DIGIT-AL DOZEN WEEK: Bathed in Light Skittle

Nothing to Disclose

Hello lovelies! We're onto Day 2, woohoo! (Hey that rhymed...)

For today's skittle, I opted to do the opposite of yesterday's skittle: I chose three colours and used them on each nail, but in different permutations.

I'm not sure how successful I was. I do really like the index and middle fingers, though!

The base colour is Bathed in Light. The main accent colour is Stardust, and the detailing colour is Smolder. Everything was done with my medium striper brush, and freehanded (no tape).

I simply adore using Stardust in manis-- look at the colour difference between above and below! What a gorgeous pink-to-gold duochrome. :)

Polishes used:

Dandy Nails - Bathed in Light

Nubar - Stardust

Maya Cosmetics - Smolder

butter LONDON - Nail Foundation (base coat)

la couleur couture - 2013 (top coat)

medium striper brush

I go back to my initial tactic tomorrow, in a really colourful way-- stop by tomorrow and see!

xo,

J.

CHECK OUT WHAT THE OTHER TALENTED LADIES OF THE DIGIT-AL DOZEN ARE UP TO:

Galaxy Nails

Nothing to Disclose

Hello lovelies!

I cannot lie, I'm pretty happy with today's nails. I did them while half-drunk last night, which would usually portend abject failure, or hilarious hijinx, but in this case: success!

Today's ABC Challenge prompt is G for galaxy. Galaxy nails have a long, honourable tradition in the nail art world. They're fun and low-pressure; usually you just sponge on various colours, have at it with a dotting tool and some white polish, and voilà! But noooo, Jolène had to go all realiiiiistic.

Here's my source image: 

Save this photo if you want an awesome galactic background for your computer. Oooh, aaaah!

Obviously, I didn't try to replicate the source photo exactly, but I did try to keep my design sort of in line with the spirit of the thing.

I used so many polishes for this. I've listed them all below, but I can't really get into the process of painting this. It kind of went: black, dark colours, medium colours, lighter colours, turquoises, white. That's as descriptive as I can get. I was really feeling this one through! I'm really pleased with how it turned out, though. :)

And, frankly, I'm also super-pleased that I did it all with nail polishes. Woot woot! Sometimes polish is actually more appropriate a painting medium than acrylic, and galaxies are one of those instances.

This photo can be super-zoomed to see all the detail, including the faintest starts that are a combination of Galinda and black + acetone (the only thing that doesn't come across is the faint holo from Greatest Treasures):

Polishes used:

A England - Camelot

OPI - Germanicure, Rally Pretty Pink, Funny Bunny

Maya Cosmetics - Smolder

Nfu Oh - JS42

Pretty Serious Cosmetics - Nightmaren

Literary Lacquers - Greatest Treasures

Nubar - Stardust

Modha HD - Ousada

American Apparel - Moon

Cirque - Galinda

Liquid Sky Lacquer - Still Waters

Deborah Lippmann - Mermaid's Dream

Cult Nails - Tempest

Duri - Rejuvacote (base coat)

Nail Pattern Boldness - Glitter Food

la couleur couture - 2013 (top coat)

Have you ever tried galaxy nails before? (Fun, hey?!)

xo,

J.

Rhinestone Skittlette!

Nothing to Disclose

Tonight I have something blingy for you!

I recently read Marta's wonderful tutorial on skittlette manicures and thought, you know what, I want to give that a try! And then I promptly overdid it.

For this look, I started with a base of My Vampire is Buff, followed with dots in Tempest and a pinkie in Once In a Lullaby (four coats! It's not a very dense glitter, but it IS lovely). I found the rhinestones at Born Pretty and affixed them on a thick coat of Gelous, topped with top coat.

I realize that the pinkie is supposed to be the blingiest and the middle two fingers are supposed to be the intermediates, and I appear to have inverted that order, and it's a whole hunk of hot mess as a result, but I like it anyway. And you know why? RAINBOWS, THAT'S WHY.

Polishes used:

OPI - My Vampire is Buff

Cult Nails - Tempest

Maya Cosmetics - Once In a Lullaby

Born Pretty rhinestones

Gelous

Duri - Rejuvacote (base coat)

la couleur couture - 2013 (top coat)

'Traditional' nail art is sort of boring to me, but I do like skittlettes because they offer a lot to look at and you can use a number of beautiful polishes without cluttering them up too much. I may start introducing this look into my repertoire a bit more, perhaps in lieu of my Swatch Saturdays (Skittlette Saturdays!) -- any thoughts on that?

xo,

J.

Iron Polish: Glitter Food Edition

WELCOME TO MANICURE STADIUM

(please don't sue me)

I own a lot of top coats that are intended to smooth out glitter. As many know only too well, glitter can be very 'hungry' and gobble up endless coats of topcoat without batting a proverbial eye, all while remaining rough like taunting sandpaper. There's a small industry within the nail community dedicated to finding ways to smooth out dem glitterbombs, and today I'm weighing in on 10 of them.

For this epic showdown, I began by painting two coats of OPI's Stay the Night on each finger-- because this is a 'first formula' Liquid Sand polish, it is VERY textured, and therefore a good candidate. I then painted on two coats of each type of 'glitter food', using what I would call medium/generous coats (neither thin, nor glooping it on). I then waited an hour, evaluated what the glitter was feeling like, and recorded it. I thereafter went to sleep for about 7 hours, woke up, and recorded once more how the glitter was feeling. Results are below (pardon the dry cuticles in the photos; I was running around that morning and forgot to prep for photos properly).

A few notes: I've done some swapping out, so now my Seche Vite, Poshé top coat, and Good to Go are all slightly thickened, but only as much as would be considered 'average' (not brand new, not in need of any polish thinner whatsoever, able to be applied in a floating manner but do not typically produce shrinkage). I have not evaluated these top coats for drying time; the only one I noticed took longer to dry than the others was the Maya Cosmetics one-- it got some ridges overnight that the others did not, but not due to the product settling into the glitter. I've therefore evaluated it based on its general characteristics, not the ridged spot.

LEFT HAND, THUMB TO PINKY: Gelous, Poshé top coat, Nail'd It Glitter Frosting, Maya Cosmetics Smoothing Coat for Glitter, Seche Vite

RIGHT HAND, THUMB TO PINKY: Dior Gel Coat, Nail Pattern Boldness Glitter Food, Poshé base coat, Essie Good to Go, INM Out the Door

INITIAL IMPRESSIONS: Good to Go and Seche Vite are the same, two coats give good smoothness after about 20 minutes; Nail Pattern Boldness does not self-level; Maya and Dior both seem to be working, but have created a multitude of little air bubbles between each piece of glitter.

AFTER AN HOUR:
Gelous - gritty
Poshé top coat - relatively smooth
Nail'd It Glitter Frosting - semi-gritty
Maya Cosmetics Smoothing Coat for Glitter - very smooth
Seche Vite - relatively smooth
Dior Gel Coat - very smooth
Nail Pattern Boldness Glitter Food - super smooth
Poshé base coat - gritty
Essie Good to Go - very smooth
INM Out the Door - gritty

AFTER 7 HOURS:

Gelous - gritty:

Poshé top coat - 85% smooth, very small amount of shrinkage:

Nail'd It Glitter Frosting - gritty:

Maya Cosmetics Smoothing Coat for Glitter - semi-gritty, lots of bubbles!:

Seche Vite - 80% smooth:

Dior Gel Coat - 95% smooth:

Nail Pattern Boldness Glitter Food - 95% smooth, would be 100% with shiny top coat:

Poshé base coat - gritty:

Essie Good to Go - 80% smooth:

INM Out the Door - gritty:

I hope this comparison has been useful to you! I have another one like this planned, to compare quick-drying top coats, but if there's anything else you'd like to see in this vein (i.e. no colour comparisons, I don't have a big enough stash to be useful on that front!!), please let me know!

J.

Distressed Patchwork Nail Art

Hey there!

I have a simple but extremely effective mani for you today. The 'patchwork' look has been around for a long time, but I was finally prompted to try it by Jeanette's gorgeous take on it over at The Swatchaholic. Hers is way, way, way, way³ more beautiful than mine. Her skill is as perfect as her nails are as perfect as her photography-- go check it out!

In the meantime, here are my efforts. :)

The colours show up best in the shade.

For this look, I started with a base of one coat of Filthy Rich, and then dabbed on the remaining colours in a way that seemed to make sense/balance everything out. I used all foil polishes with the exceptions of Filthy Rich (microglitter), Mermaid's Dream (microglitter in a frosty base), and Smolder (shimmer). I went over the dabs twice for texture and opacity.

SPARKLY

It involved a bit of clean-up at the end, but nothing serious. It's an extremely easy technique since it requires no tools other than the brushes that come with the nail polishes themselves!

Here are close-ups of Smolder and Mimi because I felt like the patchwork didn't really show their true awesomeness. Smolder has a deep beautiful shimmer that is actually duochrome (goes golden at sharp angles, could not capture it on camera). Mimi is a royal purple foil that has a hidden bright turquoise shimmer that caught me totally off-guard!

L-R: Smolder, Mimi.  Sorry about the crap clean-up, these were painted & tidied with my non-dominant hand. :)

Finally, I leave you with a purposely blurry shot to show you the shiny glory of the foil polishes. Even though you don't use very much for this technique (it works best when you take off almost all of the polish on the brush), it still packs a lot of colour punch!

Polishes used:

Quo by Orly - Filthy Rich

Zoya - Ivanka, Mimi

Spa Ritual - Conduit, Rusted Lux

Deborah Lippmann - Mermaid's Dream

Maya Cosmetics - Smolder

Poshé (top coat)

Have you ever tried this look? If not, you really should. It looks super-lovely in jewel tones, brights, pastels... any given colour family. Just keep an eye out for light/dark and colour balance!

Until next time!


J.