The Digit-al Dozen Does All That Glitters: Day 5
We arrived at the final day for January's theme, and I am looking forward to next month already! This was fun and I'm pleased with my finale - hope you enjoy it too!
This mani was a 3 step process: smooshy base, flakie topper, and stamping!! I tried to take pics at each stage so forgive the length of the post!
White undies are SH Insta-Dri - this bottle got a lot of use this week!! And the smoosh was 5 Tonic Polish colors: Endless Shrimp, Lemons & Cream, I Pink You Blue Me Off, Light of Lyra, and Deep Sea-Crets.
At this point it looks like I'm gearing up for a Holi mani, and it would be a pretty neat one, but I had other ideas in mind...
This is actually my second go at this specific design, I tried it over a year ago and every single picture was a giant fail so it all got scrapped. Peel off base coast also played a role in longevity not lasting that much so no re-takes..
Give credit where credit is due..I was inspired by a rainbow opal mani that Lucy's Stash did a few years ago - see it here! But shockingly, I am not a big fan of the shattered glass *le gasp* so I didn't use it. My "substitution" is pretty simple but I'll give it a little back story..
One lovely day, I went to visit my cousin and have a polish play date - I took my recently acquired silicone mat to show it off to her as it was still a new item at that time, and lo and behold - was super surprised to see some indie nail polish on her shelf. She's a mainstream kinda girl and hasn't gone down the indie rabbit hole, so what's F.U.N Lacquer doing on her shelf?! I didn't own any myself...it's still an expensive brand, imo. But there was Magnificent, twinkling at me like a pretty gem. My cousin let me use some, and by that I mean I painted strips of it on my silicone mat and reverently took it home to put together the opal mani I've been thinking about. I used about 4-5 coats and because the base is clear, they looked like floating flakes so the effect was super neat once I had a base color in place. My cousin, however, was confused on why I only painted 5 swatches when I have 10 nails..ha ha.. obviously Cindy wasn't getting something this glamorous!
This time I decided to be quicker about it and just sponge it directly on the nail. As having 5 coats to try and mold on a la decal style is rather stiff. But the sponge takes in clear base and deposits flakies, so it ruined that suspended flakes look. I still kept applying coats until it glowed, probably 5 or 6 times per nail. Hello fill line! But that's why I bought my own bottle of Magnificent, to get this mani done!
I'm using that "gemstones glitter" justification again for adding this to The Digit-al Dozen, :)
Lighting shifts are key for the effect to come to life and I didn't plan to take this off until my nails grew out! I also didn't plan to stamp over this but then thought "I wouldn't be myself if I didn't stamp!"
Did you catch the amazing stained glass design that Kimett Kolor did for day 3? I took a bit of inspiration from it for my own, but since I don't have any stained glass specific plates, I went with a succulent design from KADS Min 001 plate
I used a thin brush to do a frame around the nail, I've always wanted to try that out!
Although the flakies ended up giving more of a golden glow to the colors underneath, you can still see hints of them, they're just pastel now.
Overall, I am happy with the final results. But still fantasizing about how it would look on my previous longer length *o* maybe round 2 in a few months??
The link up is at the end, take a look at all the beautiful designs and The Digit-al Dozen will pick up next month!
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