SPF products

SPF & your skin

typewritergirl.blogspot.com

Over here in Australia, as well as other parts of the Southern Hemisphere, it’s summer. No “white Christmas” for us! (However you wouldn’t think it today, as in Adelaide it is cloudy, gusty, and looks like we’re in for a storm. 😦 ) It can get up to (and sometimes beyond!) 40 degrees Celsius and the sun is very strong compared to other countries – we have one of the highest rates of skin cancer in the world! This led me to think about the sunscreen that I use on my body throughout the summer, as well as the facial and body moisturisers containing sunscreen that I use throughout the year. I started to do some research, and this article was born… I hope that you enjoy it! It will also be appearing in the December issue of MIKA Magazine.

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Sunscreen, suncream, sunblock. Whatever you want to call it, it has been a great invention. It helps protect our skin from the sun’s rays and helps prevent premature ageing. In recent years cosmetics companies have released foundations and other products which contain sunscreen.

However, sunscreens and cosmetics containing sunscreen do not always have accurate labelling nor do they necessarily have all the information we need to make a decision about whether or not the product will do what it claims to do.

What is “SPF”? It stands for Sunburn Protection Factor and refers to how much ultraviolet radiation from the sun is needed to burn skin protected by a particular sunscreen compared to unprotected skin. SPF does not refer to how much time you will be safe in the sun without protective clothing (such as a hat, long sleeved shirt, etc).

One’s skin tone, the time of day and weather conditions one is exposed to, and the amount of sunscreen one applies is also very important. According to the Cancer Council of Australia, it is best to seek shade at all times, but particularly between the hours of 10am and 2pm, and between the hours of 11am and 3pm during daylight saving time (which in Australia applies to most States and Territories over the summer months). One should also apply at least 1 teaspoon of sunscreen to each limb and to the front and back of the body. At least ½ a teaspoon should be applied to the face, neck and ears.

What SPF level is enough? When you look at the different products out there, sometimes they can run from as low as 10 through to 30+ or even higher. The Skin Cancer Foundation (United States) advises that only products with an SPF value of 15 or higher provide adequate protection against skin cancer.

One of the most important things to consider when wearing sunscreen is timing. You need to apply it at least 20 minutes before going out into the sun. From the sources that I consulted (as per the footnotes!), you should reapply every 2 hours regardless of what the packaging says on your products.

As many of you may know, the sun produces 3 types of rays – UVA and B, which reach the Earth, and UVC which the ozone layer protects us from. Both UVA and B can cause sunburn, premature ageing,

and place one at risk of developing skin cancer, and all sunscreen based products will typically protect you from UVB. However, just because a product tells you it has an SPF of 15 or more does not guarantee that it protects you from both UVA and UVB rays. How can you tell? Check the ingredients. To also protect you from UVA, zinc or one of its derivatives is usually used. Additionally, there needs to be at least 5% of the zinc or zinc derivative product to give you adequate protection. Some products will list the percentage and others will not, so use your judgement to decide if the particular product is right for you.

Last, it is important to remember that use of sunscreen alone will not protect you completely from the sun. Wear a hat and sunglasses, consider wearing some light long sleeved clothing or a kaftan when at the beach, and try and avoid being out in the full sun for long periods of time.

Enjoy the sun but remember to be sun smart! 🙂

COMPARE THE PAIR: SPF DAY CREAMS

Evening all! 🙂 Having a quiet night tonight as I’ve gotta get up early tomorrow for a make up course I’m attending. (I’m looking forward to it as I’ve never gone to this type of course before; when it comes to makeup application everything I’ve learnt is from experience, youtube, magazines and blogs! ;))

Sometimes I’ll try out a couple of products that have the same intended function. As such I thought it might be more useful to readers if I review both of the products in the same post, which would make it easier for people to decide, which if any of the products would suit them best! Hence “compare the pair”! In these reviews I will not give a “beautiful rating”, but will tally the points that I assign to each product. 🙂 (Hope this makes sense!)

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I like to use a day cream with SPF every morning, no matter if it is sunny or raining outside, due to the strong Aussie sun. I’d been using Nivea Visage’s Q10 Anti Wrinkle Day Cream (Light) for a while but by chance, tried Olay’s Complete Defence: Daily UV Moisturising Lotion (Sensitive) when it was on sale, and continue to use the Olay product now. Here are my thoughts….

Price range: the Nivea product usually retails between $16 and close to $20 AUD, depending on where you buy it, whilst the Olay is around $15 (but was even cheaper when I bought it! +1 to Olay

Where can I get it? both products are available at Priceline, Chemist Warehouse, and similar, but you cannot get the “light” version of the Nivea product at supermarkets. +1 to Olay

The “light” version of the Nivea cream is designed for those with combination to oily skin, as the standard formulation is quite a heavy cream probably best for dry and/or mature skin. It has a nice consistency and is easily absorbed, but tends to leave my skin a bit shiny. It has a fairly neutral smell and has an SPF of 15. I would tend to recommend this one, despite the “light” category, to young women with dry skin rather than to women with oily skin.

The Olay product is SPF 30, also has a nice consistency and absorbs quickly, and was nowhere near as shiny as the Nivea. It does not have any particular fragrance, as I picked up the one for sensitive skin (which my skin can be at times!)

+1 to Olay for those with combination to oily skin; + 1 to Nivea if you have dry skin… and a bonus +1 to Olay for having a better SPF rating.

In terms of packaging the Nivea product is a jar which means you can get every last bit of the product out to use. The Olay is in a fancy pump pack (which even has a twist lock so you can take it travelling without any problems :)) which is nice but would make it harder to get the last few drops out. +1 to Nivea

If we look at how much product you get for your money, however, there’s 75mL in the Olay product whilst there is only 50mL in the Nivea equivalent. +1 to Olay

Total scores – 5 for Olay and 2 to Nivea…

~*~ The winner is Olay Complete Defence! 🙂 ~*~

Unsurprisingly. after having tried the Olay product I plan to keep buying it rather than the Nivea one in the future!

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PS. HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!! to those in North America. It is not celebrated in Australia so I don’t quite understand the “black Friday” stuff that’s being mentioned at the moment?!

PPS. Sorry to those on my email subscription list who received a draft version of my Nutrimetics post in their inbox earlier this week, rather than the final version. (I’d accidentally hit “publish” rather than “save draft” – embarrassing! *blush*)

PPPS. If you’re enjoying the blog be sure to like my facebook page or follow me on twitter for updates! 🙂

palmer’s face products: gentle daily cleanser, daily facial lotion & night renewal cream

Good evening readers!

The rain is bucketing down but it’s still quite warm outside = humid weather! It does, however make good weather for me to sit on the computer for a lil while! 😉

I was fortunate to pick up a free sample of Palmer’s Gentle Daily Cleanser, Daily Facial Lotion, and Night Renewal Cream recently. I’m a fan of Palmer’s olive oil based body lotion (you can click over to my review of that here) so have been keen to try their new face range. There’s also a clay based mask that they do which I haven’t yet tried and isn’t included in this review.

Price range: you can pick up these products for <$15 AUD each, depending upon where you shop!

Where can I buy it? Most chemists and supermarkets, with supermarkets typically being the more expensive place to find it.

I tried the three products across a single day – the cleanser and facial lotion in the morning and the night cream, well, at night!

The Gentle Daily Cleanser contains interesting ingredients in addition to the cocoa butter Palmer’s is famous for, such as milk proteins and antioxidants. It has a pleasant and noticeable floral scent which was not overdone. The cleanser is meant to be a “light foaming formula”, so I was disappointed when I had difficulties getting it to lather properly and it took a lot of work to wash off! (Perhaps I used too much?) My skin felt quite dry afterwards.

The Daily Facial Lotion contains SPF 15+ and seeing SPF in a skin product for daytime use always makes me happy! 🙂 It is marketed as a “lightweight moisturiser”. The scent was milder than that of the cleanser and the texture was indeed light weight. It left parts of my skin feeling dry; I’m not sure if this was due to my experience with the cleanser before hand or just my skin type (which is combination but getting older so needing extra moisture in the non t-zone areas!).

My experience with the Night Renewal Cream was the best of all 3 products. 🙂 Again the scent was lighter than that of the facial cleanser, and it had a nice consistency, not being too thick and heavy or thin. The hydration was good – my skin didn’t feel dry nor oily. A good budget night cream buy!

Of all 3 products I would buy the night cream, definitely skip the cleanser and probably not pick up the day lotion.

Beautiful rating – Gentle Daily Cleanser: quality 2/5, value 2/5

Beautiful rating – Daily Facial Lotion: quality 4/5, value 4/5 (for the right skin type – <25 year olds or for older skin if your skin is oily)

Beautiful rating – Night Renewal Cream: quality 4/5, value 4/5 (was fine on my >25-year-old combination skin! :))

PS. Priceline have 20% off all hair care products the next 2 days, and are selling Palmer’s Olive Oil body lotion with SPF 15+ for approx. $3 AUD (BARGAIN!!! XD) in their new catalogue which starts tomorrow! (Please note I have no professional affiliation with Priceline – I just shop there a lot so am on their email list :P)

phytogenic infinite foundation

Any THEFACESHOP fans here??? 😀

I enjoy browsing at my local store and use a few of their products. Some I’ve tried have been excellent, others less so. The thing I enjoy most about this brand is that the sales assistants always give you samples of other products to try! (Which I guess from a business perspective makes good sense too – makes it more likely people will return to buy more of your products!)

Anyway, I was lucky to get a sample of this foundation recently. Here are my thoughts:

Price range: at the moment it’s $39.99 AUD for a 35ml bottle.

Where can I buy it? Exclusive to THEFACESHOP.

I decided to try this out on a day I wasn’t due to go anywhere. Just as well, as the shade was not specified on the packet… I looked a bit like an oompa loompa (orange to those who have not seen Charlie & The Chocolate Factory)! You can see the shade relative to my skin tone here:

That aside, it was easy and smooth to apply, with good coverage. At the same time, you only needed a little bit to do a lot! (The sample was 1ml and there was a little bit left over when I’d finished applying it.) It also has SPF protection, but a rating of 20 (so don’t forget a moisturiser with SPF 30+ underneath). Due to the SPF content it does leave a slightly dewy or shiny finish. I thought it looked really nice, aside from the slightly too orange shade!

It also contains other interesting ingredients, which is typical for this brand, such as green tea extract, honey extract, gingko biloba leaf extract, and kaki leaf extract. It would be interesting to do some research on these! What do people think about the addition of such ingredients? Does it really improve the efficacy of the product?

It’s marketed as a “long wearing full coverage foundation”, so I left it on all day whilst I went about things, which included a 10k bike ride (on an exercise bike indoors ;)) and gardening outside. Unfortunately it did not seem to last any longer than my usual foundation, which is not from this brand. If wanting to keep your face looking fresh all day with this foundation I’d recommend packing a pressed powder in your bag for touch ups.

When it came time to remove it, it came off easily with liquid face wash and water.

I’d be willing to try this again in a colour closer to my skin tone, but not sure if it’s worth the money given it’s average staying power.

Beautiful rating: quality 2/5, value 2/5

revlon colorstay mineral foundation

Hope everyone is having a great weekend! 🙂

So, my thoughts on the bargain Revlon foundation I picked up…

Price range: usually would be around the $20-30 mark over here but I was lucky to pick it up for $5!

Where can I buy it? Chemists and other makeup retailers; Revlon is usually not stocked in supermarkets.

So I was excited about this bargain and was looking forward to trying it out Friday morning before work. Unfortunately, the packaging took me a  while to figure out – specifically, working out how to get the brush to work properly! You  have to twist the top part of the lid of the foundation to get the brush to pop out, but it doesn’t pop out very far so I kept thinking I hadn’t twisted enough (ha!).

I took a few photos so you can see how little the brush actually pops out so it can be used. The pot of foundation is quite deep so it is hard to reach the brush in to catch the powder. I also took one to show how tiny the brush is (it’s not so clear from the photo, but the brush itself is no bigger than an Australian 10 cent coin (waaaaaaaay too tiny).

Using the included brush to apply the foundation takes a very long time, due to it being so small. I quickly got frustrated (as I was getting ready to head to work after all!) and so switched to my own kabuki brush (which is a lot larger).

The actual quality of the foundation itself is good; it lasted just as long as the others I use and the coverage was good. The SPF (10) is not high enough for the strong Aussie sun so I would advise people to always use a moisturiser with SPF of 30+ under their makeup, unless of course you are using a foundation with a rating of 30+ or higher.

So, at the end of the day, you will need your own proper sized applicator brush if you want to use this foundation. That’s fine when picking it up at the discounted price, but I’d have been disappointed if I’d paid full price.

Beautiful rating: quality 2/5 (at full price), value (at full price) 2/5 (the brush really lets this product down)

beauty bargain ^___^

Hi everyone (I haven’t actually announced to my friends I’m writing this yet, so feels a bit like I’m talking to myself – weird!!)!

It’s beautiful weather today and so at lunchtime I went for a walk… Ended up at Chemist Warehouse www.chemistwarehouse.com.au which is always a dangerous place for me, as I rarely leave without buying stuff!

Anyway, at the moment they are selling Revlon Colour Stay Mineral Foundation (SPF 10; powder; kabuki brush included) for only….. 5 bucks! (Yep I bought a few – but there was still a lot left and in a variety of shades. ;-))

This offer may be restricted to only the store I went to; so Adelaide peeps if interested visit the Henley Beach Road store ASAP!

I haven’t used this particular foundation before but am a HUGE fan of mineral powder foundation, so am fairly confident it will be a good product. However I will write a review once I’ve given it a try (will try it tomorrow AM when I put my “work face” on!).

PS. Whee! As you can see I’ve just worked out how to properly insert links in my posts *dance* (I’m a bit slow with these things I’m afraid).