Halloween 2013: Pop Art costume

 {Warning: this is a pic heavy post!}

Nothing like posting about Halloween just shy of Thanksgiving!
But let's be real...Halloween is, like, my favorite holiday. I'd like to drag it out as long as possible.
Also, I'm slow. and lazy. but let's go with I love halloween!

pumpkins my friends and I carved...mine is on the far right, the disney castle symbol. No stencil!

 This being my first Halloween on the blogging scene, I did not get to participate in the fun as much as I would have liked. I saw LOTS of fun looks, tutorials, and products during the halloween 'season' though! I loved looking at what everyone came up with for their costumes!

Like I said, I really love halloween. My costumes the last few years have been (in my oh so humble opinion) pretty freaking awesome. And homemade. So when October 31st loomed closer I began to panic when I couldn't think of anything to be!

Halloween 2012 with my boyfriend as Ariel

Last year, I was Ursula with my boyfriend as Ariel.  The year before that I was Wendy with my boyfriend as Peter Pan. And the year before that I was Taylor-swift-morphing-into-Ke$ha-as-I-drank.

In my mind, I had pretty big shoes to fill. And I was running out of time.

I had seen pictures of pop art makeup floating around Pinterest for quite some time. With only 3 days until my Halloween party and about 10 bucks, I made a snap decision to be a Pop Art/ Comic book girl for Halloween.

My friend already had the yellow wig so I figured I had everything I needed.

So I scoured the internet for every picture and tutorial I could find. I want to stress that I did not follow a tutorial. I looked at several and I mean DOZENS of pictures and videos. I did not copy one particular picture, at all. However I will say that when you look at that many, they pretty much all blend together. There are few differences across the board.

Originally the plan was to do the typical red dots, as is customary. But the more I saw, the more I realized how easy it was to mess it up and end up looking sick, or too red, or not red enough. Not to mention your face would be completely red when trying to take it off. So in the end I went with white dots. I think it looks better overall, even if it doesn't look as 'legit' as red dots would.

final look the first time I did my costume

The only time you'll ever catch me being a damsel in distress

To achieve this look I first did my eyes. On my eyelids is Ransom from the Urban Decay deluxe shadow box. The point of this look is to look like a drawing and 2-dimensional so I only applied the one color with no shading and no blending.

Can you see my nails? ;)

Next I outlined everything. I did this first with Jesse's Girl waterproof liquid eyeliner (entire post coming on this product soon!) This made application very easy, as I am NOT skilled with liquid eyeliner. However the effect wasn't as dark as I would have liked. So I went over top of it with Nyx Studio Liquid Liner in Intense black. 

For the tears I used 'peace' from the Urban Decay deluxe shadow box. 

I don't know if you can see in the two pictures above but I also did my nails. I again searched many different tutorials for a style I had seen online that makes your nails look like something out of a comic book. I first tried the technique of painting the nail red first and then tracing the edges in black. 

To put it simply...that did not work. In fact in order to get the staining off and start with a fresh slate, I had to soak my fingers in a hydrogen peroxide & water mix. Then, I tried the technique where you paint your nail black first then paint the red on top. That technique worked much better and I ended up doing that. However you do have to layer it because red on top of black ends up DARK. Then I topped them with a matte top coat.

Next I did the white dots. I did these with my Nyx jumbo pencil in milk. I just twisted the pencil to make the circles. Once it got too low I switched to applying it with a brush. As you can see, these are not even remotely perfect circles. If I have ONE regret from this costume, this is it. I would have spent more time applying the dots to make them look better. But the dots were the second to last thing and at this point my patience was spent.

I applied Nyx matte lipstick and then put the nyx liquid liner where my lips met to create the illusion of a shadow. I flicked little lines to create lip lines. Then I tried applying litle white spots for 'shine' but, it was hard! 

For my outfit, all I really knew was the comics involved bright colors...I didn't have anything that really matched the style but I just took simple, non-patterned pieces and color blocked them together. Here's what I came up with the first night. A purple sweater, white tank top, and teal maxi skirt. 

The first night, my makeup took my about 4 hours. It was a LOT of trial and error. I cannot stress enough how important it is to do a trial run if you attempt this makeup yourself. I ended up showing up late to the party! 

Luckily, the second night was a much quicker process. I finished it all in about an hour and a half. 

Also, I was wearing false lashes. However I don't know the brand or what kind I grabbed. 

This was the third time I did my makeup and I must say I am MUCH happier with these dots.

I'm much happier with the outfit I wore the other 3 times I put on my costume (yes I did this makeup 4 times in total)

A blue button down shirt, white tank top, and magenta pencil skirt. 

My friend went to the party dressed as a nudist on strike :P

My boyfriend dressed as Clark Kent to fit in with my theme

So, there you have it! My costume for Halloween this year. I will say that, not a lot of people knew who I was. Womp, womp, womp. When I tried explaining it the easy way "I'm a comic book girl!" they still asked which comic I was from. D'oh! Oh well, I tried!

How do you like it? Do you think I channeled Roy Lichtenstein well enough? 

What did you dress up as for Halloween?

Follow your bliss,

Ember Darling