Makeup Products Not Worth The Hype

I’m a huge fan of beauty and lifestyle vloggers (video blogging in case you didn’t know) on Youtube, but if you have been watching their videos for a while, as I have, you may notice they never seem to dislike a product. All their reviews are along the lines of “This is the greatest product ever!’ “Or it changed my life!” Rarely do you get, “I wish I hadn’t spent money on this.” One of the reasons for this is that they are getting paid to promote certain products they are sent free from companies. Also you may the same products being reviewed over and over and think to yourself that maybe all of these people like it, then it must be worth the hype. So, I thought I would talk about the products I find over-hyped. Not necessarily “bad” or a waste of money, but definitely not deserving of the massive amount of attention they receive.

The first product I find to be over-hyped may be surprising because it seems to me that it’s the most beloved eye shadow in the beauty community. That is the Urban Decay eye shadow. I own the Naked 2 palette, a couple other smaller palettes from Urban Decay (I can’t remember the exact names because I don’t use them often, and I have used the original Naked palette as well. I’d first off like to say, all of the colors in these palettes are beautiful and well pigmented. The concern I have with these eye shadows is not with pigmentation, because honestly they go on perfectly fine and they blend well– until they don’t. As you try to layer eye shadows and create a more intense look, they become muddy and heavy looking. I’m not trying to say that these eye shadows are a waste of money or to never buy them, because I use my Naked 2 palette quite often, but you shouldn’t buy them with the expectation that they are the end-all of eye shadows. They are pretty, but for the price ($52 for the Naked palettes) they are not worth it.

Another product talked about all over the beauty community is the Benefit The Porefessionals Balm. I have used this product for a while now and honestly I don’t really know why I continue to repurchase it. For some reason I like it and all, but I don’t really know if it makes any difference. It’s meant to minimize pore and smooth out the face. While it does that to some extent, I don’t think the results are at all remarkable or hype-worthy. It does make the skin softer, but also slippery feeling and makes my foundation slide around. Also, it does reduce the size of pores, but I wouldn’t say the results are life changing. Again like the last product, I don’t hate it, but I don’t think it’s as great as everyone says it is.

The last product I find to be over-hyped is the Tarte Lights, Camera, Lashes 4-in-1 mascara. I bought this mascara because I heard great things about how it increases lash volume dramatically and is super waterproof. Well, they weren’t wrong about it being waterproof. It’s waterproof and most makeup remover-proof. It’s incredibly hard to take off in the evening, and I feel as though that know matter how long I scrub, it leaves all of my lashes stuck together and never fully comes off. Another issue I have with this mascara is that it is very clumpy and sticky. It goes on great at first, but as you try to apply a second coat it becomes clumpy. After it has been on for a while, I feel as though it never completely dries, and it feels sticky. By the end of the day my lashes end up all stuck together and look even clumpier than before. I don’t know of other people have this same problem as me, but I would not recommended this mascara.

Morphe Brushes Review

Recently I made a post reviewing and swatching the Color Warm palette from morphebrushes.com which you can see right here

While I was on the Morphe sight, I also bought the Set 648 – 18 Piece Professional Brush Set, which you can also view here. I had read great things about their brushes. I even heard they compare to Sigma brushes, but I don’t own any Sigma brushes so I can’t compare.

On the website it gives you a description of the brushes included, so I’m not going to go into that, but I will mention my favorite brushes, favorite things about the brushes, least favorite brushes, and overall experience.

First I would like to mention, it took some time for my brushes to be delivered from the time I ordered them. I selected three day shipping and I also noticed on the website it said processing would take up to a week. This was fine with me because I was in no desperate hurry to receive my brushes and eyeshadow. But, a week and three days went by and still no package. I checked back everyday for another three days, but it still hadn’t arrived. I was about to call them and ask if it had shipped yet, but then after two weeks, my makeup arrived.

When I opened the brushes for the first time they had a very strong chemical smell. I washed them right away, but the smell stuck even after they were cleaned. Now, a couple week later, the smell had faded greatly, but is still somewhat noticeable. Also after I washed them, the white ones, which are made of goat hair started to frizz as they dried, but as soon as they dried completely they were fine.

My favorite brushes from the set are the angle blush, duo foundation, deluxe oval shadow, and the oval shadow The angle blush brush is very dense, applying the product evenly with good coverage, and it’s the perfect size. I like to use it for blush (obviously) and  to contour my cheekbones lightly.

The duo foundation brush is made of a mix between synthetic and sable bristles, and is very soft. It works great to apply foundation with a stippling motion, however it could be bigger. I wouldn’t use this brush to apply all of my foundation because it is quite small, but it’s great for areas like under the eyes, nose, and chin. It makes the foundation look smooth and airbrushed.

Next is both the oval shadow brush and the deluxe oval shadow brush. They are both made of sable, so again very soft. They are also both dense, but nottoo dense that there is a lot of fall out. They work well to pack the shadow on. I especially love the oval shadow because it is small enough to apply shadow precisely in the crease. The bristles are also long enough, and not too thick, that it works great for blending,

Now onto the brushes that I don’t love quite as much. There wasn’t any from this set that I dislike enough to not use, or in that case that I dislike that much in general. Though, my least favorites would have to be the pointed liner, small blending fluff, and the deluxe blending fluff.

I feel like the pointed liner brush is just very thin. It is hard to apply any type of eyeliner with it because it is flimsy and many products seem to be too heavy for it. I always end up with eyeliner that looks like a wavy line when I use this brush, but there is a good chance this could have something to do with user error. I’m not 100 percent used to using that type of brush to apply eyeliner, so I’m just gonna stick to my liquid eyeliner pen, or gel eyeliner with an angled eyeliner brush.

The next two brushed that I’m not as fond of are both of the blending fluffs. They are made of the goat hair which I said earlier got a little frizzy when I washed them. Even though most of the frizz went away when they dried, they still don’t look quite the same as how they came. Also the goat hair isn’t soft, actually it’s pretty course. I feel they are scratchy and don’t pack enough eyeshadow into the lid, leaving more of it on my cheek than actually on my eye.

As for the rest of the brushes I have no complaints. I don’t think they are as high quality as other brands, or as others claim them to be, but they work great. For only $40 they do exactly what I need them to do. Also I love how light weight all of the brushes are and they seem to be made to last. I don’t think I’ll be having a problem with them falling apart, and my favorite thing about them is that I have yet to experience any kind of shedding,

Brushes that shed are one of the biggest problems I have with other makeup brushes, so I was thrilled to no have one single bristle fall out onto my face, even after I washed all of them.

If you are thinking about purchasing brushes from this site, I would definitely go for it. It’s going to find brushes of this quality at a lower price.

Morphe Color Warm Swatches

I ordered the 35 Color Warm Palette from morphebrushes.com and decided to not only review the eyeshadow, but also swatch them.

First, I would like to mention the price of these palettes. They entire palette was on sale for $19.99 (original price is $39.99) for 35 eyeshadows, that means I got 35 eyeshadows for about 60 cents each. I believe the sale is still going (or maybe it’s always that price. I’m not sure) but 60 cents per eyeshadow is such a great deal that I wasn’t expecting much quality wise, but to my pleasure I was surprised.

Most of the eyeshadows in this palette are of great quality, and are much bigger than I imagined. They are about 2 in diameter and compare to about the size of Mac eyeshadows. One concern that I have is that the eyeshadows didn’t come with names, or even numbers, which makes it hard to swatch. What I’m going to do is swatch each row individually from left to right, and review them separately

The first row contains the lightest shades in the palette with 6/7 of them being mattes. I was excited when I first opened the package to find so many different matte shades. I almost went with buying the color matte palette instead, which includes very similar shades to the color warm, except they are all matte. I usually don’t wear a lot of matte on an everyday basis, so I ended up with this palette. It does include a good balance between matte and shimmer shades.

These lighter shades are probably some of my least favorites in the palette. The very first shadow (lowest on my arm) took some effort to even make it show up in the picture. I did apply a light primer to my arm to begin with, but I feel as though with maybe a little more it would apply better. Like I said earlier these are all mattes with the exception of the last one. I found with this palette the matte shades are the least pigmented and hardest to apply. It takes some packing and primer to be visible on the eyes. I’m not saying it can’t be done, but there are definitely other eyeshadows in this palette that I like more. However, for the price they are great and I’m just being picky.

Moving on to the second row.  The shades in this row are significantly more pigmented than the last. It features more shimmers in pink and orange tones, and also the matte colors are more pigmented as well. I use a lot of the colors from this row for school and everyday. My favorites would include the first one. I love taupes and I think they are great for every season. The lovely taupe in this palette it’s light enough to be a base color for darker looks, or dark enough to be a crease color in lighter looks. I also love the 3rd and the 6th color in this row. They are both light matte browns and perfect shades to use in the crease.

For some reason row 3 looks very bright on my arm and dark in the palette. Anyway, this row is again not one of my favorites to use for everyday. I tend to stay away from oranges because they don’t look good on me and the first couple shadows are bright orange. Also, the grey-ish purple shade in the middle is a nice color in the tin, but it lacks pigment when it’s on. It’s a shame because I was very excited about that shade in particular when I got the palette. Despite the first couple of shades that I might not use that often I really enjoy the shimmery brown colors.

Row 4 is probably my favorite as a whole, although I love the palette as a whole. It consists mainly of shimmery browns that are all highly pigmented and easily blend-able. I also love the last color! I’m very into plums for the fall and I think the color is just gorgeous. It works great in either the crease or the outer V of the eye. My only concern is that many of the shades in the rows are very similar colors. When they are all blended out they look pretty much the same as eachother.

The last row has the darkest shades in the palette. It also features a nice plum and a grey-ish purple that makes up for the disappointing one earlier. Most of these darker shades are highly pigmented, but also have a lot of fall out, the blacks especially. Using a strong eyeshadow base or primer is advised to keep the eyeshadow on your eye and not your cheek.

Overall I really enjoy this palette and believe it is worth more than the $20 I spent on it. Despite some pigmentation issues with the matte shades, all of the eyeshadows seem to be of good quality. I would definitely recommend this people not only who want quality makeup for less, but also someone willing to spend more because it is worth it.