REVIEW: NYX Highlight and Contour Powder

When I first opened up my compact of NYX Highlight & Contour Powder, I groaned.  I thought it would either go to waste or have to be sent back.  It looks like one of those giant Black&White Cookies from Manhattan:

Yum, but not so great for my fair-to-medium skintone!

Or so I thought.  When I swatched I was relieved to find both of the powders to be silky, sheer and *nearly* goof-proof.  I found them easy to both apply and blend with a regular blush brush from Eco Tools.  I got mine from cherryculture.com for $8.50 (heads up; they're having a 20% off Thanksgiving sale with code TGS20 if you want to try your hand at contouring!).

There's a handy basic contouring guide on the outer packaging:

I applied according to these directions for the result below. What do you think?

Without Nyx Highlight & Contour Powder

With NYX Highlight & Contour Powder

Too Pretty to Use: Clarins 3D Radiance Face Powder

This is makeup porn for those who love Scrabble, word searches, Tetris... I just can't stand the thought of messing up this design right now!

This is my first Clarins makeup purchase (I've tried Beauty Flash Balm before), and it comes in such a pretty little red velvet pouch!  It's like Dior stuff that way, and in that it is a fingerprint magnet.  Oh well, look at the colors! When I finally do use this I can tell it's going to be gorgeous against skin with all the peachy-goodness, pops of hot pink, and touch of lavender highlight... <3 sigh.

theBalm SCORE! Holiday 2011 the Balm and the Beautiful, Meet Matt(e) Palette, and Mary Lou Manizer/ Betty Lou Manizer Duo

Seriously, check your local TJ Maxx to see if you can find these! It is totally worth it even if they don't have all of them!
Retail vs. TJ Maxx Score:
Mary & Betty Lou Manizer Duo (been lemming Mary since I saw it on Jess): $48 retail worth for $19.99
Meet Matt(e) Palette (was going to skip because I have the Too Faced Matte Eye palette, $36): $34.50 retail worth for $16.99
The Balm and the Beautiful Palette (supposedly for Holiday 2011! Exact shades as the 1000 limited-edition run of the Muppets Cast Your Shadow Palette): $44.50 retail worth for $19.99

These are a MAJOR steal if you can find them at your TJ Maxx. Sadly, they were the last/only ones at mine. I can't even believe my luck! I was dying for that Muppet Palette (the swatches are amazing at temptalia.com).

REVIEW: Clinique Bottom Lash Mascara

Clinique Bottom Lash Mascara is a $10 little wonder with the cutest little mascara brush head. It allows you to reach and enlarge every last tiny wisp of a lash along your bottom lash line with ease. It comes in both black and brown (black shown here).  I don't always try to put regular mascara on my bottom lashes, in part because I fear I'll just make a big tar-like smear down there and ruin my concealer work, but now I might be tempted to rock the Twiggy look of super-long lower lashes every day! How did I live without this before?

without

Eyes: TFSI, NARS Grand Palais Eye Shadow Duo, E.L.F. Studio Blush in Gotta Glow as highlight, Clinique Black Honey Cream Liner on upper lashline, MAC Zoom Lash Mascara on upper lashes

Cheeks: NARS Grand Palais dusky rose shade as blush, E.L.F. Gotta Glow as highlight

with

Eensy weensy brush! Beautiful tube! <3

REVIEW: E.L.F. Warm Bronzer and Golden Bronzer... "Bronzer"? Not so much.

All right, it's Saturday at last! DH and I slept in until 10:30 (ah, I remember back when I slept in 'til noon, but when your usual wake-up time is 5:30, five hours later is probably enough!)  On days when I can sleep in I don't really need much help from makeup to achieve a bright-eyed, glowing face, but for the other 300 days in a year it helps to turn to bronzer, blush, and highlighter/illuminator.
Fridays can be the worst.  I have the long week of sleep deprivation behind me, so I thought I would give these E.L.F. bronzers in Warm and Golden a whirl.

Sorry, they look identical in this picture! Warm is on the left, Golden on the right. 

Allow me to get right to the point.  IMHO, these are NOT bronzers.  For me, a bronzer doesn't just impart a glow, but it darkens the skin (preferably to a natural, tan color, though many lean orange).  On the plus side, neither of these had orange to them.  Each quadrant shade looked a bit different from the others when swatched.  When swirled and heavily swatched Golden definitely looked less pinky-peach than Warm, however...

E.L.F. Warm Bronzer, each quadrant swatched then swirled together to the right

E.L.F. Golden Bronzer, each quadrant swatched then swirled together to the right

I'm only NC25 and I haven't really gotten a tan this summer... these barely show up!  At least, they are a little bit different from each other.

Top Row is Golden, Bottom Row is Warm

I couldn't get the level of pigmentation shown on my hand to translate to my cheeks with any myriad of brushes (even eyeshadow brushes), and the hand swatches are all finger-rubbings, and nobody wants to finger-rub their face products!

On my cheeks, I couldn't tell one bronzer from the other, as their difference in depth was so minor.  Both did, however, impart a fine shimmer glow that I tried out a few ways:  applied just to cheeks, applied all over, and applied just as highlight on cheekbones.  I'd recommend these just on the tops of cheekbones, but you really don't need both of them.  If you want an all over sheen to the face, these actually do a decent job of that while evening out skintone imperfections though it's definitely a made-up look I'd save for evening.  The powders' sheen surprisingly didn't highlight my pores or fine lines much (I think they  managed to achieve more of a "blurred imperfections" effect).  On cheeks, it looks like I covered my blush with my regular facepowder to mute it.  This is actually useful to correct an accidental over-application of a pigmented blush (I tested this to see if it would work with Illamasqua Lover, and it worked a charm).  An anti-clowncheeks solution!

The packaging seems nice and sturdy, the mirror is large, and these look like they cost more than $3 for sure.  They were simply categorized improperly, if you ask me.  They make really good highlighting/finishing powders in the spirit of YSL Touche Eclat.  You don't need these if you have a separate powder highlighter, but I still think it's nice to have one of them.

REVIEW: Estee Lauder Modern Mercury Pure Color Illuminating Powder Gelee

Thanks to the Muse, I got a mad lemming for this Estee Lauder Pure Color Illuminating Powder Gelee in Modern Mercury.  The compact is typical for Estee Lauder's current line, pretty but a little dated in feel.  Also, maybe I am uncoordinated but the compact is a little tricky to open for me (not that I feel bad; Christine from Temptalia has to use her nails for Milani Baked Eyeshadows and I never had a problem getting those compacts open... I mean, it seems to be a common issue!). 

Swatched heavily, one-stroke with applicator, random Dior Aurora (thought they were similar, except Aurora looks matte next to Modern Mercury!)

I tried it today as a highlighter over a tinted moisturizer I am despising (Fusion Beauty Tinted Moisturizer - evens skin tone slightly and has the usual paltry SPF 15, but leaves me feeling and looking greasy quite quickly and offers ZERO coverage for my spots, of which I currently have a billion... I think even if you have perfect skin you ought to stay away!).  I used it also as an eye shadow a la the Muse.  As eyeshadow I put it over my TFSI and it's going strong even now.  It looks like it might be a dupe for MAC All That Glitters, as this girl's photos show, though in some light it looks champagne and others more rose-gold.  Either way, Estee Lauder's marketing for the Modern Mercury collection suggests that the products are supposed to have that adapting quality and it's really quite pretty. 

Cha Cha Tint adding a flush, Modern Mercury looking champagne on eyes.

Promising after 1 hour...

Spots are all so visible it's mortifying! And yet I'm posting it here, haha.

Looks like a soft rose-gold glow from this angle, but...

Highlighted PORES! Only a few hours later... Cha Cha Tint lasted but sunk into my pores.  As eyeshadow (with Clinique Black Honey Gel Liner), EL PC MM Powder Gelee is still going strong.

As a highlighter, I found this faded with my appearance of the greasies, but I think that might be due to this godawful tinted moisturizer.  Unfortunately, the tinted moisturizer has also skewed my perceptions of Benefit's new Cha Cha Tint, which I also had intended to review today.  I'll use it with a tried-and-true base tomorrow and withhold my review until then (though I can already tell you the Cha Cha tint doesn't show up on pigmented lips).

The smell of the Powder Gelee is a little strange, like potato chips obscured by flour.  The texture is certainly more of a powder than a gel, but the consistency does seem to suggest a "dampness." 
The included sponge applicator is the rare useful tool (rare for included applicators to be useful, that is, i.e. those Kat Von D applicators are garbage).  It allowed for a nice color wash across my eye area and precise application to my cheekbones.  A regular blush brush or eyeshadow brush did not play well with the powder, however.

In an attempt to thwart the pore-maginifying aspects of cheek highlighters I applied Benefit's Porefessional primer to my most lunar-like regions, but alas I believe the tinted moisturizer ruined this effort as well.  The pretty rose-gold sheen to my cheekbones has faded in little over an hour and left behind magnified pores in its wake.  It could be EL's fault, because I never have this issue with Benefit's Girl Meets Pearl...

I can confirm the Muse's suspicion that the powder-gelee appeared to regenerate slightly after use; it's as if it repositioned itself.  However, while pretty in the pan and on eyes, I think ultimately this is just a novelty product and I wouldn't purchase it again.