Make Up For Ever H104 Artist Face Color (Highlighter) Review, Photos, Swatches
H104
Make Up For Ever H104 Artist Face Color ($23.00 for 0.17 oz.) is a very light beige with subtle, warm undertones and a satin finish. It brightened without looking particularly chalky or ashy on me, but it was still a much starker shade against my skin tone; it would work better paired with blush or contour or on fairer complexions. It had good pigmentation paired with a moderately dense, very smooth texture that blended out nicely on the skin and had a natural finish. I could really see someone who likes very subtle illuminators enjoying this as it definitely reflected light but without using a lot of shimmer. On me, the highlighter wore well for eight hours.
Overview of the Formula
The formula is supposed to have “intense color payoff” with a “long-lasting finish.” The range is split into three types–Highlighters, Sculpting Powders, and Blushes–that is easy to determine by the first letter of the shade name (H for Highlighter, S for Sculpting, and B for Blush). There are three finishes–matte, shimmer, and pearl but was less obvious. In fact, the majority of the “matte” shades were more like semi-matte or natural matte where there were no distinctive shimmer particles but they seemed to take on the natural finish of the skin, which gave the “mattes” a particularly seamless finish on the skin but might be dewier on oilier skin types than desired. None of the 34 shades available were frosted or metallic except three of the highlighters (H100, H106, H312).
The pigmentation ranged from medium to opaque, depending largely on the shade, though they were always buildable if they were not opaque in a single layer. Some of the deeper, more matte shades were less forgiving and took more effort to diffuse and blend, even when I used a lighter hand or a more feathery brush. The texture was smooth, velvety, and moderately dense without any powderiness or dustiness in the pan. The formula has lasted between eight and ten hours on me.
You can view swatches of all of the blushes, all of the highlighters, and all of the sculpting powders in the Swatch Gallery.
FURTHER READING: Formula Overview for details on general performance and characteristics (like scent).
Top Dupes
- Tarte Highlight (Tarteist) (LE, ) is darker (95% similar).
- Colour Pop Releve (LE, $5.00) is more shimmery (95% similar).
- NARS Highlight (PiP, ) is less shimmery, brighter (95% similar).
- NYX Soft Light (P, $5.00) is less shimmery (95% similar).
- MAC Warm Rose (LE, $34.00) is cooler (90% similar).
- YSL Lumiere Divine (LE, ) is more shimmery (90% similar).
- NARS Paloma Highlight (PiP, ) is darker (90% similar).
- Givenchy Moonlight Saison (P, $52.00) is brighter, cooler (90% similar).
- Too Faced Light Cocoa (PiP, ) is darker, warmer (85% similar).
- Kat Von D Lucid (PiP, ) is darker, warmer (85% similar).
Formula Overview
$23.00/0.17 oz. - $135.29 Per Ounce
The formula is supposed to have "intense color payoff" with a "long-lasting finish." The range is split into three types--Highlighters, Sculpting Powders, and Blushes--that is easy to determine by the first letter of the shade name (H for Highlighter, S for Sculpting, and B for Blush). There are three finishes--matte, shimmer, and pearl but was less obvious. In fact, the majority of the "matte" shades were more like semi-matte or natural matte where there were no distinctive shimmer particles but they seemed to take on the natural finish of the skin, which gave the "mattes" a particularly seamless finish on the skin but might be dewier on oilier skin types than desired. None of the 34 shades available were frosted or metallic except three of the highlighters (H100, H106, H312).
The pigmentation ranged from medium to opaque, depending largely on the shade, though they were always buildable if they were not opaque in a single layer. Some of the deeper, more matte shades were less forgiving and took more effort to diffuse and blend, even when I used a lighter hand or a more feathery brush. The texture was smooth, velvety, and moderately dense without any powderiness or dustiness in the pan. The formula has lasted between eight and ten hours on me.
You can view swatches of all of the blushes, all of the highlighters, and all of the sculpting powders in the Swatch Gallery.
Browse all of our Make Up For Ever Artist Face Color - Highlighter swatches.
Ingredients
H104
PPermanent. $23.00.
This would be lovely on fairer complexions!
Definitely!
That this has a satin finish as opposed to a flat matte finish, I think makes this one very useful for subtle highlighting, like you said. Probably far too light and cool-toned for my skintone. Hopefully, there’s one like this that is more golden/warm-toned coming up that does just as nicely!
Fingers crossed 🙂 At this point, my memory is failing so I can’t say for sure.
This colour is stunning – I think the finish makes it so much nicer than a matte highlighter! I actually quite like this compared to a gold, rose-gold shade.
I do like it more than totally matte highlighters!
These really need to be instore for proper assessment. Your choice of the word stark is both true and unexpected. Some of that may have to do with expectations. We expect highlighter to have shimmer. When it doesn’t, somehow it’s more noticeable. Whether you are wearing ROTS or Guerlain, your skin looks wonderfully perfected, but like skin. This highlighter makes the foundation look like foundation, rather than skin, if that makes any sense at all. With so many choices in these mufes, it is pretty difficult to get what is optimal for one personally, despite the fab Temptalia swatches. The more I see here, the less inclined I am to want to order online.
I hope you can find them in store!
This is a much more refined highlighter than a lot of the ones we’ve seen, because it’s not too glittery. A really good product.
Glad you liked it, Genevieve!
I like this a lot! Sometimes I would really like a not shimmery/glittery highlight and NARS Nico is a bit flat, I think, though I do like it. This would probably be perfect for those more understated days. Am adding it to my wishlist.
I’ll have to test it on me, it might be worth it if it’s light enough. Honestly, the pan kinda looks like a powder foundation for my skin tone, lol.
Knowing this is lighter than Kat Von D Lucid gives me hope that I could wear this one as well.
I could see this working really well with fair skin tones!