My new foundation crush is Hourglass Immaculate liquid-to-powder foundation. It's absolutely incredible and has great coverage and a beautiful texture and finish. It's pricey, though, like all Hourglass products, at $55 for a bottle.
I apply it by pumping a little on my fingertip, smearing it on problem areas and quickly buffing it in with the Real Techniques buffing brush-- no time for putting it on the back of your hand, it dries fast. I haven't tried mixing any luminizers into this but I imagine that would extend the drying time of this, if you need it. It's lightweight and mattifying as all get-out, only needing a tiny bit of powder several hours later to eliminate shine and touch up coverage (if you need it like I do).
Some people have said they can't apply concealer on top of this but I've had no problem blending my L'Oréal trublend crayon concealer over the spots that need more coverage, and both have a skin-like matte finish and neither look cakey when applied and blended properly, so everything works well. Setting this with any of the ambient lighting powders makes this a joy to wear.
SEE HOW AMAZING
After several hours, still lookin good. My spots and hyperpigmentation are peeking through but they do that anyway-- I don't like building up coverage to "unnaturally perfect" because letting a little show helps me a lot with my insecurity when I go without makeup.
It's a little shiny but for 8+ hours that's really good wear time. Mattifying powder cleans it right up, if you need it.
There are only two things I dislike about this foundation and can't seem to fix-- it transfers if I scratch my nose with my sleeve or wipe something off my face with a napkin. Not a huge amount off my face, but it's definitely noticeable on my sleeve. Also it took me s while to figure out how I wanted to apply this. I started out using my fingers, but my skincare products were making everything "pill" like an old sweater, then I tried a traditional foundation brush which left things a little too heavy and it seemed to oxidize a lot, which hadn't happened before (or since). Maybe the realtechniques brush is just specially awesome, but it's really the only way I've found to really seamlessly work with this formula. I also tried the e.l.f. flat-top powder brush and it worked pretty well, but definitely a second place far behind the realtechniques brush.
TIP: Put in the work to make your foundations work. It's so worth it, and often it's not even a lot of work, just a lot of trial and error.