Had a bit of free time in between working on photos for another post (spoiler: it's contact lenses again hehe), so I thought I'd squeeze in a quick review of a recent local drugstore find—the Careline Graph-Ink Liner ✨
As with most Filipinos, local drugstore brands were my first foray into makeup. Ever Bilena, Careline, Nichido, Fashion21. The quality wasn't that great but they did the job, plus I had to make do with what I could afford as a student. This was around 2007 (I'm old...). Filipino drugstore brands have grown by leaps and bounds since then, especially in the last few years. I'm amazed at just how much they've improved!
Quick backstory on how I found out about this product: I ran out of eyeliner and needed to buy a replacement so I could shoot for a review the next day. I didn't want to order online because that would take a minimum of 2~3 days, so I thought maybe I could check the nearby drugstore. (Tbh I didn't want to go outside just to buy eyeliner in this pandemic 😠so sinabay na rin namin yung pag-grocery lol.)
Here's the thing—I was actually looking for the Blythe Cosmetics Eyeliner which, coincidentally, is also from Careline. It wasn't available in the two places I looked, but what I did find was the Graph-Ink Liner. Thinking that the formula would be similar since they're from the same brand, I went ahead and bought it.
The Graph-Ink Liner has a felt-tip applicator, but it's very similar to a brush-tip. Just like a brush-tip liner, I can make the lines as thick or as thin as I want. This makes it easier to draw the style of eyeliner wing that I like. It's great for tightlining too! That said, brush pens are a little harder to control, and because the tip of the Graph-Ink is so brush-like, it takes a bit of practice to master if you're not used to it.
The color is a true black with a matte finish. For me it looks just a little bit shiny, but not too much. I can live with it. True to its claims, this liner is waterproof, smudge-proof, and long-lasting. It literally does not move. Even without using primer this liner doesn't smudge or transfer on my oily lids.
There's a small downside to this though—once it dries (and it dries super quickly) it's hard to fix if you make a mistake. This is pretty minor if you think about all the good things about it, but it's good to keep it in mind.
If the liner does fade, it doesn't smudge or smear. It just kind of flakes and crumbles off. The first photo above was taken after 3 swipes with a cotton pad soaked in micellar cleansing water, and the second photo was after 6 swipes. Talk about staying power! Personally, I use a two-phase makeup remover to make sure I take everything off. (Just a tip: the Nivea Double Eye Makeup Remover works really well!)
But here's the most important part: it's only ₱190! For a product that does the job and does it so well, that's a steal. It's also SUPER accessible—it's available on Shopee, in supermarkets, drugstores, etc. Careline is pretty much everywhere in the Philippines so it's almost impossible not to find.
As a bonus, I thought I'd include a short comparison with the Blythe version which I was using previously. As I mentioned, Blythe is a makeup line under the Careline brand. I found out about their Eyeliner Duo Stamp from a friend who posted about it on IG. I got curious because they said the staying power was comparable to K-Palette's. And since it was just ₱185, I thought I'd try it for myself. And honestly? It was just okay for me. Saks lang. Of course I was happy about finding an eyeliner that was inexpensive and worked well, but the reason why I couldn't get myself to like it 100% was the thick felt-tip applicator.
Here are the Graph-Ink Liner (left) and the Blythe Eyeliner (right) side by side. I was right in thinking that their formulas would be the same, but I wasn't expecting their applicators to be so different. They're both felt-tip, but for the Blythe one it feels more like a marker than a brush. It's thicker so I had a hard time drawing the end of my eyeliner wing. The tip also became worn out over time, especially because it picked up a lot of my glitter eyeshadows from use, and that made it harder to draw a clean line as I kept using it.
Another thing I don't like is that it comes with an eyeliner wing (?) stamp on the other end. One time I tried using it out of curiosity, and the result was just really thick, uneven eyeliner. I decided to just not use the stamp anymore, but whenever I used this eyeliner it was a little annoying when I'd open the wrong side.
My go-to winged eyeliner look, done using the Graph-Ink Liner. I like making the end of the wing thin and pointy, so the thin tip of the Graph-Ink works so much better for me. And with only ₱5 difference, I was more than okay with just switching to this one. My only gripe is that this product only comes in black, while the Blythe liner has a brown version. Hoping Careline would make a brown version for this one as well!
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