Show Me Your Nails 2.0

[Tamara76]

Due to some technical glitches with the original Show Me Your Nails Thread, I am starting a new thread with @vegchililover78's blessing (She says "hello," by the way!).

Please share your nail looks, nail art and manicures!

...And don't forget to check out @Beadshopgirl's Nail Stamping Thread for stamping inspiration! ❤️  

https://community.sephora.com/t5/Nailed-It/The-Nail-Stamping-Thread/m-p/3328865

[Saradestin]

After seeing your amazing mani, I am tempted to get some stamping tools @RGbrown , but they look quite intimidating to me 😅

[RGbrown]

@Saradestin 

Stamping is definitely tricky at first, but once you get the hang of it, it goes by sooooo quickly. It's worth considering at some point!

Couple options to start, if you decide to go for it:

go.maniology dot com/select-free-starter-kit

I'm ignoring the brand these days for political reasons, but this is a nice intro to stamping with a low price point, and they make quality products; not sure you can go wrong with this being your first stamping set! I think shipping is $8, and they've got 5 different options to pick from. Each set has a plate, stamper, scraper, and mini polish and smudge-free top coat duo. You'll get a bazillion popups on your way to cart with "But Wait! There's More!" offers, but you can ignore those and get away with just the "free" set for the cost of shipping if that's all you want.

Or over at WUN, they've got some of their house brand stamping starter kits for $20 ($14 after the sale), with a plate, stamper, scraper, and one full size polish. I don't use stamping polish, so I can't speak specifically to how WUN's performs, but I'd say it's probably pretty great, as everything else I've tried from their brand is perfectly lovely. I have several of their plates (fairly sure my current mani used one of theirs) and have never had a problem with any of them!  

[Saradestin]

Thank you so much for the encouragement @RGbrown! You and sweet @Titian06 have given me the confidence I needed to just try. I placed an order with WUN and I will be practicing and practicing until I get the hang of it. I won’t feel discouraged by failure, because I count on it, so if the results look decent, I will feel more than happy! 😁

Time to watch some tutorials! 😃

[Titian06]

You are too kind, @Saradestin ! 😘  Not to worry since I'm learning too! 😄

[RGbrown]

@Saradestin 

Oh yay, how exciting! I hope you love it, and can't wait to see your results! 

[Saradestin]

I am so excited as well @RGbrown  😃 When I “master” it, I will share, for sure! 😊

[RGbrown]

Last week, I sat down and pulled out a bunch of fallish colors and grouped them into sets of "shades I think will look good together", but had no concrete plans for art or anything like that; these three made up one of those sets. I had no real plans for another Halloween manicure at the time either; I was so in love with my cat eyes and blood spatter that I figured I'd never top it, so I wasn't even thinking about trying lol. Then, over the weekend, I watched a Kelli Marissa video on various gradient/sponging techniques, and became enchanted with the "radial gradient", and a plan started forming 🕸️🦇

End result first!

I am loving how the gradient turned out, making this look like it's backlit 💚🦇

More deets on the polishes and process in the spoiler!

Spoiler

A radial gradient is almost exactly like doing the more common horizontal or vertical gradient; lay down a base coat and one layer of color (or more, but one is usually enough, it doesn't have to be perfect) on your nails, put down a barrier (usually latex, though PVA based stuff will work too, or even scotch or painter's tape), load polishes on a cosmetic sponge, then gently bounce that up and down on your nail, repeating 3-4 times or until you've built up the coverage you want. The only difference is that you load the polishes in a circle for a radial gradient, instead of stripes. 

First up, the practice/swatch hand. I have a terrible time visualizing how a design or color combo will look without actually seeing the final product, so I went ahead and did the gradient two different ways: light in the middle, and dark in the middle. Light in the middle was the clear winner in my mind...it flowed so much better than the one with the dark shade in the middle, and that one looks more like an oopsie than anything else to me. Perhaps if the dark spot had been bigger, it might have looked a little better, but eh, I really really like light in the middle, so it doesn't matter much.

swatch and practice hand

Colors used:
Orly Elysian Fields (pinky): murky baby poop olive. I ordered this one mostly because I needed a filler to hit free shipping and did not feel like browsing for anything else (I was already buying another Orly polish from the same collection, so it was my easy way to hurry up lol) but it's incredibly unique to my collection, and I don't dislike it like I thought I would (ringing endorsement, yes? 😅) It's actually quite lovely, moreso than I anticipated, and I'm happy to have it. Crelly formula, the first coat was quite sheer and I just knew I'd need three coats, but nope, got it down in two with no issues.

Essie My Happy Bass (index): another murky green, much lighter this time and with a strong yellow base. Easy two coater.

China Glaze Autumn's Up (thumb): fairly classic mustard yellow, honey leaning, not much brown in the mix. This was a three coater, a bit streaky, but it's a yellow, so no big surprise there.

Once I'd figured out which way I wanted to place the colors, I started my fancy hand. If you've never tried to draw a bullseye on a sponge with polish, you're in for a wild ride 😅 But the end result is pretty fabulous, even without stamping! While I probably would have been perfectly happy with a standard horizontal gradient with the light shade by my cuticles, the extra effort adds a little something that really makes this overall design pop IMHO.

 

I also used my UberChic Nail Art Barrier for the first time on my practice hand, and I have to say...it's terrible. It's similar-ish to watered down school glue, but it's too thin. I knew I'd have to put it on thick to be able to peel it back up, and I tried to do so, but apparently I didn't get it anywhere near thick enough. I had what I thought were massive blobs, and it took foreeeeeeever to dry, but it just flaked up in little bits when I tried to remove it, and I wound up scraping some off with a cuticle stick, then finally taking the rest off with my clean up brush and acetone. Sigh. 

But! Peel off masks are made with polyvinyl alcohol, just like school glue, so I dug through my stash of samples and found a Formula 10.0.6 mask and figured I've got nothing to lose...can't be any worse than the UC barrier, and if it's better, then yay! I did one finger first, just see how it went, and it was fabulously easy, peeled up in one piece. The mask I used was black, and I did wind up with a couple of tiny black spots of thin bits wedged down in my sidewalls, but they aren't noticeable, especially after adding the black stamping. Overall, it was a massive upgrade, and I think I've got another sample from the brand that's a lighter/sheer color that I can use in the future with lighter manis to avoid any obvious leftovers I can't get out. Considering how infrequently I use any sort of barrier, I hate to spring for a new bottle of latex knowing it'll probably dry out long before I finish it (like my last one), so I'm cool with this hack as long as samples keep flowing from Ulta 😂

I went to What's Up to double check the ingredient list on the UC barrier (I seem to recall it didn't have any PVA in it to begin with, but if it came in a box, I've long since tossed it, and the ingredients aren't on the bottle), and maybe leave a scathing review, but they don't even carry it anymore. Yay! 😅 

 

Oh, and I did add a little stamping to my practice hand too, to give it some Halloween oomph 🕸️

All stamping done with MT Little Black Dress

[WinglessOne]

@RGbrown  I also had radial gradients in mind for Halloween, but I got too frustrated with one of the polishes (more on that whenever I post my kinda sorta Halloween mani) and scrapped the whole idea for a much simpler look. Yours turned out amazingly well! 

[RGbrown]

@WinglessOne 

Ugh, no, I hate it when a PITA polish ruins plans 😡😣 Can't wait to see your final result though! 

[ather]

@RGbrown  Omg these turned out so good. I love that you shared the process! These are the best! 

[RGbrown]

@ather 

Thanks so much! Always happy to share deets on anything I do!

[Shosh85]

@RGbrown  Oh wow, these turned out amazing! I love it!

I've really enjoyed watching Kelli Marissa - she's who got me turned on to gradients and stamping. In one of her videos she did a gradient stamp technique I really want to try.

[RGbrown]

@Shosh85 

Thanks so much! And ooohhh, gradient stamping, yes, I keep meaning to try that too; it looks cool!

[CookieGirl1]

@RGbrown oh my gosh, I LOVE that!!!!  The stamping turned out absolutely fantastic!!!

[RGbrown]

@CookieGirl1 

Thanks so much! They were a blast to make! 🦇🕸️

[Mellmars1185]

@RGbrown Wow. This is truly amazing. Great nails. They really feel like Halloween evening nails. So festive and creative. I dont have words!

[RGbrown]

@Mellmars1185 

Thanks so much! I'm so glad I buy some of these gross shades sometimes...they worked beautifully for this one! 😂 🕸️

[Cissy63]

@RGbrown   Holy cow!!! These are fantastic! How did you have the patience?? The shading is beautiful. 🤩

[RGbrown]

@Cissy63 

Thanks so much! 

The hardest part was just trying to load the sponge relatively neatly...painting a circle on a sponge with a polish brush is an interesting task to undertake lol. But the sponge handles all of the shading work...all you gotta do is dab it up and down a bit and it blends everything out like magic 🪄 It's easier than it looks!

[Titian06]

My jaw is on the floor, @RGbrown !  Amazing!  I'm struggling with one color creams and Pixie Dusts and you're doing sponging techniques and stamping! 🤣

[RGbrown]

@Titian06 

Thanks so much! 

Grab a sponge and try a basic two or three color horizontal gradient one day...you might be surprised! 🦇