Pushing Pounds

I'm lucky enough that I get 3-days off a week from working 40hr nights, and I decided to push the boundaries of weight loss during my off days. My goal is to lose 6lb after 3 days (but even 1lb is fine too, haha)! Anyway, I'm not really sure what my final weight loss will be but I'm going to eat right, exercise, and keep my calories under what I'd normally consume. I'm sure a lot of people are gonna say "you'll just gain it right back, etc" and that's kinda OK too... but that isn't really my point for doing this. I'm doing this just  for my own amusement I guess, heh. So my day starts Thursday when I wake up and will last until Sunday at the same time so... here goes!

Alternate Eye Makeup Brushes

This week I decided to look into eye makeup brushes which could be possible dupes for MAC ones. Interestingly enough I learned that art paint brushes from your local craft store actually make good dupes for the MAC brushes, and they're pretty inexpensive in comparison. The base price for new pro MAC eye makeup brushes online seems to be $18 and up, while the average eye makeup sized art brushes I bought from Michael's craft store averaged a price of $6.50 per brush with tax. Below you'll see the 7 art brushes which I purchased and I'll go into a bit more detail about why I chose these brushes out of the massive selection at the art store.

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Starting from top to bottom (and the possible MAC dupes to the right)...

Loew-Cornell (American Painter) - 4000-1 Round (MAC 210)
Loew-Cornell (American Painter) - 34400-1/4 Angular (MAC 266)
Loew-Cornell (American Painter) - 4500-8 Filbert (MAC 194)
Loew-Cornell (La Comeille) - 7400-3/8 Angular (MAC 269)
Loew-Cornell - 272-L Dome Round (MAC 286)
Loew-Cornell - 270-1/2 Maxine's Mop (MAC 252)
Loew-Cornell (La Comeille) - 7930-6 Flora (No dupes but an awesome inner eyelid brush)

How I choose my art brushes for eye makeup use...

First of all, i've had enough eye makeup brushes and have applied eye makeup long enough to know what I feel will work best for me... so choose what will work best for you. I mostly tend to lean toward getting synthetic bristled brushes because they allow for a smooth saturated application, while I do prefer the natural bristled brushes for blending purposes because the bristles don't hold as much product and the bristles are a bit fanned out in comparison to the synthetic ones which are more compact (often I find natural bristles tend to loose their shape faster than synthetic ones over time). If you're a person that likes your makeup light or more on the natural side than you'll probably prefer the natural bristles, and if you like your makeup bold and clean lined than you'll probably prefer the synthetic ones. I like to mix up my eye makeup looks and will often end up using both types. Natural bristles are generally best suited for blending out powdered products only, while the synthetic ones are great because you can apply primers, gels, creams, etc, as well as eyeshadow however, they really aren't suited for blending like the natural ones are.

Deciding what to get...

In deciding which art paint brushes I want for my eyeshadow application I like ones that are fairly soft to the touch so that they don't scratch the eyelid during application. I generally don't want bristles that are too flimsy or stiff, I like to have control over where my makeup is being applied and I want easy application so, I choose brushes that have a little give in the bristles. I also avoid the long handled brushes because at too great a distance you'll lose control over where you want your product to go and the brush will probably be too long for most normal makeup cases/bags... so, I stick to the short handled art brush selection.

Looking at Michael's for brushes...

If you're buying your brushes from Michael's you may notice they have a level of 1-3, the higher the number the higher the quality of brush (thus making 3 the pro grade). I looked through all the levels of brushes and ended up choosing mostly level 2 grade, although the two La Comeille brushes I have I believe are level 3 grade. I found that most the level 1 grade were mainly for beginners at painting so, these just didn't seem like they'd be fit as makeup brushes because the bristle shapes seemed a bit limited and of poor quality. You're best bet is also to pick brushes used for mixed media as these may hold up best against the product/s you're using, although I don't think that matters too much.

Art brushes vs. Makeup brushes...

Some people may be asking "are these safe to use for makeup, etc". The answer is yes, and actually a lot of pro makeup artists use these brushes. Art brushes often can withstand time a lot longer than a lot of makeup brushes can and you can clean these in the same manner as makeup brushes. Some may say art brushes have harmful chemicals well, so can makeup brushes, and have you ever read what's in a lot of makeup products?! If you're asking what brand of art brushes to buy well, I've noticed quite a few people seem to go for the Loew-Cornell ones (I think that may be all Michael's carries) but that's not to say that you couldn't go for other brands as well. I find that these actually hold eyeshadow pigment better than my makeup brushes as well.

Maybelline Mineral Power Loose Powder - Quick Review

After realizing I had bought Maybelline's Mineral Power Loose Powder in not only there Translucent shade but also in Ivory and now having used both products recently I decided to give my opinion of the product.

First off, I have dry skin that tends to get a bit shiny throughout the day without the proper makeup powder to set my look, this powder did close to nothing for me. I found the Translucent shade a bit odd because as it has a white-pink color to it, it does not appear to look that way once applied (hence it looked a bit translucent on as intended). The other odd thing I found about this shade is that it didn't seem to work as well as the Ivory shade did for me... so, it might be that way with the other non-translucent shades in this. However, both shades did not seem to do anything for me after about an hour or two after application... it left my face looking shiny as though I had never applied it at all.

This loose powder was definitely not what I was hoping for so I'm not going to recommend it to people... unless you like having little to no coverage and don't need to set your liquid foundation or moisturizer. Even the stubby applicator brush got tossed aside when I got this as I replaced it by using my own foundation makeup brush. I didn't think that this powder had made me look cake-y until I had used the wrong makeup brush one day and my mom basically said "your face looks cake-y today", LOL (no sh*t! haha).

Uncharted 3 Game Review

I decided to do a new type of post today which is a bit outside of what I normally do on here, and I'm only doing this since I got a PS3 this past x-mas. So, I got three Uncharted games with it which I finished playing Uncharted 3 awhile back but I thought I'd do a review on it now that I've played a couple other similar type games. Although this is a third installment of the Uncharted series I didn't feel that it was necessary to have played any of the previous games in order to understand what was going on in this one so, you won't feel lost which is a plus.

I just jumped out of a falling cargo plane in the middle of a desert... and lived, WHAT!

Adventure games are definitely the type of games I enjoy playing the most and I felt this one was relatively easy in my opinion with clips and movies in between and during game play (similar game play as with the Final Fantasy series if you're familiar with that). It has nice graphics although at first I felt like all the men characters looked a bit like Bruce Willis, heh.

I didn't like that I couldn't really span the camera angle out further away and that it doesn't really automatically adjust on its own which makes game play a bit difficult when in pursuit of an enemy (or maybe I'm just not use to playing on a PlayStation, heh). Loads of gun shooting in this, especially in the later half of the game... which isn't really my thing but it's kinda fun when you get a gun that really blows things up :P

I love how most of the scenes end during the beginning levels as there's always a unique way in which they have made you escape from the towns usually so, you generally don't end up having to back track in this game. I didn't have any issues with lag or glitches, there is some loading parts here and there as with most games on PlayStation it seems so nothing too annoying, and there may be a few times where buildings and such may abstruct your character from getting a better view at your surroundings.

By the end of the game I began to wonder what happened to the other two characters in this... or maybe I just missed that part, idk. Anyhow, the ending of the game (slight SPOILER alert ahead!) is a bit disappointing I thought since it felt like a typical romance soap-op scenario but... that's kind of how this game is so, don't be fooled by the weird mafia-like intro at beginning of the game. Overall, I wasn't sure I would like this game or even get around to playing it, but now I can safely say that I do recommend this game if you're into fairly realistic shooting adventure type games... or maybe even if you're not into shooting games like myself then this may be one in which you find you enjoy ;) I've only played a handful of PS3 games thus far but this one is definitely at the top of my list.