Hard Candy Velvet Mousse Matte Lip Color - Daffodil

Hello again readers!

I was really hyped up with the new Hard Candy releases for 2016. Hard Candy has never been my favorite, but they do have some really amazing products in their collection, and they just knocked out one of their latest releases right out of the park.

The Hard Candy Velvet Mousse Matte Lip Colors all come in their own individualized tins. There are seven shades in the entire range.

The inside of the tins are a lot nicer than I was expecting. The container has a plastic insert with a sort of velvet feeling material to hold the lipstick. The lid has a full mirror. Look at the size of that thing! It's much bigger than I was expecting! It's incredible if you take the entire tin with you, and use the mirror for application. Although, I won't be doing that myself as I like to just throw one or two lip products in my purse to avoid taking up too much space.

All of the information is printed on a sticker in the back of the tin. Actually, in store, you can open the tins to look at the color more accurately. The downside, is that it's incredibly easy for people to reach in and just pluck out the product since it's held in by a piece of thin plastic, and two pieces of tape. It's easy to tell if it's been tampered with, however, so finding a lipstick that hasn't been broken into is easy (also sometimes frustrating).

The tube is a sleek, slim tube, much like the Hourglass Opaque Rouge Liquid Lipsticks. Same idea, except where the Hourglass has more opaque packaging on the pack, Hard Candy is completely clear, and the metallic cap is silver, rather than a taupe violet shade. It's slim, which would make reaching for more product more difficult in the future.

The applicator is strange. It's very long, and slim. It has two flat sides, and a more pencil-thin appearance on the edges. It's so easy to use the pencil side to line the lips, and use the flat sides for an even distribution of color. I was awed with how much I liked this applicator and it wasn't difficult to get the hang of it at all.

Daffodil is a very warm-toned beige nude. It pulls a little more orange than I prefer, but it still looks incredible. 

The wear time is impeccable, I get about 6 hours before I notice any significant wear. The feeling on the lips is extremely comfortable, and this product doesn't dry out the lips.

It applied just like the Hourglass lipstick did, but it wore so much better. It was very moisturizing, and didn't flake off. I noticed wear more on the inner rim of my lips, and it was made worse if I were to eat something greasy, or if I drank a lot. For a lipstick that's only $6, outperforming a $28 (for a full size) lipstick was a great breath of fresh air.

The shade range isn't that great, to be honest. There's one nude, a few pinks, a couple reds, and a couple of darker tones. It's very sad, because the formula is incredible, but there aren't enough choices to really make these to die for.

If there's a color you like, go for it, I'm sure you wont' be disappointed. I might pick up one more (Dahlia), but I'm not interested in the other shades.

This lipstick retails for $6 for .23 oz.

Thanks for reading!

New Hard Candy Products: Glamoflauge Foundation and Fierce Effects Daring Lip Gloss

Hello again readers!

Brands everywhere have been putting out new products, and it's a little overwhelming just to keep up with it all! New collections, and new additions to permanent lines, it's really exciting!

Today I have a couple of new products introduced by Hard Candy to their permanent lines; The Glamoflauge Foundation, and the Fierce Effects Daring Lip Gloss!

The Glamoflauge Foundation comes in a clear plastic tube with a metallic plastic cap. The only design features is the black detailing on the cap, and the Glamoflauge logo is the same as on their concealer. 

It comes with a pump! I was really excited to see this, because it's such a shame when a product doesn't come with one. Think of all the wasted product! The pump for this gives off a little too much product, so sometimes a half pump is just as good, and you don't use too much. A little bit of this product goes a long way.

The texture for this foundation was surprising to me. I was expecting something really thick, but his foundation is more of a liquid texture, and it's incredibly easy to blend into the skin. It's not a full coverage foundation, I'd say more of a medium coverage, which is great. It layers extremely well, and for some, you won't need a concealer with this product.

It has an odd scent, I don't know what to call it, just... 'foundation'. It doesn't stick around long, but it's noticeable at first.

I bought Porcelain, which is the lightest shade, and the color to me is a pretty dang good match. It's more yellow than a lot of pale foundations that I've tried, and that's a great thing for me since I prefer yellow foundations over pink.

The wear time is fantastic, and I got about 10 hours before I really took the time to look for flaws. It came off my nose a little bit (because I was blowing my nose so often, so it isn't rub-resistant!), in certain areas it clung to a dry patch or two, and since I have really oily skin, it started to look like it needed a powder. 

For such a long wearing foundation, I was impressed. If I used a better setting powder I could see this working even better.

Edit: I found that if I wear it and touch my face (I know that it's a sort of no-no, but during boring classes, I rest my head on my hands often) excessively it will rub off. I only really noticed it because I had areas on my cheeks where my foundation was strangely gone, compared to the areas around it and it took me a few moments to connect the dots on that one.

This foundation retails for $7 and you get 1.1 oz of product!

I was really eager to try this, because I was hoping that this would be more of a liquid lip color than just a simple gloss. The packaging is a clear plastic with silver metallic detailing on the tube, with a plastic silver metallic cap. This is one of the 'intense' (one of eight) of the glosses, while the other 4 are sheer.

The applicator is a lip brush instead of a doe-foot applicator. For this product, I feel this works out for the best, because it packs on a good amount of product, without too much effort. The only issue I have with the applicator, is I can't press down too hard or it will fan out the bristles and get the gloss in places I don't want it to be.

Adrenaline is absolutely breathtaking. It's a deep navy with violet and blue shimmer in the product. It looks fantastic on the lips, and it's really a stunning product. It lasts for a while, about two or three hours, and it needs to be reapplied fairly often. It's a lipgloss, so I was impressed with the wear time, and wasn't expecting too much out of it.

The biggest issue I have with this, is that it has a mint scent/flavor to it. It's sweet too, with what I'm not sure, but it's a heavy mint scent. The first time I applied it, I got a little in my mouth, and ended up having a coughing fit for about a minute. Mint oils and I just don't get along because it just ends up irritating my throat (even though I'm not alergic!). Be warned that if you're sensitive to mint, or you don't like mint oils in your products, steer clear.

It's easy enough to get this product to look opaque, but if you don't want to mess with it, it layers well over lip liners too. I used it over Y2K by NYX, and it paired with it well!

I love this gloss, but I hate the mint oil in it. I'm keeping hold of this treasure, but I know I will probably only buy one other, and leave the rest.

The Fierce Effect Daring Lip Glosses retail for $5 and you get .17 oz of product!

With how much I was impressed with these, I see myself going and trying some of their new products, and also investing in some of their older gems that I never picked up.

Thanks for reading!

Battle of the Eyeshadow Primers

Hello again readers!

I love being able to try new makeup products, nothing beats being able to test out a new product to see if you'll fall in love with it, or if you'll hate it. I've tested my fair share of eye primers, and after using a primer for the first time, I can never go back! Of course, not all of them are created equal, so I compared the ones I have to see which ones are really worth your money, and which ones are better worth a trip to the bin.

For the shadow, I used the dark green eyeshadow from Forever 21. I love the shade, but without a primer it just will never reach it's true potential. I applied it with my ELF Essential Eyeliner Brush, and left it on my arm for 8 hours.

The competitors:

ELF Eyelid Primer – Original

ELF Eyelid  Primer – Pearl

Wet n Wild Fergie Take on the Day Primer – Original

Wet n Wild Fergie Take on the Day Primer – Shimmer

Milani Eyeshadow Primer

Hard Candy Eyeshadow Primer

NYX HD Eyeshadow Base

Urban Decay Primer Potion – Original

Too Faced Shadow Insurance – Original

I put them in order with the (C)ontrol being the shadow by itself.

Obviously right out of the gate, they all look very brilliant, aside from E1, and F1, that look duller than the rest, and C which was almost completely rubbed off.

The next is after 8 hours of wear:

Clearly there is a lot of fading present in all of the swatches, which isn't surprising at all.

I have separated them into three categories: Low, Medium, and High Performance Categories.

Low  Perfomance:

Elf Eyelid Primer – Original

Elf Eyelid Primer – Pearl

Both of these primers are better than no primer at all, but only by a little. E2 started out looking brighter, but ended up fading the most. Out of the two, I will stick with E1 for swatches.

Medium Performance:

Wet n Wild Fergie Take on the Day Primer – Shimmer

Milani Eyeshadow Primer 

These both had better wear, but not as great as the higher performance products. They faded, but still retained color and shimmer well. I was surprised with Milani as I've heard many times that it's a dupe for the Urban Decay Primer Potion, but clearly that is not true.

High Performance:

Wet n Wild Fergie Take on the Day Primer – Original

Hard Candy Eyeshadow Primer 

NYX HD Eyeshadow Base 

Urban Decay Primer Potion – Original

Too Faced Shadow Insurance – Original

I was really impressed with how many did well. I found that the higher end products did hold up (as they should, since they are so expensive), and I was really impressed that the Fergie primer did as well as it did, since it's so cheap. They held color and shimmer for 8 hours.

I hope that this helped some of you make decisions on some of the products you're interested in.

Thanks for reading!

Hard Candy Nail Polish - Jubilee

Hello again readers!

Quick show of Jubilee by Hard Candy

Jubilee looks like you dipped your fingers in a swamp! It's slimy green, with 'dirt'. You get black glitter, with big black and silver hex glitter, and orange bar glitter. It's disgusting, but in the best of ways.

You need four coats for full opacity, one if you layer over another polish.

The only issue I had with this polish, is that some of the bar glitter would rise off the nail. I just picked those out (though I missed a couple!) and I was able to wear this for a few days before any chipping occurred. 

Thanks for reading!

Hard Candy - Fox in a Box in Spicy and Sweet, Bake Bronzer in Tiki, and Light Bright in Fair

Hello again readers~

I didn't want to just post these individually (too much time!) so I've decided to start compressing posts like these into just one. I went to Walmart and got some of the Hard Candy products off of my wishlist.

Lite Bright - Fair:

What a little H.G. I have here! I've been using the Hard Candy Glamoflauge concealer under my eyes to erase the dark circles, and though it works, it's a really heavy concealer... Lite Bright is a light-weight concealer that instantly brightens under your eyes with a brush-tip applicator. I was a little hesitant to get this, since I'm so pale as it is, but it didn't disappoint! It was easy to apply, erased my dark circles, and didn't fall into the creases! I fell in love with this little gem, and it's already scored a place in my daily routine. Lite Bright concealers are 6 dollars at Walmart.

Baked Bronzer - Tiki:

I bought Tiki since I've seen it raved a few times for being a great highlighter. I'm not a huge fan of highlighters, but I love one! It's a baked bronzer that's really pigmented, even without being applied wet! It's a light champagne colour, and is absolutely perfect as a highlighter. It reminds me a lot of the High Beam from Benefit, except I like this better! It's a little expensive at 10 dollars, but there's so much product here that I don't even mind the price tag!

Fox in a Box - Spicy and Sweet:

 I was a little iffy about buying this one too. It's a blush, in a box. Interesting packaging to say the least.. Fortunately, it outshines it's packaging and soars on it's own. It's four different colours that combine into a very warm coral shade. I love coral blushes, they suit me very well, and this is no exception. The colours all compliment each other, and when they are blended out make a wonderful flush to the cheeks.

At the end of the day, I fell head-over-heel for all of them!

I wish little gets like this always had a happy ending, but I can't be that lucky. :)

Thanks for reading~ 

Hard Candy - Gummy Green

Hello again readers~

The last of the three Hard Candy polishes I purchased, was Gummy Green. I couldn't resist, since it reminded me a bit of Illimasqua's Mottle. It's no where near a dupe, though, and I'm pleased for that.

Gummy Green is a mint green base with black, and silver circle glitter thrown in.

The first coat i wasn't impressed. It was streaky, and very very sheer. Adding a second coat is like creating magic, it evens it out, and makes the polish look opaque on the nail.

A couple things to point out, is this is definitely a wrapping polish, since tip-wear is a sure thing. Also, this needs more than one coat of top-coat. I suggest two, maybe even three. I just applied one, and though it did the job, there are still a few 'rough' spots that I would like to even out.

I'm a sucker for mint, I'm a sucker for black, and I'm a sucker for the two combined with a flash of silver in the mix. This is a definite must-have for nail polish lovers who also love mint.

Gummy Green retails for 4 dollars, and can be found at Walmart.

Thanks for reading~

Hard Candy - Crush on Lava

Hello again readers~

I was going to hold off on this, but.... Today I have Hard Candy - Crush on Lava for you! When Hard Candy revamped their polishes, I was really bummed out... You see, Orly had Space Cadet, and Hard Candy had Beetle. I was cocky and though 'Oh, Beetle will be around forever, you can put off buying it', and I was sorely mistaken. I thought I'd have to search again for Space Cadet, but luckily this polish is super similar, so I don't have to!

Crush on Lava is a copper red chrome polish that shifts to yellow and very faintly green. My first thought when I put it on, was 'oh no, I've made a mistake!', but when I saw the shift I instantly warmed up to it. 

Good news, it's similar to Beetle. Bad news, I found in my search that it doesn't shift nearly as well as Beetle does. I'm fine with it however, though part of me is still shaking my fists of what could have been...

Each bottle retails for four dollars and can be purchased at Walmart.

Thanks for reading~

Hard Candy - Black Tie Optional

Hello again readers~

I'm spoiling this, but I just couldn't wait! I'm also going to show you Hard Candy - Black Tie Optional. Hard Candy recently revamped their line, and came out with over 40 new nail polishes! Five collections, with nine colours in each. I was overwhelmed, but I talked myself down to getting only three of them. This one was my favourite pick.

Black Tie Optional is a polish with black and white hex, circle, and bar glitters all packed into a bottle. I knew I had to have it, since it's so similar to Connect the Dots by Lynnderella, which my sister owns and I don't. Now I don't have to be so jealous! I was blown away. I didn't have to 'fish' for any of the larger glitters, which is what I was expecting.

The only issue I had with this, is that you need two-or three layers of top coat, since the bar and larger glitter pieces stick up. I only have one on the photos below, and I wish I had two.

 Hard Candy polishes can be purchased at Walmart.

Thanks for reading~

Hard Candy Flat to Fab Mascara - Review

Hello again readers~

With mascaras, it's usually it does something for me, or it doesn't help me at all. I'm pleased to say, that this product did something for me.

The mascara comes packaged in a cardboard tube, and it's eye-catching as well. Sleek, metallic violet that draws your eyes to it.

The product is 7 dollars, and can be bought at WalMart.

 

The tube is similar to the packaging. Sleek, metallic violet. It's slim, and has a decorative design on the cap (which I couldn't find a way to photograph, so I left it out.)

My first impression of this was right after I got home and brushed it through my lashes: whoa.

The brush is an hour-glass shaped design, and at first I was put off by it. It's hard to get all the lashes, but once you get the hang of it, it's not that hard. I used the top portion to go in after I brush it through to catch those little rascals that try to escape.

Does it instantly curl my lashes? Yes.

Does it add volume and length? Yes.

Even better? It doesn't clump very much at all! I don't have much trouble, and when I run into issues, I just run an eyelash comb through it and it fixes right up.

The only downside I really find, is that it occasionally will flake, and is NOT waterproof. At all. Which is a problem when I'm drivng and it's day-time, since sunlight makes my eyes tear up out of reflex.

Pros:

- Add volume, length, and curl to my lashes, as it claims, instantly.
-Quick to apply
- Can add additional layers quickly after.
-Decently priced for a drugstore mascara.


Cons:

-The brush takes some getting used to
- Isn't waterproof


Overall: 5/5
I love this mascara. To get extra oomph!, I layer my Maybelline Falsies mascara over it. I reach for this more than the Falsies, and it's a great way to get quick results especially if I'm just going out or to school.

Thanks for reading~

Hard Candy Glamouflager Concealer Review

Hello again readers~

I didn't purchase this myself, my friend bought it to use for a cosplay event, and then let me have it afterwards as a repayment for styling his wig for him.

Hard Candy Glamoflauge in Light

The product comes in a plastic package. It doesn't really do much, but the design of the packaging is nice, and it clearly states if it's light, medium, or dark on the top.

It comes with a pencil, and a tube of concealer. It looks like it's not much doesn't it? Well you're wrong. A little goes a LONG way.

The dot I applied above, is enough to cover the flaws for my ENTIRE face. It's a heavy duty coverage product, that really gives a good impression. 

The pencil is darker, but this product is also used for covering up tattoos! You trace the tattoo with the pencil, and then apply the concealer until it's covered. I don't have any tattoos, myself, but it has such good coverage I'm confident it'll cover them up, even if you may need to add another coat for darker tattoos.

As you can see, it looks a bit cakey. It's easy to go overboard if you apply too much, because you only need a tiny amount on your face.

Pros:

-Covers up imperfections
-Heavy coverage
-Blends into the skin and doesn't mess up the application of foundation
-Cheap! $6. Though it doesn't look like much, since you only need a little, it lasts a long time.
-Easy to get at Walmart

Cons:

-Easy to use too much
-A little difficult to apply sometimes since it's so thick

Overall: 5/5

Even with the meager cons, I love this! It covers up blemishes and dark circles and acne scars like they aren't even there, and it helps with the overall look at the end of my makeup application.

Thanks for reading~