Author: Davina

Davina ~ Dawn Devine is a belly dance costume designer, dance instructor and author of more than a dozen publications on Middle Eastern dance.

Categories
General Makeup and Appearance

Makeup Monday: High End vs. Low End

YouTube Makeup Videos

You’ve heard the term Beauty Guru floating around the web.  You’ve probably seen lists of “Beauty Guru’s to Follow,” or articles on the “Best of Beauty on YouTube.” These days, these ladies and gentlemen are mentioned everywhere, in blogs, articles around the web, and even in mainstream fashion magazines!  You might already be totally hooked on some favorites and have subscribed to their YouTube channels. At their best, YouTube beauty gurus are fun, informative, and inspirational.  At worst, they are fake, cheesy, annoying, or simply tragically messy. 

High-End/Low End Makeup battles on YouTube.Today, I would like to draw your attention to a particular style of video that is popular amongst the beauty guru set – the department store vs. drugstore showdown.  

The mission of this style of video is to provide visible proof of these three beauty truths:

  1. Application technique is more important than makeup quality.   
  2. Good tools are essential, and are available at every price point.
  3. There are low end dupes for virtually every high end cosmetic product.

The formula for this style of video is pretty straight forward. A beauty guru will do the research to hunt down duplicate products in from both high-end and drugstore cosmetic lines.  They will then film themselves applying their makeup, so you can see the technique they use to create the final look.  The viewer has the opportunity to do a side-by-side comparison of the look, products, and technique, which they can then use to inform their purchasing decisions.

Here is a sampling from the many-many “High-end – Low-end,” “Department Store vs Drugstore,” or “Fancy vs Frugal” style videos available on YouTube today.  This collection of videos includes some of my favorite Guru’s in action, and is a great place to start if you’re interested in watching this style of video. 

Good luck in your hunt for the perfect products, tools and techniques to up your makeup game!

Dawn Devine ~ Davina
Jan. 18, 2016

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Emily Noel – One of the most well respected beauty guru’s for her professional presentation method and honest reviews, Emily lets you know the prices at the time of filming so you really get a sense of the real cost differences between both sides.  Although her look she creates is a day look, these same products can be effectively used to create a stage-worthy performance face.

Zebrena – If your coloring is more fiery, Florida based Zebrina is your gal.  She’s freckled redhead with bright blue eyes and a passion for makeup.  This tutorial takes a widely popular high-end eye shadow palette, the Urban Decay Naked Smokey, and takes it head-to-head with the much more affordable Makeup Revolution Iconic Smokey Palette.

Jasmine Hand – High End Glam Look from Australian Makeup Artist – They eye look she creates in this demonstration/tutorial could be easly amped up for stage belly dance wear.  Bonus, the drugstore products she uses are widely available in Australia, so my Aussie friends might get some great ideas for future purchases.

Michelle of ReadySetMakeup – This is a more bright and light makeup look from this exotic beauty.  Her primer/foundation routine is very similar to what I use and works. The drugstore products she uses are widely available in the US.

Shannon of Shaaanxo – This lovely New Zealand blonde bombshell presents a smokey eye “clubbing” look that would look great to wear to attend an event, or emphasized with brighter highlight, red lips, and bigger eyeliner for stage.

Angie of Hot and Flashy – Although a slightly different format than the rest on this list, what Angie brings to the table is a more mature point of view.  Middle aged skin has it’s set of challenges and issues, and this beauty guru is unafraid to get right to the heart of the issue.  

Categories
General Makeup and Appearance

Happy New Year – Website Changes and Plans for 2016

Hello Gang – Happy New Year!!!

This blog post kicks of a new series for 2016: Makeup Monday!

Throughout 2015, I have been working on the forthcoming book, Becoming a Belly Dancer: From Student to Stage, I realized that my “makeup skills set” was better than I had pegged it. On a scale from one to ten, I always fancied that I was a good solid 4. However, it turns out, that all the classes I’ve taken with professional makeup artists, my experience in modeling, dance, and theater, and that my skills-set might actually be somewhere around a 7, or somewhere between B+ to A-.

As Sara, Poppy, Alisha and I developed the content, it became clear that only a FRACTION of our combined knowledge about makeup could fit in our designated pages. But rather than let that content disappear or hoard it to ourselves, we’ve decided to share the info via our blogs.

Thank you for your continued support of my publications and projects! I hope you find these makeup articles interesting and inspiring!

Happiest of New Years!
Dawn Devine ~ Davina
January 4, 2015

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Categories
General

Hot Travel Tip – Portable Pharmacy

This winter season I’m doing a lot of traveling.  I went on a family holiday cruise to Mexico in mid December and next week, I’m heading out again to Vegas to connect with friends who are attending CES – Consumer Electronics Show.  In Las Vegas, however, I’m NOT attending CES!  Instead, I’m going to be working on my new 2016 blogging project, “Makeup Mondays,” where I talk about products and techniques that will help you up your performance makeup game.  As I unpack my bags, and then repack, I thought I would share an indispensable item that permanently live in my my travel kit.  It’s not often that one little kit can make life easier and provide piece of mind.  What is it?  My customized portable pharmacy!

PortablePharmacy

 

My portable and highly customized portable pharmacy is super simple to put together.  All you need is a week long pill organizer with enough capacity for three days of product. I choose my essential products, the ones that make my life more comfortable, and gather them together.  I used my handy P-Touch label maker to mark the product name and dosing directions.  I popped the labels onto the compartments and then load it up.  And it’s done!

Yep – there’s a typo on there too!  I know that the P-Touch label tape isn’t a precious commodity, but really, I didn’t think a typo was worth fixing. (Life Lesson: Wear glasses when using the P-Touch!)  I choose to leave the Sunday compartment unlabelled so that I can include something unusual for me that might be trip specific. For the cruise, I took along some dramamine, and just popped a hand written note into that compartment with the dosing.

During my cruise, I had a little too much fun dancing, and my old creaky knees were grateful that I had everything on hand that I needed to cope with up to 6 hours of dancing every day!  This was so useful, I’ve decided to break down and make a second one to keep in my dance kit too!

Happy Travels,
Davina ~ Dawn Devine
December 28, 2015

You can get weekly pill caddies at virtually any pharmacy, grocery store, or big-box discounter.  Here are two I am considering for my dance kit: Amazon.com or
Amazon.com.  Need a P-Touch?   I use my label machine all the time, I couldn’t imagine life without it!

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San Diego Sunrise on the Holland America Veendam, December 2015.

Categories
Belly Dance Publications

First Proof Arrives – Becoming a Belly Dancer: From Student to Stage

Hello Gang,

Just wanted to touch base with all of my friends, family, fans, and followers and say:

Happy Holidays!!!

Over the past two months, I’ve been putting in long hours working on a tremendous new book project, “Becoming a Belly Dancer: From Student to Stage.” Sara Shrapnell, author of “Teaching Belly Dance,”photographer Alisha Westerfeld, international professional belly dancer Poppy Maya and myself, have teamed up to create a text book for the art of belly dance.This isn’t a book about how to dance, but rather, it’s a book about how to manage all of the processes that go into crafting a good performance.

Over the past two months, I’ve been putting in long hours working on a tremendous new book project, “Becoming a Belly Dancer: From Student to Stage.”   Sara Shrapnell, author of “Teaching Belly Dance,”  photographer Alisha Westerfeld, international professional belly dancer Poppy Maya and myself, have teamed up to create a text book for the art of belly dance.  This isn’t a book about how to dance, but rather, it’s a book about how to manage all of the processes that go into crafting a good performance. 

This was a big week for our team.  After nearly a year of work, we reached an important milestone.  Our very first proof arrived! 

Although we are a few months away from being finished, we decided that it was time to get the manuscript printed to ensure that we are moving forward on a good trajectory.  At this stage of the game, we are looking to identify which photographs need improving, either by adjusting the brightness and contrast, or by going back to the original color shot and adjusting the tonal qualities of the various colors.  Sometimes, something that looks very spectacular in color, like a pink and blue costume for instance, can turn muddy when converted to black and white. Especially if the blue and the pink tones convert to the exact same shade of gray! 

As we massage the text, work the photos, and play with the layout, the book is finally taking shape.  I’ll follow up with more details of what info is included in this book in future posts.  But in the meantime, I’m just so very happy to be able to share this spectacular moment! 

Happy Holidays Indeed!!

Yours in Dance and Costuming,
Dawn Devine ~ Davina
Dec. 9, 2015

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Categories
Assiut/Assuit

Who’s That Girl in Assiut? Terpsichore

As many of you know, I have an ever growing collection of vintage postcards of lovely ladies, actresses, singers, and dancers lavishly dressed in assiut. However, I’ve never been able to land my hands on a hard-copy of this incredible image. I first spotted this photo of an unknown dancer many years ago during an internet search. But, I could never hunt down an original.  This appears to be a theatrical post-card, widely used in the first quarter of the 20th century as a keepsake for fans after stage and cinema performance.  Due to the age of the photo, this image is in the public domain, and consequently, there are thousands of digital copies floating around the web.  Our  mystery beauty is wearing an absolutely fabulous pair of assiut harem pants embellished with beads and fringe.  The dancer signed this post-card with her stage name or the title of her role, Terpsichore, a popular theme for early-modern art dancers.  Her lovely ensemble has all of the hallmarks of orientalist costumes typical of the era from 1905 – 1920.  I keep seeing her around the web, floating across Pinterest boards and Tumblr feeds, but never on a sale page.  Someday, I hope to make her a part of my permanent collection.  Until then, I’m happy to admire this digital version.   Be inspired.

Dawn Devine ~ Davina
Nov. 15, 2015

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