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Monday, May 28, 2012

Madd Style Cosmetics: Sunset-ey

Hi All!!  I know it's been a bit of time since my last Madd Style Cosmetics tutorial, but I hope you won't all hold that against me!  I also returned to my roots a bit and decided to do a phototutorial, instead of my more recent choices of a filmed tutorial.   My plan is to offer a 50/50 ratio of filmed to photographed--how does that sound?  :)

I decided that I really wanted to do a yellow, orange and purple look and the result of my colour combo idea turned out pretty neat (I think!).  When I originally did this look (as a practice run), I used a different yellow (I used Madd Style Cosmetics "Pop Tarte"), but when I came home from work to photograph this tutorial...I had Madd Mail!!  Hooray!  My Madd Mail consisted of the two new Wonderland collections and I knew that I had to use "Unbirthday Star" (which is part of the Psychedelic Wonderland collection) in place of Pop Tarte.  I am happy with how that switch-a-roo turned out, too.  

If you'd like to find out how I achieved this look, then please keep on reading!

 

To begin, as always, gather all of your supplies!

(Barry M Electric Purple Lengthening Mascara; NYX Eyeshadow Base in "White", MTCoffinz "Under the Rainbow" Eye Primer; Madd Style Cosmetics colours (left to right, top to bottom): Unbirthday Star, Honey Badger, Ichabod, Heart Breaker, Sugar Plum, XRay Spex and Birfday Suit; Matte Black Shadow (I'm using Bulletproof by Sugarpill); Brushes: Flat Shader brush (F70 "Concealer" by Sigma), Pointed Crease Brush (Obsessive Compulsive Cosmetics), Fine Pencil Brush; Large Pencil Brush (Sephora Professional), Large Shader Brush (788 by Bdellium Tools) and an Angled Liner brush (Sephora).  I forgot to photograph a white liner pencil, I use the white one by Korres!)

Start with a squeaky clean eyelid!


Take your chosen primer.  Currently I am relying on my MTCoffinz primer as Too Face Shadow Insurance has been proven to NOT be vegan.  I need to test out my primer from Naked Cosmetics--hopefully I'll remember do that for the next tutorial!  The reason I do like the MTCoffinz primer, especially if I'm not necessarily planning to wear the look to work/for a whole 9 or 10 hours, is that it's quite creamy and sticky. You could get away with wearing just this product as a primer and base, if you were stretched for time.



I swirl my ring finger in the product and dab my finger on the whole eye lid.  I blend this up toward the brow bone and also take it a bit along the lower lash line.  You want to be sure to get an even thin layer.  The primer will help to prevent your eyeshadow from creasing, which is always good!



Next, to ensure that the colours really *pop*, I apply a white base to the entire eyelid.  Using my ring finger, again, I start out in the center of the lid and blend this out to the whole lid and up into the crease. 


As it's been a while since I've done a phototutorial--I forgot a very important pre-step!  Close up pictures mean the brows gotta look especially good!  Ha ha.  Tweeze appropriately.  ;)


As a last step to prep your eye area before starting with colour, line the lower lash line with a white pencil.  I make this line thicker at the outer eye and taper it as I move toward the tear duct.  Also, be sure to line your inner V/duct area with this pencil so that your inner highlight will really stand out.



Now for some colour!  Take a flat shader brush and pack MSC's Unbirthday Star (a super awesome bright shimmery yellow) into the bristles.  I press the colour into the bristles by using the inside of the jar's lid--this will help to prevent fall-out, as well.  Apply this colour in a half-circle shape right in the center of the lid.  


Next, take MSC's Honey Badger (a great true gold colour--and this look was the first time I used the colour!  It's such a pretty colour, too.  Expect to see it a lot more in the future!) on the same brush (just flip the brush over), and apply it on either side of Unbirthday Star.  


You will also want to take the colour up aroundthe top edge of Unbirthday Star.  Just apply the colour to the tip of your brush to help give you some control with this step.  Lightly blend the Honey Badger in with the Unbirthday Star by "patting" between the colours with your brush.  Since we're working with a yellow and a gold/orange, these colours blend together very easily.


Lastly, for a bit of a truer orange pop on the lid, take MSC's Ichabod on that very same brush and apply it to the rest of the outer and inner lid (where you haven't applied any colour yet).  Blend this in with Honey Badger just as you did in the previous step--patting from Ichabod into Honey Badger very lightly.


Take Icabod up above the center--as you did with the Honey Badger.  With all of this blending, if you feel you lost some of the intensity of Unbirthday Star or Honey Badger, just re-apply another layer of those colours--using that same brush.


At this point, you should have something like this:


Now you're going to take a pointed crease brush and dip it into MSC's Heart Breaker.  To get away with using purple and orange together, especially in a look where you want the result to be kind of blended, choose pink toned purples!  It's a tricky trick!  Apply Heart Breaker to the first half of the crease.  You don't want to "over-sweep" this colour on, or you'll loose some of the glitter.  But you also want this colour to be quite soft--so sweep just a little!


Using the same pointed crease brush, dip it into MSC's Sugar Plum (a plum purple with pink undertones).  Start by dabbing this colour to the outer corner of your lid.


Then gently blend this colour up from the outer corner into the outer half of the crease.  You can blend this in with the orange a little--but you can see I've essentially created a soft cut-crease effect.


Taking a small pencil brush, dip it into Sugar Plum.  Apply this to the lower lash line.  Concentrating most of the colour to the outer part of the lower lash line (be sure to connect it up to where the colour is on the upper lid) and then tapering it in toward the inner lower lash line (as you did with the white liner that you used as a base).



Switching to a bigger pencil brush, take MSC's XRay Spex (a pretty neutral with a shimmery pink duochrome) and apply this to the inner V/duct area.  Blend it in with the Sugar Plum on the lower lash line, and up above into the inner crease into the Heart Breaker.  This will help to open the eye up.



At this point, your eye should look something like the below picture.  To help soften the edges of the crease colours, you will want to be sure to apply your brow highlight shade!


Take MSC Birfday Suit (a matte light toned nude brown), or whichever highlight shade you prefer, on a fluffy shader brush.  You could go with a shimmery highlight, for example.  You could even dust some of that same XRay Spex under the brow!  That would be pretty, too.  I do tend to prefer to keep my brow highlight matte though--keeps the attention on the lid, I find.  Start by applying the highlight to the highest arch of your brow.


Next, blend the Birfday Suit to under the inner part of your brow and under the outer part of your brow.  As you're doing this, be sure to blend down toward the Sugar Plum to help soften that harsh edge.  I also like to take Birtday Suit down below the outer corner of my eyelid to help create the shape of that crease colour.  As my eyes are down-turned, I like to keep things pointing "up" toward the end of my eyebrow.  



It's amazing the difference a nude matte shade as a highlight can make, huh?  



To keep this look nice and soft, I decided to go with a thin line of matte black shadow for a liner.  Make this line thicker at the outer corner of the lashes--this will help to make your lashes look fuller.  


Take a white eyeliner pencil and line your lower waterline.  This will help to make your eyes appear a bit bigger.  A good trick to lengthening the life of your waterline colour is to then "set" it by pressing a matte shadow over the top. 


I wanted to do something a bit more "fun" for a mascara--so I went with purple!  This was my first time using it and it didn't turn out quite as good (or as "electric purple") as I was hoping, but you gotta try things out before you know how they'll end up.

 
 Here is the final look:




I hope you all enjoyed this tutorial!  I also hope it will inspire you to do some yellow, orange and purple looks of your own.  And if it does, I would love love love it if you linked me to some pictures of your looks in my comments section!!  :)

As always--if there is a particular MSC colour you'd like to see me use in my next tutorial or if you have any other suggestions of types of looks you'd like to see or tips you'd like me to share, let me know in the comments section.

Wednesday, May 16, 2012

U.K. Makeup Haul: Sleek and Barry M

Hi All!

I'm super excited because this little 'ol blog reached 200 followers since my last post!  WOOT!  Welcome to my new followers!! I hope you find something in here that tickles your fancy.  :)

Recently a friend of mine was on her annual trip to England and she offered to pick me up some stuff while she was over there and I could not resist getting...a "few" things!  I got the package in the mail yesterday and it was too dark to take good pictures, so I basically rushed home today from work in order to get my swatch-fest on.

Here is what I received:


A fun looking collection of stuff, am I right??

It sure was fun swatching it all!
(Without a flash on the top, with a flash on the bottom.)

To find out more about each product--keep on reading!

First up: Sleek Pout Polishes!  The lids both look like this:

It's great that they have a little SPF in them--especially because the sun is actually *shining* in Vancouver again!  The two colors I chose were Scandal and Electro Peach.  The bottoms of the jars list the name of the colour and the ingredients.


The colours themselves are pretty darn gorgeous.  My camera didn't do such a good job of showing how "red" red Scandal is and nor did it really pick up how coral Electro Peach is.  


The texture of these is pretty neat--and the scent of the product reminds me a bit of play-dough...in a good way?  These are described as "tinted lip conditioners" and although I have only swatched them on my arm so far, I can tell that they would feel really nice on the lips!  The colour pay off, as you can see, is sheer--but not *too*sheer.  I am quite liking these!!

 (Scandal on the left, Electro Peach on the right.)


Then on to the blush!  My lovely friend who picked these up for me picked out the two colours that she sent me.  I'm relatively new to blush, but I knew that Courtney wouldn't lead my astray!  She picked me up the two newest Barry M Blusher shades for summer: Peaches & Cream and Strawberry Whip.   The packaging is pretty typical and I am planning to just toss this little brush that came with it (I have so many other awesome brushes to use, after all!).


This is Peaches and Cream close up.  It's a lovely peachy coral color.  The texture of these blushes is quite amazing--they're very very silky and have some kind of lotion-type feel to them that enhances the silky texture.


The second blush, Strawberry Whip, sadly arrived to me all broken.  It's all good though!  I'll salvage it by putting it into some other kind of container and treating it is a loose blush.  For now it will stay closed though--I keep ending up with pink powder on my table whenever I move it!


And here they are swatched.  Strawberry Whip has a nice golden glitter to it that is pretty subtle.  Both of these I applied pretty heavily to my arm so that the swatch would show up, but when applied to the cheeks they would be much more sheer.  I am really really liking the look of Peaches and Cream on my skin tone (or at least the skin tone of my arm!).




Next up,  Barry M Lip Lacquers!  I chose Cherry Red (pictured on top) and Party Pink.  These are like a lipstick crayon, I suppose.  I think there are lots of products like these out on the market, but these are the first lip crayons I've ever had.  And boy oh boy are they ever AWESOME!


(Party Pink on the left, Cherry Red on the right.) 

These glide on to the skin super easily and the colour pay-off is INTENSE.  They are both very very sparkly and I could see that causing a bit of a problem once the product starts to wear off, but holy smokes are the colours themselves every beautiful.  Party Pink has blue duochromey-ness to it and Cherry Red is definitemy more of a blue based pink than a true red (although I'm sure it would be super pretty over a red lip liner--which I will have to try soon!).

(Again--Party Pink on the left and Cherry Red on the left.) 

Here is Party Pink applied over one of my new Barry M Lip Liners, Dark Pink:

(Without a flash on the top, with a flash on the bottom.) 

To help out with all of the lip products I've been collecting lately, I also picked out two new Barry M Lip Liners.  I go Russet (the brown) and Dark Pink (the pink...obviously...heh!).  I'm still not sure why I chose to get brown...I figured if anything I could use it applied lightly to mimic my own natural lip shade.  In my head, this made more sense than it did when I finally got the colour and saw it.  I'm sure I'll come up with a reason to use it though!


These pencils "warm" up against the skin quite nicely and I find that that they apply very smoothly.  I am a fan for sure.


Lastly--Barry M Kohl Pencils.  I have, up until now, only had white and black eyeliner pencils.  I wanted to expand my horizons, so I picked out some greens, blues and a purple.  I think these are going to be so fun to play with this summer!


Once these warm up a bit against your skin they do apply very smoothly.  I think my immediate favorites were the greens and the pale blue.  Although I'm sure the darker blue and purple will grow on my pretty quick!!

 (Left to right: Kiwi Green, Lime Green, Electric Blue, Pastel Turquoise and Bright Metallic Purple.)

And oh yeah!  I almost forgot about the mascara!  I also got the Barry M Lash Modelling mascara.  The package claims that it "volumises, lengthens & separates lashes".  I tested it out this morning before running out the door to work and I did really like how it applied (I forgot to take before and after pictures of my eye lashes--but don't worry, that will follow eventually, I'm sure.  I should actually do a mascara comparison post, that might be fun!).  I like these plastic bristle applicators--I find that they don't deposit too much product at once (because it can't hold much on the brush in the first place--and that works out just fine for me!


That's all for this U.K. makeup haul post!!  One of the things that I really appreciate about both Sleek and Barry M (and especially Barry M) is that they make it very easy to know which products they offer are vegan and which aren't.  I wish more cosmetic companies would take their lead!

Do you have any Sleek or Barry M products?  What are your favorites??

Tuesday, May 1, 2012

EOTD: Starried MSC + Sugarpill Lashes

Hi hi hi!

Tonight I wanted to try out another of my new pairs of Sugarpill lashes!  This evening, "Sinnocent" was up!  As with the "Sparks" pair, I had to cut these down a bit, and because I have *finally* have started to learn my lesson that using LESS glue is *always* better than using MORE glue, applying false lashes is a breeze!  Seriously.  Sugarpill lashes have made such a good pairing with my MSC pigments, that I went for the same combo tonight!  The Sinnocent lashes are so full and fluttery--I quite like them!  They're comfy to wear, too.

Here is the look I came up with:


And here is a picture to show the lashes the very best:




 

Products used:

  • MTCoffinz "Under the Rainbow" Eyeshadow Primer
  • NYX Eyeshadow Base in "White"
  • Madd Style Cosmetics "Up in Smoke Matte Grey" applied to the crease
  • Madd Style Cosmetics "Starry Night" applied to the bulk of the lid
  • Madd Style Cosmetics "Double Rainbow" applied to the outer lid and into the outer crease
  • Urban Decay 24/7 Glide-on Pencil in "Yeyo" to line the lower lash line
  • Madd Style Cosmetics "Double Rainbow" applied over the top of the UD pencil on the lower lash line
  • Madd Style Cosmetics "Love and Rockets" applied to the duct
  • Madd Style Cosmetics "Birfday Suit" for a brow highlight
  • Inglot Gel Liner in "77" for a winged liner
  • A tiny bit of NYX Super Skinny Marker Liner to clean up/make more precise the winged liner
  • Urban Decay 24/7 Glide-on Pencil in "Zero" to line the lower and upper waterlines
  • Sugarpill "Sinnocent" lashes!
I've been hooked on smoky looks lately, I guess.  That and I'm kind of obsessed with my new Sugarpill lashes!

I hope you enjoyed this look and thanks for stopping by!  :)