Being a DIY (Do It Yourself) type of person, I took the cue of following and article describing the process of cleaning your dSLR sensor without having to spend more than $100 (the price of one of the best cleaning kits available for the task).
The gist of the article is that the natural property of Visible Dusts’ famous cleaning kit, the Sensor Brush, can be attained by using a regular, synthetic nylon cosmetics brush.
Suffice to say that the article was convincing enough to make me a believer. Today, I went with my mom to the department store in search of this so called “mask brush.”
And the trouble we had to go through for a brush really made me glad I wasn’t a woman.
To make a long story short, I wasn’t able to get it… it seems (at least in Rustan’s) the brush size needed was quite difficult to find. Out of all the cosmetics shops we visited, a lot had synthetic nylon brushes with perfect consistency, but never had the size or thickness needed for the task. Hopefully, other malls would not let me down.
Another problem is the natural ignorance of salespeople. All but two shops had any idea what I was talking about (mask brush); good thing I had saved the article with pictures into my PDA. We showed it to them, and they ended up showing us all of their brush lines. It was quite hilarious the attention we were getting as all of the saleswomen of a particular area came in to try to help me find what I was looking for, but had no idea that it wasn’t at all going to be used for cosmetics.
In Rustan’s, there were two people/shops who understood immediately what I was looking for. And I found out it was called a “mask brush” indeed, or alternatively: a “concealer brush.” The first person who knew what I was looking for was a lady in a facial clinic in the Crossings dept. store. She even showed me the brush (which was perfect) but it was already used, and wasn’t for sale. The second would be in Watercolors, but they were selling it as part of a set… which costs 8k PhP.
Though I wasn’t able to get the brush, I wasn’t disappointed ‘cuz at least now I know that it was possible to get… just a matter of timing. I’ve given my contact number to the salespeople to call me in case they would have stocks for sale. I really wish that Watercolor lady would call me back since their brush really was perfect… the bristles were even finer than that of the lady from the facial place.
Anyway’s, I’ll still be keeping my eyes peeled for other sources. If anyone reading this has come across a good candidate for the brush, then please don’t hesitate to leave a comment and details as to where you can purchase the brush (Metro Manila only please)
Going back to the title, the sheer number and types of brushes available is beyond my comprehension… what do women need all those brushes for? And the prices… my God!. A fine-bristled synthetic nylon brush from MAC costs 1.9k, and animal-hair natural fiber brushes from Shu Uemura was close to 3k a pop!
But then again, the Sensor Brush (or kit) costs 5.6k – so, as the article says, it may not be cheap per se, but definitely cheaper than the Sensor Brush.
In any case I’m still speechless about the nuances of the world of women. They have their issues with clothes, shoes, etc. This whole “cosmetics” thing is no doubt one of them, but apparently there’s even a whole sub-“world” contained in it. No wonder women are used to “thinking too much,” because the female culture requires them to by default hehehehe. No wonder they’re crazy… they’ve been driven crazy from these things… and if that weren’t enough, they have to put up with us men too! If that doesn’t drive anyone crazy, I dunno what will.