[Review] NYX HD Studio Photogenic Foundation

I've been wearing this foundation 5 months now. It's been my safety net lately so I think it's only fair to give this foundation a proper review and share it's story.

Honestly whenever I hear the name NYX my mind instantly wonders about colorful products. Yup, I'm in love with their eyeshadows, blushes, lipsticks but never really interested on their complexion products. That is, until they launched their HD lines. And as a camera whore, I'm a sucker for every foundation that promised flawless looking face in camera as well as in real life.

NYX HD Studio Photogenic Foundation gives you a high definition effect by covering the skin and a light diffusing effect. It also claimed to give a skincare benefits where it promotes collagen regeneration, reduces line and wrinkles and also skin rejuvenation.

Obviously I didn't purchased this for the skincare benefits. I don't even care about skincare benefits in my makeup (if any). So this review isn't going to cover that department. So let's call this product the way it is, which is a foundation and not a skincare.



As a foundation, this products claimed to give perfect coverage that makes it suitable for catwalk or sidewalk as written on the top and bottom of the box.


Packaging comes in a slim opaque bottle that's made of plastic. So no need to worried if you're a type of person who tends to drop things. It also has a pump (hallelujah!), a good controllable pump. It may look slim and small but you actually get more products inside which is 33mL where most foundations generally give you 30mL.


This foundation gives a light to medium coverage and it has a dewy finish. I really REALLY love the finishing of this foundation. It blends very well into my skin, looks like a second skin. It makes my skin looks flawless. I don't think my skin needs that much coverage right now, but I'll let you be the judge.


My skin is not perfect, I know. There are some acne scars that needs to be covered, redness that needs to be evened out as well as few bumps just because it's the time of the month. I don't think those are major and this foundation managed to conceal all those flaws. However if you have severe acne reaction or hyper pigmentation like my lovely undereye circle above, it will be more than this foundation can handle and a concealer might be required.

Below is my picture with the foundation on half of my face. Can you guess which part of my face covered with foundation?

Can you see? The right part of my face in this picture looks more even and it also appears more glowy compare to the left part. As I said earlier, this foundation has a dewy finish. It looks like a healthier version of my skin. Still, I highly recommend to set this foundation with powder since glow could easily mistaken as oily. For me, since I want to keep the glow, I only powdered my T-zone area which is the area where I get oily the most. Other thing to keep in my mind, considering this foundation is dewy already, I'd lay low on the highlighter. In fact, I ditch my highlighter everytime I'm wearing this foundation.

The performance of this foundation is another satisfaction. It lasts me for about 5-6 hours before I get extra shine on my nose. It even lasts longer is I spend my day in a cool weather.

My shade is Natural (03) which is a warm undertone although it's not as yellow as MAC Studio Fix Fluid. NYX's shade is slightly beige-y but it still in a warm undertone family. This shade matches me well despite the lack of yellow undertone in it.

I bought this foundation at NYX counter at Metro department store because I really wanted to find the perfect match and reduced the risk of picking the wrong shade from the internet. There are only 4 (or maybe 5?) shades available in the counter out of 8 shades, which can make finding your shade a little bit challenging. I was lucky enough that I found my perfect match.

Thanks to the bad lighting at the mall, I picked a wrong color the first time I purchased this foundation (Yup! I have two bottle of this). I picked Sand Beige (04) and it's too light for my skin.

The texture of this foundation is quite runny and it spreads so easily. My favorite tool to apply this foundation, other than my fingers, would be a sponge or a stippling brush. Basically you want to dab this foundation instead of swiping it. I don't recommend using a regular paddle brush, otherwise you'll be blending forever.

I can't say a lot about the "HD-ness" of this foundation, considering I have never been around any HD tools. But I love the appearance of this foundation on most pictures that I took with or without flash. This doesn't perform very well under minimal-lighting-and-harsh-flash-light, due to lack of yellow-ness in it (flash photography accentuate redness and yellow works to minimize the redness) but that's a rare case (like when I snap picture of me in the car at night). Other than that, I have no complain at all. I've been wearing this foundation pretty much everywhere, on casual as well as special occasion and I'm satisfied with the result, on and off camera.

This foundation retails for around IDR 285k at the counter. I know it's a little bit expensive, especially for NYX that's famous for affordable product. But it totally worth the price. Also you can purchase it at some online stores for around IDR150k, which is more affordable.

Here's some pictures of me wearing this foundation in different occasion. I believe you've seen some of it already.

All in all, I'm deeply in love with this foundation. And repurchase I will.