I just can't get along with rubber mascara brushes

Call me old-fashioned, but I've recently come to the realisation that rubber mascara brushes are not for me. Unfortunately, I seem to have reached this conclusion at a time when almost every new mascara on the market comes with one of these spiky little hedgehogs attached.

In print they sound great - designed to reach even the tiniest lash, they claim to give great volume for maximum effect. And this is, in fairness, true. My main problem, however, is that I can't get my lashes to taper off into a fine point at the end when I use this type of wand - instead I get fat lashes (good) that come to a fat, blunt end (bad) because of the way the rubber brush coats them.

My second problem with these brushes is that I can't seem to use them to coax my lashes into a nice sweeping shape, as I can with good bristle-type brushes. The problem here is that the rubber brush is too flexible, so instead of the brush controlling my lashes and pushing them up and out, it bends with my lashes and doesn't give them any lift. Even when I use a lash curler before applying mascara, I find that my lashes lack that fanned out effect when I use a mascara with a rubber brush.

One thing that I can do to improve my lashes when I use a mascara with a rubber brush is to comb through them with a lash comb afterwards - this helps to taper the ends of my lashes and separate them out into a sweeping shape. It means adding an extra step to the whole process, but for the right mascara formula, it can be worth it. On the whole, however, I think I'll be trying to stick to bristle-type brushes from now on.

What about you? Old-fashioned bristles or up-to-date rubber hedgehogs. Which one do you like better?