer so far.

Review: Dolly Wink 02 'Sweet Girly' and 14 'Natural Cute' False Lashes

On the Grand List of Women who should be Disallowed from having a Makeup Blog, I'm pretty far up there. To put it politely, I am clumsy as fuck. :D

Behind the scenes last Friday night.

My number one problem is with the eyelashes. Put a tube of mascara in my hand and suddenly I'm like a toddler making a macaroni picture. Upper eyelid, below the eye, cheekbone, eyebrow... What can I say, I am just that amazing.

So false lashes sounded great! Instant romantic, long fluttery eyelashes. It would also fix one of my pet hates with mascara - the clumpiness. I do my best with the eyelash comb (usually getting mascara everywhere again) to avoid the fate of many women who walk around with what looks like six thick eyelashes in total. But still, it's all such a pain! Falsies would be better. Right? Right?

So for my first set of lashes, I bought two Koji Dolly Wink sets, No. 2 Sweet Girly for the upper lashes and  No. 14 Natural Cute for the lower set (available from PinkyParadise... see all the Dolly Wink eyelashes, they're all nice!) The packaging features a Japanese idol wearing various wigs and lashes who is officially Cuter And More Gyaru Than You. You get two pairs in each pack, which for me, was a pretty good thing.

Well, if I thought that this was going to be easier than mascara, I was horribly, horribly wrong.

How to apply false lashes

• Squeeze blob of glue onto back of hand.
• Draw lashes through glue to coat the lash band. And often the lashes themselves.
• Dry out the glue a little. Blow on it, or alternatively snap forearm from side to side in a sassy fashion.
• Hold lashes up to eyelid and attempt to press lashes into place above the lashline. One of the following will happen.
• You somehow manage to glue your eyelids together.
• You attach the false lashes to your real lashes, where they flop about uselessly.
• Everything falls off the second after you press it in place.
• When this happens, you must run a cotton bud through makeup remover, run it over the falsies (assuming they haven't fallen off already) and peel them off. 
• Clean all that glue off your real lashes, you klutz.
• Pull all the tiny sticky strings of glue off the lashes without mangling the lashes themselves or screaming in frustration.
• Repeat until victory! (To varying degrees.) 

I don't know whether I'm just clumsy or this process is always a pain in the ass, but over the course of an hour I poked myself in the eye countless times and got glue in my real lashes, on my eyelids, and even somehow in my hair.

And this wasn't even my first go. I'll just leave this here.

A moment of silence for their fallen, sticky comrades.

Those aren't dead spiders, it's what happened with a lack of patience, over-zealousness with the eyeliner and a lack of makeup remover while cosplaying at the London Expo. That's £10 worth of crusty eyeliner, lashes and glue right there.

Still... at some point, I made it!

Looking fairly solemn.

Still showing behind glasses!

I like these lashes! The top set, 'Sweet Girly' are long enough to open up the eye without being so crazy dense that each blink causes a breeze, and the bottom set... well, not quite so dramatic (because really long lower lashes are quite creepy!) but they give a nice effect too.

I think until I get better, I might buy some cheap lashes to practice with during downtime (I prefer my £5 to buy me several sets of cheap practice lashes instead of one pair which was once beautiful but is now mangled and lumpy.) Mascara in the meantime. But I look forward to trying out more of these!

Review: Garnier B.B. Creams - a miracle?

Looks like the typical tall and skinny,
short and squat pair...

Well, not only have I pretty much missed the boat on this one, it's had the chance to do a trip of the world before I so much as got to the pier. But I have tried out BB cream!

BB cream stands for 'blemish balm', originating from Asia. There, it is touted as an idol's secret, a superb miracle of skincare, skin-smoothening, soothing and sun protecting all in one! Sssss. Well, that's Asia, and whether these claims are true or not, Western ones are said to be a rather different beast, with fewer features but more of a 'baby foundation', maybe. No-makeup makeup.

I've not tried foundation before as my skin is fairly well behaved. I usually have maybe one or two spots and they are more likely to be little pimples (or ex-pimples...) than 'I AM CYST, DESTROYER OF WORLDS' type pustules. But England has been going through a cold snap (thanks, Siberia) and my usually oily skin has gone combination, drying out in random areas. Not much I could do about flaky eyebrows short of massaging half a bottle of Head and Shoulders into it, but I figured maybe I could give BB cream a go to cover up dryness on my cheekbones.

In a giveaway, I got a free bottle of Garnier BB Miracle Skin Perfector cream in 'light' and 'age-defying'. Age defying isn't what I really go for, but if it's free... Still, can I sue Garnier if I don't look 12 afterwards?

The colour was good (though surprising - I am not 'light' by most standards) but I wasn't terribly happy with the look - it was shiny! So shiny. But I dusted some translucent powder over it (incidentally, half the bathroom too) and soon both me and the sink had a lovely matte complexion. That is, until the next day, when I broke out. :/ And that never happens!

But it seemed like a pity. I bought a bottle in 'light' and 'oil-free' instead. The oil-free version was a lot more runny (more a liquid than a cream) and less pink. Also smelled more strongly of alcohol. However, it seemed that light actually was now light. Too light for me! :c I wanted the colour of the old one but the properties of the new... so I put blobs of both on my face! Science.

HELP, HELP, SKIN DISEASE

Aaaaand we're done! Just kidding. The next step is to blend it all in. I tie my hair back to do makeup, so... forehead warning.

FOREHEAD

The mix is pretty good! It helped conceal the remnants of spots past on my forehead. I'm not too fond of the SPF 25, because that would cause a cast in photos, but I'm sure for people who want to just wear it every day instead of foundation it would be useful. Using mostly the oil-free version prevented me from breaking out too, so I'd definitely recommend that for oily skin type.

All done!

So that's that. Pretty good for everyday wear, but I need something a bit better for cosplaying. I have a MAC concealer and really like it, so perhaps I will take a trip down to the store and get colour matched for some proper foundation sometime.

War paint, for sailing the seven seas

'Why didn't I just go dressed as Luffy
from One Piece?'

So, I recently had to dress up for Imperial/UCL Japan Society boat party! And it was a ton of work, at least for me, so I figured I'd write about my amazing journey into the feminine world of cosmetic treachery, deception and illusions.

Hair
I attempted to curl it using some stronger products this time, but once again my incredible genetics won out. 'Firm hold', my flat, Asian ass. Gave up on that, secured the rest with a hairband and clip, and then twisted some fabric flowers into it. I borrowed the idea from Star Wars Ep. III's funeral scene.

Eyeshadow
I usually don't use this, but I thought I'd give coloured eyeshadow a go. I was wearing a green dress with silver accents, so I went for silver eyeshadow with a little smudge of greenish teal towards the outside.

For this, I used various 17 Eyes eyeshadows (17 eyes D:). I feel somewhat wary about buying that brand because 17 is a long way behind me now, but as yet no Boots cashiers have laughed in my face and snootily enquired if it wasn't a little 'young' for madam...

Eyeliner
I tried several brands of pencil eyeliner in the past. I don't know whether it's that I have eyelids oilier than ten thousand McDonalds meals or what, but they all kind of dusted off slightly over time, resulting in my overeye line ending up also below the eye. Panda eyes!

I wish I looked this cuddly when my eyeliner shifts.

So for once, I 'splashed out' (hah) £8 on some Bobbi Brown Long-Wear Gel Eyeliner in Espresso Ink, which is just a more delicious sounding way of saying 'brown coloured'. I suppose a makeup range with colour names like 'turd' or 'asphalt' may not sell so well. Anyway, I like this stuff. It actually stays put!

Mascara
I am not fond of mascara. I just cannot get it right. Inevitably some of it smudges onto an eyelid, then I poke myself in the eye with the wand, and a great clod of it falls off into my eye and forms a waterproof blob of fail orbiting my pupil. And so I'm left crying and clutching my bloodshot, streaky eye, lamenting everything wrong with the world.

Because I hate it and usually skip it, I'm still on the first tube I got. It's called Maybelline 'The Falsies' Volum'Express Waterproof 2: Electric Boogaloo. Seriously, it's like no-one can just call their product 'mascara' and be done with it.

Meanwhile, at the Maybelline factory.

And with that, my eyes were done.

Of course, none of this would show up on photo, that would
just be too easy.

Concealer
I've currently got a red scrape, bang in the middle of my nose. It's a remnant from my acrobatic double life as software engineer by day, cat burglar by night, and a laser beam that got too close. No, it's not because I scratched an itch too hard, why would you even say that? Get out of here. At the same time, I've been rather sickly this week, so I probably have the eye-bag equivalent of two rubbish sacks right now.

I use a blend of Revlon PhotoReady in Light Medium, a stick concealer, and the liquid MAC Select Cover-Up in NC30. Revlon's pretty good at covering, but it has little sparkly bits, which are harvested from the shed skin flakes of real vampires (maybe) and can cause an effect called 'cast'. These sparkles reflect light, which is fine and dandy until a camera flash, when all the areas you were trying to hide are suddenly blindingly white.

So I conceal the concealer (!) with a thin layer of the MAC liquid concealer. I find the MAC stuff a little too thin on its own, but it has a much less cakey finish, reduces the levels of Cullen detritus on my skin and colour matches my blindingly yellow skin nicely.

And so I evolved from 'me' to 'me with a bunch of paint on my face'. Fuck yeah.

Oh my god, I painted my nails silver too,
with all the finesse of a mentally-challenged
three-year-old.