Face Products | Beauty and Fashion Tech

Revlon New Complexion One Step Foundation

Awhile back I was in Vegas and realized that I had left my makeup bag sitting at home. Now, a girl can’t be in Vegas without makeup, so I popped into a CVS and grabbed a few items to get me through the trip and purposely picked out things I had not tried before so that I could review them.

For foundation, I grabbed Revlon New Complexion One Step Oil Free Makeup With SPF 15. This is a cream to powder type of foundation. The foundation comes in a compact that flips up to expose an included sponge applicator—something else I needed since I left mine at home! Overall, the Revlon New Complexion Foundation wore fairly well. It wasn’t the best I have ever tried, but I liked it fine. Coverage was medium, and it stayed put for most of the day. I didn’t experience any breakouts or serious issues with it. Mostly, the color wasn’t perfect. What I hate about shopping for drugstore products is the general inability to test the times in the store.

At $12, the price is OK. I don’t know if I would buy the Revlon foundation again, but it certainly was perfectly serviceable, and I liked that it came with a sponge applicator, which is always good when traveling.

Popularity: 1% [?]

L’Oreal True Match Roller Foundation

Makeup companies are always looking for new ways to get you to spend your money. Lately it seems like applicator gimmicks are all the rage. Just look at all of the various vibrating mascaras out there! Anyway, L’Oreal has a new foundation with a new roller applicator: L’Oreal True Match Roller Foundation. It has been in Europe for a while and has just recently arrived in the United States. I saw a TV commercial for it and was curious, so I picked one up at Walgreens to do a review, where it appears to be pretty popular—I got one of the last few left and was lucky that they had my shade.

The L’Oreal Roller Foundation is a pressed cream foundation. The applicator is a foam brush on a roller. The idea is that you roll the brush over the foundation and then onto your face, which L’Oreal claims will create a streak free airbrushed look. However, that wasn’t exactly the case for me.

The first time that I used it, I found that the foundation went on a bit streaky and I had to smooth it out with my fingers. I also thought that the roller brush was difficult to use under the eyes and around the nose. The second time that I used it, I put a lot less on the brush and had less streaks, but didn’t get very good coverage that way. In both instances though, once I smoothed out a few areas and put on some tinted powder over the foundation, things looked OK. Not spectacular, but OK. Coverage is on the sheer side.

The upshot is that I am not particularly impressed with the L’Oreal True Match Roller Makeup. You can get a better look using a standard makeup sponge as an applicator and, at $14 for the foundation, I didn’t think the quality was worth the price. Basically, there are better drugstore foundations for less. For example, I love Sally Hansen Natural Beauty (link is to previous review). However, there is one upside to the product that will keep me using it on occasion. I like the idea of the applicator being included in the case for travel, since I tend to prefer to not have used makeup sponges floating around in my makeup case. So I’ll save it for that.

Popularity: 2% [?]

Benefit Cosmetics Beauty to Go Kit

This Benefit Cosmetics Benefit To Go Beauty Bestsellers Kit from Sephora has a great selection of Benefit Cosmetics and is a nice way to test out some Benefit items.

The kit includes:

- 0.08 oz Posietint: A poppy-pink tinted lip & cheek stain
- 0.06 oz Some Kind-A Gorgeous: The foundation faker
- 0.25 oz That Gal: A brightening face primer
- 0.09 oz High Beam: A luminescent complexion enhancer

Personally, I love Poisetint on both lips and cheeks and high beam is one of my long time favorite highlighters. I haven’t tried the other two items in the kit.

Popularity: 1% [?]

Amazing Cosmetics Mineral Makeup Makeover

I prefer pressed mineral makeup and also like to avoid bismuth, but finding a bismuth free pressed mineral makeup can be difficult! My favorite had been Sephora Brand, but when I went to refill mine, they told me that it was being discontinued! Awhile later, I was at Ulta and walked around checking the ingredients on all of the makeup brands and found one, just one, that had a pressed mineral makeup without bismuth. That was Amazing Cosmetics Velvet Mineral Pressed Powder Foundation. The Amazing Cosmetics rep happened to be at the store, so I had my whole face done, which allowed me to try a few other items as well.

Coverage with Amazing Cosmetics Mineral Makeup was pretty good. Apply it with a brush for sheer coverage, use the included pad for medium, or as the rep showed me, try a makeup sponge for more full coverage. It builds pretty well too, so I can apply it sheer to medium on most areas and then put extra over my areas of melasma. The selection of shades is not huge, but is OK, and the packaging is nice, with a mirrored compact. I found that it wears very well. I get most of a day out of it, which is more than I often get from powder mineral makeup. So, this is a winner, which is good since it is one of the few bismuth free pressed mineral foundations out there (Neutrogena and Jane Iredale also make bismuth free pressed mineral foundations and if you want a good bismuth free powder mineral makeup, check out Purely Cosmetics).

Anyway, like I said, I had the rest of my face done, and I liked Amazing Cosmetics overall. Here is the look, using Amazing Cosmetics Suede Eyeshadow Collection in Wheat, a couple of fabulous lip products, Amazing Cosmetics Lipcolor in Oliva and Amazing Cosmetics Lipgloss in Kathy, and a new favorite blush for me, Amazing Cosmetics Blush Matte in Pink Chocolate. All wore wonderfully, and I ended up buying the lip products and the blush to go with the mineral foundation. You can read more about the lip products in my review here on Girl Gloss: Amazing Cosmetics Lip Products. This picture also ended up being used for my Open Sky Store.

Overall, I was quite glad that I tried the Amazing Cosmetics brand. They have quality products all around.

You can find Amazing Cosmetics at Ulta and Sephora.

Popularity: 1% [?]

More Items From the Luna Twilight Makeup Collection

The Luna Twilight Makeup Collection will be available beginning tomorrow! (October 22, 2009) and is also now available for preorder. The line has some interesting items and appears to be very well designed. Last week, I looked at the palettes and creme blush. Here are few of the other particularly interesting items from the collection.

First Light Face Glow contains light reflecting pigments and can be used to soften imperfections and as a highlighter. The collection also includes a similar Body Glow product.

The Luna Twilight Mascara from the line is unique in that it includes a metallic shimmer in its formulation. I am quite curious about it!

Luna Twilight Moonshadow eye shadow has unique pairing of pigmented glitter dust and a light cream shadow that can be worn separately or layered.

Lip items from the collection are equally interesting, especially a nice looking stain/balm, and a combo DuWop Lip Venom and Stain where, depending on how you use the applicator, you can apply each separately or it can be shaken to use the products together. For more coverage of those items, see my write up at Girl Gloss on the Luna Twilight Makeup Lip Products.

Popularity: 2% [?]

Philosophy The Supernatural Makeup Collection

I tend to think of Philosophy for skin care, but the company has a new makeup collection out that focuses on skin friendly products for a natural look. All products are formulated with antioxidants and are free of Parabens, Phthalates, Talcs, and Sulfates. On the whole, it is a pretty impressive collection. One of the best items is the Philosophy The Supernatural Coloring Book™ . This adorable palette comes in a cute magnetic case and includes two neutral/natural eye shadow shades, two lip shades, a blush/bronzer, and two blushes–one powder and one cream. The items wear pretty well, and the shadows have pretty good pigment. The case and swatches are below.

Perhaps my favorite item in the collection is the Philosophy The Supernatural Lit From Within™ Healthy Cream Blush. I tend to love cream blushes and this one, shown below in the shade Feel Warm All Over, is a nice peachy pink shade. It is high pigment, so if you are fair like me, a little goes a long way. If you are darker skinned and need extra pigment, this one should also hold up well for you.

The collection also includes an illuminating powder that I adore: Philosophy The Supernatural Moonlight™ Natural Illuminating Powder is a light finish powder with light reflectors and enhancers for an illuminating glow. It doesn’t look too shiny and does a nice job of providing an overall glowing look. My only complaint about it is that it has a sponge applicator, which isn’t my favorite way to apply powder.

Overall, this is an impressive collection. For a look that Philosophy The Supernatural Lipgloss from the collection take a look at my review on Girl Gloss!

Popularity: 2% [?]

M.A.C Cosmetics Well Defined Collection

MAC has a pretty good new foundation and concealer out as part of their Well Defined collection. The Studio Sculpt foundation incorporates silicone, which I particularly like. It also includes SPF 15. In addition, the collection has a full coverage Studio Sculpt concealer.

From the company literature:

Well-Defined brings to life over two years of work backstage in the lab to perfect our newest foundation and concealer. Studio Sculpt SPF 15 Foundation is a rich, luxurious Cream Foundation in tube. This lush uniquely textured foundation delivers ultimate hydration while instantly revitalizing dull and dry skin. Smooth and even application yields a medium buildable coverage with a natural-satin finish. It’s paired with Studio Sculpt Concealer, which provides full-coverage that never becomes dry and cakey with a gel-based cream formula slips onto skin, effortlessly hiding imperfections.

Look for the MAC Well Defined collection beginning February 7, 2009. Also, don’t forget that the Hello Kitty collection will be available shortly after that (I’m saving all of my monthly cosmetics budget for that one!)