Drawing eyes

♫ Helloween – Mr. Torture

Lil' miss lazy blogger strikes back with the eyeliner review post I promised a while ago. I have even tried one new product after I mentioned I could write some reviews, so I will have, um, at least four eyeliners to write about.

If you've been following my blog for a while, you've seen enough photos of my face too and thus, know that I tend to apply quite a lot of eyeliner and it's been my trademark for ten years. Yet it's taken me almost ten years to master a style I'm happy with... :> And still I think my taste is developing constantly and maybe one day I'll look back on the style of make-up I had these days and just *facepalm*. Oh well, the road to success is always under construction!

When it comes to my skin, I suffer from acne and my skin is constantly oily, and it applies to my eyelids as well. It gives a real challenge to eyeliner products and I'm still looking for a perfect one!

I didn't take photos of my products because I lack some at the moment. Instead I'm trying to link to the product web pages on their respective manufacturer's sites. I didn't take photos of sample lines drawn either, because the differences aren't either that remarkable or couldn't be seen in photos. However, I've tried to state whether the finish is matte or shiny.

As for prices, I'm not stating exact sums I paid but an approximate price ratio based on the price per millilitre. Thus, the first product, which I consider "the very basic", shall get the price number 1 and the rest a number in the proportion to that number.

Gosh Eye Liner Pen
This is "the very basic" eyeliner – promised to be quick-drying and tear-proof which stays beautiful for hours, yet is not waterproof. Well, only the last two statements may be true. I'm not sure what slow-drying would be, but in comparison with other products I've tried, I think this is one of those slow-drying ones. At least it's the one I screw up most often by closing my eyes too quickly after applying it. As for tear-proof: I disagree. However, it may stay beautiful, if you're lucky. I've seen worse liquid eyeliners. I used this for years thinking this was very good.
The brush is comfortable and easy to use, works well for both thin and thick lines. I like it so much that I've saved and cleaned some caps to be used later after the contents of the bottle have run out.
Price: 1
Finish: Matte
Durability: ***
Ease of use: ****



Gosh Long Lasting Eye Liner Pen
For a while I thought this product was beyond awesome, but it turned out not to be perfect after all. I am not too fond of the shiny finish, but it stays well. However, lately I've also had to get disappointed with it, having had it melt on my eyelids even with good primer underneath. The tip is very thin, but easy to use. The liquid is also occasionally thin! I've had to shake the bottle a bit, or apply multiple layers. I think I used 1.8 ml in a month and thought it ran out quickly.
Price: 1.26
Finish: Shiny
Durability: ****+
Ease of use: ****


Gosh Intense Eye Liner Pen
I thought an eye liner pen with a marker tip would be awesome and wanted to try it. And yes, a marker tip feels strange at first but nice after a while... Until you would need more paint. Since the container is, like in marker pens, at the base of the pen, you would have to wait for the liquid to flow down and make the tip wet again. Unlike with actual marker pens, you cannot press the tip against the paper—err, your eyelid, because it will hurt. However, the tip is supposed to be tilted slightly in order to make the contents wet the brush tip again. Yet it doesn't quite work like that! At least I have to resort to tilting the tip against the back of my hand or something, and when it starts to get wet again, all the paint is at the base of the tip, and it's difficult to get the very tip of the brush wet so that you could continue drawing neat, thin lines. Sure, the idea was good. However, the lesson learnt: brushes which are dipped into the container work better than markers when it comes to lining your eyes. P.S: It's expensive.
Price: 2.5
Finish: Matte
Durability: ****-
Ease of use: **

Isadora Glossy Eyeliner Waterproof
I have a strange habit of staying very loyal to a certain cosmetics brand even if I hadn't tried many. I may be only relatively satisfied with the products I always use, not knowing if there could be something better out there... Thus, I dared to try this one recently. Said to be "super glossy", but I think it's less glossy than the Gosh Long Lasting one. And yes, it is waterproof – tested in the rain, stayed where it should. However, it's not as oil-resistant as I'd hope! Even with primer and Grimas eyeshadow, it can melt on my eyelids – even before the eye shadow does. Left me slightly disappointed, but it's at least as good as Gosh Eye Liner Pen, and yeah well, more tear-proof too. The brush tip is similar to that basic Gosh one.
Price: 0.97
Finish: Shiny–
Durability: ***+
Ease of use: ****

Extra: Grimas Water Make-Up Pure (palette)
I sometimes use this product as well, it's good for any body painting and works well as eyeliner as well. I mix it with water and apply with an old eye liner cap brush, and it works. Naturally, it's not waterproof but stays well nevertheless, and although it's water-soluble, it's not the easiest to remove with mere water.
Price: I cannot remember the exact price of a 15-millilitre palette, but I guess I won't be lying too much if I give it the number 0.2. Much cheaper than using actual eyeliner products!
Finish: Matte
Durability: ***+
Ease of use: Must be mixed with water or such, you need to get a separate brush. At home with good equipment ***** and on the go **.

I'm willing to try more products since I'm still looking forward to meeting the perfect one. What is your favorite? What would you never recommend to anyone?

Images: Sokos webstore. Finns can go shopping and check out more accurate prices too!

P.S: I think I have tried sleeping with each of these products on my face. :> This is what I call "the ultimate test", although the conditions for the product to endure are not as extreme as in the rain, while working out, sweating on a hot summer day... I never neglect evening beauty routines and removing make-up if I'm at home, but occasionally, when I'm spontaneously sleeping elsewhere, it's easier for me to sleep with make-up and remove it with appropriate products once I get my hands on them again.

The art of war

♫ Sabaton – Karolinens Bön

I've been a slightly lazy blogger, and slightly busy in real life as well. And if I was going to write about what special I've been doing lately, you might have a déjà vu after reading "I went to see Dreamtale live" for the fourth time. *giggles*

The theme of this post is warfare as a source of inspiration for artistic endeavours. Personally, I have very contradictory feelings when it comes to war and military related imagery. I'm quite sure most people can say they hate war and wish we could leave in peace and so on, and so do I. I'm also pacifist to the point of not being enthusiastic to try firearms if I ever got a chance (I'm talking about perfectly legal hobbies here). If I was a man, I would refuse to take military service, opting for civil service instead.

However, I cannot deny that warfare is a huge part of history, inspiration for stories, and probably even a remarkable part of human nature. It doesn't matter whether we are watching Star Wars, playing a sink ship game or reading some fantasy novel; war, battle or fight is often a part of the whole thing, not necessarily everything though. And why wouldn't it be? Two (or more) quarrelsome parties disputing in violent ways is often more interesting than peaceful conciliation. I also enjoy my regular dose of warfare whenever I've watching, reading or playing something.

This blog post is about real history though, not fictional wars. I've never been a fan of war movies or books, and I have been lucky enough to graduate from a Finnish comprehensive school, high school and university without having to read or watch The Unknown Soldier. I only had to watch a few scenes of the film in the Finnish film history lectures I had to take (which were probably the most horrifying compulsory lectures in university). And well, I can say I hate live action war films with a passion!

Some time ago I came across this DVD on sale, only for 5 €. Since I had seen it in a movie theater after its release and enjoyed it, I knew it would be worth my money. Yesterday we finally had a proper movie night and watched it, and well, it was still good.

Waltz with Bashir is Ari Folman's animated documentary film, released in 2008. It depicts Folman himself trying to complete a puzzle of his memories and recollections of his time as a soldier in the Lebanon War in the 80s. And it really is a documentary film, not a drama or an action piece "based on true events" – this means it doesn't have a real dramatic arc but consists of both interview and action footage like television documents. I think I once read how some professionals in the field wondered why Folman wanted to make this kind of film using animation, but I think the choice was perfect (not only because I wouldn't have watched it otherwise). The visual style of the movie is very interesting, and I think it portrays the soldiers' feelings very well: what it is like to be utterly scared, or to have a feeling of being on a vacation even at the front.

If there is a hole in your history knowledge and you don't quite know who were fighting in Lebanon and why, the movie won't leave you much wiser. It concentrates on the veterans' feelings, fears, memories and traumas rather than politics. I would recommend it to anyone who's interested in historical wars too, but first and foremost to those who haven't enjoyed other war movies like me.

And I guess the movie's success implies it is a good one; the front cover of the DVD states it was nominated for an Academy Award for the best foreign language film and it won the Golden Globe award of the same category. (Being an Israeli film, the main language is Hebrew.) One fangirl also had trouble sitting still back then in the movie theater when OMD's Enola Gay started playing in one scene. It's also a good war related piece of art!

I won't include everything I enjoy of this theme into one single blog entry, so I will move onto music now. Ever heard of Sabaton, a Swedish heavy / power metal band whose lyrical themes revolve almost solely around historical wars? Not only are the lyrics interesting, but their musical style combined with the frontman Joakim Brodén's strong voice makes their songs very enjoyable. (Most of their songs are in English but I also really like the Swedish versions of their new songs; somehow I think Swedish suits metal music.)


Primo Victoria is about the Invasion of Normandy, and the song which got me into Sabaton in the first place.


A Lifetime of War is from their newest album Carolus Rex which was released a few weeks ago. The lyrics are a good reminder of how insane warfare actually is.

I truly suggest checking out more of their songs or videos if you got interested. I guess I will stop here, though I might write more about the theme in the future, I already have something on mind. Until the next time anyway, so long!

P.S: Anyone else experiencing problems with Blogger loading CSS stylings? My blog background and linked fonts suddenly stopped loading, sucks!