Benefit Bright Lights, Big City Set

It's been really overcast and gloomy here the past few days so I haven't particularly been swatching anything (though I do have some lip swatches I'll post later) so today's post is more of a review post than a swatch post. I absolutely adore my "That Gal" primer, so when these Benefit sets went on sale at Sephora for $35, I picked one up. The set contains 3 full sized products ("That Gal" (retail $28), eye bright (retail $20), and BADgal Blue Mascara (retail $19)) and a cute little mirror with a really nice magnifying side and a regular side.
Anyways, on to the products themselves;

"That Gal" is a peachy pink primer that helps brighten your complexion. The tube that I got in this set is a backup for the one I picked up during the Friends and Family sale back in October, but I am currently on my 2nd tube of this stuff and I absolutely love it. Oddly enough though, in the 1 year that I've had this product I've never once used it under a foundation even though it's a foundation primer. Instead, I've used it mixed with Benefit's Some Kinda Gorgeous to make a nice tinted moisturizer (which isn't too bad, but when I applied it myself it didn't wow me like when the SA did it). Instead, what I love it most for is for a quick fix. My skin isn't too awful, but when I had to continuously wake up at 4 am and be out the door by 5 am for work, I generally wasn't awake enough to apply a full face of makeup, and my complexion was suffering a bit from it. It also didn't help that whatever lit parts of my workplace were lit by bad flourescent lights (the evil kind that makes everyone look more zombielike than they already did..honestly...my lips looked a little purpley and corpselike in that lighting..though part of it may have been due to poor circulation in the mornings) Anyways, one day, I reached for this stuff in my stash and was pleasantly surprised that I could get away with just using this primer with some concealer to cover up scarring and a light dusting of powder on top to set my concealer and be good to go for the day. I actually think it controls oil just a bit too..so no complaints there. It's also got a delightful grape scent to it that fades away quickly.

Eyebright is a light pink pencil with some shimmer to it. The instructions on the back of the box say to apply this product to the inner and outer corners of the eyes and blend lightly. Maybe I'm not doing this right, but it just sort of shows up light and pink on my skin...it does brighten a bit, but the light pinkiness is fairly apparent to me on its own. I lucked out genetically and have barely visible dark circles under my eyes, so I'm not particularly sure how this would work on those. A friend of mine loves this stuff though, so maybe it has some effect on them. She is also a lot lighter skinned than I am so it's possible that it looks better on lighter skin as well. On the flipside, I really like Smashbox's Photo Op, which is a bit darker and more golden, to brighten under the eyes while she hates it so it might really be a skintone thing. The consistency of this is soft and easy to apply; there's no tugging from this whatsoever so that's a plus at least.

BADgal Blue is a blue mascara with a fat brush. It's got a fairly dry formula, but it's not really a bad mascara; it lengthens and thickens nicely, but unfortunately I don't really see any blue on my lashes and it won't hold my curl (I was bless with short, stick straight asian lashes that point downwards, so a waterproof mascara is necessary to hold my curl) so this mascara isn't really for me..but it's definitely a nice mascara if you like drier formulas.

I attempted to swatch the primer and the eyebright, but since the lighting in my room is warm, both turned out peach instead of pink...oh well

Urban Decay Box of Potions

Wow, I've really been falling back on posts the last couple of months...anyways, here's a quick little update. I bought box of potions what I think was a couple months back, but as I didn't have any imaging programs installed on my netbook, neglected to post my review here of the products in this kit. The Box of Potions retails for $65 and is available only at Sephora. Each item inside this set is full sized, making this a pretty good deal if you wanted to try out the products in this set. Unfortunately, most of the products in here were misses for me.


Pore Perfecting Primer: This one feels like a much thicker, less slick version of Smashbox's primer. It definitely does minimize the appearance of pores though..mine were pretty much invisible after using it. I don't think my foundation slid off at all when I tested this out, though I did find that my Shu brow pencil wouldn't really apply evenly on top of this..Additionally, I got the worst clogged pores from this product, which I still haven't fully resolved after a month and a half and my nightly cleansing ritual involves cleansing oil, washing my face again after, and toner (among other things). I'll stick to my Smashbox primer for now

Brightening: I should have retested this as far as lasting power goes since I wore a different foundation than I did with the Pore Perfecting primer since my powder foundation has never had super great lasting power, but I really didn't notice any brightening effects with this primer, so I left it alone. It's much less heavy feeling than the pore perfecting primer though, and also less thick. My powder foundation did go on smoothly over this, which was nice, but faded within a few hours, as usual.

UDPP: I accidently opened this when I was grabbing for the lash primer in a rush and got the primer instead, but it's got the newer angled wand. This product has been a staple in my makeup routine for 3 years now, and will probably stay one for a long long time.

Lip primer: I'm really impressed with this one. I tried this with one of MAC's Lustre formula lipsticks (Cute-ster) at around 5:20 AM and by 8:30 when I took my first break, there was still some lipstick left on me..although barely. Granted...I wasn't eating or drinking anything really, so I don't know how it really holds up against that, but MAC Lustres usually last like 20 minutes on me, so it's definitely working. It does seem to mattify the lipstick just a tad though. Once the color wears off, you have to wipe off your lips completely and reapply both the primer and the lip color, or the color won't apply evenly. I kind of felt like this left a slight film on my lips, as my lips felt weird after, but I am sensitive to sunscreens so that may have had something to do with it (this product has spf in it)

Lash Primer: I was not impressed with this at all, but I have stick straight asian lashes that point down slightly. This wilted my curl completely and made it ridiculously hard to recurl them after the mascara was on. It did lengthen a bit, but it gave no volume for me...actually I felt like my lashes looked more sparse after for some reason, possibly because it's not real good with separation on me. I have heard of other people liking this product though, so I guess it's one of those things you have to test yourself to decide whether or not you like it. Personally, I tend not to use lash primers anyways, though I have tried a couple, and I'd say there's definitely better primes out there.

All in all, I returned the set, though I did rebuy the lip primer for my MAC lustres. Price wise, it's a great set, but I personally didn't like the products in it. I'd recommend grabbing samples of the face primers in store if you wanted to test them out, but be warned that the pore perfecting primer can clog your pores.

Anyways, that concludes the review portion of today's updates. Here's a few things that will be coming up as updates in no particular order:
-Swatches of NARS Pleasures in Paris palette (Doucers de Paris)
-Swatches and Reviews of Global Goddess products
-Swatches and Reviews of a few Becca products (Demi-matte shadows, a couple of blushes, and bronzers)
-Swatches of theBalm blushes
-Review with some swatch involvement of Fyrinnae Pixie Epoxy
-I also finally got around to ordering more Fyrinnae Inks, so I should end up with all of them except Ninja, since I really don't need another black liner

I also need to catch up on some topics I started but never finished, but we'll see how that goes. My free time's been cut into a lot recently, so I haven't really had the time to test and review products, but I'm working on it.

Eyeshadow Primer Comparison- Lumene, UDPP, and Smashbox

A somewhat belated topic here, but today's topic is eyeshadow primers; more specifically, a comparison between Lumene's eye base, Urban Decay Primer Potion, and Smashbox's new photo finish eye primer.

I feel that all 3 are decent primers and all have their pros and cons.

First up is Lumene. Lumene is a nice primer that was found in drug stores like CVS for $10 and came in a nice little squeeze tube, which is a step up from Urban Decay's craptastic packaging. As you can see below, it's slightly yellow toned before you spread it out. However, once smoothed into the skin, it dries clear/nude without any problems. It's got a bit more texture than UDPP, so I like to use this primer for loose shadows and pigments as I get better pigmentation from this base than with UDPP. My eyeshadow lasts all day without creasing, although it does fade a bit by the end of the day.

Next up is Urban Decay's Primer Potion. This baby retails for $17 in it's regular size and is currently being sold in an XL size for $22. This is my favorite primer out of the 3. It is neutral toned when first applied and dries nude/clear. Eyeshadows are intensified when applied on top of this primer, and it also makes an excellent base for your brow powder. Eyeshadows last all day without creasing with this primer, though again I get some fading. The downside to this primer is that eyeshadows become a bit harder to blend on top of this primer, but this problem is easily fixed by dusting a nude/base color over your lid.

Last up is Smashbox's Photo Finish eye primer. This one was my least favorite out of the 3. IT retails for $20, more than either Lumene or UDPP, with only 0.02 oz in the tube...MUCH less product than UDPP has. I decided not to return this right away and give it a try, but unfortunately I decided that I prefered UDPP over Smashbox, though the smashbox is still a decent primer. Smashbox's eye primer is the darkest and warmest of the 3 primers and does not dry clear on my skin. On darker skintones than mine though, it probably would be pretty nude/clear. It did intensify colors and lasted all day without creasing, but fading still occured for me. Additionally, I felt that it made cooler toned and neutral toned shadows a bit warmer. It does have two pros over UDPP though; shadows are still easily blended over this primer, and it does not seem to be as drying as UDPP. nevertheless, it was not for me, and went back to the store right after these swatches.

Primer comparison before smoothing out. Lumene is a creamy yellow, UDPP is a neutal cream, and Smashbox I'd say is about a NC30 or so.

Smoothed out: I'm ot sure if it's visible here, but the Smashbox did not dry clear. It's a bit warmer than the other two primers. Lumene may have a slight yellow cast to it, but is clear for the most part. UDPP is completely clear on me.

For the eyeshadow swatched over the primers, I used Urban Decay Last Call..a red-magenta shade. Lumene intensifies color a bit, but not as much as UDPP or Smashbox. Again, the Smashbox changed the color a bit, but as Lst call is a warm based color to begin with, the change may not be all that apparent.

One more pic for color comparison:

Urban Decay Primer Potion in Sin

After many long years, Urban Decay has come out with a colored version of their eyeshadow primer in the same color as their popular eyeshadow in Sin, a peachy champagne color. When it first came out as an Sephora Beauty Insider exclusive last month, it was $1 more than the original formula, but now that it has hit the shelves in retail locations, the original formula and the new primer in Sin both cost $17 pretax. The new primer comes in a bottle that is of the same size and general design as the original primer, but the bottle is in a deep champagne color with a gold lid instead of the regular light purple color and silver lid. (Unfortunate since I, like many others were really hoping Urban Decay would get around to changing its horrendous packaging). Both are shown below, with Sin being the bottle on the right.

The Sin primer potion as stated above, is a peachy champagne color. When you first pull the wand out of the tube, it appears to be a fairly metallic shade, but once spread out on the skin, it's less scary and the shimmer is much more wearable. To me, it seemed like it was a cream eyeshadow in an inconvenient tube with a wand more than anything else as it works almost exactly the same as a cream eyeshadow-the more you build it up, the better color you get. It's one of those products that are great if you're running late and need a quick wash of color under some eyeliner, though it really doesn't excite me much. It does keep my eyeliner in place at any rate. (that may not be the most difficult thing though since I wear gel eyeliners, which are waterproof and fairly budgeproof already) I tested one of my MAC pearlglide liners on it today though, and unfortunately, I'm not sure it kept it from fading...too bad. On the plus side, it did keep my eyeshadow from creasing, and I didn't feel that it made eyeshadow as difficult to blend as the original formulation. I don't feel like it has the same power as the original formula though.

Swatches done below on NW25 neutral skin under somewhat warm indoor lighting. The original formula dries clear/nude

As a test I also swatched a grey shadow on my arm over both the original formula and Sin PP. I feel like Sin made it a smidge warmer color wise, though I'm not completely sure it shows up here. Lighting is a bit cooler this time.

Overall, I'd say I like this product ok, but I probably will not be repurchasing it as the original primer potion works much better, is more versatile, and is the same price. Consequently, because the price of the regular primer potion has gone up again, this blogger may not be swatching eyeshadows on top of UDPP for a while or at least as often (at least until I have to pull out the stopper).