Let's start with Makeup Geek's gel eyeliners. These are such high quality... go on really well and have great staying power. They have some really nice colors as well. The black is one of the best black gel liners I've used and is a staple in my kit. They run $8.99, and are better than some way more expensive liners I have.
http://www.makeupgeek.com/store/eye-products/eye-liners/gel-liner.html
They have a decent range of colors. There are the standards such as black, dark brown, metallic dark grey, and a metallic brown/antique gold. They also have some colors such as a metallic turquoise-y blue, a matte electric blue, vibrant purple, a shimmery mint green, a matte blood red (yes red and it is amazing), a shimmery white, and a metallic yellow (gold, but yellow). I have a few of them and have swatched them here. Ignore my messy swipes... this by no means is a reflection on the liner, just me being tired when I drew the lines.
In the shot above, you can see the metallic brown (Rave) on top, next down the metallic grey (Twinkle), the metallic turquoise (Fame) and a little bit of the shimmery white (Cotton Tail). The colors are very vibrant, even if you can't tell so much by my photos. I love Twinkle and Rave as an alternative for black. I will say Cottontail feels a bit soft, but I find that with most gel liners that are light colors. The softness also makes for a rockin' eye shadow base.
Here is a little better view of Cottontail, it's a really pearly white. Poison, the red is really fun. I've worn it a few times and it just pops. The black looks a little washed out with my flash, but don't worry, it is a wonderful deep dark black that is so smooth and silky to put on.
When I ran my finger through them, the did smudge, but I rubbed a lot harder than anyone would rub their eye. I would call them waterproof, as soap and water doesn't touch them. You have to use an oil based makeup remover to get these suckers off.
My next gel eyeliner loves are by BH Cosmetics. They have some really fun colors that I enjoy and a great price point at $7.95... actually I always see them "on sale" for 50% off and a 3.95 price point. Can you believe that????? I haven't tried a whole lot from BH, I sort of prefer Coastal Scents and they are very similar. However, Coastal Scents has really boring gel eyeliner colors, and only 4 or 5 of them. Meh.
http://www.bhcosmetics.com/products/gel-eyeliners
I picked up 4 to just try them out. From the bottom: Fairy, a WONDERFUL green with gold undertones. Really beautiful. Next is Fresh, a nice metallic pop of minty green. You guys know how I love pink eyeliner and Blow is a fantastic metallic pink almost fuchsia. Night is an almost black indigo-ish eggplant color. Great if you want something dark, but maybe not quite black.
These are such fun colors. The lighter colors are a bit soft as Makeup Geek's Cottontail is... but I'm sort of ok with that. That makes them versatile as a shadow base or hell, just a shadow. For $3.95 I'm going to be picking up a few more colors that were out of stock when I ordered. These are a really great value.
They did also smudge when I ran my finger through them.... but as above, I ran it through harder than anyone would ever rub their eyes. The staying power is great, it doesn't fade by the end of the day. I would call these water resistant, as just running water on them they were fine, but soap and water does take them right off. But they are so inexpensive and the colors so great, how can you resist???
The next thing I want to talk about in the realm of gel eye liners is brushes. Get a GOOD brush. I have several ranging from an angled flat brush, all the way to a square flat brush. My favorites are the bent liner brushes, and my favorite I've found is Makeup Geek's. $6.99 ladies, yep, a quality brush for under $10 bucks. Best liner brush ever. The thing that makes it different is that instead of it just being a few brush hairs in a small ferrule, it is like a tiny pencil brush. The angled ferrule makes it really easy to use as well. You can kind of see the comparison in my picture below.
Most bent eyeliner brushes (or non bent ones for that matter) are like the black brush I have here... just a bunch of straight skinny bristles. Which is fine if you want to do a really skinny line along your lash line. But in the brush with the silver ferrule (the Makeup Geek brush) you see how it looks like a little pencil. I LOVE this brush. It's so versatile and you get great control. I really recommend this brush.
Lastly, I wanted to link to a tutorial on how to do quick perfect winged eyeliner. This is the easiest most precise way out there... Yes I can do my winged eyes freehand, but when I'm in a hurry I use this tape method. So quick and easy.
http://www.makeupgeek.com/tutorials/the-1-minute-winged-liner/
That's it for today! Stay beautiful!!
