What magnifying equipment do you use to work on your face?

Hair Removal Methods Do-It-Yourself Electrolysis
#1

Been working on body parts for a couple of years and now feel confident in my ability to start work on my face, but have completely drawn a blank on finding something to magnify my skin to the extent that I want.

I have tried up to 15x lit magnifying mirrors, with and without LED separate lighting, also tried usb microscope which although was fantastic held about 5 cm from my skin, it didnt give me the room I needed to work with the probe and tweezers. I have tried high level reading glasses, again not clear enough when looking in the mirror. Also a zoom webcam, yes it zooms but not to the extent I need
I really need something that will let me see my face in macro close up , I cant afford not to on this part of my body as I know I could live scars from incorrect insertions on my legs, I just couldnt on my face, but have drawn a complete blank on how to get round this problem and I cant even think of a proffession or situation where a person needs to see a hugely magnified view of their own face so I could find out what they use.

Has anyone ever tried using a lighted ring magnifier (as used in electrolysis salons) and placing it in between a mirror and your face, ie view your skin through a mirror through the magnifying lamp? I dont want to pay out for an expensive lamp if it doesnt work. I do wear spectacles for reading but they are only a low prescription. Could anyone please share how they work on their own faces ? thank you in advance

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#2

I’m your girl! I have by far done the MOST of this kind of work, that is facial self work in a mirror. I can tell you some of the challenges you will face.

First, you wont , at least initially, be able to work all areas of your face by yourself. I can do the chin easily or upper lip, cheeks become progressively more difficult the higher you go on yourr face and become very difficult near the sideburn areas. It can be done, but as your ability to see around corners is limited it becomes NECESSARY to use blend. Not all of your insertions will be wholly accurate when vision becomes a challenge, and blend offers the best safety factor for this kind of self work. Again, I would NOT attempt this with strait thermolysis, though that might be just fine on a leg or arm.
Under the chin and neck are hands down the most difficult places to treat yourself. I still all these years later have plenty of hair on my cneck I cant treat all that well myself ( even if I had time to, which I dont) .

The best visual setup I have had is to use a 4 inch 12X magnifying mirror and using the suction cups on the back of it to mount it directly on the lens of a circle lamp magnifier. It allows for fine angle adjustments otherwise not possible. Beyond that, it’s a matter of practise. You’ll never be able to work this way as fast as you can on somebody else or on a body part but you’ll get “pretty good” at determining the angle of insertion in a mirror with practise. You can also use cheapie reading style glasses to add a few more times magnification to what the magnifying mirror already provides.

The other think I’ve done is tried mounting the 4 inch magnifier on another flat mirror hung by string from the ceiling. That gave me the flexibility to lie down during treatments and improves accuracy a fair bit.
Happy DIY’ing.

Seana

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#3

Wow! Thank you Seanna for taking the time to reply with such an informative and knowledgeable post. I can see that you surely have had the experience and know what you are talking about, On reading most of this forum I can see that DIY on the face is not something usually recommended and I do understand the reasoning, ie someone purchasing a portable cheap unit and going in blindly without experience or knowledge. saying that I knew that even so there must have been someone who is also following this journey and there you are! thank you. I have tried the cheapie reading glasses and perhaps because of my own opticians prescribed lenses, which are different for each eye and an astigmatism, find the bought glasses blurry and distorted.

The circle magnifier sounds interesting, when you say fix a small mirror to the lens, do you mean on the inside of the
lamp, so that you are looking through the lamp from the top onto a small mirror trained on your face? I know I must sound really stupid but Im trying to figure out how it would all be set up.

I can see that you had success by suspending a mirror over your bed but I dont think that would work for me as Im not getting the magnification I crave already from the 15x magnifying mirror I have at present and to do so I have to be so close to it that there isnt room to use the probe or tweezers.

What I ideally want is the sort of images you see on a microscope, but I understand I may never get that when working on myself, as I mentioned I did purchase a usb microscope on a stand but the length of focus was just too near to be able to work. I really dont have anyone nearby to share this task with me, not that I’d trust anyone ever again after my bad experiences with 3 so called professionals, and I really dont have the cash to seek out and travel to big cities where I may find I trust. From trial and error I am using blend on a sterex sb machine , low currents, longer time is whats worked for me so far, I just need to get the magnification up to a standard I feel safe with. Again thank you Seanna, I really do appreciate your reply Xinte

#4

I hate to say it, but your vision may be the issue. When I put the mirror on the magnifier I put it on the inside, so there is no magnification effect from the circle lamp. You are looking in the mirror. However a little 12X magnifier isnt going to have as close a focal length as your 15X. Also I find bluriness with the higher magnifications that arent present with slightly lower magnification.The increased focal length gives you room to manipulate the tweezersand probe without hitting the mirror.

About the only way I can think of that might give you the magnification you are looking at and angle to match, might be with somethinglike decrtro’s electronic microscope which displays the image on a screen. With poor eyesight ( which electrolysis requires good vision) you will face challenges

#5

Hi Seana,
Thanks for your reply,
I dont believe my eyesight is the problem because as I said, I have prescription reading spectacles which were prescribed by my optician and with them my vision is 20/20 on anything detailed, and Ive also used loupes on my spectacles to do my body hair, and the spectacles are only a very low prescription.
Perhaps it is the quality of the mirrors I have, in that Ive heard that cheaper magnifying mirrors somewhat distort the image and only give a limited distance.Or perhaps Im asking too much to see the follicle in macro and should be content with what I can see.
I have tried an electronic usb microscope albeit not expensive and whilst it does work if held close to the skin, doesnt give me enough room to work with probe and tweezers, I suspect there will be wonderful medical grade types of these microscopes but they come at a huge price which I cannot justify to my budget. I will continue to try to find a solution, but I think with my financial restrictions I may be unsuccessful, thanks again for reply
Xinte