mascara 101, day 10

what better way to finish up sephora's lash stash than with sephora's own in-house brand? sephora's atomic volume mascara comes with a nifty wand. tiny little bristles make it super easy to navigate the brush, and it holds just the right amount of mascara. after two coats, i couldn't believe how long my lower lashes were. those are mine, right? i sure hope sephora didn't knock me out and beam a team of experts into my bedroom, all in the hopes of tricking me, 'cuz these long lashes made my morning super. they aren't as feathery as some of the others (too faced, tarte, and smashbox come to mind), but the only thing subatomic was my camera's batteries, which seemed to be dying; the images are a little washed out.

mascara 101, day 9

traveling caused me to take a break from mascara testing. really, south florida's humidity and non-waterproof mascara don't quite jive. but now i'm back, and ready to attack!

last week i tested out urban decay's big fatty mascara. the brush is big and lush, but the mascara itself below average. my lashes clumped, and they felt heavier as opposed to feathery or longer or lustrous. i had minor raccoon eyes at the end of the day, and it was really hard to get off with my all-natural eye makeup remover. better yet, the next morning i had giant circles under my eyes that rivaled an anemic's.

mascara 101, day 8

my focus has been elsewhere lately. work was crazy busy, and now i'm hanging for a few days in south florida with family before a 5-day conference at disney world. for the next 7 days or so, i won't be testing mascara. it's just not fair with the humidity and all. gotta keep my research design somewhat intact! before i left, i testdrove tarte's lights, camera, lashes mascara (which is green in the lash stash kit, but purple as a fullsize. what gives, tarte?). the bristles are small, and the mascara coats pretty well. i felt like i was getting some lengthening and thickening going on. by 5pm, my lashes held up well, plus my eyes looked pretty together after an additional hour+ at the gym.

i took these photos with the dslr, which doesn't give you a preview of what you're shooting (that and a mirror really came in handy with my panasonic). i'm impressed that i could shoot my own eyes, although with many, many tries.

mascara 101, day 7 (plus 1)

yesterday and today, i've been wearing smashbox's bionic mascara. thankfully, this mascara doesn't attach robot parts to my lashes!

the brush is plump, but the mascara doesn't gloop. it went on smoothly, and i didn't have to do more than one or two coats to get a nice even and full look. another big plus is that the mascara came off pretty easily with my all natural eye makeup remover and warm water. the too faced mascara from earlier on came off in tiny pieces, and the korres started to rub off by my bus ride home. this one made it through 9 hours of work and an hour at the gym with a whisper. bionic also has a low score at skin deep (a 3, equal to korres), but there are some potential cancer causing ingredients here. another plus: smashbox doesn't test on animals!

as todd worked from home yesterday, i employed him to whip out the big camera and snap away at my eyes. my canon definitely shoots better than the little panasonic, but the mascara really does seem to have more potential than most of the others!

mascara 101, day 6

today's eyelashes are brought to you by the colors red, white, and blue (eventhough this mascara is black). korres deep colour mascara is natural, containing no leads or cancer-causing ingredients. skin deep gives this mascara a 3 out of 10, which means painting my lashes with korres is safer than with most other mainstream mascaras. it's also safer than if my lashes smoked, and funny enough, i think they looked pretty smoking this morning, but in a good-for-me sort of way.

korres offers a large, spongey brush, and i liked how the tip tapered to get my small inner lashes and bottom ones. on my way to the polls, i felt like the mascara took a little longer to dry than normal, but the result was worth it. they're feathery and pretty:)

too bad my pictures aren't great. i think the election excitement caused me to forget to adjust the white balance... but you get the picture.

mascara 101, day 5

last time i checked, venom was topher grace slathered in coal black latex, but now he's been turned into a mascara! ok, this isn't spidey sense in a tube. it's DuWop's lash venom mascara, to be precise. i've tried DuWop's lip venom before, and my lips looked for minutes like they had met a hive of bees. then they deflated and resembled ill-placed clownish lipstick. thankfully, lash venom is a not-so-clumpy mascara with a skinny brush, and there's no stinging. the results were ok, but i wouldn't rush out and buy this stuff. now, you're probably thinking, becca, what's up with THREE images today? well, i couldn't get the right and left sides looking equal. on the right side, my lashes sort of "fell" while the left kept that butterfly-wing-lifted look. look, eyelashes, you're going to be my test subjects. grow up and deal. resistence is futile.

mascara 101, day 4

it's halloween, but i'm not sporting orange mascara. or a witch's hat. or a kitty on my shoulder (i tried that this morning, but alphie only made it halfway down the hallway). i am, though, wearing cargo's texaslash mascara today. yee-hah! this one's got big bristles, and you know what they say about a wand with a big end! yeah, it clumps. luckily i had a dry eyebrow brush to carefully wipe away the mini-mascara boulders. with it's red state moniker, i was hoping texaslash would make me look just like those young pipsqueaks on cmt's dallas cowboy cheerleaders show, granting me perky boobs, sparkling teeth, and a can-do-even-when-totally beaten-down-by-two-way-over-the-hill-and-facially-reconstructed-den-mother-types attitude, all with the swivel of the brush. but it didn't. but if it could, it'd sell like hotcakes. think about it cargo. just think about it.

mascara 101, day 3

today's feature is too faced's lash injection pinpoint, a mascara with a very fine wand/brush combination. i was very impressed with how easy the brush coated each lash, and the bristles didn't overpowered my lashes, either. in fact, i felt like i had very ariel/little mermaid-ish eyelashes. on the bus, i was primed and ready to flirt with an old dude in a crisp suit and my hoodie-clad, pig tailed, miley cyrus-loving seatmate. the baristo at whole foods even put almond milk in my hot cocoa at no extra charge. oh, and too faced is cruelty free!

mascara 101, day .5

i realized that i never posted a "before" photos. here are my naked little lashes. sexy.

mascara 101, day 2

today i broke out make up for ever's smoky lash mascara. the bristles were thick and foresty, and the mascara went on smooth. a step up from yesterday, i think. also, taking a picture of your own eye is really, really hard.

mascara 101, day 1

i'm on the prowl for a new mascara. i loved my old clinique standby for work, but when it ran out, i wondered if i could do better. i tried to go the drugstore route, but apparently walgreens doesn't restock often, so the tubes of l'oreal and maybelline i bought were pretty dry. then i tested some vegetarian mascara, but the stuff just wouldn't stick. i'm sorry, animals, but i can't pull off the raccoon look like you can.

cue sephora, who hasn't yet sold-out with it's latest round of "lash stash." i tried to buy the first one months ago, which featured eight mascaras, but it sold out in a snap. now it's back with 10 sample-sized mascaras, each good for at least several trial runs. could it be any more perfect? i think not!

today's lashes featured vincent longo's the curl mascara. i liked the brush: thick bristles with a curved applicator. but the mascara itself didn't do much for me. maybe i need to layer it better? or pump the brush more? i think this one deserves a second go.