I am so glad to not be at work right now so I can be myself, and wear a much glitter as I want! I did a gradient glitter mani with China Glaze's Optical Illusion (Prismatic line) over China Glaze's Starboard (Anchor's Away, 2011).
 |
In this photo, the top two fingers you can see the tinted green base
that the glitters sit in, in Optical Illusion. |
 |
My husband chose this photo.
I think he likes it because of its composition. It is a little over exposed.
See the duochrome shift? Pinky is flashing green, the others are more plain silver. |
 |
In this photo, I think you can see the multi-colored hex glitters the best.
My most clear photo, with good contrast. |
How did I do this? I started with Starboard as the base color, two coats. Then I dabbed 3 small dots of Optical Illusion across the edge of my tips then dragged the glitter towards the cuticle with the brush. Start with a small amount of glitter because it is easier to add more and impossible to take away. Optical Illusion is a densely packed glitter so it is real easy to get full coverage and a little difficult to apply when you just want a dusting of glitter. For the tops of the nails (near the cuticle) I still wanted some glitter up there, but just a little. So I added Ulta's silver glitter top coat over Optical Illusion. Ulta's silver glitter top coat is just a clear based polish with micro silver glitter in it. Orly's Etoile might be a nice alternative.
Overall, I think it came out okay, it might not be the best color combo since the greens are a little different. Optical Illusion is more of a forest green and Starboard may be a bit too bright.... ??? Oh well, I have 32 oz of acetone to create a new blank canvas!!! However, what I really love about the Prismatic collection are all the multicolor hex glitters and they all shine and sparkle like mad!
Thoughts?
I really like it. I just received a break up text (I feel so high school right now) and I am welling up every now and then so I decided to check out blogs from people who have shortly became dear to me, and I saw this and it's green (my favorite color) and I feel slightly happy that I'm seeing green and glitter together. You're right, it's not really the best combo but anything pretty is welcome to my world right now. Thanks for posting this and for sharing how you did it! I'm thinking of wearing black nail polish later (I'm currently wearing a salmon pink one but I feel like my mood and my nails are not complementary) but your post made me think otherwise. Maybe instead of sulking, I should try cheering myself up w my favorite color and some glitters too.
ReplyDeleteI love the glitter gradient manicures, and your gradient is very well done! :) The colours are nice! Okay, you could have found a better match; but honestly I like the way it turned out!
ReplyDelete@ Kumiko: OMG! break up via text, that is totally inappropriate!
ReplyDelete@ Criminal: Thanks!