If you live in our part of Europe, then you probably know it's Pust season or week. It's a time when people dress in costumes to scare away the dreaded winter, at least that's what we tell the children. It started on Saturday and tomorrow is the most important day, when particularly children wear masks and go door to door, while the rest of us eat a ton of doughnuts (#noragrets). Basically it's our version of Halloween. I'm very boring when it comes to costumes and my ideas are always last minute, so I often do the easiest thing for me - Snow White. I have dark hair, pale skin, so the only thing I need is a red lipstick, a red bow, blue t-shirt and yellow skirt, which I just have in my closet (well, I found the skirt in mum's old stuff as I'm not fond of yellow).

I made the red bow myself and it's a super simple process. If you don't know how to do a bow, I found a tutorial that shows a similar method to the one I used. I pinned the bow onto a red headband that I also made myself a long time ago (tutorial here, but you can buy one), however you can just pin the bow straight on the hair, though if you have long hair like me, you'll see further on why it's better to have an elastic headband.

Makeup is simple and very close to what I normally wear. A pale foundation is a must, I used Nars Sheer Glow in Siberia with their Chantilly concealer. Flushed cheeks are a necessity as well and I used a bright, warm pink by Catrice called Think Pink (no need to be frugal with it). I kept the eyes very neutral with white on the lids, taupe and deep brown in the crease for definition and a black eyeliner close to the lashes (no flick, so I got a more rounded shape of the eye). I have a make up breakdown at the end of the post.

I prepared three different drugstore lipstick choices. I'm wearing L'Oreal's Reds Exclusive in Blake, which is blue toned and the most expensive at 13 € per tube. Catrice has a classic red called MATTtador for 4.29 € and if you're afraid to go full on red, Essence has a sheerer choice All you need is Red for 2.49€ (another is called Adorable Matt, but more pigmented. A nice sheer lipstick choice is also Bourjois 21 Rouge Making of). You can just use a lip liner, which is cheaper especially if you don't have any reds in your collection. Essence's Femme Fatale is so creamy that it feels like a lipstick and costs 1.19 €, while Catrice has a deeper red called …040 and a Cherry on the Top for 2.29 € and Bourjois has a Ruby-Woo-kind-of shade called Rouge Soyeux for about 6 €. You can find more red lipsticks, glosses and lip liners here.

Source: http://hero.wikia.com/wiki/Snow_White

Disney's Snow White has a lot shorter hair than me, so I started by curling the hair with a 2.5 cm (1 inch) curler and left the curls tight. I proceeded by tucking the ends behind the hair band to get the Snow White length. It's way better when you do this with curled hair, so you have some additional volume and it looks more real. A few pins or hair clips here and there will come handy as well. If you're one of the girls that sports a "lob" then just curl the hair with a straightener or curler, but comb out the curls.

And there you have it -  a quick and easy Snow White. I could also add red stripes to the sleeves of my T-Shirt, but I didn't want to ruin it. 

  

BASE

Max Factor All Day Primer 

NARS Sheer Glow in Siberia 

NARS Radiant Cream Concealer in Chantilly

E.l.f. HD Powder 

Catrice Defining Blush 040 Think Pink 

NYX Blush Taupe

Jemma Kidd Dewy Glow Radiance Creme Ice Gold 

EYES: 

Lancome Hypnôse Custom-Wear Volume Waterproof 

Essence Eyeliner Pen Waterproof 

Essence Big Bright Eyes 01 Highlight it...Nude 

Catrice Absolute Matt Eyeshadow Palette 010 Eyes Wide Matt 

LIPS

L'Oreal Color Riché Pure Reds Collection Exclusive Blake 

Catrice Longlasting Lip Liner 040 ...And the Cherry on the Top 

I hope you enjoyed this post and to my fellow Slovenes I wish many doughnuts tomorrow. Have a great day!

I've talked about inexpensive studio set-up for beauty blog photography in the first part, so today it's time for some quick tips on taking photos with a smartphone. I only own an ancient Nikon Coolpix S200 with 7.1 pixels, which takes rubbish pictures and currently my Samsung Galaxy S2 is the best thing I have (update: since January 2015 I'm using Galaxy S5). Maybe if I have a windfall I'll buy a proper new camera, but for now what I have suffices. As you might imagine there are no fancy settings there, however, there are a few things to tweak when taking product pictures. Of course proper cameras all have the same functions, as these are just basic settings.

Focus

Now for the Captain Obvious advice - keep the camera steady (as I said in the previous post, I use a box instead of a tripod) and focus on the item you are taking a picture of. On my camera I have to do this manually, but some have that automatic like Samsung Galaxy S4 that I was using for these pictures (which I borrowed. It only reminded me how much I'd like a new phone).

Take a lot of pictures with different settings and from different angles

You don't want to transfer the whole thing to a computer only to see it's out of focus or just bad. Also take pictures at the highest resolution because they are easier to edit later. 

Again if you have any helpful tips write them in the comments. I also wouldn't object if you recommended me an affordable, but decent camera. I hope this was helpful and have a great day.

I don't own a fancy state-of-the-art camera nor can I boast with an elaborate studio with professional lighting or skills for that matter. In fact, for the last two years I've been taking pictures with my mobile phone Samsung Galaxy S2 (update: since January 2015 I'm using Galaxy S5). My pictures aren't even close to professional, but they are decent, so today I'm sharing my knowledge that I acquired during my years of blogging, while trying to keep the whole thing as budget friendly as possible. 

I've been planning on doing this series forever, but since I'm a complete amateur, that fact always pulled me back, but sod it, here it is. It is in three parts: first dealing with location, background and lighting, in the second I share tips about taking pictures (with a smartphone) and I discuss editing in the last part.

Let begin with the background. You can just take pictures wherever you like as long as it has good lighting. Outdoors, indoors, with a cluttered background or not - it really doesn't matter, just make sure it's not too distracting so it might take focus from the product(s). White background is a nice, classic, simple option and it's best for accurately showing the shades of the products, so if you're determined about having a white, clean background, but the place where you take your pictures is anything but white, the solution is damn simple - large sheets of paper. They are cheap as chips and when they get dirty, you simply replace them. Currently I use one A2 sheet for the background, but before I've done renovations and the desk was beech, I used another one for a base (by the way, I suggest a thicker paper, I buy them in Müller). Of course, I don't always use a white background, I prefer to mix it up a little and different textures in the back can really make a picture.

I highly suggest taking pictures in natural light, however, avoid direct sunlight as it's quite a harsh light and strong shadows are cast, not to mention it's too yellow and it'll compromise the accuracy of colours and swatches. Indoors take pictures by the window, but try to avoid hours with strong sunlight. Pictures in this post were taken during a storm meaning there was very little of natural light, but as you can see it can be done even without an expensive camera and lighting.

Where I take pictures the source of natural light (a.k.a. the window) is on the left. So how to avoid it looking darker on the right? There is a very simple, low cost solution that I learned from Makeup Savvy and here is a whole post dedicated to it. So to make an improvised reflector, take a piece of cardboard or an old folder, basically anything that has a hard surface. Now go to the kitchen, grab some aluminium foil and tape it on one side of the chosen surface. You'll place this on the side opposite of the natural light source and it will reflect the light, making that part of the setting as well as the image lighter.

If you find your location is not light enough (like in storm conditions as in my case), use an additional source of light. My improvised "studio" light is a work/office lamp I got from Ikea for 15€ and it's bloody brilliant because I can set it the way I want to (btw for Slovene readers, there is a very similar one in Merkur for 13 €, I checked yesterday). I have another lamp as back-up in case it's still not light enough and it's again a cheap, simple night light that I purchased a million years ago. 

Use a cool daylight light bulb -  I have a Phillips Economy Twister Cool Daylight (15W, E27), which was about 6 € in a local hardware store, but I plan to get a brighter one. So many brands make these, it doesn't even have to be this shape, LED's are nice as well, just make sure it's cool daylight and not warm (warm means yellow toned), somewhere around 5000 - 6500K is great.
Edit (2.1.2015): I did get brighter/stronger bulbs from the same brand. Both are 23W and when I have both on, it looks almost like day. I have taken several pictures at night by now and they are just as good. Picture of the bulb with the packaging here.

This is optional and I usually don't do it - to make the lighting a bit softer, so it doesn't cast strong shadows (especially in the case of strong lighting), you'll need to make an improvised soft box - I use one layer of tissue taped over the mouth of the lamp. White T-shirt works as well. 

And that's the improvised studio done. See how simple it is? 

If you have any tips as well, I'd love the read them in the comments.

Part two dealing with how to take photos for a beauty blog (with a smartphone) will follow soon. Until then have a great day!